Mendocino County Today: Friday, Nov. 19, 2021

Showers Ending | 19 Cases | NaphCare Contract | TG Muffins | Rittenhouse Acquitted | Hudson Art | BoontTunes | MRC Destruction | Winter Market | Short-Term Rentals | Furniture/Undertaking | Listserv Question | Nervous Bait | Ed Notes | Trent Video | Hopkins Meeting | Corporatist Surge | Thunder Updates | Library Card | Appalling Apartments | Thank Labor | Dead Landline | Yesterday's Catch | Spooner Stories | Eliminate Burnouts | Lithpy Thigns | Vehicle Price | Corrupt Parties | Klan Slam | Medical Advice | National Priorities | Complicit Media | Rittenhouse Lies | Scary Socialism

LIGHT RAIN SHOWERS may persist through the morning hours but will begin to clear out later in the day. Conditions continue to improve Saturday, as upstream ridging and subsidence will clear skies and increase temperatures until the next system arrives early next week. (NWS)

19 NEW COVID CASES reported in Mendocino County yesterday afternoon.

NAPHCARE IN THE SPOTLIGHT

by Malcolm Macdonald

At the October 26 Mendocino County Board of Supervisors (BOS) meeting, the consent calendar contained an item to approve an extension of a contract with NaphCare in the amount of $3,484.847.76. How does almost three and a half million dollars of county funding go through the BOS as a “consent” item?

Fortunately, it did not. Fifth District Supervisor Ted Williams pulled the item “for further consideration.” Williams added that the supporting material for the contract extension with NaphCare to provide physical and medical health services at the county jail was “a bit thin.”

Supervisor Glenn McGourty concurred as did Supervisor John Haschak. Board Chair Dan Gjerde requested the contract come back for potential approval as a regular agenda item after a motion by Williams that additional background material including performance records be brought to the BOS by the contractor with input from the sheriff’s office and county behavioral health services.

This takes us to the November 16 BOS meeting. The item rolled around on the regular agenda. Undersheriff Brewster was present, but seemed reluctant to provide any introduction on the contract, so officials from NaphCare (Bradford McLane, Susanne Moore, and Amber Simpler) jumped in with a Powerpoint show. Supervisor Williams remarked later that this presentation had the appearance of a glossy brochure.

Williams questioned why the NaphCare officials failed to bring more quantifiable data. At one point Williams asked pointedly, “Why didn’t you bring it or attach it [as supporting material to the November 16 agenda]?”

At another juncture in the discussion, after Williams made a specific point about things lacking in NaphCare’s presentation, McLane sounding a bit childish said, “That’s not very fair.”

A couple of times McLane touted NaphCare’s electronic records, which just served to underline the questions that Williams and other supervisors asked. Indeed, why is a company that is supposed to be expert in computerized record keeping bringing such lightweight facts to a hearing involving a $3.5 million contract.

NaphCare provides healthcare services in prisons and jails. It does this in thirty states. Mr. McLane stated that it currently is working ninety separate contracts with law enforcement institutions. Originally founded in 1989 by Jim McLane under the company name Correctional Pharmacy Systems, the moniker softened to the current title. The company created a first of its kind corrections specific electronic health record (EHR) called TechCare (which is a registered trademark) and implemented it in Las Vegas during 2003.

After Ms. Simpler (who holds a PHD in psychology) touted the number of inmates who had intake mental health evaluations done as they entered Mendocino County’s jail, it came to light that these intake assessments were not performed by clinicians trained in mental health but simply by a NaphCare hired nurse.

Supervisor Williams talked about constituents who had been placed in solitary confinement for lengthy periods of time, allowed out only at night, not seeing the light of day for months, and not receiving medications. He said, “I don’t know if that falls on us as a county or NaphCare.”

This, of course, begs questions about competent mental health assessment. As Williams alluded to, if this is no longer a practice, proof of that requires more thorough data. Simpler noted that medications are available in the county jail, but except in rare circumstances an inmate cannot be physically forced to take those medications.

Amber Simpler is a forensic psychologist with her doctorate from Sam Houston State University. She has testified at murder trials in Texas in which the mental capacity of a defendant is in question. Readers interested in such matters can check out reports on the case of Gregory Lawton. Part of Simpler’s testimony in that case reflected her belief that intelligence test numbers could be manipulated to avoid punishment or to gain Social Security disability benefits.

That case is now several years in the rearview and serves up only an anecdotal look at the person who heads NaphCare’s mental health services for the Mendocino County jail. Put NaphCare itself in your computer’s search engine and you can find a site titled “NaphCare Rap Sheet.” This includes a 2004 Gainesville Sun article about a lawsuit settlement claiming HIV-positive inmates were not given adequate health care treatment by NaphCare. An end result of the lawsuit, as reported in the Sun: the state department of corrections changed medical providers.

The NaphCare officials present at the November 16 BOS meeting noted that there had been no deaths in the county jail under their healthcare services, which began in 2017. Perhaps they have learned a thing or two. A 2016 inspector general report concerning conditions at the Hampton Roads Regional Jail in Virginia cited the death of a twenty-four-year-old mentally ill man due to “wasting syndrome.” The inspector general’s report stated that records kept by NaphCare, the facility’s healthcare and mental health services provider, were “incomplete and inconsistent.”

In May, 2021, a family in Fulton County, Georgia sued the jail and NaphCare, along with individual medical providers after the death of a high school student in custody. Allegedly, in April an eighteen-year-old inmate complained of chest tightness. Though he said the pain was constant and intense, rating it ten out of ten on a scale of severity to a doctor, the medical providers prescribed only ice packs, Ibuprofen, and antacids.

Undersheriff Brewster stated, “The Sheriff was extremely pleased with NaphCare.” Placing the statement in the past tense may have simply been a slip of the tongue. Brewster also said, “The lack of lawsuits, [no] deaths at the jail, it’s extremely impressive.”

At one point Supervisor Williams put Dr. Jenine Miller, head of Mendocino County’s behavioral health services, on the spot by asking her if she could endorse the $3.4 million contract as presented. Miller maneuvered her way around a direct answer. The lack of a straightforward, yes, without any hesitation may be telling in and of itself.

Other questions from supervisors elicited the current lack of independent oversight as to NaphCare’s work in the jail. At the end of the BOS questioning, a motion passed unanimously for the sheriff and behavioral health to assist NaphCare to come back to the Supervisors with a more thorough and data-based report.

THANKSGIVING at The Boonville General Store 

JUST IN: RITTENHOUSE ACQUITTED. Mendocino County Remains Calm.

GRACE HUDSON ART COMES HOME

by Mike Geniella, Endowment Board Member, Grace Hudson Museum

A prized collection of artist Grace Hudson’s paintings are returning home to Mendocino County in a unique agreement reached with the Palm Springs Art Museum in Southern California.

The pact provides for the direct gift of 16 Hudson artworks to the Grace Hudson Museum in Ukiah, and a long-term loan agreement for two other oil paintings.

The Palm Springs collection includes two oil paintings Hudson did in 1901 during a transformative sojourn in Hawaii. Her work from that period is rare.

Also in the gifted collection are five sepia portraits (bitumen on canvas) of local Pomo elders in the 19^th and early 20^th centuries, and oil paintings that depict a sweat lodge, hop fields, and an Ukiah Valley landscape with the subtle presence of a figure carrying wood in a Pomo burden basket.

There are two unfinished portraits, ‘Indian Girl’ and ‘Head of Indian Girl’, that Grace Hudson Museum staff believes will be useful for research purposes. Lastly, there are two small landscapes of historic Todd Grove, and the old Fish Hatchery that once existed along Gibson Creek on Ukiah’s west side. 

Costs associated with the transfer of the paintings was underwritten by a grant from the Miner Anderson Family Foundation in San Francisco. Author/filmmaker Robert Mailer Anderson has deep ties to Mendocino County, where he graduated from Anderson Valley High School. An uncle, Bruce Anderson, is editor-publisher of the Anderson Valley Advertiser.

Norma Person, a Sonoma County philanthropist and widow of former newspaper publisher Evert Person, pledged her support if needed for the transfer agreement with the Palm Springs Museum in addition to making a generous contribution to help ease pandemic related financial losses at the Hudson. The Persons to date are the single largest financial contributors to the Grace Hudson Museum.

“We are happy to help return this special collection to Mendocino County,” said Robert Mailer Anderson.

Palm Springs Art Museum staff contacted the Grace Hudson Museum about the possibility of gifting the collection last May. 

Rather than sell the individual Hudson art works to collectors on the open market, senior staff at the Palm Springs museum decided that gifting the artwork to the Grace Hudson Museum would be the best outcome for the public, scholars, and art historians. 

“Palm Springs believed that by keeping the paintings in the public trust rather than selling them to private collectors was the right thing to do,” said Grace Hudson Museum Director David Burton. 

The Miner Anderson Family Foundation awarded a $40,000 grant to the Grace Hudson Museum to cover the expected transfer costs of the Palm Springs collection. Sotheby’s estimated the collection could fetch up to $200,000 if auctioned.

The Palm Springs Art Museum is shifting emphasis to modern and contemporary art, leading to its decision to gift the Hudson work. The museum in the early 2000s decided to move away from an art mission first defined in the 1930s. For decades the Palm Springs museum focused on natural history, the surrounding Cahuilla Indian culture, and later fine art. 

Senior Palm Springs staff realized as the museum’s new direction evolves that the important Hudson collection would mostly likely remain in storage, and out of view of the public.

During the discussion between the two museums, Palm Springs staff asked the Grace Hudson Museum to pay all transfer-related costs associated with the gift of the paintings. Director Burton said he, current curator Alyssa Boge, retired museum director Sherrie Smith-Ferri, and former curator Karen Holmes reviewed the collection, and evaluated its potential importance. Burton traveled to Palm Springs to personally view the paintings and he found them to be in “good or excellent condition.”

“We concluded the Palm Springs collection would significantly expand and enhance what we do here”, said Burton. 

The Ukiah museum is the single largest repository of artist Hudson’s work and is known nationally for the breadth of its collection of Hudson paintings and Pomo artifacts collected by the artist and her husband, Dr. John Hudson, a noted ethnologist. 

How the Palm Springs collection of Hudson paintings was assembled is a study in art history.

Eleven Hudson paintings were donated to Palm Springs by C. Frederick Faude, a wealthy fine arts and antiques dealer who had showrooms in San Francisco and Sausalito. At the time, Faude’s collection of Hudson paintings was considered one of the country’s largest. Faude also was a benefactor of the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco, where a gallery is named in his honor. 

Faude and his partner, San Francisco restauranteur Louis Foerster, lived in San Anselmo in Marin County where they donated fourteen acres of land for a public park that is named in his honor. 

Three of the Hudson paintings coming to Ukiah were gifted to the Palm Springs museum by a trust established by the late actor and artist George Montgomery. Another Hudson painting was given by a trust of actor William Holden.

The newly acquired paintings from Palm Springs are to arrive at the Grace Hudson Museum in Ukiah in early January. Museum Director Burton said they will be the centerpieces of a new exhibit highlighting recent acquisitions, scheduled to open in February.

WILD AND SCENIC: ALBION RIVER CANOE/KAYAK TOUR

The after glow…

In case you didn't know it, we have a jewel right here in our own backyard. It's the Wild and Scenic Albion River, that opens up about five miles in, to what's come to be known as Enchanted Meadows. If you go with the tides, you can easily paddle in a canoe or kayak up and back, in the six hours it takes for the tides to change.

But you'll have to share the beauty of big trees, growing right down the river's edge, with an abundance of wildlife, or at least whatever's left of wildlife. During yesterday's paddle, I saw three Great Blue Herons, a Kingfisher, numerous ducks of various breeds, two river Otters, a Red Tail hawk, and during our walk along the river’s edge, a bounty and variety of mushrooms that I've never seen anywhere else. The river itself is also precious habitat for endangered Coho Salmon and Steelhead trout.

Unfortunately, the land along this Wild and Scenic corridor is owned by Mendocino Redwoods Company, and the multi-billion dollar Fisher Family. These insatiable greed-heads also own the GAP, Old Navy, Banana Republic, the Oakland Athletics, and the Devil only knows what else. They don't need the money but are shooting themselves and everyone else in the foot by liquidating all the old Redwoods in the area. These trees would only increase in value if left in the ground. But what’s worse, they are doing this on extremely steep, landslide prone areas, with thick unstable topsoil that is infamous for mudslides in the Winter, and blinding dust clouds in the Summer.

To fight the dust and mud of badly built dirt roads that MRC has slashed into the steep river mountainsides of the rugged Albion watershed, they have been spraying huge amounts of Magnesium Chloride (or “Dust Off”) - with multiple applications and untold thousands of gallons of the substance sprayed from water trucks on their miles of steep, dusty logging roads. When it rains, this stuff ends up in the creeks, and ultimately Albion River itself. Yesterday we saw the results - an ugly, grey, oily sludge that floats on the surface of the river just below where they've been logging. What this portends for the Salmon and other wildlife in the area, we’ll now have to “see what happens.”

Anyone who's been up that river knows why it's been designated Wild and Scenic. Most would agree it should have been declared a National Park or Monument a long time ago. But unless they are stopped, Mendocino Redwoods Company - with the corrupt rubber-stamp approval of CalFire and other state agencies - will take it all, and all the wildlife with it. They are right now causing irreparable harm to this precious and important place.

We need to slow them down. Please come to the hearing for a Temporary Restraining Order on Friday, Nov. 19 at 9:30 am, Dept. E of the Superior Court, Ukiah, CA, to halt this highly flawed, unwise, illegal, and very destructive Timber Harvest Plan.

Be there!

David Gurney

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UPDATE FROM DAVID GURNEY: The TRO hearing on the Enchanted Meadow/Albion River logging plan has been delayed by a last minute decision over a “procedural error.” No further legal action is scheduled until Dec. 17.

SHORT-TERM RENTAL NIXED

Dear community members,

The Mendocino County Planning Commission voted today to deny an application for a short term rental in Albion. If interested you can look up Case # U_2021-0001 (Kung) for the dates: July 14, Sept. 2, October 21, and Nov. 18 at mendocinocounty.org/government/planning-building-services/meeting-agendas/planning-commission and also see the videos at https://www.youtube.com/MendocinoCountyVideo

The issue about short term rentals was and will continue to be discussed on the MCN announce list and among community members. Rentals are either too expensive and/or not available throughout the County. Many are only available as short term rentals through organizations like Airbnb, VROB, Vicasa, or others.

The Mendocino County Board of Supervisors approved the formation of an Ad Hoc Committee that would explore the creation of a balanced short-term rental policy for business licensees and others, consisting of Supervisor Williams and another Supervisor (sorry, forgot who else volunteered).

You can look up the concerns expressed by individual people in response to the Board of Supervisor’s agenda item 6b from Tuesday, Nov. 16 meeting. See agenda at mendocino.legistar.com/Calendar.aspx

If you have interest, time and energy please get involved with either one or both of the below indicated contact people: 

The Housing Team-North Coast Mendocino County (HAT) contact person Elizabeth Swenson <eswenson@mcn.org> and/or Ted Williams, 5th District Supervisor <williamst@mendocinocounty.org>. 

Ted Williams is one of the two Mendocino County Supervisors that is a member of the newly formed Ad Hoc Committee that would explore the creation of a balanced short-term rental policy for business licensees and others.

We need housing for local people that is affordable. We should not allow our County to be taken over by Corporations; wealthy out of town owners who buy up everything they can and leave these places either empty for most of the year; or turn them into short term rentals for tourists.

Annemarie Weibel

Albion

TIME TO SHUT IT DOWN? AN EXCHANGE:

[1] With the disgusting rhetoric exchanged by a few (mostly non-local participants) becoming an increasing embarrassment to the local school district who tacitly “sponsor” these rants by offering this list tool, Is it now time to petition the school board to delete this list? Imagine the bad press MUSD might get should some of the homophobic or racist rants make it to the front page of a major news outlet.

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[2] I find there is little which is beneficial about this list, with some exceptions. It is often harmful, and simply a tool for some to embarrass themselves by displaying their hateful qualities while creating unpleasantness for others who accidentally happen upon their psychological bile. I suggest the school district abandon the list or alternatively, moderate it. There are local alternatives available to all, besides this listserv.

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[3] The List DID serve its intended purpose until it was found by two paranoid schizophrenics it could be used as a platform to dispense their conspiracy theories and as a means of venting their rage and frustration.

I simply blocked both of them but have found that little of any academic or social interest is posted here as most posts are replies to these two paranoid schizophrenics in a vain attempt to disprove their conspiracy theories with facts.

Oh well, such is the price we pay for the First Amendment. For the mentally ill have the same rights we do to voice their opinions....and no, I am NOT being sarcastic.

ED NOTES

DIALOGUE OF THE DEAF. I wrote to a Fort Bragg guy named Zwerling, apparent herd bull for the people who want to re-name Fort Bragg. 

He replied,

“Thanks Bruce, for responding to my announcement of the new website and residents group formed to change the name of Fort Bragg. We have been meeting and organizing to do the work of education, research, and political outreach necessary for this effort. There are almost 50 of us right now and we are independent of both the City Council and the Ad Hoc Name Change Commission they established in summer 2020‚ though we will certainly support any efforts they make to change our City’s name.

“We are not sure how a name change will finally be realized locally but know that with the wave of name changes nationally (the US Army will soon change the name of Fort Bragg, North Carolina) and internationally make a local change inevitable and an important part of this ongoing work for racial justice. How could you help? What skills do you possess (and I am sure you do have skills that would help)? We will need to raise more money, to do more public outreach through letters to the editor and newspaper articles and door to door outreach to neighbors. Teachers may want to work at changing the name of Fort Bragg High School and educating students about our town’s true history. You may have ideas for projects we haven’t even considered yet.

“Our next group meeting is 11/20 at 2 p.m. We meet out of doors, vaccinated, and socially distanced. Would you like to attend? Please be in touch. 30 more people responded to my outreach on the mcn listserv. and I’d like to work with you. Can the AVA support this effort?

— Phil Zwerling”

UH, NO, but thank you for replying, Mr. Zwerling. I admit I was writing simply to gauge how open your group is, and am reassured it is open to interested persons, among whom, I'm afraid, I'm not. I think a re-name is misguided, that American history, ugly as much of it is, is our history and should remain as vividly horrific as it is. Best to you, Bruce Anderson, ava. 

I SHOULD have added that until the righteous ones brought it up, Fort Bragg’s namesake and his lamentable life were mostly unknown, that the best way to combat racism is not to be one. Every day race relations have never been better in this country.

ZWERLING: “I understand your position, Bruce, but think the name change project is a very pointed way to raise those historical issues in the present. Surely you do not oppose the removal of the various statues of Robert E. Lee erected around the South specifically to glorify the 'Lost Cause'? or believe we should still call Chinese people "coolies" just because that was once the acceptable term? Fort Bragg is an ugly name in both its constituent parts but I think you'll find few residents think beyond the idea that Bragg was a general and the Fort protected white settlers from the savage natives. Keeping the names merely reinforces this complacent amnesia. Of course, if a town is named after you, General Bragg, you don't need a statue. And if you have a plaque downtown noting your service to the Confederate States of America no one need mention you owned slaves (100 +) all your life. My point about the term "coolies," which I draw from my current research for a book about Hollywood in the 1930's (see the 1927 Gable/Harlow film "Red Dust" for its prophetic treatment of colonialism in Vietnam) is that the term is no longer in usage BECAUSE people made an issue of it rather than keeping it around as a reminder of our racist past (as in the Chinese Exclusion Act which followed the aptly named Anti-Coolie Act.) And why bother with publishing the AVA if the only pressing issue is climate change?” 

I REPLIED that there are no statues honoring Bragg in Fort Bragg, and no one in contemporary America would consider calling Chinese “coolies,” a term long gone from contemporary usage. The danger in name changes and other re-writes of historical realities is historical amnesia, that our history isn't our history, that what history we do have is an unbroken series of crimes, which is a serious distortion of history itself. With the planet warming, there are more pressing concerns than a re-name for Fort Bragg. And for the historical record, Fort Bragg was established to protect the already decimated Indians for the purpose of relocating them to Covelo where, the theory went, they would be safe and self sufficient. Didn’t work out that way but, as has often occurred in American history, good intentions went terribly awry. You really ought to work on your hierarchies of peril. Re-naming Fort Bragg, on a list of average Mendo person's concerns, wouldn't make the first fifty, I daresay.

ZWERLING, whom I’d addressed as dude in our final communication, replied, “I would disagree… but time will tell, DUDE.”

A PRIVATE FIREFIGHTING CREW allegedly lit an illegal backfire on Spring Mountain during last year’s Glass Fire, and Cal Fire wanted to charge them with arson, according to an exclusive story from The Chronicle’s Matthias Gafni. The private crew was a subcontractor of Jackson Family Wines, say the Cal Fire reports, working to protect its Lokoya property. Neighboring wineries Keenan and Kieu Hoang lost land due to the backfire, the report shows. And it gets even better: The star witness was U.S. congressman Mike Thompson. (Esther Mobley, SF Chron)

ONE OF THE GREAT MISCARRIAGES OF JUSTICE. THE DOCUMENTARIES ON THIS SAD CASE ARE HIGHLY RECOMMENDED

The Wisconsin Supreme Court rejected Steven Avery’s petition to have his case reviewed on Wednesday, offering little explanation. “It is ordered that the petition for review is denied,” the high court’s sparse statement said, “without costs.” The petition, which asks the state Supreme Court to review issues raised in a series of rejected appeals, was filed on Aug. 25 by Avery’s attorney, Kathleen Zellner. Avery is seeking an evidentiary hearing and new trial, based on what Zellner said were three issues: ineffective assistance of counsel; prosecutors’ withholding of evidence; and destruction of bone fragments. 

An appeals court previously denied Avery an evidentiary hearing in July. He was sentenced to life in prison in 2007 for the murder of photographer Teresa Halbach two years earlier. Avery won the right to appeal his case in February 2019, after the 2015 Netflix series Making a Murderer cast doubt on the legal process used to convict him. He was diagnosed with COVID-19 while incarcerated in June last year.

PROBATION, HOW TO, an on-line comment: For perspective…when I was busted for weed in Mendocino County the charge was “transportation.” I got a year sentence and three years probation. Three years is what they now consider as “too long” for people to do — ha ha! Yeah it sucked so what I did was never miss a reporting, not do anything stupid, kept my official residence clean, stayed away from idiots and then applied to get my probation dismissed after half-time of a year and a half. They dropped my probation at half-time like they always do when you’re not a fuck-up. So…why even with the AB1950?!! To be honest that three year probation (actually a year and a half) was long enough for me to re-order my priorities and clean my mental house. (I went sober to avoid any dirty piss tests.)

THE LATEST TRENT JAMES VIDEO

VIRTUAL TOWN HALL MEETING FOR RESIDENTS IMPACTED BY THE 2021 HOPKINS FIRE

On Monday, November 29 at 4:00 pm, the County of Mendocino Executive Office - Prevention, Recovery, Resiliency, and Mitigation Division (PRRM) will host a virtual Town Hall Meeting for those impacted by the 2021 Hopkins Fire. The event will follow a webinar format, which will provide residents with the opportunity to write in questions. County representatives will be available to provide resources and address community concerns related to fire recovery programs, including Small Business Administration Loans and Debris Removal. 

Virtual Town Hall Details: 

What: Virtual Town Hall: Fire Recovery Programs 

When: Monday, November 29, 2021 at 4:00 pm

Who: Mendocino County, CalOES, CHP, and SBA

How to attend: 

To join via Zoom, click the link: https://mendocinocounty.zoom.us/s/83783059196

To join via phone, dial: +1 669 900 9128 and enter the webinar ID: 837 8305 9196 

If joining via phone please use *6 to Toggle mute/unmute & *9 to Raise hand 

The webinar will also be streaming live on the County’s YouTube channel (https://www.youtube.com/mendocinocountyvideo) 

How to submit your questions and comments:

E-mail questions and comments in advance to: disasterrecovery@mendocinocounty.org

There will also be a live Q & A feature on the webinar. 

For more information, please contact PRRM at:

(707) 234-6303 or disasterrecovery@mendocinocounty.org

https://www.mendocinocounty.org/community/fire-recovery

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Right-of-Entry Permits Now Available for Phase II of the 2021 Hopkins Fire Debris Removal

The State of California has approved Phase II consolidated debris removal operations for properties impacted by the 2021 Hopkins Fire. In order for properties to be eligible for the State debris removal program, the County of Mendocino must receive completed Right-of-Entry permits by December 10, 2021. This will allow entry onto your property to perform the necessary debris removal tasks. 

CalRecycle is managing Phase II operations, which involves the removal of the majority of burn debris. The bid package for debris removal operations is open and accepting bids until 12/03/2021. Once a contract is awarded, debris removal is expected to begin in mid to late December of 2021.

To access the Right-of-Entry permit online, click here. Right-of-Entry permits should be submitted to the Prevention, Recovery, Resiliency, and Mitigation Division by: 

Mailing or delivering them to the Prevention, Recovery, Resiliency, and Mitigation Division at 501 Low Gap Road, Room 1010, Ukiah, CA 95482

Faxing them to (707)-463-5649

Emailing them to PRRM at disasterrecovery@mendocinocounty.org

For more information, please contact Disaster Recovery at: 

(707)-234-6303 or disasterrecovery@mendocinocounty.org

CONVICTED ABUSER OF THUNDER THE WONDER DOG COULD SEE SHORTENED PROBATION AS A RESULT OF STATE LEGISLATION

A little over a year ago, in October 2020, defendant Katie Rhiannon Smith, now age 36, of Caspar, dodged a jury trial by pleading to felony animal abuse with a gun against her former dog, now referred to by many as Thunder the Wonder Dog.

A little less than a year ago, in December 2020, Mendocino County Superior Court Judge Clayton Brennan surprised everybody by downgrading that felony conviction to a misdemeanor and then basically punishing the defendant with a very mild slap on the wrist.

So what has happened since those court proceedings in late 2020?

The People’s Appeal:

On behalf of the People of the State of California, the Mendocino County DA authorized an appeal of the criminal proceedings leading up to and including the misdemeanor judgment and sentencing imposed by Judge Brennan, the notice of appeal having been filed later the same day that Judge Brennan reduced defendant Smith’s felony conviction to a misdemeanor.

The appeal remains pending with the First District Court of Appeal in San Francisco. The parties have fully briefed the issues and the appeal has been taken under submission by the court as of August 13, 2021 pending issuance of a decision. It is not possible to say when that appellate decision will be issued.

New Charges and Probation Violation Proceedings:

Based on an investigation in early 2021 that uncovered that defendant Smith was in possession of live animals in violation of California law, new infraction charges were filed last February against the defendant and a petition alleging she had violated the “obey all laws” portion of her court probation was also filed.

True to his word, the DA disqualified Judge Brennan from hearing the defendant’s new law violations. Judge Brennan also apparently wanted no part of the violation of probation proceedings, so both cases were transferred to Ukiah and eventually assigned to Mendocino County Superior Court Judge Victoria Shanahan.

During a May 12th hearing, during which the defense sought to have both the new charges and the probation violation dismissed “in the interests of justice,” Judge Shanahan ruled that, “the trial court [Judge Brennan] rendered an illegal term, meaning allowing Ms. Smith to possess animals.”

Judge Shanahan continued, in pertinent part, “I think that there is a requirement under the clear reading of the statute that if there was an exception, because once an individual is convicted of 597 [animal abuse], it’s a mandated prohibition to possess animals. It’s mandated. The court does not have discretion to change that unless there’s been a petition filed [which didn’t happen] and a hearing held where the People can be heard in regards to that.”

In denying defendant Smith’s motion to dismiss, Judge Shanahan concluded, in pertinent part, “The sentencing court [Judge Brennan] did not follow [the law] and rendered an illegal sentence in this component…”

With the motion to dismiss resolved against the defendant, the court moved forward to take evidence on both the new law violations and the probation violation allegations.

At the conclusion of evidence on May 18th, defendant Smith was found guilty of the infraction charges of unlawfully possessing animals after having been convicted of animal abuse. She was fined $50.

In this regard, an infraction is a level of violation for which the only punishment authorized by statute is a fine.

Defendant Smith, however, was acquitted of having violated her terms of probation, specifically that she failed to obey all laws, because, as Judge Shanahan ruled, “I think [to find you in violation] would be an unjust result based on the statements made by Judge Brennan giving you an allowance to possess animals, which [was] in direct violation of the statute.”

The defendant’s informal probation was thus reinstated but modified by Judge Shanahan to include a new term that defendant Smith not possess any animals, as mandated by statute, absent a noticed hearing and a court order allowing a different result.

But the court proceedings were not over yet. Deputy District Attorney Josh Rosenfeld, the senior coast prosecutor, renewed a demand for restitution from defendant Smith for the expenses caused others in caring for both Thunder and also now the chickens that were seized from the defendant’s residence (and later forfeited and adopted out).

On November 9, 2021, by stipulation of the parties as accepted by Judge Shanahan, defendant Smith was ordered to pay:

$3,740 to reimburse the Mendocino Coast Humane Society;

$200 to reimburse Sheryl Armstrong; and

$150 to reimburse Mendocino County Animal Control.

Subsequent Law Change:

As reported previously on this page but in the context of a serial arsonist, a majority of the California Legislature in 2020 – including both Assemblyman Wood and Senator McGuire, unfortunately — came to the legislative conclusion that “longer in time” grants of leniency in the form of grants of probation commonly ordered by local judges victimized those convicted of crimes and are thus unfair.

This conclusion was based on the belief that too many probationers were being returned to jail or prison because they kept violating the terms of their probation. It was decided in Sacramento that there would be fewer violations of probation if the legal window of time that a person convicted of a crime could be ordered to spend on probation was dramatically reduced by legislative fiat.

Thus, effective January 1, 2021 and known as Assembly Bill 1950 (now codified as Penal Code section 1203a), the Legislature took away the discretion of local judges, with only a few exceptions, to order or enforce any misdemeanor probation that exceeds 12 months.

In the context of Thunder the Wonder Dog, when Judge Brennan reduced defendant Smith’s felony conviction to a misdemeanor back on December 16th of last year, he then granted her further leniency by purportedly imposing a 36-month term of probation with no jail time, the 36-month probation basically being the primary sanction.

Now, as a result of AB 1950, defendant Smith’s 36-month term of probation will terminate by operation of the change of law at midnight on December 15, 2021, the date and time that the new legislated ceiling of 12-months will have been reached.

Deputy District Attorney Rosenfeld advised Judge Brennan to no avail of this upcoming law change at the sentencing hearing last December, meaning the 36-month probation Judge Brennan granted to defendant Smith – like the felony conviction that Judge Brennan downgraded — was likely intended to be illusory.

(DA Presser)

* * *

John McCowen comments:

The headline could just as easily have been "Judge Illegally Allows Convicted Animal Abuser to Possess Animals." Let that sink in. The judge was unable to read and understand the plain meaning of the law. Or he didn't care what the law said. Or probably both since this judge has consistently demonstrated an ignorance of the law.

CLOVERDALE APARTMENTS SUBJECT OF LAWSUIT

by Kathleen Coates

Aldys, who does not speak English, smiles sweetly as she welcomes strangers into her home.

She and her husband, Gerardo, a grape picker, live in their two-bedroom McCray Road apartment, part of a converted motel, with their two children, ages 6 and 7. They did not want their last names used for fear of retaliation.

They do the best they can for their children. They have chosen to put bunk beds in one bedroom (the one on the bottom is a double) so the children can have a playroom in the other bedroom. There is a small kitchen with a table where the children do their schoolwork and the family eats their daily meals and a living room.

Aldys, who works part time at a nearby restaurant, said the family has lived there for four years, dealing with the humidity that makes the walls sweat and the black mold that forms when it rains. Things were more difficult during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic when the children didn’t go to school, she said.

They are one of seven families who are part of a lawsuit that was filed in April against owners Joy Kane and Charles Traboulsi, who purchased the buildings in 2013 and own dozens of other rental properties in Sonoma County. The suit is still in the discovery phase.

‘Places that shouldn’t be apartments’: Many live in squalid conditions to work in county…

After taking on the case in November 2020, sending the owners a letter and working with them for several months “and getting nowhere,” said attorney Edie Sussman of Santa Rosa, she and her longtime partner, Joshua Katz, filed suit and suggested that their clients withhold rent until “a terrible lack of functioning heat, mold just everywhere and raw sewage coming into people’s tubs, showers and sinks” is repaired, Sussman said.

“It was appalling what was going on there,” she said. “But we’re suing not only to get damages but to get the whole place fixed.“

It wasn’t easy getting residents to agree to join the lawsuit or withhold their rent, Sussman said. They all feared eviction. Tenant Susana Alfaro talked to the families and convinced them that they would be protected by the attorneys, Sussman said.

On Oct. 15, she and Katz sent a letter to the county citing long lists of violations including missing weather stripping, rodent and cockroach infestations, multiple points of rodent entry, mold and elevated moisture levels in the bedroom and bathroom walls and baseboards, dry rot and bedroom electrical outlets “that show open ground,” and requesting an inspection.

As a result, a county inspector visited the property on Oct. 27 and toured three units with Katz. They were cited in one unit for two leaking windows, noted “weather protection on the roof” indicating the tenant had to block leaks, holes in a wall leading to rodent infestation and soft floor near a bathtub, chipping and peeling paint among other things. Similar violations were cited in two other apartments.

A notice to correct the violations was given to the owners that day, said Permit Sonoma policy manager Bradley Dunn.

The owner was required to remove and replace all existing windows with new double-paned insulated glass and vinyl sash windows in two buildings. The county also told them to remove and replace parts of the roofs in two different buildings, and to install a new hood exhaust, electric wall heater and ceiling fan in another.

“Clearly these are minor violations and we did find out when talking to the manager that these occupants had not paid rent for up to a year,” said Harrison, county code enforcement manager. “And there was some credible information that perhaps these tenants failed to do repairs, but we don’t care,” she said. By law, repairs must be made regardless of those things, she said.

Harrison said the owner has taken out building permits to remove and replace all windows, remove and replace the roof and replace all ceiling fans and lights. The inspector said they were told there were sometimes problems with getting access to the units to make repairs.

Sussman said it was “absolutely not true” that residents who are her clients hadn’t made their units accessible. She pointed out that the permits were taken out in February and August and nothing had been done.

The attorney for Kane and Traboulsi, Robert Farrell of San Francisco, promised a statement from the property the owners but one was never sent. A follow-up call was not returned.

“These kinds of situations can be very contentious,” Dunn said. “Our job is not to adjudicate these cases but to ascertain the condition of the buildings and apply the building code. It’s not legal to rent an uninhabitable building. That’s why we have inspectors out there trying to help everybody involved.”

As a result of the rent strike, four families have been able to save money and move out. They also received help with paying first month’s rent and deposits from various charitable organizations.

That includes Alfaro and her husband, Luis Lua, who moved to a newer apartment in Cloverdale 11 months ago.

The two-bedroom apartment, which costs $1,700 per month, is light and bright and has hardwood floors.

“You can’t compare it with the other apartment,” Lua said.

But most of all, Alfaro said, “I can sleep and I don’t cough or get rashes anymore.”

And, she added, “my girls are happier and healthier.”

(Santa Rosa Press Democrat)

WHY WON'T AT&T FIX MY LAND LINE?

Sister Yasmin: My phone has been dysfunctional since last Monday, Nov. 8, and AT&T doesn't give a damn. I cannot receive any calls from any land line in Ft. Bragg, and this is where my entire medical team is located. I have gone up the food chain to "The Office of the President" with no results. I have also made a complaint to the CPUC, with no results. This is the 11th day with broken phone service. Is this happening to anyone else around here? I have heard that others with 1-707-884 Land Lines are having similiar issues. What can we do? AT&T does not care about Seniors with land lines, obviously. I have no screens, no other phone, nothing (not even Solar or PG&E), and my AT&T Land Line is my lifesaver, literally. Any suggestions? Who else is having these issues? Please respond. Thanks. I can call out, just cannot get a lot of incoming calls.

Yasmin Solomon <sisteryasmin@hotmail.com>

CATCH OF THE DAY, November 18, 2021

SETH COSTA, Redwood Valley. Failure to appear.

JACOB DELOSSANTOS, Willits. Failure to appear, probation revocation.

JACK FULLER, Willits. Disorderly conduct-alcohol, probation revocation.

CHAD LEWIS, Willits. DUI.

JADEN LUNDY, Fort Bragg. Failure to appear.

ERIC OWEN, Ukiah. DUI, leaving scene of accident with property damage.

SCOTT SALO, Fort Bragg. Protective order violation, resisting.

NELSON VOSE, Talmage. Failure to appear.

NASCAR IMITATORS?

Editor: 

Has anyone wondered about the relationship between sideshows and NASCAR winner burnouts? Are sideshow participants trying to imitate the NASCAR race winners?

If so, maybe it’s time to go after NASCAR to eliminate burnouts as a means of celebration. As an alternative, race winners could be encouraged to carry the American flag or their team flag while doing a reverse lap around the track.

I know this is a radical thought, but if the example isn’t there, maybe the sideshows would go away. As a bonus, NASCAR and sideshow participants would eliminate the contamination of the tire smoke to spectators and drivers.

Wes Brubacher

Geyserville

ON LINE COMMENT OF THE DAY

Car and Driver magazine ‘Car of the Year’ 2021: Lucent EV.

What, never heard of it? I don’t think any have been sold yet, but we are told the company’s value exceeds $100 billion.

A lux model will cost you $160,000.

Wait till Joe Sixpack, or the 2025 equivalent of Joe Sixpack, decides it’s time for a new pickup truck, and finds out the only thing available is an EV Rivian, with a range of 300 miles, and a pricetag of $83,000 (which includes a few accessories), and also requires the purchase of a 10 year $15,500 subscription. The ownership of automobiles in the US has been more or less ‘Democratic’ thru out the decades, where not just wealthy people but citizens of ordinary means could afford to own and operate a car. Going forward, it appears this might not be the case; many people might be a little more than pissed off about this turn of events, and $160,000 Lucents could be targets of vandalism, or worse, from the dispossessed majority who can no longer even afford a good pair of shoes.

CHARLES WARRIAX AND SIMEON OXENDINE, both members of the Lumbee tribe of North Carolina, pose triumphantly with a KKK flag they seized during the Battle of Hayes Pond.

In 1958, the Ku Klux Klan tried to hold a rally and cross burning in the heavily Native American town of Maxton, North Carolina, to intimidate the local population and recruit more members. Instead, the Klansmen were outnumbered 10 to 1 by the 500 armed members of the Lumbee tribe, many of whom had fought in World War II, who showed up to meet them. For several minutes, the field where the rally was to be held turned into a battleground. 

Gunfire erupted everywhere, Klansmen fled into the woods, and the Lumbee captured the KKK’s banner, cross, and even their PA system, all of which they kept in celebration of their victory.

Within days, the story of the Battle of Hayes Pond made national news and even garnered a three-page spread in Life magazine. 

ON THE DEFENSE SPENDING BILL

by Bernie Sanders

Many of my colleagues tell the American people, day after day, how deeply concerned they are about the deficit and the national debt. They tell us that we just don’t have enough money to expand Medicare, guarantee paid family and medical leave, and address the climate crisis to the degree that we should if we want to protect the well-being of future generations. Yet, soon, the U.S. Senate will be voting on an annual defense budget that costs $778 billion – $37 billion more than President Trump’s last defense budget and $25 billion more than what President Biden requested.

All this for an agency, the Department of Defense, that continues to have massive fraud and cost overruns year after year and is the only major government agency not to successfully complete an independent audit. Isn’t it strange how even as we end the longest war in our nation’s history concerns about the deficit and national debt seem to melt away under the influence of the powerful Military Industrial Complex?

Further, it is likely that the Senate leadership will attach to the National Defense Authorization Act the so-called ‘competitiveness bill,’ which includes $52 billion in corporate welfare, with no strings attached, for a handful of extremely profitable microchip companies. This bill also contains a $10 billion handout to Jeff Bezos for space exploration.

Combining these two pieces of legislation would push the price tag of the defense bill to over $1 trillion – with very little scrutiny. Meanwhile, the Senate has spent month after month discussing the Build Back Better Act and whether we can afford to protect the children, the elderly, the sick, the poor and the future of our planet. As a nation, we need to get our priorities right. I will vote ‘NO’ on the National Defense Authorization Act.

RITTENHOUSE

by Miranda Devine, New York Post

The central media narrative is that Kyle Rittenhouse is a white supremacist whose mother drove him across state lines with an AR-15 to shoot Black Lives Matter protesters. All lies.

“A white, Trump-supporting, MAGA-loving Blue Lives Matter social media partisan, 17 years old, picks up a gun, drives from one state to another with the intent to shoot people,” was typical from John Heilemann, MSNBC’s national affairs analyst.

So, let’s go through 10 lies about Rittenhouse, debunked in court:

1. He killed two black BLM protesters. All three of the men he shot in self-defense during violent riots in Kenosha on Aug. 25 last year were white.

2. He crossed state lines. He lived 20 miles from Kenosha in Antioch, Ill., with his mother and sisters. But his father, grandmother, aunt, uncle, cousins and best friend live in Kenosha. He had a job as a lifeguard in Kenosha and worked a shift on Aug. 25 before helping clean graffiti left by rioters at a local school. There, he and his friend were invited to join other adults who had been asked by the owners of a used car lot in Kenosha to guard the property after 100 cars had been torched the previous night, when police abandoned the town to rioters. Kyle took his gun to protect himself, since the rioters were violent and armed, including, for instance, Antifa medic Gaige Grosskreutz, who lunged at him with a loaded Glock pointed at his head before he was shot in the arm. 

3. Rittenhouse took an AR-15 across state lines. Esquire accused him of “terrorist tourism.” False. His rifle was kept in a safe at his best friend’s stepfather’s house in Kenosha.

4. The gun was illegal. Wrong. Under Wisconsin law, he was entitled to possess the AR-15 as a 17-year-old. The judge dismissed the gun charge, which the prosecution never should have brought.

5. Rittenhouse’s mother drove him across state lines to the riot. Wendy Rittenhouse, 46, never went to Kenosha. She slept late the morning of Aug. 25 after working a 16-hour shift at a nursing home near her home in Antioch, she told the Chicago Tribune. Kyle had already gone to his job in Kenosha when she woke up.

6. He was an “active shooter” who took his gun to a riot looking for trouble. “A 17-year-old kid just running around shooting and killing protesters,” said MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough, “who drove across state lines with an AR-15 and started shooting people up.” On Friday, after evidence in court already had debunked his talking points, Scarborough called Rittenhouse a “self-appointed militia member … unloading 60 rounds.” When the defense called out the lie in closing arguments, Scarborough had the gall to tweet that he was “embarrassed” for the lawyer.

7. Rittenhouse is a “white supremacist,” as then-candidate Joe Biden labeled him in a tweet showing the teenager’s photograph. When White House press secretary Jen Psaki was asked to explain why recently, she slyly slimed Rittenhouse again, without naming him, as a “vigilante.”

In one story, the Intercept used the term “white supremacist” 16 times. The accusation has become holy writ, but there is zero evidence. The FBI scoured Kyle’s phone and found nothing about white supremacy or militias, the court heard. All they saw were pro-police, “Blue Lives Matter” posts from a kid who had been a police and fire department cadet, wanted to be a police officer or paramedic and once sat near the front of a Trump rally. That was enough for the media to brand him a white supremacist.

8. He “flashed white power signs” with Proud Boys. After spending three months in jail, Kyle was freed on $2 million bail two days after his 18th birthday last year, and went to a bar for a beer, with his mother and other adults, which is legal in Wisconsin. He posed for selfies with strangers at the bar, who the media say are Proud Boys, and was pictured making the OK sign with his thumb and forefinger. The false claim that this is a white supremacist sign comes from a 2017 hoax on the website 4chan, to punk liberals, who keep falling for it. Biden uses the gesture frequently. It was unwise to pose for the photo, but it does not mean Kyle is associated with white supremacists.

9. He wore surgical gloves “to cover his fingerprints.” This pearl was spread by Matthew Modine, another celebrity bigmouth. Kyle wore gloves because he was giving first aid to protesters. His face was bare, so he was hardly hiding.

10. Judge Bruce Schroeder is a “Trumpy” racist biased toward the defense. This slur is based on the fact he would not let the prosecution use the term “victim” — common practice when the jury has not ruled on a case. He told a lame joke about Asian food for lunch being held up by the supply-chain crisis, and his phone’s ring tone sounds like a 1980s ditty played at Trump rallies. Ridiculous. In fact, Schroeder is a Democrat, has run as a Democrat for the Wisconsin Senate and was first appointed by a Democratic governor. Bias was also perceived in what the Chicago Tribune said was his “highly unusual” decision to allow Kyle to draw names randomly out of a container at the end of the trial to determine which 12 of the 18 jurors would decide his fate. It’s something this judge always does, he told the court.