Letters (Sep 9, 2015)

• Inmate Reduction Money Wasted?
• What Is It Good For?
• Who Is This ‘Counselor’?
• Homeless & Unwanted
• Tan Oak Snags & Fire
• The New Normal
• Resettling Syrian Refugees

INMATE REDUCTION MONEY WASTED?

To the Editor,

I wish to inform the taxpayers of California that this prison — CTF-Soledad — receives about $1.6 million per fiscal year for the prison reduction plan. But these funds are not used for any type of programs to assist or help the state prisoners in any rehabilitation criteria as there is no program at the prison due to so-called staff training and medical redirects. The outdoor exercise program is always shut down with no type of program at all each day. The day room program is always shut down and this prison has ample staff to run a program. Out of eight hours of mandated programs allocated between 9am and 9pm, we get maybe 24 hours of mandated programs every seven days. The rest of the time we are locked down in our cells for no reason at all. The warden, Mr. Spearman, along with Captain P. Santiago, shut this prison down with no questions asked! Where do the funds go for the prison population reduction plan issued by the federal courts to run a rehab prison? I think that the FBI and the Department of Justice need to look into this. I stand by what I do write. The United States Constitution and the First Amendment.

Thanks for reading this

Kenny Callahan (Irish)

CTF Soledad

WHAT IS IT GOOD FOR?

Letter to the Editor,

George W. Bush gave a speech to a group that supports wounded veterans and then charged them $200,000 plus $20,000 for the use of a private jet. Shouldn't he have donated this money to the group since it was his incompetence as President that caused them to be wounded in the first place?

I guess war is just too lucrative for the 1% and their corporations. War profiteers need to have a war going on at all times. War makes the rich get richer, the middle class pays most of the cost through their taxes, and the lower classes donate evermore in the form of lives and limbs.

The business of America is business, and war is the best business.

Iran anyone?

Don Phillips

Manchester

WHO IS THIS ‘COUNSELOR’?

Editor:

I have been a client with the California Department of Rehabilitation three times in the last 15 years, seeking help for employment based on a mental illness disability. I never liked the bureaucratic aspect of dealing with them, and the last few days I've tried getting a question with a yes or no answer answered by the DR counselor (a misnomer, really, she doesn't do any "counseling," she's a bureaucrat) who was assigned my case when I was last a client with them.

I've recently stopped taking psychiatric medication and am letting go of my psychiatrist, so my question to the DR counselor was whether I could still qualify for their services without a medical doctor treating my disability. I left her a phone message and sent her an email. She left me two phone messages in which she had interpreted my question as a desire to have my case reopened, which I had told her was not the case— I just wanted the question answered. In her emails she said she had to "review my old file" before she could give me an answer— why? … I don't know.

She comes across to me as dense, and it's disturbing to me that she won't answer a simple yes or no question. Also makes my desire to avoid DR stronger, hoping that my current volunteer work efforts could lead to employment without having to turn to an agency that appears incompetent.

Keith Bramstedt

San Anselmo

HOMELESS & UNWANTED

Dear Editor,

My grandfather. A. Lotero, was unwanted and homeless in his childhood. He couldn't attend local schools because of his illegitimate birth. He went on to became one of the largest employers of Jewish and non-Jewish people in South America, after World War II. I am so proud.

Susie de Castro

Fort Bragg

TAN OAK SNAGS & FIRE

Editor,

I realize the "hack and squirt" controversy is primarily a philosophical one, and will avoid venturing down the fruitless path of discussing it in that context. But I will respond to the face of it, as a fire issue.

I have been using herbicides to control hardwoods, including tan oak, in my redwood forest in Comptche since 1985. I also do thinning and pruning of young trees, and logging, all of which produce dry fuel that can easily burn if ignited. All these forest practices I employ also serve to reduce the potential of a wildfire moving rapidly through my forest because they improve access and break up fire fuel continuity. Every fire season, I am intensely concerned about the possibility of a wildfire, and do what I can to prevent such an event.

Are my forest management operations my primary fire concern? In short, no. My primary fire concerns are what everyone’s primary concerns are. First, because all our native landscapes burn, I try to prevent ignitions and focus on where an ignition is most likely. Ignitions are most likely where people are, especially along public roads. Second, I secure a defensible space around my house, and other high value structures. This requires a minimum of 100 feet where all fuels are treated. A defensible space around my home is also good for my neighbors because it improves the chances of my fire not spreading to my neighbors property. Third, I concentrate on the fire fuel that is up wind from structures, since the worst fire will be coming from the up wind direction. Up wind in my neighborhood, is from the North and West, and downhill. Fourth, I focus on dry grass and brush on my property. Fires easily start and move quickly in dry grass. Dry grass is present every year, and doesn’t just rot away as forest residues do. Dry grass in association with brush is worse, dry grass and brush in association with dense forest is worse yet.

How concerned am I for fire where I have dead oaks and where I have performed other forest operations? My fire concern here fits in the context of my concern for fire in my forest in general, and in general, the presence of hardwood snags, and dry fuel, in it self, is not the biggest concern. Like all our native landscape, my forest can burn, and on a bad fire day can burn intensely. That said, my primary fire concern is for a fire that burns in young forest with lots of light green fuel and fire fuel continuity. My strategy is to prevent ignitions, and maintain fire breaks, so if a fire gets started, it can be contained with minimal forest loss. The areas where I have done logging or conducted other forest improvement operations that create dry fuel that readily burns if ignited, are in areas with newly opened roads. These roads lesson the ability for a fire to spread, improve fire fighter access, and increase the opportunity for fire containment. The logging and forest improvement operations also break up fuel continuity in the forest. Breaking up fire fuel continuity, reduces the potential fire intensity. In a short number of years these dry fuels from my forest management operations rot away. Of course my wildfire concern remains, because as the light fuels from my forest operations disappear, young redwoods and brush return along with the new fire fuel concern. This is the reality of managing the fire ecology landscape that most of us live in.

It has been stated that the creation of hardwood snags is a significant added safety risk for firefighters. Is it? That is a good question that needs further explanation. What is the fire scenario that results in significant added risk to firefighters? I don't know, and I have never heard anyone explain this.

If my forest management strategy were strictly to prevent intense wildfires, instead of commercially growing redwoods, I would regularly open up the forest by reducing the forest canopy and understory. Thinning the forest by logging does this, as does pruning, thinning small trees, and killing hardwoods. Yes, the very operations I mentioned above that, for the short term, create light dry fuels that if ignited, readily burn.

George Hollister

Comptche

THE NEW NORMAL

To the Editor:

I have been employed by Mendocino County for 23 plus years. I went on vacation in July and returned to note my auto-deposit paycheck was $20 net less with the new SEIU contract. This totals to an annual loss of $520 to me; this is in addition to the 10 percent permanent wage loss we’ve been living with since 2011 (and that permanent loss was after several years of furlough/mandatory time off of 10 percent). All in all, since 1992, I’ve been paid 10 percent less than what I’ve been promised for over half the years I’ve been working here. This new reduction is a shift in retirement costs from the county to employees. We’re not getting anything new, just taking the hit for portions the county is making employees pay.

Managers and deputies have been living with the 10 percent reduction for even longer than SEIU employees.

So it’s interesting that the County takes credit for “restoring” 3 percent of our wages and yet is now charging us for these costs. They are giving with one hand and taking away with another. The general public reading the story probably doesn’t realize the whole story; it’s actually not much of a win for employees, just more of the same old song. Luckily, I’ve been through this so many times that I was able to just laugh when I saw the auto-deposit. They’re not fooling anyone. The County is no longer a reliable, trustworthy employer and it’s financially dangerous to depend on them for anything related to fairness with wages, so many of us have explored second jobs that are now subsidizing our county salaries. It seems everyone is enjoying the economic recovery except County employees.

Expect more of the same: long-term vacancies, fruitless recruitments for staff with special skills, workers covering more than one position, more stories like the CPS Grand Jury story. We’re all learning to live with the “new normal.” From the view of the staff who are actually doing the work, it’s not a pretty picture.

Valerie Lawe Cannon

Ukiah

RESETTLING SYRIAN REFUGEES

Dear Editor:

This letter complements my previous letter in reference to the United States exercising their moral responsibility to help resettle Syrian refugees. We need to remember our invasion of Iraq set the stage for the emergence of ISIS. Isis follows a very strict interpretation of the Wahhabi Code which is centered in Saudi Arabia. The ISIS fighters rarely have families. They usually are single men who buy sex slaves at the slave market for their female companionship. Many of the migrants are family groups and are Alawites (Shi'a), Christians, Kurds and Sunnis who do not share the beliefs of ISIS. It is worth noting the family that had the wife and 2 children drown were Kurds who are our allies in the fight against ISIS. In general these families do not pose a terrorist threat. The administration is mulling over and appears not willing to accept the 65,000 migrants which is the suggested share for the U. S. The U. S. is providing money for assistance to the migrants but on a per capita basis it is chump change. In conclusion I would say we caused the problem but are unwilling to take any significant action to clean up the mess. Again I would say shame on Obama and Congress for failure to exercise their moral responsibility for the Syrian refugees.

In peace and love,

Jim Updegraff

Sacramento