MCT: Wednesday, August 14, 2019

• Kirk Gustafson
• Moose Fire
• Missing Man
• Red Finch
• Disposal Field
• Mendocino
• Ed Notes
• Fiesta Familiar
• Covelo Gym
• Phantom Makeup
• Vern Piver
• Epstein Watch
• Hebrew Hammer
• Steam Festival
• Yesterday's Catch
• Iranian Nuke
• Official BS
• Pharmacological Method
• Marilyn's Stuff
• Fair Fare
• Fastest Warming
• Gift Warp
• Testosterone Autism
• Hail Satan
• Housing Assistance
• Workers Unite

KIRK GUSTAFSON

The Honorable Judge Kirk Gustafson died peacefully in his home on July 23rd, 2019 in Willits at the age of 74.

Kirk is survived by his children, Ari and Nils, his Grandchildren Sam and Ronin and his ex-wives Robin and Joyce.

Kirk was born on November 6th 1944 in Pennsylvania to Alvin Gustafson (a WWII Marine Raider Medic) and Ruth Tilstrom (a school teacher). He graduated from Stanford with a degree in Law and became a Lawyer, 1st Circuit Superior Court Judge for the State of California and then a Superior Court Judge for Mendocino County before retiring.

Kirk was an accomplished fisherman, fan of Bob Dylan, ping pong player and often opened his home for community events. He was a generous individual who loved people and who was passionate about giving them a second chance. He was an active and dedicated member of the community and often donated to the local community as well as international charities. Kirk also had a wonderful sense of humor and tried to make people smile and laugh in the most dire of times. He brought happiness and hope to many of us and will be missed greatly.

A memorial is scheduled for August 24th, 2:00 - 7:00 pm at the Willits Art Center. Friends and colleagues are welcome to attend and celebrate Kirk’s life. Bring a dish or appetizer to share.

The family would like to thank Phoenix Hospice for supporting them in bringing Kirk home. Memorial information can be obtained at (415)680-5465.

CALFIRE REPORTS: As of Tuesday evening, the Moose Fire was still at 225 acres, same size as reported earlier on Tuesday, but now 35% contained, up from 25% contained. Progess is being made as containment lines are being widened and the fire is burning more internally than expanding. According to earlier reports the fire was started by the negligent disposal of a cigarette.

THE FAMILY OF JOHN ALAN BAKER is asking Southern Humboldt and Northern Mendocino residents to be on the lookout for the 81-year-old missing man.

Baker suffers from Alzheimers and drove away from his home in Southern California last week. His last known purchase was at the Patriot Gas Station in Piercy.

If you see John Alan Baker, please call Sergeant Mike Rodriguez with the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department at (323) 890- 5500. (KMUD News)

RED PILEATED FINCH (Coryphospingus cucullatus), also known as the Red-crested Finch in the Pantanal, Brazil by Paulo Barreiros. www.pantanalrainforests.com

FIFTH DISTRICT SUPERVISOR Ted Williams attended Monday night’s Fair Board meeting at the Boonville Fairgrounds where the Community Services District board presented a preliminary layout for use of the Fairgrounds back lot as the “disposal field” for processed and de-odorized effluent from the proposed wastewater system the CSD is working on for downtown Boonville. 

An area of about 100 feet by 300 feet would be excavated for underground dispersal of treated effluent beneath the area now used occasionally for parking and camping during fair events; the specific location has not yet been finalized. 

The fairgrounds backlot came onto the radar following objections to the proposed Boonville airport area for disposal despite the engineers’ assurances that the processed wastewater is not raw sewage and doesn’t smell much. (It was the "much" that seemed to alarm property owners.)

But the main concern expressed by fair board members Monday night was not the smell, but whether the ground under the parking/camping area would “perc.” As CSD Board member Larry Mailliard quipped, “If it won’t perc, it won’t work.”

If it does perc, the engineers say that most of the area will still be usable for parking and camping since the effluent will be at least three feet underground — the main above-ground space will be for a smaller pre-fab treatment plant, perhaps 50 x 100 feet, plus an underground “equalization” or surge buffer tank.

The fair board was also concerned about road access to the area since the old road behind the fairgrounds is an unmaintained and well-worn old county road which might not hold up under heavy truck and system maintenance traffic. 

CSD Board Chair Valerie Hanelt pointed out that state grants will cover the construction cost and the community will only have to cover the operation and maintenance costs via hookup fees which have yet to be calculated but which must be low because downtown Boonville is considered to be an economically depressed area.

The grant-funded engineering outfit is current working on the perc question which will also be discussed further when the CSD will discuss the project further with Mendocino Building and Planning staff in Ukiah on August 26.

After that there’s still the full range of public meetings and environmental and permit reviews and ultimately a parcel-by-parcel vote by parcel owners in the service area that would follow — if it percs. If all that were to happen according to the current plan, the system could be operational by 2023.

(Mark Scaramella)

BEAUTIFUL DAY in Mendo

ED NOTES

AS PUBLIC RADIO-MENDO'S senior critic — I began complaining about the station before it went on the air because I was acquainted with founder, Sean Donovan, and was immediately suspicious of the enterprise, suspicions soon confirmed — which brings us forward thirty years to Monday morning where my colleague, The Major, was listening to a KZYX interview with Supervisor Williams. "Who's that doing the interview?" I called out. "She's good." And darned if it wasn't Alicia Bales, aka Alicia Littletree, KZYX's newly appointed program director. I listened on, and must say Ms. Bales seems like a radio natch — informed questions, pleasing voice, moved the talk briskly along. The Major said Laura Hamburg also seems to be reporting out of the Philo bunker now, and she's a real pro of long standing. Prior to Ms. Bales, news reporting at KZYX, with the exception of Sarah Reith, ranged from pathetic to weird. This all assumes, of course, Ms. Bales keeps it up. When I heard she was the program director I was expecting an unending audio parade of tiresome loons out of the Mendocino Environment Center, but so far so good.

ALTHOUGH INTERESTING, Williams didn’t say much beyond the things he’s already said at the various Supervisors meetings. Except for his comments about Measure V. Williams was one of the sponsors of Measure back in 2016 which the voters subsequently approved by over 62% but which has been on hold for years while Mendo waited for an Attorney General opinion on the enforceability of the Measure which declared standing dead trees to be a public nuisance. In the Monday morning interview Williams ventured a guess that the Attorney General’s long-delayed claim of having a conflict which meant they wouldn’t be issuing the anticipated opinion, was because the AG represents Calfire, an agency which has recently been planning to use hack&squirt for other fire safety projects. Williams noted that County’s cannot regulate the use of poisons which the state retains jurisdiction over. Williams said that the request to the AG was itself mainly a delaying tactic to postpone possible enforcement. But the AG’s delay indicated that they couldn’t poke holes in it, Williams thought. He also noted that Measure V had been reviewed and approved previously by County Counsel as a legal way to mitigate fire hazards. Realizing that MRC will likely resist any attempt to enforce the law should the County ever pursue enforcement, Williams added that he planned to try to reason with MRC to do something about the obvious hazard, including, Williams properly noted, the possibility that dead trees also pose “widow maker” risks to volunteer firefighters should they happen to be under a falling branch while fighting a fire like the popular firefighter from Utah was a couple of years ago. (-- ms)

AT THE RISK of rousing the Appropriate Police, the late Judge Gustafson presided over the funniest session I've ever seen in a courtroom. It was June of 1989 and Don Lipmanson had been busted for the second time that year for growing marijuana near his home in Navarro. The first bust had resulted in an acquittal because the video-taped evidence of Lipmanson in the act of cultivating had been inserted upside down in the surveillance apparatus, and even the FBI lab couldn't convert the jumbled images into enough evidence to convict.

AT ONE of the endless hearings of The People vs. Lipmanson, Gustafson presiding, and with the theatric David Eyster doing the prosecuting, Mrs. Lipmanson asked the judge, "Can I sing my testimony?" Gustafson paused to consider the unusual request before he said, "Yes, sure." At which Eyster exploded in exasperation, throwing his hands in the air as he shouted, "Why not? Get out the kazoos. Let's have a concert!"

MRS. LIPMANSON, just happened to have a guitar with her, and took the stand to warble out a mournful lyric about how the fascist surveillance helicopters had disturbed her nude sun bath in the Lipmansons' backyard. Her tremulously sung argument seemed to be that the surveillors were flying illegally low and seemed to have been ogling her rather than hubbykin's pot plants.

DON LIPMANSON went on to become a lawyer himself, having honed the requisite ethical experience in the drug trade. Mrs. Lipmanson became Joy LeClair and something of a radio pundit at KZYX. Mr. L, incidentally, was finally convicted and jugged out at the County Jail on Low Gap Road, but he successfully sued the Mendocino County Sheriff's Department for denying him work furlough to pursue his stained glass artistry under his patron, the well-known Ukiah aesthete, John Schaeffer of Real Goods. Lipmanson said he used his lawsuit winnings to go to law school, and the rest is history in the only place in America where history like this can be made.

ORDINARILY, $4.5 million for a new high school gym might beg questions about educational priorities, but the new gym under construction at Covelo is likely to give the whole community a needed morale boost, especially given the popularity of basketball in Native American communities. A fascinating documentary available from NetFlix called "Basketball or Nothing" films a season of high school basketball on the sprawling Navajo reservation in Arizona. The initial shot of the gym in the tiny town of Chinle, whose high school team the doc follows, surprised me. Their gym is huge, and often packed as the Chinle Wildcats battle other rez teams in fierce competitions for state playoff berths. The social life of the town and the surrounding area revolves around basketball season and the fortunes of the hometown team. That team, like Covelo's, also has to battle a quicksand-like social morass that drags many Native youngsters into drugs and consequent lives of futile despair. Basketball, in this setting, and this marvelous gym in the middle of literal nowhere of Arizona, inspires young people to think bigger and better than the grinding poverty characteristic of reservation life. The film makes it clear how central the gym is to the more wholesome aspects of life in Chinle. Covelo, before the drug scourge took hold in the later 1960s, was a small school sports power only to fall into years of non-competitive teams that often didn't finish the season for lack of the basic self-discipline athletics require. The new gym at Round Valley High School will be worth every penny, and maybe even restore Covelo to its powerful sports presence of long ago.

LON CHANEY poses with his own makeup kit in 1925 during the production of Phantom Of The Opera.

PIVER & THE PIRATES

Fort Bragg Umpire with a Big League Past

by Brooks Mencher (March, 1991)

The high school baseball season begins. Behind the plate at Fort Bragg high, umpire Vern Piver will continue his long tenure on the coach, making the calls that determine winners and losers. Find a ball field, you will find Piver.

It was 1951. Vern Piver had just been drafted into the Pittsburgh Pirates farm league by Scout Robert Fontaine, signing on at the age of 17 for $500. The “hayseed” from Fort Bragg would play volleyball with some of the greatest names in baseball for the next nine years from New York to California to Mexico.

Born on the Pomo Reservation in Manchester 57 years ago, Piver grew up in Fort Bragg and by the time he was a teenager he had played with the junior Loggers and Fort Bragg Loggers baseball teams, establishing a reputation that followed him across the country.

"The ball field was where the twin cinema is now on land donated by the Union lumber company," says Piver. Every Sunday locals would fill the stands to capacity as the Loggers played amateur and semi pro teams and even the DiMaggio brothers came up for a game of ball. Peanuts were roasted across the street by Pat Tamborini, a shortstop who was offered a position on the San Francisco Seals, a pro team in the California State league.

"When I was a kid, you played baseball," Piver says. "There wasn't anything else to do. No TV, no variety of sports, in the summer you played baseball."

His playing earned him the nickname "Animal," which followed him, though in Spanish translation, to ballfields in Mexico.

In his first year in pro ball at 17 he was named the most valuable player for the Batavia New York Clippers, playing infield positions. He would later switch to catcher where he had the greatest shot at the majors.

After a stint in Korea where he fought with distinction, the Animal returned to California and pro ball, playing in the state league for the Salinas Packers, still within with the Pirates chain. In 1955 he racked up 110 runs, 197 hits (including 17 triples) and had a .346 batting average.

The following year, playing with the Hollywood Stars and with the Pirates’ New Orleans farm team he carried a .266 batting average. In 1957 batting .283, he played with the Mexico City Tigers where the popularity of baseball filled the huge Mexico City Stadium game after game. But by 1958, batting .306 with the Northwest League's Tri-City team, Piver was nearing the end of his baseball career.

In 1959 after the talk of the teams was whether Piver or Roberto Clemente had a stronger arm, he was back in New Orleans where he suffered a triple break to his ankle.

He had lived in Fort Bragg during the off-season all his life and he returned. Vern had only recently married the former Betty Black, who became his most admiring fan. Born in Clarks, Louisiana, Betty met Vern in New Orleans. The couple moved back to Fort Bragg. Piver played with the Loggers and again broke his ankle, ending his career as a player. Yet the athlete who can still drop names of his friends and acquaintances — heroes who fill the misty realm of baseball history — was only beginning his contributions to local sports programs.

With the help of Howard Macki, Dan Mulvihill, and others, he chartered the local Little League program which in its first year ten years ago brought the sport to 500 youths; almost every kid in town. "We had to raise $10,000 in just a few weeks to pay for uniforms and equipment. Nobody thought it could be done, but we did it," Piver says.

Supporting his family as a woodsman, and later as owner of Redwood Chainsaw, Piver has coached and officiated in most scholastic sports in Fort Bragg.

Reflecting on the big leagues Piver maintains a realistic outlook. "There were a lot of politics. They owned you like a piece of meat."

"In the lower leagues the wages were lower and the conditions were less. We traveled from Lincoln Nebraska by bus to play at Albuquerque New Mexico. The motels were brutal."

But within a few years as he plied his way through the competition, Piver traveled by train and plane through Florida and New York.

"When I signed, they offered $500 which was a lot to a 17-year-old hayseed from Fort Bragg, California," he says. But he was basically taken advantage of as other equal players had been signed for several thousands of dollars.

"Baseball was different then," he says. "There were a lot of players. No one trained all year round like they do today."

"There weren't any tailgate parties, none of the promotion there is today."

Living still in Fort Bragg, and married to Betty, Vern continues to follow the Pirates and the Giants.

THE HEBREW HAMMER

Editor,

Sorry if my last letter was too much for drama. I'm writing you again to give you my nickname for my letter to the editor. "Memoirs from the Hebrew Hammer." I have created a real nasty scene over in a part of the jail that I'm closed by. I’m able to listen and write down people's phone numbers when they say them loud enough because I'm still in administrative segregation (ad-seg) here at the Mendocino County Sheriff Office Detention Center. Only because I bully people in all the modules here — all except A-mod. Unfortunately those guys are a little more than the Hebrew Hammer can handle. So I’ll get those guys real good now any way I can!

My favorite though is when the Sergeant (Sergeant Knapp, female) comes through first thing in the morning and I yell and scream unseemingly rude and ungodly nasty profanities at her while two other lower-class corrections officers walk right along beside her and I know they can't do it god damn thing about it because I will sue them for anything I can.

The Hebrew Hammer strikes again. What's a little bit of paperwork on those cops to get them fired? I mean, aren’t we all against the police? I am to the fullest. But first I'm going for the guys in A-Mod.

So please stay tuned for more drama from the Hebrew Hammer and my kosher ways.

Sincerely,

Jacob Silverman

Ukiah

ROOTS OF MOTIVE POWER FESTIVAL

Roots of Motive Power is a working museum located in Willits CA. Once a year we hold our Steam Festival (9/7 & 9/8) where we invite the public down to our yard at 420 E. Commercial Street. We have everything running that we can get engineers for from Trains to Steam Shovels and everything in between. On Saturday we have our member appreciation BBQ and raffle auction. This is our ONLY fundraiser for the year. We “Steam up” several times through out the year including Christmas and the 4th of July. We never charge for our events because we want them to be enjoyed by everyone. We are hoping you can help us out and put the attached press release in your community events section. If you have any further question or possibly want to do more of a story about us please feel free to contact me.

Thank you for your time, Alexis England

This year we will be celebrating our 41st year at the Roots of Motive Power Steam Festival. The Weekend AFTER Labor Day, Saturday and Sunday, September 7th, and 8th, whistles will be tooting and bells ringing as Roots steams up for our 41st year in a row. Historic train rides and and old logging equipment demonstrations will be going on throughout the Festival featuring: steam locomotives, a steam shovel, steam rollers, stationary engines, and tractors. Durning the Festival, watch out for the infamous bandit Black Bart. Black Bart and his Gang have been at it again, robbing trains in our area!

On Saturday, September 7th our Annual Appreciation Barbecue begins at 4 p.m. we will be having locally raised pork, lamb and beef ($15 adults/$6 kids) Live music, a silent auction and raffle will fill the afternoon with cheers. And don’t miss the Early Day Gas Engine and Tractor Association, our guests in the Recreation Grove along with the Shifter’s Car Club.

Then on Sunday, the antique machine show continues with the addition of Steam Roller printing. Our 1924 Buffalo Springfield Steam Roller will be making linoleum prints with help from talented artists around the state. You can try your hand at print-making and say you did it with an antiques steam roller!

All in all, it’s a unique show you won’t want to miss! Save the date September 7th and 8th 2019 for the Roots of Motive Power Steam Festival.

Directions: Take Willits Main Street and turn on East Commercial Street - you will find Roots at 420 East Commercial Street Willits CA

CATCH OF THE DAY, AUGUST 13, 2019

JADE BENNETT, Fort Bragg. Assault with deadly weapon not a gun, county parole violation.

CHERYL BERMUDEZ, Crescent City/Ukiah. Failure to appear.

JAMI HENNESSY, Leggett. Domestic abuse, resisting.

CRYSTAL HOAGLIN-PIKE, Ukiah. Domestic battery, protective order violation, probation revocation.

CASEY IRELAND, Willits. Parole violation.

STEVEN LEARD, Ukiah. Community Supervision violation.

LEINA LEITE, Ukiah. Controlled substance, parole violation.

TRENTON LOCKHART, Redwood Valley. DUI.

BRANDEN LUCAS, Redwood Valley. Disorderly conduct-alcohol, disobeying court order, failure to appear, probation revocation.

TERRENCE O’BOYLE, Kelseyvile/Ukiah. DUI.

TIMOTHY O’LAUGHLIN, Caspar. Domestic abuse.

ELIAS RUTHERFORD, Laytonville. Controlled substance for sale, paraphernalia.

ON LINE COMMENT OF THE DAY

I would like to comment a little outside of this particular case and point a few things out.

Our government lied us into a war in Iraq. We know this because of the Downing Street Memos and Scott Ritter, and that there was a complete lack of evidence and nobody was held accountable for “accidentally” starting a war in Iraq over a non existent weapons of mass destruction program. In fact, people were fired from both the news and the intelligence agencies when they (foolishly) pointed out that the Bush administration was “likely” incorrect .

Our government lied to us about why it was bombing Libya. Remember that? Supposedly it was to “prevent a humanitarian crisis” – well it was left in civil war, with slavery markets operating.

Our government lied us into Syria. What would Assad’s motivation be to use chemical weapons against the civilian population there? What would be his strategy doing that? He was setup, those were false flags. The ONE WEAPON that would give the US an excuse to bomb Syria was used, maybe.

How’s that Venezuelan coup going? Juan Guaido have a lot of popular support? That was another lie.

Our government is lying every now and then about Iran. When Iran was supposedly blowing up a Japanese tanker ship, that was HEADED to Iran, Shinzo Abe, the Japanese PM, was in Iran meeting the PM there. That was another lie.

Afghanistan is filled with lies. Do you know that back in 2001, Afghanistan produced about 5% of the world’s supply of opium, and now produces over 80% of the world’s supply – and this was done ALL UNDER US military occupation. Oh, and the US just happens to have an opioid epidemic.

Then we had 2 1/2 years of “Russia hacked our election!!!” and “Trump is a Russian Stooge!!”. 30 months of that.

Finally, what appears to be a pedophile who very well may have worked for an intelligence agency to get politicians and business leaders in compromising position with child RAPE victims gets arrested, and appears to have been done away with in prison.

And now, FINALLY people are starting not to believe the official bullshit. I wonder if any of you know what it’s like to be in an insane world for 18 years, before the rest of the people you’re surrounded with, FINALLY notice it? It’s been extremely lonely here, 18 years.

I wonder how you will react when the full scale of criminality of your government is finally exposed to you? Once you see what is actually going on, you don’t go back to your lala land of denial and gullibility. You never will.

MARILYN’S STUFF

by Andrew O’Hagan

Contrary to popular opinion and Frank Sinatra – New York is never a city that doesn’t sleep. It sleeps soundly in fact. You walk the streets on certain nights and suddenly you can feel quite alone under the buildings. It’s not that the place is deserted, there are things going on – taxi-cabs, homeless people, late-night walkers, the police – but they can seem to proceed at that hour like things out of step, like odd yearnings of the imagination, or unexpected items in a gasoline-smelling dream of urban ruin.

I stopped one night in front of the Ferragamo shoe-shop on Fifth Avenue. The light from the shop was so strong it seemed like daylight spilling over the pavement. I felt drenched in the uncanny whiteness. And there in the window, draped on transparent mannequins or laid on silver boxes, were some of the dazzling relics of the late Marilyn Monroe. “A pair of stilettos by Salvatore Ferragamo, scarlet satin, encrusted with matching rhinestones.”

There’s no place like home, I thought.

“Estimate: $4000-6000.” And further along a hand-knitted cardigan, “with a brown geometric pattern and matching knitted belt. Worn by Marilyn Monroe in 1962 and featured in a series of photographs by George Barris taken on the beach in Santa Monica, California. Estimate: $30,000-50,000.” In the corner of the window there stood a halter-neck dress from the movie “Let’s Make Love.” I thought of Marilyn and Yves Montand posing for the cameras with their unhappy smiles. “Estimate: $15,000-20,000.”

The Monroe things had been to London, Paris and Buenos Aires, and were now back in New York for auction at Christie’s. Ferragamo took the opportunity for a cute bit of public relations flimflam. The cold air from the ice-rink at Rockefeller Plaza — underneath Christie’s salerooms — seemed to be blowing in one great frosty whoop down the avenue.

The people who stopped put both hands on the Ferragamo window and the white light made each one a little blonder. One woman said “beautiful”; the glass misted up in front of her mouth. I walked on a few blocks. There was a midnight service going on at St Patrick’s Cathedral. A long queue stretched all the way down to the altar, where a glass case stood by itself, with a casket inside, containing the relics of St Theresa of Lisieux. A hundred years ago the Carmelite nun Thérèse Martin died, and she died, according to a woman I spoke to at the end of the queue, “with a heart as big as the world itself.” The last words of St. Theresa are not open to doubt. “I am not dying,” she said. “I am entering into Life.” She was canonized in 1925.

I joined the line at St Patrick’s and followed it down and when it was my turn I touched the glass and walked away. Men to my side were crying and whispering. The relics of St. Theresa were travelling the world too: in Russia and Europe, and now America, from New York to Tucson, Arizona, with a spell over Christmas at the Church of St. Jane Frances de Chantal in North Hollywood.

The Christie’s sale of Marilyn’s relics in the year 2000 raised $13,405,785. The Ferragamo ruby shoes were bought for $48,300 by the son of the man who made them, while Lots 51 and 40, the Santa Monica cardigan and the dress from Let’s Make Love, sold for $167,500 and $52,900 respectively. The big wow of the auction, as expected, was the Jean Louis sheath dress, covered in tiny stones, worn by Marilyn at John Kennedy’s birthday tribute in 1962, when she sang “Happy Birthday.”

This went for over a million dollars. The man who bought it (owner of a memorabilia shop called Ripley’s Believe It or Not) thought he’d got a great bargain. The Kennedy dress smashed the previous world record for the sale of a female costume: a blue velvet Victor Edelstein dress belonging to Princess Diana that sold for about $400,000 in June 1997. The actor and peroxophile Tony Curtis, who must have forgotten that he once said kissing Marilyn was like kissing Hitler, got out of his seat at the auction to tell reporters that Marilyn would have been thrilled. “She’d have enjoyed the fact that people still love her so much,” he said.

EXTREME CLIMATE CHANGE has reached the United States: Here are America’s fastest-warming places

washingtonpost.com/graphics/2019/national/climate-environment/climate-change-america/

A READER WRITES:

Comment of the year: “It’s hard work talking to some people, most often males. I have a Theory about it. With age, many men come down with testosterone autism, the symptoms of which are a gradual decline in social intelligence and capacity for interpersonal communication, as well as a reduced ability to formulate thoughts. The Person beset by this Ailment becomes taciturn and appears to be lost in contemplation. He develops an interest in various Tools and machinery, and he’s drawn to the Second World War and the biographies of famous people, mainly politicians and villains. His capacity to read novels almost entirely vanishes; testosterone autism disturbs the character’s psychological understanding.” —From “Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead,” by Olga Tokarczuk & Antonia Lloyd-Jones

IF YOU'RE WONDERING WHAT'S HAPPENING IN RIO DELL…

Housing Assistance Workshop to be Held in Rio Dell

A Housing Assistance Workshop will be held on Thursday, August 15th from 8:30am to 12:00 noon at the Journey Church at 95 Belleview Avenue in Rio Dell. If you or someone you know is homeless or at risk of homelessness, assistance will be available to help you submit needed paperwork or otherwise provide important information. This will include one‐on‐one assistance later in the afternoon from 2:00pm to 4:00pm at City Hall for those making application for Section 8 housing assistance.

Experts from Humboldt County’s Mobile Intervention & Services Team (MIST) will be available. MIST works with city law enforcement and other partners in the field to identify and engage homeless persons with mental illness and/or substance use disorders. The goal is to obtain and retain stable housing and to engage in substance use disorder and/or mental health treatment. Information and assistance will also be available to apply for Medi‐Cal. Construction is well underway to construct a 25 unit Permanent Supportive Housing project in Rio Dell. The facility provides housing for members of the community vulnerable to homelessness, including those who are disabled, suffer from mental illness or have a Section 8 certificate. The workshop is hosted by the Rio Dell Community Resource Center during their normal food distribution day at the Journey Church with the assistance of the City and the County’s Department of Health and Human Services. Those needing further assistance with Section 8 applications or other special assistance will be referred to the one‐on‐one assistance at City Hall later that afternoon.