Mendocino County Today: Sunday, Dec. 5, 2021

Mostly Sunny | Estuary Query | Jimmy Rickel | Grange Breakfast | Charlotte Mailliard | Company Kitchen | Why Nicole | KYBU Birthday | Salsa Secrets | Alarm Warning | Tower Rejected | Whale Skeleton | Good Farm | Emergency Logging | Evening Star | BOS Watch | Last Crew | Millsite Machinations | Bragg Peephole | Hump Fire | Healthcare Decision | Enoch Nelson | Instant Death | Underground Meeting | Mask Trauma | Ed Notes | Yesterday's Catch | Teenage Brain | Survival Skills | Maga Rebels | Senior Tax | Today's Parent | Scalped | Marco Radio | Official Haircut | President Mitty

EXPECT STRATUS AND FOG BURN OFF gradually during the morning hours today to bring a mostly sunny skies with above normal daytime highs across the interior, while coastal temperatures remain mostly seasonal. Rain will spread across much of the area on Monday. Temperatures are expected to return to near normal by early next week, with more rain possible by Wednesday. (NWS)

TOM WODETZKI ASKS:

I went to Navarro Beach today [Saturday] at 10am to see the highest tides of the year, a King Tide of 7.2 feet. The beach sand dam was still fully blocking the river from flowing into the ocean, and yet I was very surprised to see that the road to the beach was not blocked or flooded. How could that be?

The ocean's high King Tide is among the highest of the year, and I could see that the beach dam blocked the river's flow making the backed-up lagoon even a few feet higher than the ocean level. That extra high lagoon water, it seems to me, should have flooded the beach road and even Hwy 128. And yet that wasn't the case. How could that be?

Let me know if you have an explanation for the lack of flooding, which occurs several times each winter but didn't today.

There's a second King Tide of 7.17 feet tomorrow at 10:50am. Check it out.

ROLLAND JAMES ‘JIMMY’ RICKEL

July 19, 1946-November 25, 2021

Jim was born in Tucson, Arizona, and moved to Ukiah in 1951 with his family. He attended Yokayo, Nokomis, Frank Zeke, and Pomolita schools, and graduated from Ukiah High School.

Jimmy had an active military career. He joined the Army in 1963 and participated with the 82nd Airborne Headquarters Company. He re-enlisted to go overseas to Baumholder, Germany and served as a squad leader in the 39th Infantry out of Worms, returning to the US in 1967.

Jim was employed in various pursuits and then attended Santa Rosa and Mendocino colleges for AA degrees and a certificate in Human Services. He was a part of New Careers in Mental Health, the Mendocino Alcohol Project, and Completed his BA at Sonoma State.

For many years he posted shows on public access television in Ukiah. He called his programming "News Team 3" and entertained many with his interviews of public figures, and coverage of parades and events around town and surrounding areas. He also stirred up a few controversies with his political and social commentaries. Over the years he also participated in the Trucker's Light Parade, and was active in the American Legion, Elks, and Loyal Order of Moose, and other civic interests.

Jim was a registered consultant for the Department of Motor Vehicles, doing outreach registration services under the name Human Services. It is in this position that he helped many Lake County car enthusiasts with their vehicle titling challenges.

Jim and Linda met in 2012 and married in 2018 at the Church of the Nazarene in Clearlake, California, and were very happy. Jim enjoyed time with friends and family, and joined and participated in the Clearlake Car Club, No Name Car Club and the Lake Lords Car Club, and attended many rides and shows with his 1985 Firebird.

In 2019 Jim was diagnosed with lung cancer, and went to his eternal rest on November 25, 2021, Thanksgiving morning.

Jim is survived by his loving wife Linda; his daughters, Christa and Jackie Rae; grandsons, Dylan and Gabe; his sister, Vicky; brother, Terry; niece, Heather; cousins, Don and Lee Richie; and many friends both in Mendocino County and Lake County. He was a much-loved great-grandfather to Halona, Arianna, Shomoe Ine (JR) Arabella, and Josephine.

He was predeceased by his mother Phyllis and father Robert Lee, daughter Pamela who died shortly after birth, and his other sister and brothers.

He will be missed by his family and his many friends.

A memorial in his honor will be held Monday, December 20 at 11a.m. at Clearlake Church of the Nazarene. 15917 Olympic Drive, Clearlake, 95422. Call Linda Rickel at 707-295-6099

AV GRANGE HOLIDAY PANCAKE BREAKFAST

Are you in the mood for the holidaze? Yeah, we know it's a bit different smiling behind your mask, not quite knowing if you can give that big bear hug. But, the Grange may have a way to be together safely. Let's break bread, er pancakes, together! Sunday, December 12 at the Grange in Anderson Valley we are having the Holiday Grange Pancake Breakfast. Doors open at 8:30 and we serve until 11:00. 

We'll be dishing out the classic David Norfleet secret recipe flapjacks (Gluten free upon request), bacon and scrambled eggs with all the usual trimmings, coffee, tea, orange juice plus some seasonal surprises. Live music, not elevator Xmas stuff, the local real deal. In the big hall, with social distancing, you and your family will be smiling behind those masks. PS. We'll supply disposable plates and utensils but feel free to bring your own. 

REMEMBERING CHARLOTTE MAILLIARD

by Mike Geniella

My encounter with Charlotte Mailliard Schultz was brief but spectacular.

The legendary San Franciscan and I had two long telephone conversations 30 plus years ago. I have never forgotten them. 

The first was brief, and business like. Mendocino County’s Mailliard Ranch had been cited by state officials for being an outstanding example of timber harvest management across its 14,000-acre family ranch along Fish Rock Road. The honor came during the height of tensions on the North Coast over logging of the last remaining stands of old growth redwoods.

Family member Larry Mailliard is general partner of the Mailliard Ranch in Yorkville, but Charlotte, the savvy socialite, at the time was an equal after her first husband Jack Mailliard died. Charlotte had Jack Mailliard buried in Cathedral Grove at the ranch, his favorite place to be. 

I sought out Charlotte Mailliard for a story because I was intrigued how a high-profile San Franciscan was engaged in a family-owned timber operation in an era when logging practices were under intense scrutiny. At first, Charlotte was agreeable. She saw the relevance of how the family’s long-term management practices worked, and how they might set an example statewide. We agreed to do a follow up, formal interview for The Press Democrat. A few weeks later, however, Charlotte in her ever so charming way backed out. She and the family decided they did not want to be drawn into the fiery public debate over logging practices that was unfolding around them.

In 1954 the 242-acre Mailliard State Natural Reserve inside the ranch was donated to the state by John Ward Mailliard Jr. a conservationist and longtime member of the Save the Redwoods League. In February of this year, Save the Redwoods League announced it was paying Mailliard family descendants $24.7 million to buy a conservation easement over the sweeping Mailliard Ranch. The 14,838-acre property is believed to be the largest family-owned coastal redwood forest remaining in California.

I recall Charlotte and I spending an hour in 1990 debating the merits of her decision to not sit down for an interview about the Mailliard logging operations. While Charlotte rightly credited nephew Larry with implementing and managing the family’s redwood logging operations, she clearly was informed about the environmental related issues and how the ranch managed them. 

Charlotte was proud of the Mailliard family legacy, but she concluded that a full blown profile on the ranch’s current logging operations might exacerbate public tensions locally. “Whatever I say might come off as pointing fingers at others. That is not now, or ever will be my intention. The Mailliard practices speak for themselves,” she declared diplomatically.

I pushed for the story as any good journalist would. But in the end, I agreed to back off. In between we had a rambling, delightful conversation including stories about our backgrounds. She was a small-town girl from the Texas panhandle. I was a country boy from the Sacramento Valley. We understood that when opportunities present themselves, you grab them. I still remember Charlotte’s enthusiastic comments about finding herself living with Jack Mailliard in an old San Francisco house with a knock-out view of the Golden Gate Bridge. “I wake up, look out and thank God every morning,” Charlotte said.

Our long conversation ended about an hour later. I felt like we had become friends. It was a great gift of hers. I am glad I was a recipient.

WHY NICOLE? 

by Mark Scaramella

Why would Nicole Glentzer, a hitherto invisible Ukiah Unified School District administrator, suddenly decide to run against incumbent Michelle Hutchins for County County School Superintendent, especially since Ms. Hutchins has established the agency as effectively helpful to the far flung independent school districts of vast Mendocino County and there have been zero complaints about her administration? (The prior admin of Paul Tichinin was a regular Laff Riot; Warren Galetti seemed downright overwhelmed by the job and resigned to return to the Fog Belt.)

Ms. Glentzer’s facebook page doesn’t offer much in the way of specific reasons for her campaign, boldly declaring with see-through vacuity, “With the right leadership, our schools can rise to any challenge and go above and beyond meeting student needs.”

And, “When teachers, parents, and administrators from across the county began approaching me to run for this position [Names! And why did they “approach” her?], it became clear that we needed change in the office, and that I could make a difference. The Superintendent of Schools should provide better support to our schools. The 13,000 children in our schools deserve dedication, experience, and common sense.”

We’re pretty sure Ms. Hutchins would say pretty much the same thing. Edu-speak is heavy on uplift, but uniformly vague, rhetorically the same here in the NorCal outback as in San Francisco, and always without so much as a hint of the grim fact that California schools, even as measured by the loose metrics of American ecucational standards, annually churn out millions of functional illiterates totally unprepared to cope in an imploding society.

Ms. Glentzer offers no specific reasons to unseat incumbent Hutchins; simply implying that Ms. Hutchins is not dedicated, experienced and lacks common sense. Pure wind, thrown out there with zero evidence of the charges, but hard evidence that Ms. G has no issues, or no issues she cares to share because, as we shall see, that issue is so transparently without merit it would make her look grasping, not for students but for herself and her “upper-level management” colleagues.

We suspected there was some kind of insider bureaucratic dispute behind Ms. Glentzer’s run for County Superintendent. We asked Superintendent Hutchins if she had any idea why Ms. Glentzer decided to run. Hutchins speculated that it may have begun when Ms. Hutchins denied some money for Ukiah Unified for a program called “differentiated assistance,” i.e., state edu-money for underperforming school districts — which Ukiah Unified certainly is by most ordinary indicators. Ukiah Unified features an abnormally high suspension rate and lagging academic test scores, a fact that the Ukiah district, with its over-large admin apparatus, would probably prefers to hide from most of its consumers.

Back in May of 2020 Ukiah Unified Superintendent Debra Kubin asked Hutchins for “differentiated assistance funds” which Kubin wanted to spend on her own consultants which, Kubin explained, “could be extremely valuable in this area with our upper level managers,” and “a retreat we would like to hold.”

Hold it right there. Consultants? Upper level managers? Retreat? We've had years of these ripoffs out of Tichinin's seemingly endless reign at County Schools, and before him, the agency was operated as a criminal conspiracy that saw two “upper level managers” packed off to jail for stealing and what you might call “moral turpitude.” (An upper level manager named Hal Titen was making pornographic films with underage girls in the back room of his bar using educational equipment he'd “borrowed” from MCOE. His “upper level manager” colleagues said they were “surprised and shocked.”)

Ms. Hutchins replied to Kubin's attempt to grab off a nice hunk of cash for her Ukiah-based upper level managers by citing the Education Code (Sec. 52071) which clearly requires that the differentiated assistance money go to County offices from which the assistance is provided to all county school districts. It's not supposed to be passed along to individual districts. Ms. Hutchins added that she and her County staff would be more than happy to work with Ukiah Unified to figure out ways to improve Ukiah Unified’s performance challenges but would not simply hand over the money for consultants and retreats for upper level managers. (Although Ms. Hutchins phrased it a bit more tactfully.)

Ukiah Unified was very unhappy. Prior MCOE administrations always played ball. And then some.

When Hutchins ran four years ago she ran against another Ukiah Unified administrator named Bryan Barrett. Barrett, AVA readers may recall, was the ring leader behind trying to nail Ukiah teachers union rep Dennis Boaz as a racist for writing that Ukiah Unified’s administration was being “niggardly” in their salary negotiations. The Superintendent at Ukiah at the time was a black woman who commuted to the job from LA. There was certainly nothing niggardly about her salary and perks.

It's entirely possible that the common adjective found offensive by the Ukiah boobouisie was truly not recognized by Barrett and MCOE's Tichinin, educational standards being what they too often are among school administrators, but the wider public wondered out loud, “These dummies are running our schools?”

Ukiah Unified is the largest school district in the County by far and they don’t like it when their funding requests are denied, especially when those requests are for Ukiah Unified’s “upper level managers” and their preferred consultants — one of whom is that wacky Ukiah guy Steve Zuieback who bases his “consulting” on this wacky navel-gazing “enneagram.” 

(A former Ukiah City Council also thought Zuieback's lunacy was “clarifying.”)

Unless Ms. Glentzer can do better than vague claims of “leadership” and “making a difference,” we prefer the incumbent who is not a captive of any one County school district. In fact, if Ms. Glentzer is such an effective administrator, how did Ukiah Unified’s edu-rating fall to the level of needing “differentiated assistance” in the first place?

KYBU ROUND VALLEY COMMUNITY RADIO is Celebrating 10 Years On-The-Air on Saturday, December 11, 2021

KYBU Round Valley Community Radio volunteers powered-up the transmitters and began broadcasting to listeners at 96.9FM in Covelo/Round Valley on December 11, 2011. 

Now, after 10 years of broadcasting music, talk, news, public affairs and more, KYBU is celebrating with on-air specials, a pop-up online merch store (kyburadio.com), a silent auction, a membership drive and live DJ’s at an outdoor in-person event under the patio at the Round Valley Public Library Commons from 4pm to 8pm on Saturday, December 11, 2021. It’s a Supporter Appreciation party with beer, wine and soft-drinks for sale, and fun with fellow KYBU supporters. Attendees will be limited to members and underwriters. Become a new member at the door. Current members and underwriters can renew at the door or at www.kyburadio.org prior to the event. 

No outside drinks, food, or dogs. KYBU will follow all current health orders and recommendations for COVID safety. Do not attend the event if you or anyone in your household are experiencing, or have recently experienced, fever, cough, or shortness of breath. 

This event is sponsored through generous contributions from KYBU’s Decennial Club Members: Wylatti Resource Management, Keith’s Family Foods, M&M Feed and Supply, Round Valley Auto Care, John Seaver and Susan Jung. Event and silent auction contributors include North Coast Brewing Company, Vichy Springs Resort, Benbow Inn, Frey Vineyards and Husch Vineyards. 

KYBU Round Valley Community Radio is an all volunteer, member supported community radio station broadcasting a mix of music, talk and public affairs programming and streaming online at www.kyburadio.org thanks to a recent grant from the Mendocino Community Foundation’s Fund for Round Valley. KYBU is a project of the 501(c)3 nonprofit, Friends of the Round Valley Public Library. Everyone is invited to join! 

For more information, contact KYBU at mail@kyburadio.org.

TUNE IN. Lew Chichester writes: "When the Anderson Valley Panthers basketball team travels to Round Valley in 2022 for a league game you can listen online to the varsity competition. Round Valley Community Radio KYBU has two excellent sports announcers, Julian Medel and Mitch McCarty, who provide the play by play live on 96.9FM. The radio broadcast only extends to the Round Valley area but anyone can listen online by going to kyburadio.org on a computer or phone and click on “listen.” We have a brand new, 500 seat capacity gymnasium at Round Valley High School, home of the Mustangs, and are looking forward to an exciting season of games in 2022. Tune in, in Round Valley: 96.9FM, the rest of the world: kyburadio.org" 

BETH SWEHLA (AV Ag Instructor): "Hello from the livestock pastures at the high school, If you happen to be walking by the creek. If you happen to get close to the school fence. You are going to trip a Gadfly Critter Alarm that is very loud and scary. It is part of our mountain lion deterrent plans."

GUALALA SAYS NO. The Gualala Municipal Advisory Council met for just over three hours on Thursday, Dec. 2, spending almost two hours of that time considering -- and ultimately recommending rejection of -- a proposal by AT&T Mobility to add a 120-foot tower on Country Club Way. The council also heard a report by Law Enforcement officers, tabled discussion on a new home at Iversen Point, and conducted other routine business. 

DOUG MOSEL: 

Having raised and distributed a quarter of a million dollars in grants to small farmers, I can think of no volunteer effort that has done more to support local food production in tangible ways than the Good Farm Fund. Grants have helped the Mendocino Grain Project to do a better job cleaning grain and improving the soil that produces dry-farmed, climate-friendly heirloom grains. 

This Giving Tuesday, please give generously to this important cause!

http://www.grapevine.org/c/k9WtwRz?gvu=MQuZ5l...#givingtuesday @goodfarmfund

PG&E WANTS TO REMOVE 389 TREES within State Parks jurisdiction between Fort Bragg & Point Arena

BOS meeting, December 7 agenda, starts at 9am.

From Yesterday's Mendocino County Today:

Consent Item 4X is another stunner: “Accept the informational report regarding the issuance of Emergency Coastal Development Permit EM_2021-0008 (PG&E) to remove 389 trees within California Department of Parks and Recreation jurisdiction.” 

The affected areas include: MacKerricher State Park (70 trees) Jug Handle State Natural Reserve (30 trees) Caspar Headlands State Beach (16 trees) Point Cabrillo Light Station State Historic Preserve (51 trees) Russian Gulch State Park (140 trees) Mendocino Headlands State Park (40 trees) Van Damme State Park (46 trees) Navarro River Redwoods State Park (3 trees) Manchester State Park (16 trees) Schooner Gulch State Beach (9 trees). 

“All trees proposed for management [sic] under this permit are within the Coastal Zone as defined by the California Coastal Act and within Mendocino County’s Local Coastal Plan management area. This project is also within PG&E’s Multi-Region Operations and Maintenance Habitat Conservation Plan area (MRHCP).” 

This “Emergency” Logging Permit was issued back on Sept. 24, 2021 and now two and a half months later staff is getting around to notifying the Supes. Supervisor Williams has been involved in direct negotiations with NorCal PG&E reps over terrible plans to cut a swath through County owned Faulkner Park in Boonville but PG&E’s removal of 389 trees in State Parks has flown right past the Board. 

My comments: Please write, call, and/or comment via ZOOM and ask the Supervisors not to approve this agenda item along with all the other items in the consent calendar, but to discuss this at some later time and list it as an action item. Also add whatever else you think is important to add, 

Annemarie Weibel

Albion

THE EVENING STAR (photo by Dick Whetstone)

REMEMBER that still not used “Behavioral Health Training Center” in Redwood Valley paid for by Measure B funds that nobody wanted to use unless it was free? 

It’s not free. 

According to an item on next Tuesday’s Supes agenda, veterans and other “historically sponsored groups” as well as County departments and agencies will be charged $30 per day. Employee groups will have to pay $90 per day. Other non-profits and ouitside government agencies will be charged $150 per day. Public use, however, will be an outrageous $500 per day plus a $500 cleaning deposit and a $20 key deposit.

The last time Behavioral Health Honcho Dr. Jenine Miller surveyed possible users of the facility she was told that most organizations already had free space available elsewhere so they wouldn’t use the Training Center if they had to pay for it. 

As for law enforcement use, we assume they’d only have to pay the $30 per day as a county department. But since it was paid for by Measure B specifically for law enforcement mental health use/training, we don’t see why they should have to pay for it at all. Don’t they want to encourage mental health and de-escalation training for cops?

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CEO & SUPERVISORS TO CONTINUE closed to the public meetings.

From a proposed resolution to continue closed zoom meetings of the Supervisors:

“The Mendocino County Board of Supervisors finds that State or local officials continue to recommend measures to promote social distancing pursuant to Government Code section 54953(e)(3) to allow legislative bodies to use teleconferencing to hold public meetings in accordance with Government Code section 54953(e)(2) to ensure members of the public have continued access to safely observe and participate in local government meetings.”

(Mark Scaramella)

ON LINE COMMENT on Skunk Train takeover of old GP Mill Site in Fort Bragg:

As mentioned previously, not a lot of progress was made for many years on development of the millsite, except for the coastal trail and the set aside for the Noyo Center – thank you, Linda Ruffing (I wonder if the Skunk can claim all that property at some point, too? or the waste water treatment plant, for that matter.) Most of the delay was because of the remediation problems GP faced. Somehow, the Skunk convinced GP they could get out from under all that and GP walked away. There might have been other considerations between the two that we don’t know about – 1.3 million is a steal, remediation notwithstanding. While I can understand why people would doubt that the City would be able to manage development of the millsite – it’s a huge project – it wouldn’t be impossible. Bringing in a larger entity experienced in such things manage the project would have been a great idea. Having it controlled by an entity with an amusement park plan and that rejects any local rules except when it’s to their advantage is an invitation to a City takeover and a possible disaster. Real estate development and the amusement industry are both sensitive to the whims of the economy. Having all the eggs in a skunk basket is extremely dangerous. But they own it now and, unfortunately, seem bent on jamming that fact down the City’s throat and flaunting their claim of immunity from oversight. There’s a reason the City and many coastal citizens are pushing back. I wish things could be better, but I think the only way that’ll happen is if the Skunk’s public utility claim is disallowed and the playing field is leveled.

— Mark Taylor

TRAVIS HUMPHREY CHARGED WITH ARSON Causing Ukiah Structure Fire; Used Accelerant to Fuel Flames

On the evening of December 2, 2021, multiple fire agencies responded to a structure fire on Ukiah’s Gibson Street that left the first floor of a residence charred with minimal damage to the second story.

Investigations that evening concluded that the fire was an act of arson and 31-year-old Redwood Valley Man Travis Joseph Humphrey was arrested for the crime.

Ukiah Police Department Lieutenant Andrew Phillps told MendoFever that investigators determined Humphrey had “poured an accelerant onto his mattress and left [the residence] just prior to the fire being noticed.” When officers contacted Humphrey that evening, Lieutenant Phillips said an accelerant was found on his person....

mendofever.com/2021/12/04/man-charged-with-arson-causing-ukiah-structure-fire-reportedly-used-accelerant-to-fuel-the-flames/

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MR. WENDAL COMMENTS:

This announcement is from Redwood Community Services. They are in way over their heads when it comes to providing mental health services.

Public Announcement

Yesterday evening, our Gibson House program in Ukiah was damaged by a fire caused by a client receiving support and services through this program. All clients and staff are safe, and damage was limited to the Gibson House property.

Gibson House is a mental health supportive housing program with mental health professional staff onsite 24/7. It is the goal of Gibson House to support local residents experiencing mental health illness that prevents them from living with family or independently to remain connected to their community. The supportive environment provided by a team of staff ensures that an appropriate level of mental health services and medication management is received by all clients while working with them on individual plans to reduce barriers caused by mental illness to lead an independent and healthy lifestyle.

Redwood Community Services is reviewing this incident in detail and all related policies and procedures to ensure the safety of our clients, staff, neighbors, and community. First and foremost, we would like to thank our staff for their quick response and commitment to keeping clients safe. We appreciate the support of the Ukiah Valley Fire Authority, Hopland Fire Protection District, Redwood Valley/Calpella Fire Department, and CAL FIRE, Ukiah Police Department as well as our community partners that also support our clients of Gibson House.

IN 1921 WHAT IS NOW KNOWN AS EAGLES HALL was Labor Temple aka Comrades Hall, built by the Socialist Party circa 1916, where on any Saturday night those passing by could hear The Internationale being sung … in Finnish! In that year Enoch Nelson, a former IWW activist and member of the fledgling Communist Party left Fort Bragg with a few other locals for Soviet Karelia, an ethnically Finnish area near the Finnish border to work on a collective farm there, but in 1938 locals here were informed that he had died of liver disease. In the 1950s under Khruschev the truth came out: he had been murdered in the purges of the time. (“The Nelson Brothers: Finnish-American Radicals of the Mendocino Coast” by Allen Nelson, published by the Mendocino County Historical Society)

— Joe Hansen

TO BURY OR NOT TO BURY

The City Council of the City of Fort Bragg will conduct a public hearing at a regular meeting to be held at 6:00 p.m., or as soon thereafter as the matter may be heard, on Monday, December 13, 2021. Due to state and county health orders and to minimize the spread of COVID-19, City Councilmembers and staff will be participating in the public hearing by video conference. A link to the meeting will be listed on the first page of the agenda. 

The City Council will solicit citizen input regarding the following: 

Receive Report, Conduct Public Hearing, and Consider Adoption of City Council Resolution Approving an Underground District for properties located on Chestnut Street between South Main Street and Ebbing Way to remove poles, overhead wires, and associated overhead structures and replace with underground wires and facilities for supplying electric, communication, and other similar associated services. 

The hearing will be opened for public participation. All interested persons are invited to appear at that time to present their comments. The public comment period runs from the date this notice is published and mailed until the date of the hearing to allow sufficient time for submission of comments by mail. Written communications must be directed to the City Clerk, 416 N. Franklin Street, Fort Bragg, CA 95437, or emailed to jlemos@fortbragg.com, and received no later than the meeting date. 

The Agenda Item Summary and supporting documents that will be considered by the Councilmembers will be available for review at Fort Bragg City Hall and on the City’s website: https://city.fortbragg.com/ on or after December 8, 2021. At the conclusion of the public hearing, the City Council will consider a decision on the matter.

ED NOTES

CANNABIS SHOPS across the San Francisco Bay Area have taken big fiscal hits as gangs of thieves broke into more than 15 shops throughout November during the series of “smash-and-grab” robberies. Oakland Police Chief LeRonne Armstrong told reporters that “hundreds” of vehicles targeted marijuana stores in Oakland last month, firing 175 shots and stealing about $5 million worth of products. Alphonso ‘Tucky’ Blunt (sic), owner of Blunts and Moore, said his store lost about $25,000 during a November 22nd raid where more than a dozen burglars ransacked the store. “I know 25 or so businesses that got hit … and out of all those, the percentage I know that told me that they may not be able to reopen is about 50%. That's scary,” Blunt said. “I was safer, and had more money (selling) on the street, illegally.”

ANOTHER SIGN OF THE APOCALYPSE: “The Census Bureau's count showed that a mere 17.8 percent of the United States' 130 million households featured married parents with children under the age of 18.

AND SPEAKING of the young, a new poll from Harvard found that 52 percent of young Americans believe that U.S democracy is “in trouble” if not “failing,” while 27 percent found that the government was “somewhat functioning.”

CATCH OF THE DAY, December 4, 2021

JOSE AGUILARA, Santa Rosa/Ukiah. Attempted murder, 20 year enhancement for use of weapon, conspiracy.

CHRISTOPHER ASHURST, Ukiah. Registration alteration or forgery, damaging communications device, disobeying court order, failure to appear.

ROBERTO CHAVEZ-SOUZA, Lakeport/Ukiah. Attempted murder, 20 year enhancement for use of weapon, conspiracy.

CLAYTON FIGUEROA JR., Redwood Valley. DUI.

WHITNEY HUGHES, Loleta/Ukiah. Disoderly conduct-alcohol.

DEAN MCCONNELL, Willits. DUI, second offense within ten years, suspended license, probation revocation.

MICHAEL PARKER, Ukiah. Disorderly conduct-intoxicated by drugs/alcohol, county parole violation.

MARCUS RAM, Ukiah. DUI, no license.

ANTHONY SILK-HOAGLIN JR., Hayward/Covelo. Felon-addict with firearm, manufacture or sale or possession of undetectable firearm, ammo possession, registration alteration or forgery, pot for sale. 

RAUL SOLANO-DIAZ, Talmage. Disobeying court order, failure to appear.

KIDS

by Marilyn Davin

In 1969 my husband boarded a military transport bound for what he assumed would be a long flight to Danang. The flight landed instead on the island of Okinawa, where he and another young recruit were instructed to grab their seabags and get off the plane. They had just been transferred to non-combat duties for the duration. Why? Because they were just 17 years old. One of the flashpoints in a war chock full of them was that 17 was just too damned young to send American men halfway around the globe to fight in an increasingly unpopular war. 

When you’re 17 in the United States you’re legally still pretty much of a kid. You can’t buy cigarettes or drink alcohol. You can’t join the military or buy a gun. You can’t vote, marry, or get a tattoo (my own daughter, after a year of much tearful sturm and drang about the injustice of it all, had to wait until she was 18 to get that tattoo, which she then spent thousands of dollars to have removed when she was in her clear-sighted 30s).

As a society we collectively recognize that the great majority of 17-year-olds are too psychologically and emotionally immature to be handed a master key to adulthood. In one of its publications the ACLU quotes studies by the Harvard Medical School, the National Institute of Mental Health and the UCLA's Department of Neuroscience, which collectively found that: 

The frontal and pre-frontal lobes of the brain, which regulate impulse control and judgment, are not fully developed in adolescents. Development is not completed until somewhere between 18 and 22 years of age. These findings confirm that adolescents generally have a greater tendency towards impulsivity, making unsound judgments or reasoning, and are less aware of the consequences of their actions. 

This is hardly news for parents who have raised teenagers, but bears a reminder as more and more minors are tried as adults in this country. As of this writing some 250,000 juveniles are tried as adults every year in the U.S., and three states – Georgia, Texas, and Wisconsin – still try juveniles as adults at 16, though they are no longer executed.

Those still touting American exceptionalism might do well to note that, prior to the 2005 United States Supreme Court ruling Roper v. Simmons, which on a now-familiar 5-4 vote banned the execution of juveniles who committed their crimes before they were 18, only the United States and Iran still engaged in that barbaric practice – and Iran beat the U.S. in drafting its own law banning it beginning in 2003. The justices of the U.S. high court who voted to ban the practice wrote in the majority decision that the juvenile death penalty was “inconsistent with evolving standards of decency in a civilized society.” 

Look, everybody knows that teenagers regrettably often make poor choices and should suffer some consequence for them. But they’re still kids, not mini-adults, no matter how sophisticated or reasonable they may appear on their surface. As Nature intended, juveniles are a dynamic stew of great energy, impulsivity, and raging hormones. 

One of my best friend’s sons, who is now a prosecutor, crashed his car while he was driving home drunk at 16. Another had multiple DUIs. These are of course non-capital offenses but nevertheless serious events that require remedial actions both for the offender and for society at large. Fortunately, most of even the wildest kids eventually grow up to become responsible adults. 

This biological reality is something to keep in mind when juveniles are tried as adults for their alleged crimes. I thought of it as the recent Kyle Rittenhouse wrongful death trial dragged on in the news. It was automatically tut-tuttingly reported in the liberal media as a black/white event, but the victims were white and the accused was white. Before jurors even heard all the evidence (and jurors are the only ones who hear all the evidence), opinionated media pundits were predicting dark days of murder and mayhem in American cities if Rittenhouse were acquitted. There were many societal issues at play in this case: how Rittenhouse came to possess an assault rifle, how he wandered across a state line to “volunteer” for crowd control during a peaceful demonstration, how any of this even seemed like a good idea to the 17-year-old suburban lifeguard. There is no question that he shot and killed the victims. But the jury believed his claim of self defense and aquitted him of murder, undoubtedly reasoning, at least in part, that he was a terrified kid. 

JANUARY 6TH, an on-line assessment of the magas: “All the insurrectionists of Jan. 6 look like a bunch of homeless crack heads. They think the scraggly beards, the pre-washed, pre-faded jeans, and black shirts with racist, anti-Semitic slogans emblazoned across the front make them look less like the fat, middle age losers they actually are and more like their ideal of a rebel. James Dean, Bruce Springsteen, and Waylon Jennings all wrapped up in one nasty package. Until the steel handcuffs smacked their ulnar nerve and made them cry like a schoolgirl.” 

ON LINE COMMENT OF THE DAY

ON ANTI-VAXXERS: Hmm… ”wants to open civil discussions where individuals can openly question what is being said without feeling attacked or censored”? 

Notice anything about these people? That they never talk about anything other than how others are impinging on their rights but never about how they impinging on other’s rights? Accommodation is what others are required to do. That they demand respect for their constant rhetoric about how everyone from officials to doctors lie, lie lie but how anyone dare say that they are the ones doing most of the lie, lie, lying? That if a person gets sick, it is because they chose the life style of junk food, laziness and believing the media? Not at all that someone chose to spread a disease? That not enough people have become sick or died for them to willing to be inconvenienced by having to – oh the horrors - wearing a face mask? In the face of their own utter self centered contempt for any narrative they find objectionable, they find it best to complain about a lack of respect for their own lack of respect? 

For tips on handling the level of discussion involved: todaysparent.com/toddler/toddler-behaviour/how-to-handle-a-screaming-toddler/

SCALPED! (This guy survived.)

Robert McGee, one of the few people in American frontier history who got scalped and survived to tell the story (1864). 

Photographer E.E. Henry took this rare photograph of Robert McGee displaying his scalping scars.

TYPICAL.

"And happy 30th birthday greetings to Rudolf Crudd from the girls on the corner. They'd just like to say, 'You take our money but you never hit us.' This goes out to Rudy."

The recording of last night's (2021-12-03) Memo of the Air: Good Night Radio show on KNYO-LP Fort Bragg (CA) is right here: https://tinyurl.com/KNYO-MOTA-0465

Email me your writing on any subject and I'll read it on the radio next week. That's what I'm here for. If it's more than plain text, please provide a link to the media you want me to see or hear, rather than attach it.

Furthermore, at https://MemoOfTheAir.wordpress.com you'll find a fresh batch of dozens of links to not necessarily radio-useful but nonetheless worthwhile items I set aside for you while gathering that show together. Such as, for instance:

This is how I am. Not necessarily about someone being late coming home, but that the big show is inside, and on almost all the time, interrupted by the real world (except when I'm critically engaged with the real world, such as driving a car or operating power tools or cleaning my ears with a Q-tip). That's why I jump, startled, even when someone I've been in the same room with for awhile suddenly moves or speaks. I was alone, thinking things through, writing a story. I think people are all like this to a greater or lesser degree.

https://boingboing.net/2021/12/01/the-education-of-louis.html

Lab rats on shrooms.

https://theawesomer.com/experiment/649242/

Art of Margarethe Habauer.

https://www.margarethe-illustration.com/michael-sowa.html

And the service station. "Evenin', pretty lady. How much gas you want?" He puts the gas in, then quickly checks your oil, water and tires and washes your windshield. If you're low on oil or radiator water or tire air he just puts some in till it's right. This video implies that a lube job might be free, too, but I don't remember that being true. I remember paying for lube jobs, and taking wheels off in the back yard to repack the bearings with grease. Cars needed grease all the time; they don't so much anymore. Also, I had forgotten about putting oil on leaf springs to keep the car from going/eee-er eee-er every time you drove over a bump. I actually miss manual window cranks, and manual air and heat controls, where the temperature lever pulled a cable that opened and closed a spigot for coolant water to go into the heater core. I liked knowing how everything worked and being able to fix it with a screwdriver and pliers and stuff lying around in the garage. If the clutch linkage failed you could replace it with a piece of coat-hanger wire. I liked it where if a rock or a deer broke the headlight you'd get another light for $3, take the old one out and put in the new one in the parking lot of the car parts store. Now if the headlight gets smashed it's $500 for a big plastic part from China that's practically the whole front corner of the car.

https://misscellania.blogspot.com/2021/11/the-service-station.html

— Marco McClean, memo@mcn.org, https://MemoOfTheAir.wordpress.com

JOE BIDEN’S MADE-UP STORIES AND MANNER RAISE SERIOUS QUESTIONS ABOUT HIS MENTAL HEALTH

by Kevin Williamson

Once, toward the end of her life, when she was not in good health, I woke my mother up from a nap, and, unusually for her, she snapped fully awake immediately. Over the next several minutes, she talked at length about the strict Catholic schools she had attended as a girl, remembering how mean the nuns had been and how afraid she had been of them. Her memories were vivid, and I was surprised that she had never shared them with me before.

The reason she hadn’t shared them with me, of course, is because none of it had ever happened. She was raised in a Methodist family in a company town in the Texas Panhandle and had never set foot in a Catholic school a day in her life — she probably would have had to drive two hours just to find one. I’d be surprised if she’d even known any Catholics back then. Her mind had, for whatever reason, played a trick on her. She didn’t suffer from dementia in any obvious way, and she never had another episode like that, as far as I am aware, for the rest of her life. When we get old, we break down, and strange things sometimes happen.

A thing about my mother, though: She did not possess a single nuclear weapon.

President Biden is having a series of worrisome episodes that seem to be a mix of his trademark plagiarism (adopting episodes from other public figures’ lives as his own in addition to appropriating their words) and what we sometimes euphemistically call a “senior moment.”

Recently, President Biden told a truck driver: “I used to drive a tractor-trailer.” This wasn’t the first time he had made the claim. But the White House has since conceded that it is a fabrication; asked for proof of Biden’s truck-driving career, aides pointed to a newspaper article showing Biden riding in a truck — once — as part of a publicity stunt. He keeps telling this story, and it keeps being untrue.

But that’s par for the course for Biden, who infamously slandered an innocent man in the matter of the death of his first wife and daughter, claiming that the man had been a drunken driver. He wasn’t, there was no suggestion that he was, and police reports at the time suggested that it was probably Mrs. Biden who had been at fault in the accident. Yet Biden spent years alleging that the man “drank his lunch” before causing the accident.

Biden also has a rich fantasy life, which is not limited to his mythical truck-driving days. There is cloak-and-dagger stuff, too. On Wednesday, he told an audience that during the Six-Day War, he had acted as a liaison between Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir and the Egyptian government. The Six-Day War occurred in 1967, when Levi Eshkol was the prime minister of Israel and Biden was plagiarizing his way toward finishing No. 76 of 85 in law school. Nobody had ever heard of such a thing as a Joe Biden back then. (And nobody was asking for one.) He was years away from beginning his Senate career. This is another fantasy, one that Biden keeps repeating. Is it an ordinary lie, or is it a delusion?

(Biden did later meet Golda Meir. The Israelis were not impressed with the young senator, and certainly were not asking him to be their back channel to Egypt.)

A certain kind of Republican takes a lurid and celebratory view of Biden’s mental fugues. But you do not have to be a bitter partisan to be concerned about the fact that the president of the United States of America has become a sort of Walter Mitty, so deep into his fantasies that he muses in public about events that — let’s go ahead and emphasize this once more — never happened.

To broach the subject of the president’s competence in a formal way is a serious thing, one that Republicans probably cannot do effectively on their own. (Imagine the hilarious spectacle of Marjorie Taylor Greene arguing that somebody else is mentally unfit for office.) But it is difficult to imagine a single Democrat, much less a meaningful group of them, stepping up on this.

So we must rely either on Republican credibility or on Democratic political courage — i.e., we are hosed.

Because of Biden’s long history of habitual dishonesty, it is difficult to tell how much of this is Biden being Biden and how much of it is Biden no longer quite being Biden — how much is his longstanding and familiar moral disability and how much is, as it may be, late-life mental disability.

We need an independent medical assessment of the president’s mental health. That is a sobering fact to face, but face it we must. And right now, we need a Democrat who will say so in public.

(New York Post)