The Mission Is Clear: Starting a Business

I’m a business owner.

It’s almost surreal seeing the reality in print. I launched my editing business Mission: Clarity two months ago. Actually, I began laying the foundation for the business last year by purchasing the Web domain www.missionclarity.com, buying some business cards, and fishing for clients. The business became official when I filed for a home business permit in May with the city of Vacaville.

I decided to start an editing business after enduring a year and a half of furloughs. When California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger imposed furloughs on 237,000 state employees in February 2009, the action amounted to a 14 percent pay cut. With a new contract for the 95,000 workers under the SEIU Local 1000 union ratified in November 2010, I have 5 percent of my pay taken out toward my government pension and one unpaid day a month, amounting to an 8 percent decrease. Also, with some legislators and activists calling for “pension reform,” that is, a cut in my future retirement pay, I realized that I needed another income source. I have a friend in Texas named “E” who not only teaches at a public school but runs a cake-making catering business. Noting her example, I’ve concluded that it’s silly in this sluggish economy to depend on just a 40-hour-a-week job to keep one’s head above water. After all, I’m not one of the hundreds of California state workers earning six figures.

My sister, Black Woman Blogging, thought of the name Mission: Clarity and discovered through an online search that the URL wasn’t taken yet. She has been my biggest supporter of this effort.

The business moniker Mission: Clarity fits because my goal is to make prose, whether in reports, brochures, manuscripts, or periodicals, concise and clear to the lay reader. I have been doing this for 5 years for a California state agency and 12 years as a newspaper staff writer. I believe there is a need in Solano County for someone who can look at copy and make it cleaner and, if necessary, grammatically correct.

Mission: Clarity will be my lifelong project. Because I’m the only one invested in this business, I’m not worried about failure. I would rather try and fail than do nothing. Doing nothing would be my biggest regret, and it’s not an option.

So, friends, please check out Mission: Clarity on Facebook and Twitter, where I will dispense grammar and usage advice. When my website is complete, I will let you know. And thank you in advance for your support.

Writing Diva

Buh-Bye, 2010. Don't Let the Door Hit You on the Way Out

From the title, it's safe to say that I'm not shedding any tears over the departure of 2010. This year was a chastening one, from the three-day-a-month furloughs for California state government employees to the death of two cousins (brothers) to the theft of my car hood.

It wasn't all bad, though. I went to a convention this summer in San Diego. I sang in two choral groups -- the Tony Baldwin Chorale and the Solano Chamber Society, which performed the "Messiah." My mammogram was clear. I saw friends I haven't seen in years (my fault!). And I reaffirmed that some of my best friends are like sisters, and my siblings are among my best friends.

This year taught me hard lessons about tightening my belt and that many state workers have a second gig. I'm starting mine in January -- an editing business focusing on college papers and resumes, then branching out. I have to have more than one source of income to survive these days.

Money permitting, I'm returning to ballroom dancing and more singles activities. I want to have a life in addition to work, church, and visiting my family.

And I will continue writing until I can't form a sentence or my fingers stop working.

May 2011 be much better to everyone than this year.

Writing Diva

State Worker Ping Pong

Yesterday a colleague who is retiring tomorrow commented on the ongoing furlough fights between California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and the unions representing most of the 240,000 state employees. He said that it felt like he was in a ping pong match.

Couldn’t have said it better myself.

Frankly, I’m tired of the Governor using state workers as pawns in the legislative budget battle. California has gone 43 days without a budget. So far, there have been reports that the governor and the California Legislature are three-quarters of the way toward a budget. Democrats and Republicans are still haggling over the $4 billion in proposed tax revenues to fill the $19 billion gap in the 2010-2011 budget.

Two weeks ago, when state Controller John Chiang announced that the state would run out of money by October, Schwarzenegger reinstated furloughs after affected state workers endured them for 18 months. Our July paycheck was the first time since February 2009 that we received full pay. Our newest round of furloughs was to start the second Friday in August.

The unions filed a request with the Alameda County Superior Court to block the latest furloughs. On Monday night, Alameda County Superior Court Judge Steven A. Brick sided with the workers and ordered a temporary restraining order on the furloughs. Typical Arnold, he filed an appeal with the First District Court of Appeal in San Francisco, stating that Brick’s TRO “will exacerbate the ongoing fiscal and cash crisis in California and will correspondingly harm the state and the public.” Yeah, right.

Sorry for the cliché, but I’ve gone through an emotional (not to mention financial) roller coaster with these furloughs. I wish that the Governor and Legislature would get its act together and figure out something. I just want to know how much, if any, money I’ll be taking home each month for how long.

(Blogger’s Note: I just learned that we have to report to work tomorrow. The colleague just said a four-letter word. Couldn’t have said it better myself.)

Hang Together or Hang Separately?

When I heard Thursday night that an Alameda County Superior Court judge sided with SEIU Local 1000 and other California state employee unions against the imposed three-day-a-month furloughs, I was at first overjoyed and hopeful for 2010. Judge Frank Roesch ruled that Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s decision to furlough about 200,000 state employees, regardless of whether they were paid through the general fund or special funds, was legally flawed. To which I said, “Duh!”

Then reality settled in. The state faces a $21 billion deficit and growing. Tomorrow the Governor makes his last State of the State address, and I expect the other shoe to drop – layoffs for state employees.

I admit that at first I selfishly thought, “Let him do layoffs. I have nine years with the state and I’m in a special fund agency.” Then I remembered I have friends who work for general fund agencies who don’t have as many years of state service as I do. I also have family members who work for the state who may be affected. A prime example is my sister, Black Woman Blogging (http://www.blackwomanblogging.blogspot.com). She is an attorney for a general fund state agency who has been furloughed, as I have been. She and her husband, an attorney for a federal agency, bought their first home together in November 2008. I don’t want them to lose their home and go through more financial struggles.

Last night on KTXL Fox 40 in Sacramento, reporter Rick Boone interviewed Antonio Mitchell, a 19-year state employee. Mitchell looked directly into the camera and told his union SEIU Local 1000, “If you’re listening, union reps, save everyone’s jobs. I think it’s better for us to take the 15 percent (pay cut) than for some to lose their jobs. That’s a no-win situation. I think everyone everybody can share in the pain.”

Mitchell has a valid point. The superior court judge’s ruling and the subsequent appeals are a train wreck waiting to happen. If SEIU Local 1000 wants to help its membership, it should take a poll of its members asking if we should stop the war and take furloughs over firings. If the unions truly represent us, the leadership should listen to us.

I will side with Mr. Mitchell and ask SEIU Local 1000 to stop. As Benjamin Franklin said, “We must hang together, gentlemen,…else, we shall most assuredly hang separately.”

Writing Diva

Hard Choices

Just three hours ago Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger signed an executive order mandating three furlough days a month for California state employees. Starting July 10, most state offices will be closed the first, second, and third Friday of each month.

By my calculation, three furlough days a month will cost me 14.3 percent of my paycheck -- $689 a month before taxes. This is really going to hurt.

My boss sent out an e-mail reminding us that at least we have a job and thanking us for keeping our heads above the turmoil that has been brewing over the past several months.

Now, can she talk to my mortgage banker about approving a loan modification to lower my monthly mortgage payments?

I will be making some hard choices this month, including:

• Cancelling my health club membership. I had rejoined Solano Athletic Club in January after a disastrous stint with 24-Hour Fitness. Now I'll have to exercise on my own.
• Reducing my cable subscription to limited basic. I was going to do that earlier this year, but the customer service representative persuaded me to stick to expanded basic for $38.40 a month, including taxes. I'm afraid I'll have to return to $16 a month, including taxes.
• Ordering no more magazine subscriptions of any kind, not even my writing magazines, until these furloughs end, supposedly on June 30, 2010.
• Getting a job working Friday through Sunday, except for the fourth and fifth Friday of each month. Considering the tight economy, that will be difficult, but not impossible.
• Applying for a loan modification with my mortgage banker. I'll explain the situation and send all the required documents and a copy of the Governor's press release. Hey, it's worth a shot.

I'm already shopping at WinCo Foods, driving less, clipping coupons, limiting my entertainment, suspending contributions to my IRA, and cutting back on my church offerings. But it could be worse. I could be unemployed without a roof over my head for me and my two cats.

It's time for me to batten down the hatches.

Sigh....

Writing Diva

Whither Newspapers?

Eight years after I left newspaper journalism to “join the dark side,” as my former journalist colleagues put it, and become an information officer for a California government agency, I still miss pounding the pavement and pressing phone buttons hunting for a story to fill a slowly shrinking news hole. These days, with newspaper layoffs, pay cuts, furloughs, and newspaper shutdowns or conversions to Web sites, I realize I can’t return to newspapers even if I wanted to.


Over the past several weeks, the Rocky Mountain News folded after nearly 150 years. Last year, according to National Public Radio, it cost its parent company E.W. Scripps Co. $16 million in losses. The Seattle Post-Intelligencer went completely digital and shut down its print edition after 146 years. The Ann Arbor News will stop its presses in July after 174 years and be replaced by a Web-focused community news operation, according to the Associated Press.


The San Francisco Chronicle was perilously close to shutting its doors after losing $1 million or more a week for the past several years. On March 7, members of the Chronicle's unit of the California Media Workers Guild agreed to job and benefit cuts required by management, the San Francisco Business Times reported. The job concessions included cuts regardless of seniority.

There have been layoffs at newspapers nationwide, including The Sacramento Bee, the San Diego Union-Tribune (which Copley Newspapers, its parent company, sold last week), the Los Angeles Times, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, The Buffalo News, just to name a few. Gannett Newspapers and MediaNews Group have ordered furloughs for their employees.


The recession is a big factor in newspapers losing money, especially with steep drops in advertising revenue and stores like Circuit City and Mervyns closing their doors. I believe another factor is that newspapers didn't consider their information to be valuable enough to charge Internet users. The Wall Street Journal, for example, requires that its Web site users subscribe to its newspaper. San Francisco-based media analyst Alan D. Mutter wrote in the Los Angeles Times that the WSJ claims more than 1 million paid subscribers to its Web site "(b)y aggregating an audience of business people willing and able to pay to view its content."

The Daily Republic of Fairfield, California, also requires that its Web site visitors subscribe. About 21,000 Solano County residents are willing to pay to find out what's happening in their neighborhood. Online ads help, but information should not be free.

My stance may offend Internet users who have been accustomed to getting their news gratis. I don't know if newspaper companies charge Google for their news. If they don't, they should. If newspapers want to survive, newspaper owners have to get out of the mindset that the horse has left the barn and start charging for content. The horse is still in the barn, but is considering making a run for it.

Writing Diva