Mendocino County Today: Sunday, April 3, 2022

Front Coming | Noyo | Ukraine | Poppies | Rental Needed | Gardening Workshop | Pet Ruger | PG&E Devastation | Soccer Ninos | Unassessed Properties | Erratic Behavior | Loggers | Consent Calendar | Chalfants | Bond Supporters | Slappy | Hutchins Campaign | Yesterday's Catch | Spider Death | Stop Thief | Drug Problem | Academy Calling | Rowe Bros | Bad Joke | Four Chiefs | Climate Playbook | Carbon Tax | Container House | Marco Radio | Russell Kelley | Elite Victims | Sorrel | Amazon Union | Blake & Weiss

CLOUDS WILL PREVAIL most of today along the coast north of Cape Mendocino today, with a mix of clouds and sun along with cooler high temperatures inland. Rain will push in ahead of a cold front late tonight into Monday, with an inch or so around Del Norte County. High pressure building in to our north will result in dry, sunny and warm weather from Tuesday through Friday. (NWS)

RUSSIA-UKRAINE WAR: what we know on day 38 of the Russian invasion

Volodymyr Zelensky says Russia is trying to recruit conscripts from Crimea, as Kyiv denies being behind oil depot attack

by Helen Davidson and Dani Anguiano

Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky has said the military situation in the country’s east remained extremely difficult. He repeated warnings that Russia was preparing for strikes in the Donbas region and Kharkiv. In a video address late on Friday, he said Russian troops in the north of the country were slowly pulling back.

Zelensky also said that Russia was trying to conscript troops from Crimea, but said that being drafted to fight in Ukraine was “guaranteed death for many young guys”. He warned their families: “We don’t need more dead people here. Save your children so they do not become villains. Don’t send them.”

Ukraine exchanged 86 members of their armed forces with Russia today, according to senior Ukrainian officials.

Russia says Ukrainian helicopters attacked an oil storage facility in Belgorod, Russia, about 16 miles from the border and close to Kharkiv, destroying fuel tanks. Ukrainian officials have denied their forces were involved.

The UK Ministry of Defense says the destruction of oil tanks at a depot in the Russian city of Belgorod means probable loss of fuel and ammunition supplies to invading forces. It will likely add more strain to Russia’s already stretched logistic chains. Supplies to Russian forces encircling Kharkhiv may be particularly affected.

The US department of defense will provide an additional $300 million in security assistance to Ukraine, to include laser-guided rocket systems, drones, and commercial satellite imagery services.

The US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, earlier spoke with Ukraine’s foreign minister Dmytro Kulebo today and discussed “ways the US allies and partners are helping Ukraine defend against Putin’s unprovoked and unjustified war”, Blinken said.

The US State Department said Washington will continue to provide support to Ukraine and won’t push the country to make concessions in negotiations with Russia following a report that said Britain was concerned the US, France and Germany will push Ukraine to “settle” in a peace deal.

The US military has cancelled plans to test an intercontinental ballistic missile in an effort to reduce tensions with Russia.

Zelensky also said more than 3,000 people had been led to safety from the besieged city of Mariupol. More than 6,000 in total had been rescued from Mariupol, Donetsk, Luhansk, and Zaporizhzhia. The International Committee of the Red Cross said it had been unable to reach the city but will try again to evacuate civilians on Saturday.

The Hollywood actor Sean Penn has called for a billionaire to come forward and buy two squadrons of F-15 or F-16 aircraft for Ukraine in an unlikely attempt to tip the scales against the Russian invaders in the five-week-old war.

European governments have more time to figure out how they are going to act on Russia’s demand to pay for Russia gas in rubles after the Kremlin said today that it would not immediately halt gas supplies.

Around 200 Ukrainian national guard members have likely been taken prisoner by the Russian troops as they withdrew from the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, the mayor of Slavutych, Yuri Fomichev, said.

(theGuardian.com)

CANDACE HORSLEY took this photo of poppies in bloom in the Evert Person Courtyard at the Grace Hudson Museum in Ukiah. (Mike Geniella)

ERNIE PARDINI: I have been informed that the house in Boonville that I'm renting has been put on the market for sale and my landlord called today to say that he has a potential buyer and it looks as though the sale will go through. In light of that fact, I will be in need of another house to rent, so if anyone has a house for rent or knows of a house for rent in the Boonville area, please let me know. I have an excellent reference in my present landlord who will vouch for the fact that my rent is always on time and that his rental has been very well taken care of. Thank you.

GARDENING WORKSHOP, APRIL 9TH 

I will be offering a gardening class/workshop on Sunday April 9th at the Noyo Food Forest Learning Garden in Fort Bragg. My co-instructor is Veronica Storms the NFF garden manager. We will meet in the shade house at 10:00am and I will be speaking about how to care for and cultivate healthy garden soil with time for questions and discussion. At about 11:00 we will move outside to look at fertilizers, compost, worm castings, cover crops, sheet mulch, and have some demonstrations and hands on practice of different methods of preparing garden beds including double digging and using a broad fork. 

The cost for class is $30 and class size will be limited. The shade house is a large covered outdoor space with plenty of fresh air and room for distancing. If you would like to sign-up please reply to this email. You will receive a confirmation that you are signed up and another email later to confirm your place before the class. You can pay on the day of the class. 

Happy Gardening 

Sakina Bush <sakina@mcn.org> 

UKIAH SHELTER PET OF THE WEEK Ruger is happy as can be, and likes to be with people. He seeks out attention and thinks of himself as a lap dog. Ruger will definitely want a home where he is inside, with lots of time to spend enjoying his new family. Ruger is mellow indoors, and cheerful outside. This handsome hound sure enjoys his walks! Ruger is a nice medium-sized dog who appears friendly with other dogs. Ruger is 4 years old and 59 hound pounds. 

If you can’t adopt right now, think about fostering. Our website has information about our FOSTER PROGRAM: mendoanimalshelter.com And don’t forget our on-going SPRING CANINE ADOPTION EVENT—half off adoption fees for all spayed/neutered dogs 6 months and older at the Ukiah and Ft. Bragg Shelters! While you’re at our website, check out all of our canine and feline guests, our services, programs, events, and updates. Visit us on Facebook at: https://www.facebook.com/mendoanimalshelter/ 

For information about adoptions, please call 707-467-6453. 

‘SHOCK AND AWE’: WILLITS AREA RESIDENTS GRAPPLE WITH PG&E’S TREE FALLING OPERATIONS

In spite of scathing, high-profile rebukes for its efforts to increase wildfire safety, public outcry against PG&E has been slow-moving and small-scale. And a proposed Senate Bill  is poised to strengthen the rights of utilities to fell trees around lines on private property.

Neighbors on Hilltop Drive in Willits speak of little else when they meet each other on the road. But very few neighborhoods have mounted an organized response to the utility’s enhanced vegetation management program. “PG&E has been masterful at dealing with all of us individually,” noted Lauren Robertson of Pine Mountain, another Willits neighborhood where residents are bewildered over the extent of the tree removal taking place. 

“This has been like shock and awe,” added her neighbor, Susan Monteleone. “Nobody knows what the heck is going on, who to call.”…

kymkemp.com/2022/04/03/shock-and-awe-willits-area-residents-grapple-with-pges-tree-falling-operations/

SUPERVISOR WILLIAMS: Mendocino BoS - April 5, 2022 - item 5a

Discussion and Possible Action Including Approval of Direction to Staff to Estimate Cost of Contractor to Assist Assessor in Tax Rolls Catch Up and Reserve Necessary Funds from American Recovery Plan Act Allocation (Sponsor: Supervisor Williams)

Taxpayers are not receiving the services and infrastructure they deserve due to a significant pool of structures remaining untaxed. We have an outstanding Assessor, but the office cannot catch up anytime soon without a greater workforce. The board previously directed staff to prioritize American Recovery Plan Act funding of projects which would provide an ongoing return on investment. No other project comes close to the return on investment of bringing assessment up to date. A third party contractor can provide data to our Assessor's office, accelerating our internal catch up.

A volunteer assisted Supervisor Williams in counting supposedly vacant parcels within a 1.5-mile radius of the volunteer's home. The count was 47. Public safety, roads, and so much more depend on the fair collection of taxes.

UKIAH MAN ACCUSED OF SPARKING THE DESTRUCTIVE HOPKINS FIRE Ordered To Undergo Psychiatric Treatment To Restore Competency To Stand Trial

On September 12, 2021, the Hopkins Fire roared through the Mendocino County community destroying homes and forcing the evacuation of thousands of nearby residents. 

Two days later, a 20-year-old Ukiah man by the name of Devin Johnson was arrested and accused of lighting the flames that would swell to the county’s most destructive fire of 2021. As a result, he has been charged with one count of arson which could result in a prison sentence of ten years to life.

As per reporting by Colin Atagi published in the Press Democrat, Johnson’s criminal trial is on hold after officials deemed him not competent to stand trial after displaying erratic behavior in the courtroom. Johnson will undergo a jail-based competency program attempting to restore his ability to stand trial.

kymkemp.com/2022/04/03/ukiah-man-accused-of-sparking-the-destructive-hopkins-fire-ordered-to-undergo-psychiatric-treatment-to-restore-competency-to-stand-trial/

$4.2 MILLION FOR RETROACTIVE DISPATCH SERVICES ON TUESDAY’S SUPES AGENDA

by Mark Scaramella

The last item on Tuesday’s Supervisors meeting consent calendar is a retroactive, five year, $4.2 million renewal of Mendo’s emergency dispatch services contract with CalFire.

REPEAT: That’s $4.2 million over five years on the consent calendar, meaning it's an automatic go, no discussion called for.

We’re not against it. We get our money's worth from Calfire. 

But retroactive, big dollar contracts should not be on the consent calendar.

Besides, there’s some important neglected history to this particular contract.

In October of 2017 the Supervisors narrowly decided to retain CalFire as the operator of the County’s fire and emergency services dispatch center by a split 3-2 vote after having voted 3-1 to put the dispatch contract out to private bidders the week before.

The County gives hundreds of thousands of dollars a year to an unaccountable obscure Sonoma County agency called “Coastal Valleys Emergency Management Services for administrative oversight of Mendo’s emergency services. Unlike Calfire, we don’t get our money’s worth from them.

In 2017 they pushed for a dispatch privatization proposal until Supervisor Dan Gjerde got back from vacation and convinced temporary-fill-in Supervisor Georgeanne Croskey that putting Calfire’s local dispatch operation out to bid was a bad idea. So Croskey changed her earlier vote and joined Gjerde and McCowen in postponing the Dispatch privatization indefinitely.

After that re-vote the Board voted for the “Formation of an ad hoc committee to work with the City of Ukiah and possibly the City of Willits to form a unified approach for Emergency Medical Services (EMS) and Fire Dispatch Services; and to negotiate with CalFire for enhanced dispatch services that will optimize an Exclusive Operating Area ambulance contract.”

Supervisors Carre Brown and Dan Hamburg, after having voted against Calfire in 2017 for no other reason than the overpaid and underserviced Coastal Valleys EMS Agency had recommended it. They petulantly refused to volunteer to even be considered for the ad hoc committee which was supposed to consolidate dispatch services to save money for the County and the agencies involved.

Hamburg and Brown, citing a version of staff-(i.e., Coastal Valley EMS) right-or-wrong, steadfastly refused to reconsider — even when faced with a phalanx of local firefighters and cops who explained in detail why privatizing Dispatch was a very bad idea.

In explaining at that time why she had no interest in saving the County and the City of Ukiah some dispatch money by consolidation, Brown specifically referred to the prior week’s 3-2 vote to hold off on the Dispatch RFP, adding that she was sure Supervisor Hamburg felt the same way. “Thank you, Supervisor Brown,” replied Hamburg, indicating his solidarity with Brown’s nonsensical refusal. 

Supervisors McCowen and Croskey were appointed to the dispatch consolidation ad hoc committee in 2017, but not until Brown and Hamburg had again reminded the other three Supes that they had no intention of participating in the “cooperative” manner they always talk about.

* * *

Fast forward to January of 2019, right after Supervisor Ted Williams was seated to replace Hamburg as Fifth District Supervisor when the following item was quietly approved on the Consent Calendar:

“Approval of Formation of an Ad Hoc Committee Regarding Contracting for Dispatch Services for Fire and Emergency Medical Services and Appointment of Supervisors Williams and McCowen.”

The Board Clerk conveniently noted: “Previous Board/Board Committee Actions: On October 3, 2017 the Board appointed Supervisors Croskey and McCowen to an ad hoc committee regarding contracting for dispatch services; on December 18, 2018 the ad hoc was disbanded due to Supervisor Croskey’s impending departure from the Board.”

Supervisors McCowen and Croskey’s committee had produced nothing in 14 months before their ad hoc was unceremoniously disbanded when Supervisor Croskey up and moved to Ohio without having done a single thing in her short tenure after having been appointed to finish out Supervisor Tom Woodhouse’s similarly accomplishment-free term when he resigned for mental health reasons.

So the Dispatch consolidation committee re-established itself in 2019 with newly seated Supervisor Ted Williams replacing Croskey along with McCowen.

That committee also produced nothing. We have no idea if they even met because ad hoc committees are not subject to Brown Act meeting requirements.

* * *

Introducing himself as “Tom Allman, private citizen,” former Sheriff Allman raised the subject again at a January 2020 Board meeting.

Allman patiently explained that Mendo has five overlapping 911 dispatch centers — the understaffed and underfunded Willits Police Department has one, the Ukiah Police Department (which, oddly, also handles Fort Bragg), the Sheriff's office for unincorporated calls, the Highway Patrol has its own, and Calfire. Nine people work in five dispatch centers in the middle of the night when few calls come in. Allman noted that there’s lots of money to be saved by “working with our other entities and having just two 911 centers — one for fire and ambulance, and one for law enforcement.” Allman pointed out that a consolidated dispatch operation could also operate as an emergency operations center during disasters.

Any other place but here consolidation would be a no-brainer; all they had to do was work out some details.

Newly elected Third District Supervisor and then Board Chair John Haschak replied to Allman as he and his colleagues often do with nothing more than: “Thank you.” 

Ignoring Allman’s practical suggestion, the Supervisors rambled on aimlessly and at length about committees and meetings, and groups and ad hoc this and ad hoc that.

Supervisor Ted Williams seemed to vaguely agree with Allman but he thought the only way to solve it was to throw money at it.

“It's been nine years since the Fitch [inland Ambulance services] study. It's been nine years of Let's have meetings, let's get fire people in the room, let's get ambulance providers in the room, send it out to this committee or that and we haven't gotten anywhere. This situation is worse today than it was nine years ago. It may be that we have to get a group together, but I only want to do that if funding is a possibility. We need to get a group together to address creative solutions to the outlying areas. But if it's not backed by public money I don't see how we are going to make progress. We have gone through that exercise n-times. Why has there been no estimate of the cost, why are we still talking about this a decade later? Where is the breakdown?”

No one knew, probably because there are no mirrors in the Supervisors chambers.

This was followed by more talk about plans and committees and meetings and funding.

It was so lame and unfocused that AVA reporter Malcolm Macdonald was moved to try to light a fire under the Board.

Macdonald: “I live on a ranch where one side of my family has lived since the 1800s. If you break a leg or an ankle there you crawl up the hill to the nearest relative or friend or neighbor, you get in a car and drive to Willits and hope that Dr. Bolan or one of his proteges is on call that day. That's the reality in this county. If you are on the coast in the past you might see Dr. Lagomarsino. That's the reality of being in a rural area. I am hearing a lot of obfuscation here. You have an opportunity to do something. But you would rather form a committee to start a study to form an ad hoc to get some ‘stakeholders’ which may be real stakeholders maybe not. It ends up just being a runaround and runaround and the runaround and we are still here. … You have people here interested in your legacies. With this runaround you are going to abrogate your responsibility to public safety right now. It's already happened. You can't change the past. But if you are going to go down this ‘form a committee to form a something to form a something else’ — that's ridiculous! As I used his say to my students: catch a clue. They are flying by all the time. Maybe you have to do some piecemeal things. Maybe you need a countywide plan. But that may not be possible unless you want to wait for six or eight or ten more years and we are talking about supervisor Williams’s legacy. Catch a freakin’ clue! This has to happen in the here and now. You better set some dates and hear from people with experience in ambulances. Make them come up here and talk to you.”

Allman agreed: “This is a critical time. We are coming up on these summer months. Whatever you decide, I certainly suggest that you do a six-month quick fix while we talk about what kind of solution there is going to be. Whether it's MedStar or the Fort Bragg ambulance, let's get somebody who is going to commit to being up in the north quarter of the county as soon as possible. Then we can have a conversation about how we are going to solve the problem.”

Allman’s short-term, quick-fix/bandaid suggestion was ignored and the Board voted unanimously to ask Coastal Valleys EMS Mendocino coordinator Jen Banks to come up with a financial summary of the situation for further discussion at an upcoming meeting. Which she later did, albeit only partially, but only when the Board was handing out PG&E settlement money, a little of which went to County ambulance services. But it had nothing to do with dispatch services. 

And the subject went away again.

No one followed up on Allman’s dispatch consolidation proposal where large amounts of money could be saved and dispatch efficiency enhanced, with saved funds perhaps re-allocated to underfunded and understaffed ambulance services.

A few days after that 2020 meeting, Supervisor Ted Williams posted this comment on the Fifth District facebook page:

“I ask you to watch the ambulance discussion from our Tuesday BoS meeting. It's long. What I submitted as a fifteen minute item consumed two hours. It began somewhat contentious, but in the end I was proud of the full board for engagement, asking critical questions and hearing varied messages from the field. More questions than answers, but with the board better aligned on the problems, I left confident that we're on the initial phase of identifying solutions. Years into an ambulance crisis, we don't have the core causes documented. That's about to change.”

Of course, not only did nothing change, but the subject hasn’t even come up again since then.

Now it’s April of 2022 and in all likelihood the subject will continue to be ignored. In fact, even the Calfire contract renewal itself has been ignored for nine months.

April 5, 2022. Consent Calendar Item 3aw: “Approval of Retroactive Agreement with California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (Cal Fire) in an Amount not to Exceed $4,165,206 for Fire and Emergency Dispatch Services, Effective July 1, 2021 (our emphasis) through June 30, 2026; and Adoption of Resolution Authorizing Mendocino County to Enter into Agreement with Cal Fire to Provide Fire and Emergency Medical Dispatch Services.”

The $4.2 million Calfire contract expired in June of last year and is only now being put up for retroactive renewal on the consent calendar.

In all likelihood this item, like the ad hoc committee that was formed years ago, will not be discussed on Tuesday, and the prospect of saving millions and gaining substantial operational efficiencies will be tossed down Mendo’s expanding memory hole along the Board’s and the CEO’s long list of major failures and dropped opportunities.

In the last few weeks, we have pointed out a number of those major failures, such as:

Failure to deal with non-reimbursable mental health and drug-addled residents as Measure B called for.

Picking a pointless fight with the Sheriff over computer independence and liability for ordinary budget overruns.

Failure to enforce Measure V to reduce standing dead tree fire hazards, consigned to the County Counsel’s office two years ago and never mentioned again.

Failure to revise the pot ordinance after their latest use-permit proposal was withdrawn in the face of a pending local initiative, leaving the County and well-meaning applicants in permanent limbo.

Failure to plan or budget for their ill-considered consolidated Chief Financial Officer office despite voting it into existence with no plan or analysis.

Failure to convene their Public Safety Advisory Board despite its incorporation in County Code more than a year ago.

Failure to follow advisory Measure AG which was supposed to allocate the majority of pot tax revenues to Mental Health, Roads, Emergency Services and enforcement. In fact, nobody has even asked for a tally of those revenues for purposes of proper allocation.

We could go on and on.

But, as we learned at CEO Angelo’s teary send-off last month, the Board views criticisms of the CEO or themselves as “unfounded personal attacks.”

AV UNIFIED SCHOOL BOND SUPPORT GROWS

Confirmed Endorsements

• Donna Pierson Pugh, Retired School Principal
• Richard “Dick” Browning, Retired School Administrator and Board Member
• Philip Thomas, Retired Teacher and Senior Center Treasurer
• Michael “Flick” MacDonald, Retired Teacher and Coach
• Jim Boudoures, Philo Saw Works
• Pilar Echeverria, Business Owner
• Robert Pinoli, AVHS Retired Teacher/Athletic Director; Current Commissioner Coastal Mountain Conference
• Melinda Ellis, Business Owner
• Ric Bonner, Anderson Valley Health Center Board President
• JR Collins, Retired Superintendent 
• Dr. Leah Collins, Anderson Valley Health Center
• Star White, Parent
• Kathy Cox, Retired Teacher
• Deb and Ted Cahn Bennett, Navarro Vineyards/Pennyroyal Farms
• Sarah Bennett, Navarro Vineyards/Pennyroyal Farms
• Aaron Bennett, Parent Co-Owner Navarro Vineyards/Pennyroyal Farms
• Kathleen Bennett, Human Resources Navarro Vineyards/Pennyroyal FaRms 
• Aaron Wellington, Parent
• Erika Damian, Parent
• Veronica Barragan, Public Employee
• Linnea Totten, Retired Teacher
• Robert Day Retired Contractor
• Emilia Theobald, Teacher
• Doug Leach
• Bruce and Ling Anderson
• Mario Espinoza
• Gabriela Henderson
• Chrissy deVall
• Deanna Branesky
• Michael Mannix
• Rob Risucci
• Mark Reffle
• Teresa Markofer
• Ana Ramirez
• Maria Ramierez
• Joshua Treespirit
• May Ann Grzenda
• Jill Derwinsk
• Charlotte Triplett
• Guadalupe Espinoza
• Ricardo and Francisca Suarez
• David Ballantine
• Noor Dawood
• Ali Cook
• Julie Honegger
• Keevan Labowitz
• Martin Quezada 
• Leigh Kreienhop
• Nat Corey-Moran
• Eden Kellner
• Chloe Guazzone
• Maria Villamor
• Ginny Roemer
• Ana Maria Guerrero
• Erika Echeverria
• Moses Perez
• Greg Potter
• Dawn Emery Ballantine
• Sophie Otis
• Helen Papke
• Wendy Kein
• Linda Mendoza
• Dan Reed
• Evan Marie Petit
• Maricela Balandran
• Nicholas Benett
• Elizabeth Wyant
• Elizabeth and Wallen Summers
• Cymbre Thomas-Swett
• A. Balandran
• Anna Farquar
• Mary Pat Palmer
• Lauren Goldsmith
• Marta McKenzie
• Clem Donahue
• Efrain Garcia
• Gabriela Lena Frank
• Kelly Griere
• Daniel P. Horton
• Cloey Bloyd
• Scott Zarness
• Kevin Jones
• Gerald Karp
• Captain Rainbow
• Torey Douglas
• William Ross 
• Stephanie Tebbutt
• Jan Pallazola
• Star White
• Casey Farber
• Rob Goodall
• Marry Paffard
• Stephanie Gold
• Edwin Nieves
• Dawn Trygstad
• Deborah Cahn
• Jessica Trombley
• Jeffrey Pugh
• Preston Metter
• Caroline Blair
• Dennis Johnson
• Claire Walker English
• Evetee La Paille-Thomas
• Zack Anderson
• Mark Scaramella
• Gwyn Leeman Smith
• Ann Gibson
• Ann Christen
• Francois Christen
• Gail Gester
• Ron Gester
• Sharon Korn

FROM MICHELLE HUTCHINS Mendocino County Superintendent of Schools

We've launched my re-election campaign!

Visit my website, learn about my work in my first term and why experience matters.

Dear friends and supporters,

I’m overwhelmed at the support we are getting; I am excited to tell you that our website is live! You can read all about our accomplishments in my first term, keeping kids safe and our schools improving. We look forward to the next four years with your continued help and support.

Kick off Celebration April 10

We’d be thrilled to have you join us for a Kick-Off Celebration on April 10. Music with John & Anita Wagenet from Twining Time, other entertainment, and snacks in a beautiful outdoor setting overlooking Willits.

Sunday April 10. 1 - 3 pm. at the Wagenet Pond, 23931 Sherwood Road, Willits. Watch for orange marker for turn off from Sherwood Road. Stay to the right past the gate, then stay to the left past the pond. Parking is on the right.

Saturday April 30. 1 - 3 pm. Lynda McClure is hosting a Meet and Greet with Michelle on April 30 from 1-3 pm. At the Mendo Dragon Community, 9870 Grey Fox Road, Boonville.

For more information on both events call Michelle at 707 496-9725 - email mhutchins@mcn.org or Lynda McClure at 707 272-0580 - lynda@pacific.net

Thanks for all your support!

Re-Elect Michelle Hutchins Mendocino County Superintendent of Schools

1801 Hearst Willits Rd

Willits, CA 95490-9738

CATCH OF THE DAY, April 2, 2022

MARIC ARRIAGA, Ukiah. Controlled substance, disobeying court order, failure to appear.

ANDRES FUENTES-LUCERO, Ukiah. Failure to appear, probation revocation. 

JEFFREY SCHNEIDER, Ukiah. Disorderly conduct-alcohol, criminal threats.

RAYMOND SMITH JR., Redwood Valley. Domestic battery, Assault with firearm, criminal threats.

RANDI SPENCER, Ukiah. Controlled substance, paraphernalia, conspiracy.

CHRISTOPHER THOMAS, Ukiah. Disorderly conduct-drugs&alcohol.

JULIE WINKELMEYER, Mendocino. DUI with prior, resisting, probation revocation.

MY SPIDER PROBLEM

by Bill Grimes

Spider, spider in the sink

Trolling for a simple drink

Then I worry late at night

Does it linger out of sight?

I can’t sleep. Again, another night.

It’s the thought of death that triumphs over the nightly ingested 10MG tablet of Zolpidem that increasingly occupies my mind. Why would it not when my 81st birthday passed yesterday?

Not that I think there is an afterlife. No heaven or hell or any consciousness. I believe being dead will be like before birth. Nothingness. What I think is that dying could be painful. I am not good with physical pain, being luckily spared from much of it. 

The things I think about now living alone. Never needed Ambien when in bed with a woman. 

This evening after spending hours at my desk writing what I hope will be my first novel, I went to the bathroom, switched on the light, and to my shock I saw a spider in the sink. Black as coal, its body about the size of a dime, seeking a drink of water I assumed.

I wanted it out of the sink, out of my cottage. How to do that?

My thought was to dampen the wash cloth and use it to pick up the spider and drop it down the toilet. No, too dangerous; the spider might be able to bite through it. I pulled the handle of the sink stopper, turned on the spigot to drown the spider. I watched as the water rose in the sink, mesmerized by how the spider fought for its life, its eight legs frantically clamoring up the enamel curl. I watched the creature’s gallant struggle to live, an evolutionary instinct more fundamental than reproduction. 

I thought how it must feel to be in a situation of a continuous struggle to live. And the spider’s fight against impossible odds.

Seconds turned into a minute and still the unwelcome visitor fought an unwinnable battle it never imagined. I thought drowning would be a painful death, no doctor, no drugs, only my lungs filling with water, breath receding. Pain.

I took a wash cloth soaked it in spigot water and put the spider out of its pain and life. 

I felt a need to know more about spiders. A Google search told me spiders procreate like we do, using his pedipalps (appendages) attached to its head and thorax which are used as sensory organs to insert the male’s sperm into both the female spider's genital openings. Unlike us usually, after sex the male kills the female or the reverse.

I got into bed, pulled the covers up, and thought about bygone nights of sex and wondering how my ending might come.

ON LINE COMMENT OF THE DAY

We need to start enforcing drug laws and stop enabling drug users. California homeless crisis is also a drug crisis. We need to stop using the $12,000,000,000 (12 billion) toward housing first programs and shift that state money to drug programs for the unhoused. We have an opportunity to stop two crisis - homelessness and drug addiction - if we use the money that the state has toward drug programs and mental illness facilities. If we keep pursuing the "housing first" method, we will continue to waste money on programs that do not work (California's homeless population has increased despite spending $13 billion in the last two year). Demand that funding for homeless services goes primarily into drug rehab, mental illness and programs for the previously incarcerated. We need to stop "harm reduction" programs that give people needles. Instead, we need harm reduction that collects dirty needles, gives fentanyl strips, and drug counseling. We need to start ticketing for open drug use. We need to make it harder - not easier - to purchase and use drugs. PD - thank you for running this story. It is important information.

FLY ON THE WALL: THE SLAP

by Ishmael Reed

Will Smith is not holding the Oscar; the Oscar is standing in front of him. His B-Boy dance is as good as Crazy Legs, the Bronx dancer who perfected the dance. A crowd is gathered around the two. Oscar does a little Lindy Hop move as a nod to tradition, picking up Will and flipping him over his shoulder. The people shout, “Go Oscar go.” But then a life-sized dollar bill cuts in. Shows that it has some moves too. Smartphone rings so loudly that it almost bounces off the table.

Will wakes up. He’s gripping the Oscar, sliding his hand up and down on it.

WILL: Who the fuck is calling me at 6 a.m.? I’m Will Smith. I just won an Oscar—

ACADEMY: This is the Academy, asshole.

WILL: (Wakes real quick). O, sorry, Sir. Didn’t recognize your voice.

ACADEMY: What was that shit you pulled last night?

WILL: I see it as my duty to defend Black women wherever they might be. Chris Rock insulted my wife. Both Black and white women applauded my gallantry. Gave their approval to my battering a Black man before a worldwide audience. Even feminists. They said that in this case battery was ok.

ACADEMY: Bullshit. You laughed at the joke. You embarrassed the Academy all over the world. We got that name Academy from the Greeks to show that we’re not some cheap outfit pushing car chases and big-screen video games and PlayStations. We have class, yet here you come messing with our image. I thought that you people would keep that Black-on-Black crime shit in the streets. No, you had to bring that crap into our august surroundings. You frightened Nicole Kidman.

WILL: But it was a question of my manhood.

ACADEMY: Even the Williams’ father, a certifiable nut, said that you were wrong. I was the one who recommended that we allow you Black Americans to be admitted to the awards ceremony in the first place. Others were against it. They said that you were violent and I’d regret it. You didn’t see the Nigerian actors up there on the stage punching each other out. One of them was dressed like a lion tamer. And the Latinos put on a great show and whatever complaints they had about Tony Kushner and Steve Spielberg’s view of Puerto Rican life, they kept to themselves. And the women cooperated. Gave up that #MeToo shit for the evening. They showed their tits and asses. And Regina Hall gave those actors a pat-down in their private places. You had to blow it. Now I could kick myself for promoting diversity. It was my idea to let Black people escort the Oscar winners on and off the stage. I hired 3 women comedians to narrate the show even though we had trouble getting one down and out of her flying-harness rigging. And what thanks do I get. And we’re going to lose money on that film where you play a guy who gives his organs away. Every time they see that movie they’re going to think of you assaulting Chris Rock, a little guy. And then you started cussing.

WILL: I thought that you blipped that out.

ACADEMY: It got through in some countries. Parents had to hide their children. And then you got up and made that weeping incoherent speech, the most self-pitying speech since Nixon’s when he lost the California governorship. They asked you to leave and you refused. You’re lucky that we didn’t call the cops. Look Smith. We made you and we can break you.

WILL: What should I do, Sir?

ACADEMY: You apologize to Chris Rock.

WILL: What? I have my pride.

ACADEMY: Well we’ll get one of those Nigerian fellows to do your next film. The Nigerians studied acting in England.

WILL: But—

ACADEMY: You don’t like the Hollywood lifestyle? $42m Calabasas home? The cars: Maybach 57 S, Rolls Royce Ghost, the Bentley Azure, the 1965 Ford Mustang?

WILL: Ok. Ok. I’ll write an apology.

ACADEMY: It’s written. Check your in-box.

(Hangs up.)

The End

(courtesy, CounterPunch.org)

FRAN LIEBOWITZ ON THE SLAP:

I’d like to first say that I think it’s ridiculous they still have the Oscars. I am old, so if I think it’s old-fashioned, how old-fashioned could it be? For years, I’ve been saying, ‘This is absurd, this is something from another era, they shouldn’t have this anymore.’ In a way it’s like if they were having a butter-churning contest. 

In addition, people who are up for Oscars are among the most highly and overly rewarded people on planet Earth, they don’t also have to be given golden knickknacks.

Truthfully, there are not even movies anymore — the movie business, in the way that people think of it, is gone, so move on.

In regards to Will Smith, here’s what I think: You don’t get to hit someone because you don’t like a joke. It’s unbelievable to me that that was tolerated, and it was tolerated. They let him sit there for the whole hour or however long it was until he got his award.

Will Smith was well aware that he was on television. It’s not like he lost his temper or something because there was too much time between those two things. He didn’t jump up right away, he sat there at first, he laughed, though I’m sure he didn’t think it was funny. Everyone knows, if you’re sitting there, there’s a high chance you’re on TV and that is why, when they announce the winners, they shoot to the audience and they show the losers, and all the losers know that they’re being shot and they smile and they applaud, even though they’re thinking, ‘I should’ve won!’

It’s not the first time someone got angry at a joke, but it was outrageous to me that he did that, it was outrageous to me that they let him sit there, but most outrageous was that self-serving, self-regarding speech that he made with the tears — which were for himself — and the way that he talked about himself, which is not uncommon in Hollywood. These people talk about themselves like they’re countries. They’re actors, they’re not countries! ‘I’m a vessel, I’m a river’ — I thought, ‘You are an actor! This is not actually the highest form of human life.’ That speech was ridiculous and outrageous.

I know Chris, and one thing I know about Chris is that he’s a very slight guy, physically. He’s not terribly short, but he’s slight; Will Smith is at least twice his size, so that alone is a kind of bullying.

Chris has wisely not said a thing, and I think that’s the best way for him to go because what could he say?

A lot of people tell me that when Will Smith got up, they thought it was a bit, but I didn’t. I knew that he was going to hit him because I could see by the way he was walking that it was real. I also could see — and I hate to use the word ‘thought’ in regard to whatever went through his mind, such as it is — but he knew he was going to do it, and it seemed pretty clear to me that Chris didn’t, because naturally it’s really unusual for someone to get up and hit someone during the Oscars.

I don’t recall it ever happening before, even though I’m certain that there’s never been an Oscars where tons of people didn’t feel like hitting one another, because the Oscars is a competition. People can smile when they lose, but they’re angry. There’s a lot of emotion, there’s a lot of tension; it’s very competitive, it’s very important to these people.

One thing that really angered me as a woman was when people said [Will Smith was] defending his wife. And I thought to myself, ‘Really?’ First of all, did Chris hit his wife? If Chris had hit his wife then he should’ve been arrested, but he didn’t hit his wife, he told a joke that was not funny. It was a bad joke. He told a bad joke about his wife, but that doesn’t mean you get to hit him. If she had gotten up and slapped him, it would’ve been outrageous, but a little less outrageous from the point of view of women. The wife can defend herself if she needs to be defended.

No one should hit people because they don’t like a joke. First of all, this is a terrible precedent because most comedians tell lots of jokes that are bad, most jokes are not funny, most people are not that good at their job. Does it mean now that someone can get up from the audience and hit you? It’s totally ridiculous.

That should be it for the Oscars. This is a good excuse. They should say, ‘Well, we’re not going to have it anymore because we don’t want everyone to get hit.’

There was some kind of statement from the Academy saying they’re going to look into it — what do you mean ‘look into it?’ Millions of people saw it live. It’s like looking into the January 6 riot — I’m not comparing them in importance, but we have a movie of these crimes, we all saw these crimes in real time. Everyone saw it.

It was really unfair if you care about the Oscars — which I don’t — for all the people that follow that because what Will Smith did was take all the attention and keep it on himself, and he still has it on himself two days later — and that, by the way, is the goal of all actors.

THE LEFT’S CLIMATE PLAYBOOK IS ALREADY OUTDATED

Russia and inflation are pushing America into a new climate era.

In the United States, the philosophy behind many of the most important progressive climate proposals of the past few years—such as the Green New Deal and Joe Biden’s climate plan—was premised on three ideas. Each was rooted in a diagnosis of the 2010s economy—and each, unfortunately, is looking more and more out of date.

theatlantic.com/science/archive/2022/03/left-climate-playbook-biden-russia/629425/

LEAVE IT IN THE GROUND

Editor,

In his recently published Marin Voice commentary (“Producing oil allows U.S. to break fossil-fuel reliance,” March 19), author Todd Hooper writes that we can reduce dependence on oil by increasing the amount we produce. But as long as we depend on oil, we’ll have price shocks.

Global commodities are subject to hiccups in supply and demand. They’re traded on Wall Street, which profits from the price volatility we’re seeing now. A few speculators are getting very rich at our expense. This is how the system is designed to work.

If we truly want cheap energy that isn’t subject to price volatility or susceptible to weaponization by corrupt nations like Russia, the answer is obvious: Replace fossil fuels with energy resources using fuels that can’t be commodified, like the sun and wind.

A big, practical step toward price stability and true energy independence would be to put an annually escalating national tax on fossil fuels. Return all revenue to individuals in equal shares. Start the tax low, but raise it meaningfully every year, to give everyone a reasonable time horizon to phase into new energy sources.

The return of the revenue from the carbon tax would protect consumers from any tax costs the fossil fuel companies try to pass along. Meanwhile, businesses would rapidly innovate to squeeze fossil fuels out of their supply chains. As demand for fossil fuels drops, so will both price volatility and prices themselves.

No amount of domestic drilling can alter a worldwide commodity system designed to produce price volatility. Continuing our dependence on fossil fuels plays into the hands of maniacal despots like Russian President Vladimir Putin. I urge our congressional delegation to include a carbon tax to protect individual consumers in whatever climate measures they might work on this year.

Ray Welch

Marinwood

BUITENGEBIEDEN.

"That's the trouble with cops. You're all set to hate their guts and then you meet one that goes human on you." 

—Raymond Chandler

Here's the recording of last night's (2022-04-01) Memo of the Air: Good Night Radio show on KNYO-LP Fort Bragg (CA): https://tinyurl.com/KNYO-MOTA-0482

Thanks a lot to Hank Sims for all kinds of tech help over the years, as well as for his fine news site: https://LostCoastOutpost.com

And thanks to the Anderson Valley Advertiser, which provided at least an hour of the above eight-hour show's most locally relevant material, as usual, without asking for anything in return. Though I do pay $25 annually for full access to all articles and features, and you can too. As well as go to KNYO.org, click on the big red heart and give what you can. Also email me your work on any subject and I will read it on the radio this coming Friday night.

It's been bugging me: In the above show, when I was talking about Keith Laumer's Retief books, and Retief's boss, Mr. Magnan, and the Corps Diplomatique Terrestrienne, and I mentioned Earth's chief rival race in the cosmos, slimy upright-starfish-like creatures with eyes on stalks, who were grasping, tricky cheats and in all ways dishonorable, I left out the main thing I was driving toward: those creatures were the Groaci, but the racist name everyone called them behind their back, in whatever language was used on whatever planet where the Groaci went, was Five-Eyed Sticky-Fingers. There, closure, whew.

BESIDES ALL THAT—

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 the show together. Such as:

"How about an old man whose wrinkled smile represents the wisdom of the poor?" (When I was in fourth grade in Fresno, my stepbrother Craig and I used to ride our bikes to a Norman Rockwell-ish gas station out in miles and miles of empty fields that are now, I see by Google Maps, encancered with metastatic commerce and a braided lanyard of intersecting freeways and apartments and big box monstrosities, like everywhere else anymore. We'd go there to get soda pop in thick bottles from the gas station vending machine. There were several houses being built near where we lived, so there were slugs, coin-size knockouts from electrical boxes, all over the place, and I scientifically discovered that the pop machine would accept slugs as nickels and quarters, so, free pop as long as we didn't get greedy. One day there was a bracket on the soda pop machine, with pamphlets titled The Orange Crush Story. It was like a little history book. It was serious yet light. Orange Crush had founding fathers, and troubles and triumphs along the way, and somebody in the company thought to spend a little money educating the public about something they were proud of, and paid someone to write that pamphlet, and paid someone to print it, and someone to drive around and hang them on pop machines, and I was left with a fond feeling about not only Orange Crush but whimsical publishing in general, that lasted all my life. In contrast: if you kept the Skunk Train's recent full-color folksy mailer about the wonders of the future development of the former GP mill site, pull that out and look at it again, because a lot of people around here were hoping the Koch Bros. would clean up the poison ponds and we'd get a park there, not a Disneyland-like casino complex. Developers only need to look good long enough to get their hand in your pants. Then their hand is in your pants, and your pants are their pants now.)

https://misscellania.blogspot.com/2014/03/generic-brand-video.html

Desert = Moistland.

https://catandgirl.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/2022-03-22-cgrealreal.gif

Some days the bear will eat you, some days you eject the bear.

https://pictojam.com/p/that-time-when-the-us-air-force-ejected-yogi-the-bear-at-supersonic-speed

And "Uh-oh, boss, you're not gonna believe this, but there's a broad on a skateboard comin' after us. And she's gainin'!" The term broad, while not appreciated by ladies of the time, even Wonder Ladies, applies here, as the video aspect ratio is incorrect and makes all characters appear rather broad in the beam, a term that, like the term light in the loafers, you don't hear used much these days. Loafers were a kind of shoe that you didn't need to lace up and tie. Loafing was being lazy. Loafers implied that wearing shoes you didn't have to tie was laziness, as was writing with a ball-point pen and not a proper fountain pen that you had to learn to fill and clean and maintain for Jesus; but mainly it was that Catholic schools got money for the nuns by selling fountain pens. They were a mess. Ink everywhere, and all over the side of your hand if you wrote left-handed, another practice the nuns frowned on. Light in the loafers also somehow implied homosexuality.

https://www.vintag.es/2022/03/wonder-woman-on-skateboard.html

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

WHEN HILLARY CLINTON'S DIVINE ENTITLEMENT to the U.S. presidency began to look imperiled in 2016 — first due to the irreverent and unkempt (but surprisingly formidable) Democratic Party primary challenge from Bernie Sanders, the independent socialist Senator from Vermont — her campaign and its media allies invented and unveiled a deeply moving morality tale. A faceless horde of unnamed, uncredentialed, unmannered, violent, abusive and deeply misogynistic online Sanders supporters — dubbed with the gender-emphasizing name "Bernie Bros” even though many were women — were berating, insulting and brutalizing Hillary, her top campaign surrogates (U.S. Senators, former cabinet members, corporate executives), and especially pro-Hillary corporate journalists with a vast artillery of traumatizing words and violent tweets.

This storyline — and especially the way it cleverly inverted the David v. Goliath framework of the 2016 campaign so that it was now Hillary and her band of monied and Ivy-League-educated political and media elites who were the real victims — was irresistible to Harvard-and-Yale-trained journalists at NBC, CNN, The New York Times and Washington Post op-ed pages who really believe they are the truly marginalized peoples. This narrative scheme enabled them — the most powerful and influential media and political elites in the world, with access to the most potent platforms and megaphones — to somehow credibly lay claim to that most valued of all currencies in American political life: victimhood. 

With this power matrix in place, what mattered was no longer the pain and anger of people whose towns had their industries stripped by the Clintons’ NAFTA robbery, or who worked at low-wage jobs with no benefits due to the 2008 financial crisis caused by Clintonite finance geniuses, or who were drowning in student debt with no job prospects after that crisis, or who suffered from PTSD, drug and alcohol addiction and shabby to no health care after fighting in the Clintons’ wars. Now, such ordinary people were not the victims but the perpetrators. Their anger toward elites was not valid or righteous but dangerous, abusive and toxic. The real victims were multi-millionaire hosts of MSNBC programs and U.S. Senators and New York Times columnists who were abused and brutalized by those people's angry tweets for the crime of supporting a pioneer and avatar for marginalized people: the Wellesley-and-Yale-Law-graduate, former First Lady, Senator from New York, and U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

The genius of the Bernie Bro rhetorical scheme was two-fold. First, it prioritized and centered elite discomfort over the far more important and real anger and deprivation of ordinary people. Secondly, and even better from the perspective of elite interests, it implicitly imposed a ban on any meaningful critiques of powerful political and media elites by insisting that the online abuse and resultant trauma they endured was the fault of those who criticized them. According to this elite-protecting script, this crisis of online abuse and trauma did not materialize out of nowhere. It was triggered by, and was the fault of, anyone who voiced criticism of those elites. By speaking ill of these media and political figures, such critics were "targeting” them and signaling that they should be attacked.…

greenwald.substack.com/p/your-top-priority-is-the-emotional

HERE’S HOW WE BEAT AMAZON

After decades of union decline, Amazon workers in Staten Island have achieved the most important labor victory in the United States since the 1930s. Taking on and defeating Amazon would be a David versus Goliath story no matter who led the effort, but it is especially stunning that the successful unionization drive at the JFK8 warehouse was initiated by the Amazon Labor Union (ALU), an upstart, independent, worker-led effort.

ALU leaders include both former employees like Christian Smalls, who was fired from the JFK8 warehouse in 2020 after organizing a walkout, and a small crew of worker leaders inside the warehouse. While much of the national media attention has understandably focused on Smalls, the remarkable story of how workers on the inside of the building brought about this stunning upset largely remains to be told.

Few people are better placed to tell this story than Angelika Maldonado, the twenty-seven-year-old chair of ALU’s Workers Committee. One of the key leaders responsible for yesterday’s historic victory, Maldonado works as a packer in the outbound department on the night shift at JFK8. After yesterday’s vote, she sat down with Jacobin’s Eric Blanc to discuss how they accomplished the seemingly impossible — and what organizing lessons workers across the country can take from their efforts.…

jacobinmag.com/2022/04/amazon-labor-union-alu-staten-island-organizing