What Happened to the Public Safety Advisory Committee?
Remember all the hullabaloo in 2020 and 2021 in the aftermath of the George Floyd murder and the Ukiah PD's awkward encounter with the naked tweaker in the street? Months later, a few Coast people who think they could have handled the naked tweaker better than the police, convinced Supervisor Ted Williams to agendize their mis-aimed call for some kind of audit of the Sheriff’s Department. That went nowhere, of course, because there were no George Floyds or naked tweakers dogging the Mendocino County Sheriff’s office.
But the experts on policing had determined that Mendo needed law enforcement oversight. That idea had some traction, mainly because the state recently authorized counties to cobble together some kind of generic oversight.
Sheriff Kendall had no objection as long as the Board stayed out of his operational hair. So in February of 2021 County Counsel Christian Curtis drafted an ordinance creating a “public safety advisory board” which would: “Outreach to the Mendocino County public, provide options for community input, and receive input from community in culturally and linguistically appropriate ways on matters related to law enforcement and public safety; Examine and report on interdepartmental issues related to law enforcement and public safety; Review public safety concerns by: (1) ensuring that complaints are appropriately dealt with for County employees, (2) receiving resident concerns, suggestions, complaints, and compliments about County employees and forward them to the appropriate department for review, (3) producing a public report about the issues, concerns, complaints and recommendations on a summary level, and (4) considering public safety concerns and promote appropriate communication, interaction, and problem-solving strategies; Review current policies for compliance with applicable law; Review redacted reports presented to the [Sheriff’s] use of force review board [a board we can find no indication of ever having met] and provide objective and independent evaluation of reviews of use of force; Engage in community outreach to better ascertain if additional trainings are required, and educate the public about those trainings that are performed; and nominate a member of the public to the use of force review board.”
Curtis’s draft also recommended that “The Public Safety Advisory Board shall prepare and recommend bylaws governing its operations, which shall become effective upon adoption by the Mendocino County Board of Supervisors.”
All of this is exactly the kind of pointlessly complicated, overbroad and vague process beyond the known capacities of present-day Mendocino County.
At the February 2021 Supervisors meeting, the Board voted to turn Curtis’s draft — itself supposedly based on input from a board ad hoc committee of Supervisors Dan Gjerde and Ted Williams — back to the ad hoc to work with Curtis to see if there were any conflicts with the newish state law (AB-1185) which authorized the creation of county oversight boards.
Four months later, in July of 2021, after laborious poring over the question, Curtis finally concluded that, by golly, there were no conflicts. So the Board voted to approve the draft, and within days Chapter 2.39 was added to Mendocino County government Code enacting the Mendocino County Public Safety Advisory Board exactly as drafted four months earlier, to be comprised of seven members: One supervisor (as yet unnamed), five supervisorial civilian appointees, and the Sheriff or his designee.
According to the County’s committee website, there are so far only four appointees with three vacancies remaining, one of which is the Sheriff’s rep, another is the designated Supervisor.
There is no indication that the Advisory Board has met or even tried to meet. Nobody has taken a stab at bylaws. There have been no press releases requesting membership applications. Last we heard when it was briefly discussed at a Supervisors meeting, Supervisor Williams semi-seriously told his colleagues that he had received several applications from the Fifth District and was willing to offer the non-appointed Fifth District applicants to other Supervisors who had not received any (qualified?) applicants.
It’s now more than a year later since that February meeting which presented the draft and more than nine months since it was approved, and only four of the seven positions have been appointed and nobody has done anything about the stated objectives or anything else related to the original purpose. This despite Supervisor Gjerde’s calls at the February 2021 Board meeting for acting “as promptly as we can.”
In December of 2021 Supervisor Haschak mentioned in his “Supervisors Report” that “The 3rd District is in need of a representative on the Public Safety Advisory Board.”
And indeed since then we’ve noticed that Haschak has appointed Ms. Laura Betts, a member of the Round Valley Area Municipal Advisory Board, and aunt of Khadijah Britton, the young Round Valley woman who has been missing since 2018 and presumed dead.
Sheriff Kendall and Probation Chief Izen Locatelli are both on record saying they’d like to see the Public Safety Advisory Board modeled after Fort Bragg’s Public Safety Committee.
But that committee is not a good model because it is simply a monthly meeting of a few Fort Bragg officials (Police Chief John Naulty, Fire Chief Steve Orsi, and City Councilmen Lindy Peters and Bernie Norvell) — and no civilians or citizen appointees. We can’t find their bylaws, but their “duties and responsibilities” are “This committee reviews and makes recommendations regarding public safety issues, including: police, fire, building safety, and disaster preparedness. The committee is the liaison with the Rural Fire District, and volunteer fire department.”
Their minutes indicate that they deal mainly with relatively minor traffic problems, local trouble spots, and a routine monthly “oral” report from the police chief.
So, despite the mini-burst of interest in 2021, the Public Safety Advisory Board has yet to be formed, has not met, has not discussed their charter or their bylaws or procedures, has not issued press releases and has returned to its non-existent status quo ante with no indication that it will ever actually get going.
And nobody seems to care.
Until the next naked tweaker does a rain dance on State Street.
Given Mr. Curtis’s toothless committee charter and vague objectives, that may be for the best. We don’t need more Mendo blatherfests like the Behavioral Health Advisory Board or the Measure B Advisory Committee. But that would be too bad because, if taken seriously by serious appointees, the Board could serve a useful purpose focusing on such topics as Sheriff’s staffing and budgeting, overtime and overtime budgeting, crime trends, response times, and forecasts by sector (Coast, North, Central), recruiting, clearance rates, jail population and status and expansion, the newly instituted dual response unit (aka “crisis van”), dispatch consolidation, coordination with city law enforcement and probation, resident deputies, and other subjects of public interest.
It could also be a clearinghouse to build an historical record of local law enforcement activities and be a forum to address real law enforcement issues in the unincorporated areas of the County.
But this is Mendocino County where good ideas go to die.
Like Measure B (supposedly funding mental health treatment for Mendo’s walking wounded) and Measure V (declaring standing dead tanoaks to be a nuisance) and Measure AG (advising that most pot tax revenues go to mental health services, emergency services, roads and enforcement), and any number of other blips on the electorate’s radar over the years, the Public Safety Advisory Board has become just another pile of paper designed to make the public think the Board is doing something other than what the CEO instructs them to do.
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THE LATEST ISSUE of the California Farm Bureau Magazine reports that “The optimism spurred by heavy snowstorms in December has melted away and the 2022 water year is now looking bleak. After facing the driest recorded January and February in state history, the California Department of Water Resources reported that statewide, the snowpack stood at 63% of average for the date (end of February) after conducting the agency’s third manual snow survey of the year.
“This year is probably going to be the worst year ever,” said Thad Bettner, general manager of the Glenn-Colusa County Irrigation District. “It’s been a brutal year for California all around.”
In a summary of his remarks, provided by the state water board, State Water Resources Control Board Chair E Joaquin Esquivel said they are “considering water curtailments in critical watersheds to preserve supplies for cities and limiting the amount that water rights holders may be able to divert this year.”
A MUCH SMALLER VERSION of this situation faces Mendocino County, of course. And Official Mendo, despite all the talk of forming a Water Agency and developing grant funded water storage and delivery projects, has done absolutely nothing to mitigate the problem or prepare for it.
WHAT’S KINDA SURPRISING is the silence of the Cheap Water Mafia about the looming drought’s impact on their grapes. We can only assume that they 1. know that expecting the County/Supervisors to do anything about the problem is a waste of effort/breath, or 2. Many of them have already siphoned off enough water to fill their ponds along the Russian River and don’t want to draw any more attention to the problem.
SUPERVISOR JOHN HASCHAK seems obsessed by the problem of water trucks delivering diminishing water supplies from private wells to illegal marijuana grows and expects to propose some rules to address that problem a little later this month, but that effort is already too late since the illegal pot market is way down and its water draw will be reduced accordingly, and it won’t do much to increase anybody’s already low water levels. In addition, Haschak’s proposal may also make it harder for legitimate water haulers to provide water to thirsty residents who are running out.
THAT FARM BUREAU report also includes a discussion of the rapidly increasing fuel costs on California’s sprawling agriculture. The inflationary pressure on California’s food producers affects fuel, propane and fertilizer costs, historically a significant part of a farmer’s budget.
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MENDO’S $310k WATER AGENCY CONSULTANT (GEI Consultants out of Rancho Cordova, Sacto area) to present “urgent” workplan for creation of County water agency amidst "unprecedented" drought conditions — sometime in July or August when he'll be consulting some more. Maybe.
The consulting contract was awarded in October of 2021 and now only five months later they’ve come up with a schedule which says they’ll give the Board “Final Work Plan” sometime in July or August. (Apparently no “work” has yet been done; just some planning to do some work…)
The only substantive item in their Tuesday presentation is entitled “Plan, construct, operate and maintain water supply facilities,” but the water agency will only have a “Support role” — somebody else (no one actually, there are no projects even being talked about) will have to do the actual planning, construction, operation and maintenance.
The consultant also lists “assist in grant preparation,” but even that “activity” is listed as “Support Role.”
Translation: Neither the consultant nor the Water Agency that may ensue months and months from now if not longer will do a damn thing about the actual water shortage or the drought. No mention of actual grant application preparation. No mention of requiring metering for ag wells, no mention of water project development. Nada, zilch, nothing.
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Supervisor Haschak’s Pet Water Project
Agenda Item 5c: “Discussion and Possible Action Including Direction to Staff Regarding Regulation of Water Extraction/Mining and Water Hauling (Sponsors: Supervisors Haschak and McGourty)
Recommended Action: Direct staff to implement proposals 4) Ban commercial water hauling to any destination at which the end user will be using the water for non-permitted commercial activities, 5) utilize existing law to require use permits for water extraction and amend the code to provide clarification of this existing requirement, and 6) Develop standard conditions and guidelines respecting use permits for water extraction with the input and assistance of the Planning Commission, and update the code accordingly, listed within the summary of request; bring back the remaining proposals for Board consideration in 6-12months, once there is more information regarding the anticipated staffing levels of the Mendocino County Water Agency and its capacity to take on new programs; and affirm that the Ad Hoc will continue to take public input on the matter.”
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Yes, you read that right: the proposals are number 4-6. No mention of 1, 2, or 3. And since Haschak thinks this problem needs urgent attention he wants the Planning Commission to “bring back the remaining proposals for Board consideration in 6-12 months” whatever those may be.
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‘Carmel’ Sets All-Time Mendo Whereas Record
A Consent Calendar Item (3f) for next Tuesday is entitled:
“Adoption of Proclamation Recognizing and Honoring Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Carmel J. Angelo For Her Years of Service Upon Her Retirement from the County of Mendocino
(Sponsors: Supervisor Williams and Executive Office)”
The “Proclamation” refers to the CEO as “Carmel” in a long parade of whereases — (go on line to our website or the Board Agenda if you want to read them. There are nine wordy whereases. This proclamation has shorted out County bullshit detectors from Gualala to Covelo.
As usual with Mendo’s whereas-laden golden send-offs, there’s not one actual accomplishment mentioned — unless, of course, you count “the first female Chief Executive Officer” as an accomplishment.
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SURPRISE! Camille Schraeder gets sole-source $1.8 million contract (with options for four more sole-source years) to operate the Crisis Residential Treatment house (a $1 million four-bedroom house next door to Ms. Schraeder that the County paid $5 million of Measure B money for) for two years. Oddly, the County plans to “lease” the $5 million crisis house to Ms. Schraeder for $12 [sic] a year.
Essentially, $5.5 million awarded on the consent agenda!
Consent Agenda Item: 3r) Approval of Agreement with Redwood Community Services, Inc. in the Amount of $911,058 per Year, with a Total of $1,822,116 for a Two-Year Period, to Provide Residential Treatment Facility Operations and Crisis Residential Services on a Transitional Basis to Mendocino County Adults, Age 18and Older, Who Are Experiencing a Mental Health Crisis, Effective Upon Full Execution and for Two Years Thereafter, With the Option to Extend for Up to Two Additional Two-Year Periods for a Total of Six Years.
ANOTHER large sole-source gift to Ms. Schraeder and her Redwood Community Services outfit was delivered at the Supervisors’ March 1 meeting, also on the consent agenda:
Consent Item 3ai) Approval of Agreement with Redwood Community Services, Inc. in the Amount of $719,712.00 to Provide Facilitation of Restorative Youth Justice Court Services for the Period to Commence Upon Approval of Agreement through October 31, 2024 Recommended Action: Approve agreement with Redwood Community Services, Inc. in the amount of $719,712.00 to provide facilitation of Restorative Youth Justice Court Services for the period to commence upon approval of agreement through October 31, 2024; authorize the Chief Probation Officer to sign any future amendments to the agreement that do not increase the contract dollar amount; and authorize Chair to sign same.
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