Mendocino County Today: Wednesday, May 18, 2022

Breezy | Fire Weather | AV Unified | FFA Dinner | Park Entrance | Redwood Tour | Fish Market | Supes Briefs | Chile Marmalade | Dead Whale | Maru | Watering Can | Vote Glentzer | Ed Notes | Rough Fiance | Yesterday's Catch | Ukraine | Sculpture Con | Supreme Catholics | Noyo Ruins | Fuel Price | Plumber's Cleavage | CA Budget | TWA Posters | Women Strong | Sheriff Candidate | CRV Return | Headlock Mugshot | West Appointed | Herculean | Shooter Blame | Lemos Saloon

BREEZY CONDITIONS will continue through the end of the work week. Temperatures will continue to warm across the interior today, while seasonal temperatures continue along the coast. After a slight inland cool down tomorrow, warmer temperatures are expected to return by the weekend. (NWS)

AV UNIFIED NEWS

Dear Anderson Valley Community,

I want to remind everyone to please join us for the elementary Measure M walk through on Thursday at 4:30 at the elementary playground. This is a wonderful opportunity for our families and community to see the many areas of need at our elementary school. We have sewage that backs up on the playground, classrooms with no water, and no place to play when it rains. Our amazing staff never complains and always make due, but I dream for the future and all that we can become. I hope you will join us. I thank the Parents Club for their donation of popsicles and supervision, so your kids can have a wonderful time on the playground while you take the tour. A fact sheet is attached. Ballots must be mailed or returned to the fairgrounds by June 7.

I joined you as Superintendent less than a year ago, and the deep infrastructure needs that we have in this district continue to weigh heavy on my heart. Today was a good day. With our architect, Don Alameida, we opened bids to replace major portions of the High School HVAC with Federal funding. This is thefirst step of many improvements that we need to make but thankfully for this one we got a $500,000 government partnership! 

But that said, sometimes the small improvements are the ones that have the most impact. We had a student this week, Gael Gonzalez, install his Senior Project, which was refreshing the letters AVHS on the high exterior above the high school gym. I had a tear roll down when I looked at his work.

When I prepared to interview for this job back in January, and I came with my mentor to visit from Calaveras County, I thought those faded letters looked sad and mournful and spoke of good times past. But because of Gael Gonzalez, and his parents, and his mentor, Mr. and Mrs. Mendoza, those letters were refreshed and beautiful and unequivocally state PRIDE. A story made more memorable, as his brother was the original student who installed those letters years ago. For his senior project, Gael took on refurbishing those and his family and mentor had the arduous task of reinstalling them. No more tears are flowing about those faded letters. In the words of Little Richard, “I FEEL GOOD!”

In the big scope of a full reconstruction, this was a very small thing, but what it showed me was that a LITTLE SCHOOL HAS A MIGHTY ROAR, and one student did, one thing, that brought pride and excellence back to campus. I saw this also with the senior project of Larry Cruz Fuentes who took it upon himself to restripe the exterior basketball courts at the high school near the domes and replace the basketball nets. The simple refreshment by a graduating kid speaks of excellence, care, and commitment, and I honor him and his family for what they did for us and the students coming forward. The hit parade of kindness continues with the service of Maricarmen Guerrero and Brianna Ferreyra who each spent a significant amount of time running groups at the elementary school to show their younger peers what being successful, responsible, and inspiring is meant to be.

And then, there was the beautiful concert opportunity coordinated by James Snyder and Gabriella Frank. WE DEFINITELY NEED TO MAKE THAT A COMMUNITY EVENT. Our students stepped out and stepped up, and it was a magical concert. What do I want to see moving forward? MORE OF THAT AND A DRUM LINE TO BOOT!

I am not even going to go into the AMAZING NEWS that we have 28 students attending a dual enrollment auto mechanics class every Wednesday at Mendo College (thank goodness for bus Driver Dennis Johnson) and another 20 attending an advanced level English course on site. College is the new normal at AVHS.

So what am I saying? AVUSD is special. Our facilities are worn out, but our heart beats strong. If you haven’t been to campus lately, come visit–any day, any time, and we will walk you through. A school is only as strong as the community that supports it. 

I am grateful.

Sincerely yours,

Louise Simson

Superintendent

Anderson Valley Unified School District

Cell: 707-684-1017

ELIZABETH JENSEN: What do you see? - Looking for volunteers to help recreate the fenceline by our beloved Arch gate at our local Community Park in Boonville (aka Airport Park or Health Center Park). I would love to collaborate with members of the community to replace the wooden fenceline framing the arch to better highlight its beauty and celebrate our growing community! 

Do you have a vision for what this could look like? How would you like this entrance to be improved to better welcome our community?

TOUR THE REDWOOD MULTICOHORT EXPERIMENT WITH PASCAL BERRILL PH-D

How can we regenerate the right number of redwood sprouts to grow up and replace harvested trees, while simultaneously promoting resistance to destructive wildfires?

Join UC Cooperative Extension at Jackson Demonstration State Forest for a walking tour of the Whiskey Springs Redwood Multicohort Experiment with CalPoly Humboldt Professor Pascal Berrill and JDSF Foresters to learn from 52 years of experiments asking this question and others.

Jackson Demonstration State Forest (meeting area TBD), Friday, May 27th, 10:00 am –2:00 pm. Rain or Shine. Bring lunch.

Registration is free, but required: http://ucanr.edu/multicohort

Please plan to observe COVID best practices, wear a mask if sharing a vehicle, and maintain social distancing.

For questions, contact Kyle Farmer, kfarmer@ucanr.edu, (707) 463-4495.

SUPERVISORS BRIEFS

by Mark Scaramella

Over the objection of Supervisors Dan Gjerde and John Haschak, the other three Supervisors, Glenn McGourty, Ted Williams and Maureen Mulheren, voted to simply hand over the nearly $600k to the tourist promoters again this year. Gjerde and Haschak had asked that the decision be postponed to next month when the Board will (supposedly) deal with the entire budget for next year. But the three fiscal profligates were worried that not throwing more money at the tourism people and their “marketing” might lead to a little dent in tourism and tourist jobs. (Never mind that there’s never been any proof from anyone that marketing Mendo makes any difference in visitor volume.)

* * *

Employee union reps: President Julie Beardslee and Representative Patrick Hickey told the Supervisors that they were considering budget cuts for operating departments without having a full picture of the true financial state of the county. Ms. Beardslee reminded the Board that the $20 million General Fund reserve is much bigger than necessary and bigger than what other neighboring counties maintain and should be used to staff more of the positions that bring money into the County. Mr. Hickey pointed out that the Board has yet to see any departmental budgets and actuals. 

The Board’s reaction? “Next speaker please,” said Chair Williams. (Not even a thank you!)

When she was elected union president recently Ms. Beardslee told her members: “Back in 2009, when the last recession hit, the county was hurt financially, because they had not anticipated a downturn. They implemented pay cuts and layoffs. As a result of the pay cuts, over the past 20 years, salaries have never recovered and have been so far below market value that this has had a huge negative impact on the county. We became a ‘train and trot’ employer. People would get hired, work for a short time, and then move on to jobs with higher salaries in other places. We were losing talent and we were losing institutional knowledge, something that is essential to a functioning government organization.”

* * *

Supervisor Mulheren pulled the approval of the cannabis department report from the consent calendar. But the Board’s previous request for the County’s burgeoning pot bureaucracy didn’t come up in the discussion that followed. Instead, they heard from another parade of aggrieved pot growers/permit applicants who repeated many of their ongoing complaints about the current permit process. Lately a bunch of petty and seemingly arbitrary new requests are demanded of applicants. Supervisor Williams, thought he had frequent critic Corinne Powell boxed into a corner by asking her to specify what kind of petty requests the applicants were dealing with. Ms. Powell, a close follower of the County’s permit mess, was ready.

She replied that the Cannabis department had asked things like, Where do you store your generator? Or, where do you have your water tank? (Ms. Powell has a truck-mounted tank that she uses for her pot plants and for her garden.) Williams was surprised that Ms. Powell had her facts ready for him and reverted to his previous position: “Why not just issue the permits?,” posed Williams again. “Let us get back to county business.” “I don’t want to talk about cannabis permitting anymore,” throwing up his metaphorical hands. “If we get complaints we can pull their permit.”

None of his colleagues agreed, of course, so the program, such as it is, muddles along, with no troublesome questions about uncollected pot taxes or promised pot taxes for emergency services. As an alternative way to not do his job, Williams demanded that the ad hoc committee do more ad-hoc-ing and bring back some quick-fix suggestions. 

* * *

THE BOARD voted unanimously to ask staff to draft a possible sales tax ballot measure or two for water and emergency services to be considered next month. Supervisor Gjerde said he didn’t think the public trusted the board enough to pass a sales tax and that doing so would be “a passage to nowhere.” Supervisor Haschak thought that before they propose a tax the Board should “prove that we can implement it.” There was some question about whether “the public” should circulate their own sales tax initiative petition like the Library tax proposers are now doing, instead of the easier but more risky approach of having the Board put the question on the ballot. Nobody brought up the pot tax revenues (over $16 million in the last four years) that the public already voted should go to in large part to emergency services (among other things) back in 2016 but which the County has sat on ever since.

OUR CITRUS AND CHILE MARMALADE is back in stock! If you’ve had your eye on it for the past few months or have been longing for it since you finished your last jar, we’ve got you covered! Our 8oz jars of marmalade are packed in a different jar than what’s pictured here, but the goods inside are still the same. 

- Krissy and the Boonville Barn Team

A RARE, BEAKED WHALE WASHES UP DEAD ON THE MENDOCINO COAST

On Sunday, May 15, 2022, a dead beaked whale washed up on the shore of Mendocino County’s Jug Handle State Natural Reserve near Fort Bragg. The deceased whale, known to be elusive and for its ability to dive deeper than any marine mammal, provides a unique opportunity for researchers to understand the rarely seen creature and the environment that could have led to its death.…

mendofever.com/2022/05/17/a-rare-beaked-whale-washes-up-dead-on-the-mendocino-coast/

IN PRAISE OF THE OLD-FASHIONED WATERING CAN

by Marshall Newman

A drought is a terrible thing; daunting, scary, uncertain and damaging. To mitigate the effects of a drought, we adapt as best we can. We track every bit of water we use, limit or forego water use in various ways and try to get every last benefit from the water we do use. Often we adopt new technology, and even more occasionally we adopt very old technology. In my case, it is the latter, in the guise of an old-fashioned, bright red watering can.

During my years in Anderson Valley, from the late 1950s to the early 1980s, I can recall only one drought year: 1977. I remember crossing Rancheria Creek in September with a single step in couple of places and seeing our usually robust spring, the source of our drinking water, reduced to a trickle. 

Compared to current predictions regarding the drought of 2022, the drought of 1977 was a picnic. The Navarro River flow as of Monday, May 16, is 31.4 cubic feet per second, higher than the 7.4 cubic feet per second it flowed last year (the worst number on record for the date) but still less than half of the historic median flow for May 16. The very scant rain during the 2020-2021 rainy season means groundwater supplies were not replenished during the better, but still below average 2021-2022 rainy season. The heat of summer has yet to arrive in Anderson Valley – in my experience, usually it kicked off with a three-day heatwave in early to mid-June – but when it does, Navarro River flow, the flow of local springs and water tables throughout the region will drop in a hurry.

Unlike those Anderson Valley days, today I am in the Bay Area and water comes from the Sierra Nevada snowpack. But growing up in Anderson Valley leaves ingrained habits and one of those habits is to never waste anything. So the water I run to clear the pipes in the morning goes into buckets, to be used in the garden or the downstairs toilet, a toilet that only gets flushed once a day. Same with water run until it gets hot. I take “navy” showers, turning off the water before soaping and after rinsing. I also shower only every other day. Dishes are done twice a day and when possible a bucket catches the rinse water. I am not a saint (no chance of that!): the more water I save now, the more water I – and everyone else – will have later in the year. 

I used a hose with a nozzle in my garden for years, but found it problematic. The water hit the ground with such force it disturbs cultivated soil. The nozzle spray was so wide as to waste water on either side of the planted areas. The hose also was a pain to drag around and barely reached some corners of my garden.

I suppose I could have installed a drip system. But between the expense and labor to put one in, and the general messiness of having all those black tubes all over the yard, I opted against. 

So I bought a watering can at the local hardware store instead. Spiffy red - way out of character for me, but the only one available. And I love it. The water goes precisely where I want it to go, with no waste. The water is like rain on the soil; soft and gentle. The watering can puts my “reclaimed” water to good use. Watering takes about the same amount of time as with the hose. Last but not least, the watering can makes gardening more personal; leaning over the plants, making sure each bed of vegetables and wildflowers gets an adequate soaking, watching the bumblebees at work, and taking time to appreciate the garden as a place of beauty.

One watering can isn’t going to address the pending drought. Even several million will only have limited impact. But right now saving water is everyone’s duty here in the west and doing something is better than nothing. 

ED NOTES

THE ABOVE PHOTO was taken yesterday in Danville, a deep white suburb of San Francisco. The masked yobbos equate the racist Buffalo attack with an Illinois mass murder committed by a crazy black guy who was just aiming his vehicle at people, whoever they were. It's not like Poor Old Joe's handlers shuffled him off to Buffalo because the victims were black, but because the perp, an 18-year-old white kid poisoned by the internet, carried out an attack aimed specifically at black people. The irony underlying the media's saturation race-talk is that race relations in this country have never been better. Where, in 1960, say, there were virtually no white relationships with black people there are now literal millions of loyal, affectionate cross-racial friendships between people of all races. Jeez, racial harmony is one area of American life where we've actually made some headway.

THE BEST BOOK since Marc Reisner's seminal “Cadillac Desert” has appeared, and Bev Dutra I am in your debt for drawing my attention to “The Dreamt Land — Chasing Water and Dust Across California” by Mark Arax. Can a book about water catastrophes in the Central Valley be a page turner? Yes, this one is absolutely riveting and contains a whole lot of historical anecdotes about California that this, ahem, avid reader of the Golden State's back story did not know. If you read one book this year, you won't go wrong with this one. 

DR. NICOLE SAPHIER: “An uncomfortable truth has become obvious as anxiety over the worsening infant formula shortage grows. For potentially millions of parents and children, it didn't have to be this way. At birth, 1 in 5 newborns receive formula within the first couple days. By three months, less than half are exclusively breastfed. Breastfeeding is physiologically more advantageous to mother and child, yet breastfeeding is underutilized in this country. The formula shortage has highlighted our collective, self-induced frailty related to feeding our infants. And part of the problem is that we are discouraged from talking about it. To be clear, I am not minimizing the struggles associated with breastfeeding. I breastfed my three children for their first 12 months of life. I will be honest; it was not easy. Women who cannot breastfeed should not be ridiculed or made to feel as they are not prioritizing the wellness of their child. It is a physiological truth they are faced with. But one truth does not cancel the other. The paucity of infants breastfed for their first year of life is a public health concern that should be carefully deliberated by parents and pediatricians.”

ERIC SWALWELL, a hustling congressman from the East Bay adept at keeping himself in the news for no real reason, came out with this implausible attention-getter on Monday, when he called for a swift gun control response to the racially motivated mass shooting in Buffalo because, he claimed, his 4-year-old was asking him questions about the attack. “My 4-year-old just FaceTimed to ask what I’m doing to ‘help the people in Buffalo’ and ‘why did the bad man do this?’ Absolutely gutting. This cannot be his normal. It’s time to BAN ASSAULT WEAPONS. #EndGunViolence,” the Livermore Democrat tweeted.

THE KID'S already on electronics? Anyway, the child was allegedly watching CNN, likely the only four-year-old in the world to take an interest in current affairs. Trying hard to be fair to a guy who deeply irritates me, I suppose it's possible Swalwell's child caught a portion of the sad news from Buffalo, which is the kind of event that would grab the attention of a four-year-old, which is why responsible parents keep little kids away from television except for Sesame Street or other age-appropriate visuals. Best of all, keep the tykes away from TV. Period. Drive them young to books for entertainment, which will pay educational dividends and strengthen the fledgling consumers against the violent chaos of the world they'll be stepping into.

SPEAKING of our nation's future, I was surprised to see a couple of little girls, 8 or 9 I guessed, riding their bicycles, unsupervised, near the Co-Op in Ukiah. But why should the sight of unsupervised children riding past on their bikes be surprising? Because it's a sight seldom seen anymore. Better yet, the two girls weren't padded and helmeted, totally free as children should be of adult fears that they will be somehow harmed. My theory, relayed here to you absolutely without obligation, is that children neurotically cosseted in their formative years, tend to indulge in extremely dangerous behavior as soon as they're away from adult supervision as chronological adults.

NORM CLOW: “Do you remember in the ‘90’s when Ukiah was named the ‘Best Small Town In America’ by some organization or another, especially for seniors? My dad sent the Press Democrat news article to us out on Guam with a couple of humorous comments noted on the clipping, as he was wont to do. Strange choice then, a town seemingly irrecoverable now. We were there overnight in 2015, 2018 and last year. Indescribably depressing and run down, nothing like the town we remember from the ‘50’s and 60’s, although that might be only wishful thinking, to cite Carole King.”

YES, I REMEMBER when Ukiah was regularly on 'Best Of' lists, but agree with Comrade Clow that the town's steady deterioration over the years since is obvious. One reason is a lack of civic leadership. Another is the withdrawal of Ukiah's monied families from civic engagement. Big Chuck Mannon of the Savings Bank gets recent attaboys because he sponsors a free document shredding, and immediately returns to his Savings Bank bunker to roll around in his inactive millions like Scrooge McDuck for another five years. Eversole Mortuary has processed generations of corpses into a fortune that stays entombed in the family's bulging pockets. And ditto for the rest of the scruffy town's moneybags whose ancestors cared about the town and what it looked like. You wouldn't know it to look at the place, but there's a lot of money in Ukiah.

AND NOW, the nail in Ukiah's decayed coffin brought to an unsuspecting Mendocino County by our over-many and over-paid Superior Court judges who are poised to destroy the town's center with a brand new County Courthouse nobody but them wants, a new County Courthouse three long blocks from where it is now and, by the way, designed only for the judges and their gofers. This appalling project slides right on by Ukiah's management and the County's inattentive supervisors, the very people who should oppose it.

AND, like most municipalities in our battered land, Ukiah permits its public spaces to be occupied by people who should either be hospitalized or jailed. The town's become an open-air asylum.

I GET THE FEELING THIS RELATIONSHIP IS NOT LONG-TERM

On Friday, May 6, 2022 at approximately 7:23 AM Deputies from the Mendocino County Sheriff's Office were dispatched to investigate a domestic violence dispute in the 1400 block of South State Street in Ukiah.

Deputies contacted a 56 year-old Lakeport male and his fiance, Chandra Silva, 18, of Lakeport upon arrival. 

Deputies learned that earlier that day at approximately 7:23 AM the adult male was physically assaulted by Silva during an argument.

During the altercation Silva ripped the adult male's shirt off of him and hit him several times, causing injuries. The adult male had visible injuries on his face, neck and chest which were consistent with the assault.

At the conclusion of the investigation, Deputies placed Silva under arrest for Felony Domestic Violence Battery.

Silva was subsequently booked into the Mendocino County Jail where she was to be held in lieu of $25,000 bail.

CATCH OF THE DAY, May 17, 2022

LUIS CHAN-FONSECA, Fort Bragg. Domestic abuse.

JESUS CHAVEZ-CARMEN, Ukiah. DUI, probation revocation.

CESAR DELCAMPO, Ukiah. Under influence.

JESSE DUGGER, Ukiah. Probation revocation.

CASEY FAAHS, Ukiah. Domestic battery.

ERIC GARCIA, Redwood Valley. Under influence.

JAMES GOWAN, Ukiah. Taking vehicle without owner’s consent, failure to register annually, serious felony with prior, strike prior.

GAGE GRIFFIN, Laytonville. More than an ounce of pot, evasion, resisting, probation revocation.

LUKAS HODSON, Cloverdale/Ukiah. DUI.

JERI PERDUE, Ukiah. Disobeying court order, failure to appear.

UKRAINE, TUESDAY, MAY 17

Ukrainian Defence Minister Oleksii Reznikov says the war is “entering a protracted phase”.

The fall of Mariupol appears at hand as Ukraine moves to abandon the Azovstal steel plant where its soldiers had held out for months.

The fate of Azovstal fighters remains uncertain after hundreds surrendered and were transported to Russian-controlled territory.

The US State Department asserts Washington will support Kyiv but it is up to Ukraine to define its own objectives in talks with Russia.

The European Commission is expected to lay out a plan for how to wean the region off Russian fossil fuels by 2027, the Reuters news agency reports.

“ART” & “SCULPTURE”

This huge steel blob is a “sculpture” by Richard Serra. I put “sculpture” in quotes, too, since it's unlikely much actual sculpting went into its creation.

I laughed when I saw it advertised on page C16 in the Arts section in today's NY Times. David Zwirner thinks a gray, cylindrical blob that looks like a massive misprint was a good advertisement for the show at his gallery.

And he's probably right. If you think Serra is an important artist in the first place, you're the mark targeted by this con. Just invoking Serra's name will be enough to get you scurrying to see this crap. 

— Rob Anderson, District5Diary

TOO MUCH CHURCH IN THE STATE

by Maureen Dowd

During her Supreme Court confirmation hearings, Amy Coney Barrett tried to reassure Democrats who were leery of her role as a “handmaid” in a Christian group called “People of Praise.”

The group has a male-dominated hierarchy and a rigid view of sexuality reflecting conservative gender norms and rejecting openly gay men and women. Men, the group’s decision-makers, “headed” their wives.

Barrett said then that she would not impose her personal beliefs on the country. “Judges can’t just wake up one day and say ‘I have an agenda — I like guns, I hate guns, I like abortion, I hate abortion’ — and walk in like a royal queen and impose their will on the world,” she said amicably. “It’s not the law of Amy. It’s the law of the American people.”

Yet that’s what seems to be coming. Like a royal queen, she will impose her will on the world. It will be the law of Amy. And Sam. And Clarence. And Neil. And Brett.

It’s outrageous that five or six people in lifelong unaccountable jobs are about to impose their personal views on the rest of the country. While they will certainly provide the legal casuistry for their opinion, let’s not be played for fools: The Supreme Court’s impending repeal of Roe will be owed to more than judicial argumentation. There are prior worldviews at work in this upheaval.

As a Catholic whose father lived through the Irish Catholics “need not apply” era, I’m happy to see Catholics do well in the world. There is an astonishing preponderance of Catholics on the Supreme Court — six out of the nine justices, and a seventh, Neil Gorsuch, was raised as a Catholic and went to the same Jesuit boys’ high school in a Maryland suburb that Brett Kavanaugh and my nephews did, Georgetown Prep.

My father was furious that Catholic presidential candidates Al Smith and JFK had to defend themselves against scurrilous charges that, if they got to the White House, they would take their orders from the pope.

One must tread carefully here. A Catholic signed on to the Roe v. Wade decision and another was in the court majority that upheld it in Planned Parenthood v. Casey. Justice Sonia Sotomayor, a Catholic, has expressed support for Roe, and Chief Justice John Roberts, a conservative Catholic, may be working for a compromise decision that can uphold Roe.

Still, this Catholic feels an intense disquiet that Catholic doctrine may be shaping (or misshaping) the freedom and the future of millions of women, and men. There is a corona of religious fervor around the court, a churchly ethos that threatens to turn our whole country upside down.

I come from a family that hews to the Catholic dictates on abortion, and I respect the views of my relatives. But it’s hard for me to watch the church trying to control women’s sexuality after a shocking number of its own priests sexually assaulted children and teenagers for decades, and got recycled into other parishes, as the church covered up the whole scandal. It is also hard to see the church couch its anti-abortion position in the context of caring for women when it continues to keep women in subservient roles in the church.

Religiosity is a subject some Catholics on the court have been more open about in recent years.

Last year, at Thomas Aquinas College in Ventura County, Justice Samuel Alito fretted that there was growing cultural hostility toward Christianity and Catholicism. “There is a real movement to suppress the expression of anything that opposes the secular orthodoxy,” he said. Precisely which belief or practice of his religion does he feel he has been denied?

President Joe Biden is a Catholic who is uncomfortable with the issue of abortion despite his support for Roe. Still, when Barrett was a law professor at the University of Notre Dame, a group she belonged to unanimously denounced the university’s decision to honor Biden even though he didn’t support the church’s position on abortion.

We have no one in the public arena like Mario Cuomo, who respected the multiplicity of values in an open society and had the guts to wade into the lion’s den at Notre Dame in 1984.

“The Catholic who holds political office in a pluralistic democracy — who is elected to serve Jews and Muslims, atheists and Protestants, as well as Catholics — bears special responsibility,” Cuomo said. “He or she undertakes to help create conditions under which all can live with a maximum of dignity and with a reasonable degree of freedom; where everyone who chooses may hold beliefs different from specifically Catholic ones — sometimes contradictory to them; where the laws protect people’s right to divorce, to use birth control and even to choose abortion.”

The explosive nature of Alito’s draft opinion on Roe has brought to the fore how radical the majority on the court is, willing to make women fit with their zealous worldview — a view most Americans reject. It has also shown how radical Republicans are; although after pushing for this result for decades, because it made a good political weapon, they are now pretending it’s no big deal. We will all have to live with the catastrophic results of their zealotry.

(The New York Times)

ANY EFFECT OUT THERE?

Editor,

A Saturday article talked about rising gas prices and people’s feelings about them, but I’m curious about how higher gas prices are affecting people’s actions and choices. Scientists have told us we have a tight window to drastically reduce our use of fossil fuels. Is this knowledge, together with the pressure of higher gas prices, motivating us to drive less, carpool and choose more efficient vehicles and electric vehicles? These are all things that can ease the pain at the pump while reducing climate change and the resulting droughts, fires, floods and more. Something to think about while watching the numbers spin out on the gas pump.

Paul Larkin

Sebastopol

NEWSOM’S SPENDING PLAN: ‘SIMPLY WITHOUT PRECEDENT.’

by Ben Christopher

Gov. Gavin Newsom is a man of many superlatives, but even he seemed to struggle to adequately describe just how much extra cash the state of California will have to spend in the coming year’s budget: $97.5 billion.

In a press conference in Sacramento, Newsom unveiled his latest record spending proposal for the coming fiscal year. Riding a superheating economy and drawing disproportionately from the state’s highest earners, the state is now projected to have a surplus bigger than California — or any state — has ever had, and significantly more than the $76 billion that the governor predicted in January.

Roughly half of the surplus is required by law to be spent on education. That leaves “only” roughly $49 billion in discretionary money, and the governor wants to reserve 99% of that for one-time spending: $18.1 billion to provide financial relief for Californians buffeted by inflation, plus $37 billion for infrastructure investments, including $5.6 billion for education facility upgrades, and an extra $2.3 billion for the ongoing fight against COVID-19.

A few of the other big numbers that Newsom mentioned during Friday’s presser:

• $128.3 billion in education spending, from transitional kindergarten through high school, a record-breaking sum that works out to $22,850 per student. Another $23 billion will be parked into the state’s rainy day fund, to be drawn upon the next time the economy slows

• $2.5 billion for housing, including $500 million to fund the conversion of vacant malls and storefronts into homes

• An extra $3.4 billion to pay down state employee retirement debt

Now the ball is in the state Legislature’s court as they decide where they agree with the governor and which priorities they want to haggle over before the June 15 deadline to pass a final, balanced budget for the fiscal year that starts July 1.

The “May revise” rollout is part of the annual call-and-response between the governor’s office and the Legislature over how to spend your tax dollars. Each year, the governor sets the negotiations in motion in January with a preliminary budget proposal. This year, Newsom’s proffer included a record surge in K-12 education spending, along with multi-billion dollar proposals to ramp up the state’s wildfire prevention projects, convert more vacant hotels into housing for the homeless and open up Medi-Cal, the state’s health insurance program for the poor, to all undocumented immigrants.

What Newsom unveiled Friday is a retake on that earlier budget blueprint, but freshened up with new estimates of the state’s fiscal future. Tack on the extra surplus money and you end up with a new record-high total: $300.7 billion.

When discussing money on the scale of the California state budget, it’s easy to lose perspective. But to be clear, even by Golden State standards, that is an astounding amount of money.

What a difference two years makes. In May 2020, with the state still weathering the first surge of COVID-19, the governor’s Department of Finance projected a $54 billion deficit and a year of Great Depression-level unemployment rates. Neither came to pass, just the opposite: Boosted by rosy economic conditions for the state’s highest earners and a massive in

flux of cash from the federal government, state coffers have been overflowing for the last two years.

For the governor and Democratic leadership in the Assembly and Senate, having to divvy up billions of new dollars during an election year is a good problem to have. But on financial aid to struggling families, the scale of the state’s drought response, what to do about the sky-high price of gasoline and other pressing policy conundrums, not everyone is on the same page.

Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon kept his cards close to his chest in a statement, simply heralding his Democratic “teammates” in the Senate. “We know how to work together to present Governor Gavin Newsom with a budget he can be proud to sign by the constitutional deadline,” he said.

The Republican minority in the Legislature is so diminished that Democrats don’t need their support to pass a budget. But that isn’t stopping GOP lawmakers from weighing in, if only to provide voters with a clear contrast as Election Day approaches.

“Newsom specializes in grand announcements and flashy sounding proposals, but he rarely follows through with effective solutions that actually help California families,” GOP Assembly leader James Gallagher from Chico said in a statement. “As Californians struggle to fill their tank and put food on the table, Democrats fail to provide any real solutions to cut costs.”

(CalMatters)

100+ WOMEN STRONG GATHERING JUNE 2

Excitement is building for the next 100+ Women Strong of Inland Mendocino County Gathering on Thursday, June 2, 5:30-7:00 pm, at Rivino Vineyards and Winery. Attendance is open to anyone who wants to participate in giving a financial boost to an inland Mendocino County nonprofit.

The three nonprofits presenting in June are the Ukiah-based United Disaster Relief of Northern California (formerly MendoLake Complex Fire Relief), Building Bridges, services for the homeless; and the Shanél Valley Academy in Hopland.

Another highlight is a presentation by the last 100 WS Gathering’s winning nonprofit the Humane Society for Inland Mendocino County.

100+ Women Strong is an inclusive all-volunteer group. Anyone interested in attending the gathering and hearing from three nonprofits doing indispensable work in our community is welcome. To register, each attendee pledges a hundred dollars on the 100+ Mendocino Women Grapevine website via <https://100strongmendo.com> https://100strongmendo.com. Already more than five thousand dollars have been pledged.

At the gathering, after the nonprofits’ presentations, everyone votes on the nonprofit they want to win. The votes are counted, one winner is announced and receives the pledged money. It is common for many attendees to write another check to the other nonprofits, making the gathering a win for everyone.

100+ Women Strong for Inland Mendocino County was spearheaded in 2019 by Katie Fairbairn and twenty volunteers. Previous winners include NAMI (National Alliance for Mental Illness) Cancer Resources of Mendocino County, Ukiah Valley Trails Group, NCO Gardens Project, Caring Kitchen, Project Sanctuary, and the Humane Society for Inland Mendocino County. More than a hundred thousand dollars was raised in 2019 and 2020 to support these worthy nonprofits.

The next 100+ Women Strong of Inland Mendocino County events is Thursday, October 6, at Nelson Family Vineyards.

For more information and to become a member of 100+Women Strong for Inland Mendocino County check the website https://100StrongMendo.com. Or call Karen Christopherson, 707-272-5560.

Heidi Cusick Dickerson

PO Box 301 Redwood Valley CA 95470

707-671-6301

REFUNDABLES, A DISCUSSION

(Coast Chat Line)

On 5/17/2022 10:06 AM, Tom Tetzlaff wrote:

Now that the CRV buy back center at Pudding creek is closed, people living in this region should not be required to pay the “refundable” CRV deposit fee on the recyclable items that we buy.

These fees should be rescinded until a local buy back facility is available to local consumers. The distance to the nearest buy back center is now so far away that it is unreasonable to think that every consumer in the Fort Bragg region would or could travel that far to recover their deposit money.

Also, if the idea is to help the environment, having people schlep their recycling by driving for an hour and a half to recover their deposit that alone seems to negate the point. The money spent on the fuel alone to make the trip is likely more than their CRV return.

We are going to place these things into the recycle bin anyway and with the cost of everything constantly increasing, the extra cost we pay to this program should be rescinded until a reasonable option is available for the community.

I have called the CalRecycle main number (you get a recording and are asked to leave a message) and emailed them at their Office of Public Affairs email address linked below with the following questions in reference to the Pudding Creek facility.

You may have some questions of your own so feel free to ask them and share any response you receive.

1 - Are there plans to reopen this facility? If so when?

2 - If not, will there be a new facility built for this community to recover their Cash Value Deposit?

3 - If there are no plans for a new facility, will you continue to collect these fees even though the residents here have no way to reasonably recover them?

opa@calrecycle.ca.gov 

Here is the CalRecycle entire contact list.

https://calrecycle.ca.gov/contactus/

* * *

Erif Thunen <erif@saber.net> wrote:

I contacted Ted Williams about this issue. Here is his reply:

”The contract is between the City of Fort Bragg and Waste Management. A new contractor has been selected by Fort Bragg. It appears to me, Waste Management has decided to close up early no matter contract obligations. In another 45 days the new buyback center will be open. I recommend you hold onto the recyclables. Unfortunate hardship. Apparently, after the 45 days, we can once again get our CRV fees back.”

Erif.

* * *

From: ”Lea Christensen” <mjmorris@sonic.net>

In a meeting today, it was announced that the BOS has a new contractor and a return of a redemption center could occur as soon as 45 days.

WEST CENTER NAMED AS ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT LIAISON; County Board of Supervisors Approves Contract

On May 3, 2022, the County of Mendocino Board of Supervisors (BoS) voted to appoint West Business Development Center (West Center) as the Economic Development Liaison for the County’s nascent economic development program. Specifically, the motion, which passed by a unanimous vote, directs the Executive Office to work with West Center as the first phase of their economic development program strategy. The $175,000, 12-month contract was negotiated in coordination with the BoS Economic Development Ad Hoc Committee, the County’s Executive Office, and the Planning & Building Services Department.

West Center was contracted to provide services in three strategic areas: economic development capacity; business recruitment and retention; and workforce development. Under the terms of the contract, West Center will become a business grant clearinghouse, serve as the initial point of contact for businesses interested in locating or expanding into Mendocino County, provide business retention and recruitment information resources, develop an economic development newsletter, and create a business toolkit that will assist both County departments and budding businesses with the information necessary to launch or grow a business in the county.

The need for an economic development lead agency was highlighted by the findings of the Mendocino Opportunities for building a Vibrant Economy (MOVE 2030) initiative. The year-long MOVE 2030 project planning process was funded by the federal Economic Development Administration and was intended to lay the groundwork for the development of a more resilient economy in Mendocino County. The legwork of MOVE 2030 was achieved in 2020 through a broad stakeholder engagement process that involved community organizations, strategic public, private, and non-profit partners, industry representatives, and public policy advocates. The MOVE 2030 process culminated in the publication of the County of Mendocino Economic Development Analysis report, presented to the Board of Supervisors at their March 22, 2021 meeting. The report contains five strategies for the county’s action summarized as:

 Bolster the county’s economic development infrastructure

 Strengthen the small business and entrepreneurship environment

 Build, support and retain a robust and adaptable County workforce

 Address housing affordability and barriers to new development

 Expand the regional broadband access

Mendocino County Economic Vitality was also included as a key pillar of the 2022 Mendocino County Strategic Plan, adopted by the BoS on January 23, 2022. The scope of work being undertaken by the West Center includes key actions that support implementation of the County’s strategic plan by collaborating with economic development partners to identify areas where the County can support business attraction, development, and expansion and implementing policies and practices to make it easier for businesses to start up and expand.

In the discussion leading up to the BOS vote on May 3, First District Supervisor Glenn McGourty offered his full support for this latest economic development measure, stating: “[With] the connections that Mary Anne Petrillo [West Center] has with both the SMEDD as well as with Josh Metz, who has extensive background in economic development, we are creating our own eco-system to access numerous grants in the coming year. I’m confident this plan is going to work.” Josh Metz is a Lead Advisor in the Economic Development service group for Regional Government Services, and will be collaborating with West Center to meet the terms of the contract.

Likewise, Supervisor John Haschak (District 3) who also supported the vote said, “We’re going to get a lot more out of this contract — we don’t have anyone in the County to do this work and it’s critical. We are at a critical juncture as far as economic development. We need to move forward with this.”

With the backing of the Board of Supervisors, West Center will start the work of identifying and sourcing grant funding opportunities that will further core economic development efforts in the county. West Center has already begun work under their new contract and will report their findings and progress in monthly reports to the Board of Supervisors.

About West Business Development Center: WBDC is a U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA) funded non-profit business development center that provides reliable no-cost confidential counseling and relevant training programs to entrepreneurs throughout Mendocino and Lake County. West Center hosts the Mendocino Small Business Development Center and the Mendocino Women’s Business Center.

www.westcenter.org

Phone: 707 964 7571 

Address: 345 N. Franklin St. Fort Bragg, 

185 E. Church St. Ukiah

THE DEMENTED - AND SELECTIVE - GAME OF INSTANTLY BLAMING POLITICAL OPPONENTS FOR MASS SHOOTINGS

All ideologies spawn psychopaths who kill innocents in its name. Yet only some are blamed for their violent adherents: by opportunists cravenly exploiting corpses while they still lie on the ground.

by Glenn Greenwald

…A very vivid and particularly gruesome display of this demented game was on display on Saturday night after a white 18-year-old, Payton Gendron, purposely targeted a part of Buffalo with a substantial black population. He entered a supermarket he knew was frequented largely by black customers and shot everyone he found, killing 10 people, most of them black. A lengthy, 180-page manifesto he left behind was filled with a wide variety of eclectic political views and ideologies. 

In that manifesto, Gendron described himself as a "left-wing authoritarian” and “populist” (“On the political compass I fall in the mild-moderate authoritarian left category, and I would prefer to be called a populist”). He heaped praise on an article in the socialist magazine Jacobin for its view that cryptocurrency and Bitcoin are fraudulent scams. He spoke passionately of the centrality and necessity of environmentalism, and lamented that “the state [has] long since heavily lost to its corporate backers.” He ranted against “corporate profits and the ever increasing wealth of the 1% that exploit the people for their own benefit.” And he not only vehemently rejected any admiration for political conservatism but made clear that he viewed it as an enemy to his agenda: “conservatism is corporatism in disguise, I want no part of it.”…

greenwald.substack.com/p/the-demented-and-selective-game-of