Mendocino County Today: Wednesday, June 8, 2022

Warming | 1927 Kids | Early Results | AVHS Graduation | Handley LZ | Hollywood Hundred | Hendy Zip | Boonville Lot | Tree Work | Reduction/Museum | Lake Levels | Ed Notes | Shrode's Sundries | Supes Shorts | Albion Crew | Water Sharing | Police Reports | Survey Deadline | Yesterday's Catch | Ukraine | Red Dress | Applebees Dinner | Grand Army | Stupid Movie | Introvert Soap | Gun Safety | Kicking Can | Color Lines | 1966 Message | Power/Control | Carrie Nation | Free Speech | Boyle's Crew

WARM, CLEAR WEATHER will continue late in the week with ragged marine stratus. Isolated temperatures above 100 are possible on Friday. Cooler temperatures and light coastal rain will return for the weekend. (NWS)

AS WE CLOSED UP SHOP for Tuesday night, early election returns of three to four thousand votes counted, showed the Hutchins/Glentzer race for County School Superintendent predictably close, with Glentzer ahead 52% to 48%. Everything else is trending as expected. Upstart Sheriff’s candidate Trent James had garnered 138 votes or about 5% of the votes for Sheriff in initial returns with almost 800 voters choosing not to vote for either incumbent Matt Kendall or Trent James. Measure M, the Anderson Valley School Bond, was running about 65% to 35% in favor in early returns (55% required to pass) but only 116 AV votes had been counted.

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MENDOCINO COUNTY ELECTION RESULTS, SELECT LOCAL RACES, as of midnight Election Day

County Superintendent of Schools

• Michelle Hutchins 1,625 (47.77%)
• Nicole Glentzer 1,777 (52.23%)

Supervisor, 3rd District

• John Haschak 630 (73.94%)
• Clay Romero 222 (26.06%)

Supervisor, 5th District

• John Redding 137 (15.91%)
• Ted Williams 724 (84.09%)

Sheriff-Coroner

• Matthew C. Kendall 2,787 (93.24%)
• Trent James 202 (6.76%)

Anderson Valley Unified School District - Measure M

• Yes 105 (62.50%)
• No 63 (37.50%)

Unofficial Results; All Precincts Reporting; 3,864 of 52,602 Registered Voters (7.35%)

AV HIGH GRADUATION CEREMONIES

What do you say when you see a community open their heart and share their treasure to ensure their graduating high school seniors have the educational resources to make their dreams come true?  As a newbie looking in, I say “THAT IS SO SPECIAL, AND SO COOL, AND WHERE ELSE IN THE UNIVERSE DOES THIS HAPPEN”?

Generosity filled the air as thousands upon thousands of dollars from a range of organizations was awarded to AVHS seniors to help them pursue their next steps in college and career.  Gifts large and small were delivered with love, emotion, humor, and promise.  Anderson Valley, how can we ever thank you?  A favorite quote of mine is “We rise by lifting others”.  Tonight, Anderson Valley did more than rise.  They  lifted our young adults with monetary resources that will let them pursue college and career learning without the hardship of trying to determine how to pay for all of it.   My hope is that through your gifts and demonstration of a “Big Lift”  that we will enable them to do the same for others.

The gifts were touching and generous.  Khalilah Thomas, a former alumni, flew in from the East Coast to honor the memory of her mother, Cheri Fish, with three scholarship gifts and finished her presentation with the pledge, “See you next year”.  She shared inspirational motivation with our CTE Academy students, and I understand she is currently serving our country as a Colonel in the Marine Corp.  

The Anderson Valley Education Association presented 17 scholarship awards worth tens of thousands of dollars.  

And how can you even begin to express gratitude to the Robert Anderson Scholarship Foundation, this year with awards presented by Bruce Anderson, for their on-going incredibly generous gifts to our kids to take the worry and burden of funding a college education off the table and focus on being a student.  Another one of my favorite quotes is the “Greatest gifts aren’t wrapped in paper, but in love”.  The love this family shows our community’s graduates is stunning.

Other Organizations with incredibly generous gifts included: 

• The Mendocino Community Foundation
• AV CSEA
• Unity Club
• Lions Club
• American Legion
• Anderson Valley Grange Dusenberry Memorial
• Yorkville Scholarship
• Anderson Valley Firefighters Association
• AV Teachers Association
• Michael L. Shapiro Memorial
• AV Arts
• Independent Career Women
• AV Boosters
• William Sterling Memorial
• Jim Levine Scholarship from Mendocino County Youth Projects
• Northern California Scholarship Foundation

We deeply appreciate the many community members that took time out of their evening to honor our students by presenting their awards in person.  We thank James Synder and Nat Corey Moran for their guidance with the senior class.

Academic awards and accolades were also presented with great fanfare.  DO YOU KNOW WHAT THESE KIDS DID?

Good stuff.  Special Stuff.  A gift that will be invested in a lifetime. If you have any belief or  investment in paying it forward, I saw it tonight.  Anderson Valley tonight you should be proud.  If all communities took care of kids the way you came out tonight, the world would be a different place.

With deepest appreciation.

Louise Simson

Superintendent

ANDERSON VALLEY FIRE DEPARTMENT: Long transport times in Anderson Valley make air ambulance resources very important for getting people to the care they need with as little delay as possible. We have a few pre-identified landing zones (LZs) throughout our 356 square mile district - this one is in the parking lot at Handley Cellars, which has the benefits of being paved and close to the highway.

Thank you, Handley Cellars! 

FAKE HUNDRED

Danger/Rip Offs

We just got a $100 bill that looks like the real thing but says: “In Props We Trust” instead of “In God” (which is the same to me, religion being a prop) BUT restaurants and other small businesses operate on a 10% profit margin and that's if we are doing o.k. That means stealing $100 is the same as $1000 which is a really shitty thing to do. Watch out, everyone! On the other side, where it says “United States of America” it says “For Motion Picture Purposes Only.” We can't blame our waitstaff; they often pick up payment folders with just the top of the bills showing. This is mean and suckworthy. 

Meredith Smith <merrie@mcn.org>

FREE ENTRY TO HENDY WOODS State Park for local residents 

On the Second Sunday of every month in 2022, the Hendy Woods Community is covering the Hendy Woods State Park’s Day Use fee ($8) for local residents from the following communities: Yorkville, Boonville, Philo, Navarro, Comptche and Elk - Know your zip code.

Enjoy a free visit to the park on us and stroll the old growth redwood groves and beautiful meadows, hike the trails, and unwind along the river! Note: Day use is from sun up to 1 hour after sunset.

PIC N PAY/DOWNTOWN BOONVILLE: Jesse B says turn the Pic 'N Pay lot into… Hopefully, someone's smart enough, to turn it into Boonville's first tiny house village.

ALL IN 1 TREE AND TIMBER INC is back in the valley available for your tree work needs, fully licensed and insured w/workman's comp. All pricing depending upon project specifications. For further information or any questions please message us here or call 707-272-7387. Thank you and have a great day. (Highly recommended by the ava. This guy gets it done fast at a reasonable price.)

SATTIE CLARK:

There is an urgent water issue happening now that will make Mendocino County's water situation much worse. PG&E has filed a request to hugely reduce water flows through the Potter Valley Project which feeds Lake Mendocino. There is an opportunity to comment today through Thursday (6/9/22) only. I am hoping members of our community could write a short comment using the following template and submit it via the FERC website link provided below. The process is you go first to the link and enter your information. They will then send you an email. You click on the link and then paste your comment. You will need to enter docket number P-77-311, then hit "search", then click on the plus sign to add that docket. Thank you!!

Draft comments (feel free to edit):

Re: PG&E's Flow Variance Request Due to Limited Water Availability for the Potter Valley Hydroelectric Project, Federal Energy Regulatory Commission No. 77

Dear Secretary Bose,

I am writing as a concerned citizen of Mendocino County regarding Pacific Gas and Electric’s May 13, 2022 request to reduce water flows through the Potter Valley Hydroelectric Project.

Lake Pillsbury has 30 thousand acre feet (TAF) more storage this year to date than in 2021. PG&E has not completed the requested and agreed upon water quality models to demonstrate that such cutbacks are necessary and beneficial to preserving salmonid populations.

It has been demonstrated that severe water curtailments are detrimental to health and human safety in regards to water availability. Residents of Mendocino County are already suffering under curtailments, as are residents of other communities that are dependent on Lake Pillsbury’s contribution to Lake Mendocino and Russian River.

I respectfully request you approve PG&E’s request only with the modification of 25 cfs minimum flow in the East Fork Russian River.

http://www.ferc.gov/docs-filing/ecomment.asp

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THE BOARD OF SUPERVISORS is considering closing the Mendocino County Museum in Willits - they currently say for a year, but if they close it for a year, likely it will be difficult to ever reopen it. The Museum is a priceless resource for our town and is also a tourism draw. Please contact our BoS and tell them NO! Very, very little money would be saved by shuttering the Museum but a great deal would be lost! Below are contacts for our BoS. Please contact them and tell to protect our cultural heritage, our town, and our people.

Email: BOS@mendocinocounty.org

ED NOTES

TODAY'S banalities were typed out Tuesday afternoon, well before the polls closed.

ALL OVER but the shouting on election day in Mendocino County, but there'll be plenty of recriminations, especially over the election for County Superintendent of Schools. Incumbent super Michelle Hutchins has been the target of the nastiest secret slander campaign I've seen in my five decades behind the green curtain, and if she's re-elected, she'll have to work amicably with people whose murders she must have at least contemplated. 

THE INSURGENT CANDIDATE, Nicole Glentzer, an administrator among the over-many school administrators affixed to the Ukiah School District, ran a campaign based on… nothing, raising zero issues except, I'm not her. 

I'M NOT HER, was the Glentzer campaign theme, but you should vote for me because four years ago when we ran a Mean Girls campaign against Michelle we put a man up front, an opaque individual called Bryan Barrett, because, well, we couldn't come right out and say it, but we thought Ukiah, being the county seat and the county's largest school district, should get first dibs on all the money flowing through the County Office of Education, just like we always got first dibs when Paul Tichinin, the well-known lexicographer, was out there all those years in the lush Talmage offices developed for max edu-crat comfort when the agency was run by criminals. Paul was never niggardly with Ukiah! We had a blank check in them (those?) days. Running a man against Michelle was a mistake! Any political race in Mendo pitting a man against a women is doomed. The woman will triumph, no problemo.

AND BARRETT was a man in a county where angry women make up a solid twenty percent of the vote, and darned if they were going to vote for a male-type candidate against a sister. So, the intellectuals atop Ukiah educational bureaucracy put their pointy heads together and… “Got it! We'll run a woman! A woman against a woman! Our woman against the woman who won't give us first dibbsies on all that money we need for endless in-services and all those white wine retreats that make our easy jobs even easier.”

ENTER Ms. Glentzer with the support of Tichinin (of course) and the spiritual Tichinins who comprise much of the educational establishment of the county, an uninspired and uninspiring collection of time servers, mostly. 

THE HUTCHINS VS. GLENTZER vote will be close, but we predict Hutchins will pull it out, trying to work fairly with people who have vilified her for the past six months, longer in the case of a coven of vengeful women based in the Anderson Valley who have again led the charge against the superintendent.

5TH DISTRICT SUPERVISOR, Ted Williams, will easily defeat challenger John Redding, a guy almost as routinely vilified as the above-mentioned Hutchins. Redding regularly gets it from the, ahem, highly evolved human beings of the Mendo Coast as an alleged “sexist” and “racist.” But any public person outside the suffocating NPR political consensus that prevails here in the 5th better hunker down for a lot of gratuitous, and typically unfounded, political flak. Redding, unlike the petulant Williams, seems cut out for political combat. 

VOTERS in the 5th will return Williams for another four years although his performance in office should have earned him the bounce. But voters don't know, or care, that Williams has “under-performed” because they pay zero attention to the Supervisors. We've suffered years of underperforming — except for their own pay and perks — 5th District supervisors. Williams is in the grand tradition.

TRENT JAMES, the charismatic young former cop might get 6 or 7 percent of the vote, and would have gotten a lot more of the vote, especially from women who seem to make up about 80 percent of his support, if he'd gotten into the race for Sheriff earlier. James, mostly by implication, blasted what he claims is an old boys network dominant in the command structure of the Sheriff's Department, doing it by retailing ancient tales of alleged bad behavior by some old timers that should, in James' opinion, preclude them from being in charge of deputies. Incumbent Sheriff Kendall runs an honest shop, and we'll note here that James didn't have anything bad to say about Kendall. James brought some splash to the Sheriff's race but has made no lasting waves.

MEASURE M here in the Anderson Valley is a bond issue to repair the aged Boonville school facilities. Takes 55% yes to pass. Will it? We think so, but it'll be close. While there's a lot of money in the Anderson Valley these days there are also a lot of property owners without money for whom 60 bucks per $100k assessed value is a big bump, especially considering that even many modest homes on the smallest lots in AV are assessed at a half-mil. And up. One might think that the state of CA, with its huge budget surplus, would pump some of that largesse into the schools, both for repairs and enhanced instruction, but despite a lot of mawkish rhetoric about how we all love the kids, that affection often disappears when it comes time to put up cash. This one will be close.

TUESDAY’S SUPERVISORS MEETING contained more disingenous comments than we can cover in one day. Perhaps the craziest was the discussion of the proposed water agency. After having needlessy wasted over $300k for a consultant to tell them how to structure a revived water agency, the Board suddenly discovered that they couldn’t afford to staff it! Besides, the County holds no water rights, provides no water to anybody, and has no water projects pending or proposed to even apply for grants for. After further discussion the Board concluded that local water agencies, districts or cities can hire their own consultants and grant writers — over $300k later. (Need we note that we pointed out that spending over $300k on a water agency consultant was a waste last October when it first arose? "Like Water for Elephants")

LATER THIS WEEK, we’ll go into some detail about Former Supervisor John McCowen’s cautious financial advice (ignored of course), a contorted rationale for how the Board justifies to itself ignoring the Pot Tax Advisory measure (Measure AJ), some good advice from the Employees union about how to handle the County’s high vacancy rate (not quite ignored, but punted and misunderstood), the apparently increased costs of the consolidated Treasurer/Auditor’s office, an interesting proposal from “Dead Dog” to save tens of thousands of unnecessary “exclusion”-oriented wildlife services, and a downright weird debate over whether to use some Transient Occupancy Tax revenues for non-existent “enhanced” pot permit enforcement. Stay tuned…

For now, here’s a trenchant comment from Mendocino Observer Editor Jim Shields which was buried in the Board’s on-line comments and probably not noticed concerning the sales tax the Board intends to consider on Wednesday:

(Mark Scaramella)

FROM: Jim Shields, Member, Mendocino County Water Agency Steering Committee

To: Mendocino County Board of Supervisors

RE: Discussion of sales taxes for November 2022 and future elections and 

Agenda Item 4D of the June 8, 2022 Board of Supervisors Meeting.

I fully concur with the June 3, 2022 memorandum sent by the the Citizens for the Library Initiative 2022, and with the June 5, 2022 memorandum sent by 4th District Supervisor Dan Gjerde regarding the disposition of Agenda Item 4D of the June 8, 2022 Board of Supervisors Meeting.

Specifically, I want to briefly address the issue of the proposed sales tax as a funding mechanism for the as yet-to-be determined final action of re-establishing the Mendocino County Water Agency as a stand-alone agency. 

Unless and until a final decision is made regarding refining the mission, goals, objectives, staffing, and jurisdiction of the Water Agency, it is premature to be taking any action concerning agency funding. To do so, literally equates to positioning the cart before the horse.

In fact, based on my three decades of experience as a local government, public water utility official, most county residents are not even aware of the existence of a Water Agency.

Succinctly stated, the proposed sales tax measure is both premature and bereft of any broad-based public support at this time.

STATE WATER BOARD APPROVES HISTORIC RUSSIAN RIVER WATER SHARING AGREEMENT

by Mary Callahan

The State Water Resources Control Board on Tuesday approved a groundbreaking agreement that allows “senior” water rights holders in the upper Russian River watershed to share their supply with junior rights holders whose claims might otherwise be suspended due to drought.

The collaborative, community-first approach, negotiated over many months by agricultural, municipal, tribal and other stakeholders in the region, is the first of its kind to try to bring balance to the allocation of scarce water supplies in a state governed by what one board member called an “inherently inequitable” water rights system.

Instead of relying on the century-plus-old “first in time, first in right” system, through which younger water rights can be fully curtailed while senior rights are left completely whole, the voluntary framework approved Tuesday allows neighbors to support each other through hard times, supporters say.

Any senior water rights holder who participates will be agreeing to forgo some of their water so that junior water rights holders can at least have a minimal amount to sustain their agricultural interests or other needs.

The five-member board, which approved it unanimously, lauded it for its innovation and focus on equity, as well as its practicality in making room for more people to weather the drought successfully.

The water rights system “is what it is, and it is something of a blunt tool,” board Chairman E. Joaquin Esquivel said. “But here, again, water rights holders in communities can organize and say there’s an ability to share better with one another.”

The decision comes as the state board imposes what Division of Water Rights Deputy Director Erik Ekdahl called “significant, very deep cuts” on 4,252 water rights holders in the San Joaquin/Sacramento River Delta watershed. The curtailment orders take effect tomorrow.

About 1,800 upper and lower Russian River water rights were curtailed last year as Lake Mendocino receded to its lowest level on record. Ekdahl said supply and demand evaluations for this year had been conducted monthly and would be made at the end of this week, with curtailments possible as soon as June 16.

If the water sharing agreement works, some who might be curtailed may still get some water. But success still depends on enough people and institutions enrolling in the program, including enough with senior water rights to contribute enough water for junior rights holders to use.

Enrollment is open through June 20. Calculations made in the days to follow will determine if the program is viable for this year. That means curtailments could go into effect a few days before that determination is made.

It may be possible to go forward with as few as 10 participants, depending on the mix, said Sam Boland-Brien, supervising engineer with state water board. But there are hundreds of water rights holders in the upper river and “obvious” benefits of scale, “so we would like to see 100 percent enrollment,” he said.

There is no way of knowing whether there will be sufficient water in the watershed for even the most senior water rights holders to share.

Storage in Lake Mendocino is currently at about 56% of the target water supply curve for this time of year, and Sonoma Water, which manages summer releases, expects to have just enough water available to sustain minimum river flows required to support federally protected salmon and steelhead trout.

While diversions of Eel River water into the East Branch Russian River and Lake Mendocino through the Potter Valley powerhouse still might provide enough to buffer downstream users, supporters of the voluntary agreement were incensed to discover three weeks ago that Pacific Gas & Electric had asked federal regulators for permission to reduce those flows to a fraction of what they normally would be.

The company did so, members of the water sharing steering committee said, even though it has pledged and been directed by regulators to share such information with a working group comprised of stakeholders in the Potter Valley project, many of whom are involved in the water sharing effort, as well.

“This is a year’s worth of work,” said Phillip A. Williams, special water counsel for the City of Ukiah, still clearly angry. “We are 99 percent of the way there, and then PG&E files a variance.”

If federal regulators approve the lowest end of PG&E’s proposed range, the program may not be viable, Boland-Briend said.

Members of the steering committee said they believe it remains worth pursuing, however.

Some also spoke of the experience of working on the agreement once water board staff initiated discussions about a locally driven solution to the threat of curtailments back in 2020, in the first year of what’s now a 3-year drought.

Elizabeth Salomone, general manager of the Russian River Flood Control and Water Conservation Improvement District in Mendocino County, recalled how early conversations with disparate parties “morphed into partnerships” and all became “a team.”

Williams, special water counsel for the City of Ukiah, told the board he had reflected recently on the longtime usage of the phrase “water wars” to capture the tension in the West over this vital resource and the tension over who has it and who needs it.

It is, he said, “an extraordinarily unfortunate term and a misnomer,” conveying a zero sum game.

“My experience tells me the this past year has been nothing like a war 

“The water sharing agreement testifies to the fallacy the paradigm of water wars offers to us.”

For more information, go to waterboards.ca.gov/drought/russian_river/voluntary_program.html.

(Santa Rosa Press Democrat)

THERE'S FRANK

On Friday, June 2, 2022 at approximately 1:50 P.M., Mendocino County Sheriff's Deputies were patrolling the area of Ford Road near Masonite Road, Ukiah when they observed a person, subsequently identified as Franklin Patty, 56, of Ukiah, standing on the side of the road.

Deputies knew Patty from prior law enforcement contacts and knew he had an active felony arrest warrant. Patty was detained and a records check confirmed the existence of an outstanding Mendocino County felony warrant for his arrest.

A search incident to arrest revealed Patty was in possession of suspected methamphetamine. Patty was also placed under arrest for possession of a controlled substance.

Patty was booked into the Mendocino County Jail where he was to be held on a no bail status pursuant to the arrest warrant.

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McSORLEY GOES OFF

On Monday, June 6, 2022 at approximately 11:02 P.M., deputies were dispatched to the 8400 block of Flynn Creek Road in Comptche for a subject causing a disturbance. The subject was reportedly yelling, discharging a firearm, and operating an ATV on the roadway.

During their response, deputies received an additional call for service for an arson in the 36000 block of Comptche Ukiah Road in Comptche. Deputies first arrived at this location and observed fire personnel on scene and in the process of extinguishing a fully-engulfed trailer fire.

While on scene, deputies received information that Michael McSorley, 40, of Comptche, was suspect to the arson and suspect to an unreported assault that occurred at the same location on Saturday, June 3, 2022. Deputies learned the victim, a 36 year-old male from Comptche, was confronted by McSorley in the early morning of Saturday, June 3, 2022 and McSorley was reportedly armed with what was described as an “AR-15 style” rifle.

Deputies learned that McSorley struck the victim multiple times with his hands and feet, aimed the rifle at the victim, and discharged the rifle several times near the victim’s head and threatened to kill him. Deputies observed the victim had injuries consistent with an assault.

Deputies also developed information to suggest McSorley was the same subject causing the disturbance on Flynn Creek Road. Deputies caused a reverse 9-1-1 and Nixle alert to be issued and advised residents in the surrounding area to shelter in place while deputies attempted to locate the subject, believed to be McSorley. The shelter in place was eventually rescinded following their unsuccessful efforts in locating the subject.

On Tuesday, June 7, 2022 at approximately 08:30 a.m., deputies developed information that McSorley was currently inside his residence located in the 8500 block of Flynn Creek Road in Comptche. Deputies responded to McSorley’s residence in attempt to arrest him. Because of McSorley’s refusal to respond to commands to peacefully exit the residence and the belief McSorley was armed, the Mendocino County Special Weapons and Tactics (SWAT) Team was called to respond.

At approximately 11:40 a.m., McSorley was taken into custody at his residence without incident by the Mendocino County SWAT Team. McSorley was ultimately transported to the Mendocino County Jail where he was booked on charges of criminal threats and assault with a firearm. Deputies contacted a Mendocino County Superior Court Magistrate who approved a request to increase McSorley’s bail, which was set at $250,000.

The fire that occurred in the 36000 block of Comptche Ukiah Road is being investigated as an arson and is still currently under investigation.

The Mendocino County Sheriff’s Office would like to thank Ukiah Valley Fire Authority and the California Highway Patrol for their response and assistance during this incident. The Mendocino County Sheriff’s Office would also like to thank the Comptche Volunteer Fire Department and several Comptche residents for the assistance they provided.

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GENTLEMAN JOHNNY

On Wednesay, June 1, 2022 at about 4:50 PM, the Mendocino County Sheriff's Deputies were dispatched to Adventist Health Howard Hospital in Willits, regarding a 38 year old female assault victim at the location. Deputies responded and found the victim was suffering from major facial injuries.

Deputies learned the victim's boyfriend of two years, later identified as Jose ‘Johnny’ Santiago, had hit the victim in the face with a large piece of wood. Deputies were advised the incident occurred in Covelo on Wednesday, June 1, 2022 at about 2:00 AM along an unknown dirt road. Santiago had also taken the victim's phone and caused damage to her vehicle. The victim was able to call her family using a different phone. The victim's family responded and gave her a ride to the Covelo Fire Department.

Deputies attempted to locate Santiago with negative results. A be-on-the-look-out (BOLO) was issued for Santiago related to this ongoing investigation.

On Thursday, June 2, 2022 at about 2:30 PM, MCSO Dispatch advised Round Valley Tribal Police had located and detained Santiago. An MCSO Deputy responded and subsequently arrested Santiago for Domestic Battery, Assault with a deadly weapon, and Battery causing serious injury.

Santiago was transported to the Mendocino County Jail to be held in lieu of $30,000 bail.

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AND GENTLEMAN JOEL

On Tuesday, May 31, 2022 at about 7:30 P.M., MCSO Deputies were dispatched to a residence in the 29000 block of North Highway 101 in Willits regarding a domestic dispute. The Deputies arrived and found the 41 year old female victim who advised that she and suspect Joel Neely, 38, of Willits, were in a dating relationship and lived together. The Deputies were advised Neely had left the location prior to their arrival.

Deputies learned the couple was involved in an argument about how dinner was prepared. During the argument it was alleged Neely punched the victim in the face causing an injury.

Deputies checked the area for Neely but were unable to locate him. A be-on-the-look-out (BOLO) was issued for Neely related to the domestic dispute.

On Wednesday, June 1, 2022, an MCSO Deputy located Neely and ultimately arrested him for domestic battery. Neely was transported to the Mendocino County Jail to be held in lieu of $25,000 bail.

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THE TRIPLE M GANG

On Thursday, June 2, 2022 at approximately 09:15 PM, a Mendocino County Sheriff's Deputy was on patrol in the Laytonville area. The Deputy observed a suspicious vehicle in the 500 block of Steele Lane and determined the vehicle's out-of-state registration was expired over 6 months. The Deputy contacted two people in the vehicle, which had stopped in a driveway, and noticed one person walking away.

The vehicle occupants were identified as Chad Mallett, 49, of Arcata (driver), and Marie Manning, 52, of Eureka (rear passenger). Another Deputy contacted Bradley Mallett, 40, of Laytonville, as he was walking down the roadway from the vehicle. The Deputy noticed drug paraphernalia and marijuana in the vehicle. Chad Mallett further advised he had warrants for his arrest.

As the Deputy was detaining Chad Mallett, a fixed blade knife dropped from his side and a sheath was later located for the knife. The Deputy further noticed a canister of pepper spray attached to the side of Manning's purse when he was talking to her.

Sheriff's Office Dispatch confirmed Chad Mallett had 3 warrants for his arrest issued in Humboldt County. Sheriff's Office Dispatch confirmed Manning was found to be prohibited from possessing pepper spray.

Chad Mallett was arrested for the 3 Humboldt County warrants and Possession of a dirk/dagger). Manning was arrested for possession of pepper spray by prohibited person.

Sheriff's Office Dispatch confirmed Bradley Mallett was on Post Release Community Supervision (PRCS) with numerous terms. The Deputy noticed the signs and symptoms of Bradley Mallett being under the influence of a controlled substance. Bradley Mallett was arrested for being under the influence of a controlled substance and violation of the terms of PRCS.

All the subjects were transported to the Mendocino County Jail.

Chad Mallett was to be held in lieu of $35,000 bail.

Bradley Mallett was to be held in lieu of no bail due to the PRCS violation.

Manning was to be held in lieu of $15,000 bail.

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VISITING FROM CLEARLAKE....

On Thursday June 2, 2022 at approximately 11:00 P.M., Deputies were on patrol in the area of Highway 20 and Road A in Redwood Valley. During this time, a Deputy observed a black Dodge Charger being driven by Ashley Lenhart, 35, of Ukiah. The Deputy was familiar with Lenhart and knew her to be wanted on multiple misdemeanor arrest warrants, plus her license was suspended and revoked.

The Deputy also observed numerous vehicle code violations on the vehicle, so a traffic enforcement stop was conducted. The Deputy contacted Lenhart and her two male passengers, who were identified as 23 year-old Jermaine Watson from Clearlake Oaks, and 22 year-old William Hutton from Clearlake.

Lenhart gave the Deputy consent to search her vehicle so she and the two male passengers were removed to conduct the search. It was during this time that Watson admitted he had a firearm in his pocket. Watson was detained in handcuffs and the firearm was removed from his pocket without incident.

At the conclusion of the traffic stop, Lenhart and Watson were both arrested. Lenhart was arrested for her five misdemeanor warrants and for driving on a suspended license. Watson was arrested for carrying a loaded firearm on his person in a public place and for carrying a loaded handgun for which he was not the registered owner. Hutton was released at the scene without charges.

Lenhart and Watson were transported to the Mendocino County Jail where Lenhart was held in lieu of $28,500 bail and Watson was held in lieu of $15,000 bail.

CALIFORNIA DEPARTMENT OF HOUSING AND COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT RECOVERY PROGRAM Will Be Closing The Disaster Housing Assistance Survey For 2017/2018 On July 30, 2022

The Prevention, Recovery, Resiliency and Mitigation Division encourages Mendocino County residents impacted by the 2017 and 2018 wildfires to complete the California Department of Housing and Community Development (HCD) ReCoverCA Program Disaster Housing Assistance Survey before the July 30, 2022 closing date.

The survey is the first step for homeowners of single-family or manufactured housing units who are interested in ReCoverCA Owner-Occupied Housing Rehabilitation and Recovery (OOR) grants. The OOR program provides grants of up to $500,000 for eligible homeowners still rebuilding. Full eligibility information is available at https://recover.hcd.ca.gov/index.php/eligibility.

If you are aware of any homeowners who may be interested in OOR funds, please encourage them to visit the ReCoverCA website at https://recover.hcd.ca.gov/. Anyone who does not complete a survey before July 30 will not be eligible for 2017 or 2018 OOR funds.

HCD will be opening the Disaster Housing Assistance Survey for 2020 survivors shortly. Please stay tuned for further announcements about OOR program developments. You can also sign up for the ReCoverCA newsletter at https://recover.hcd.ca.gov/form/sign-up-for-updates.

If you or anyone you work with has further questions about ReCoverCA, OOR, or other disaster recovery resources, please contact HCD by email at ReCoverCA@hcd.ca.gov or call (916) 202-1764.

(County Presser)

CATCH OF THE DAY, June 7, 2022

KELIE ADAMS-PENROD, Fort Bragg. Domestic battery.

LAWRENCE BROOKS, Fort Bragg. Disorderly conduct-alcohol.

ROCKY DUMAN, Ukiah. Burglary, burglary tools, paraphernalia, vandalism, conspiracy. 

RAMAULDO FERREYRA, Ukiah. DUI-alcohol&drugs.

HOWARD GROVER, Fort Bragg. Domestic battery.

ANGEL GOMEZ, San Jose/Ukiah. Failure to appear.

CHAD HOWE, Redwood Valley. Brandishing.

ZACHARY IRVEN, Fort Bragg. Disorderly conduct-alcohol.

ADAM KESTER, Willits. Failure to appear.

CHRISTOPHER KEYES, Ukiah. Indecent exposure, disorderly conduct-alcohol.

RACHEL MCBRIDE, Willits. Domestic battery.

MICHAEL MCSORLEY, Elk. Assault with firearm, criminal threats.

SHANNON PHILLIPS, Willits. Controlled substance, paraphernalia, vandalism.

TIMOTHY RAY, Ukiah. DUI-alcohol&drugs, controlled substance, paraphernalia, under influence.

ALBERT SCOTT, Laytonville. DUI, probation revocation.

JOHN WAHLSTROM, Fort Bragg. Disorderly conduct-alcohol.

PHILLIP WINTERS, Mendocino. Disorderly conduct-alcohol.

STACEY YOUNG, Ukiah. Failure to appear, probation revocation.

UKRAINE, TUESDAY, June 7

As Tuesday draws to a close in Kyiv and in Moscow, here are the key developments of the day:

The World Bank warned that Russia's invasion of Ukraine "has magnified the slowdown in the global economy, which is entering what could become a protracted period of feeble growth and elevated inflation." The bank's new Global Economic Prospects report projects a drop in global growth from 5.7% last year to 2.9% in 2022 and beyond. "For many countries, recession will be hard to avoid," World Bank President David Malpass said.

Ukraine's Foreign Ministrytweetedthat Russia is "blocking the exports" of 22 million tons of grain.The European Union's top diplomat,Josep Borrell, accused Russia of destroying a major grain terminal in the southern port city of Mykolaiv — part of a wider campaign that he said is driving up food prices and destabilizing entire regions. And European Council President Charles Michel said at a U.N. Security Council meeting on Monday that the Kremlin is using food as a missile against poorer countries, which caused Russia's ambassador to walk out. Meanwhile the U.S. has accused Russia of trying to sell grain it has stolen from occupied parts of Ukraine.

Anna Episheva: My niece was supposed to graduate this year from her high school. She and her friends bought dresses and were looking forward to this day. Then Russians came. Her school was directly hit and destroyed. Today she came back to what is left of her school and her plans pic.twitter.com/q9cJW2j8f0

— Oleksandra Matviichuk (@avalaina) June 7, 2022

ON-LINE COMMENT OF THE DAY

Gas is inching up to $5 per gallon, but still people driving around like sonsabitches. Its manic, a last desperate go-round as indicated by the plethora of head on collisions, reckless driving, pedestrians being run down, and road rage incidents. Last night we drove about 40 miles west to attend a HS graduation. It was well done, not much political BS, and the graduates appeared eager and hopeful; my nephew commented “These kids are in for a rude awakening.” Yes, but I wish them the best anyway. Stopped at an Applebees at the edge of town on the way home (I always liked Applebees) Burger and fries for me, chicken salad for my wife, a beer and a soft drink: $50 with a tip. I’m sure they’re trying to keep prices down but many more of these restaurant will be struggling to survive in the near future.

TOP GUN

I am the skunk at the garden party. Yes, Tom Cruise’s new “updated” Top Gun: Maverick movie is a real crowd pleaser, especially in the United States, and is racking up the box office numbers that thrill the Hollywood executives keen on retaining their jobs. But the movie is stupid because it is glorifying an outdated technology and is operating as a hallucinogen on the American public’s belief of how future wars will be fought. The movie is very well made but it is a military anachronism.

Here is the military mission <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Top_Gun:_Maverick>:

Maverick is ordered to train an elite group of F/A-18E/F Super Hornet aviators assembled by Vice Admiral Beau “Cyclone” Simpson and Rear Admiral Solomon “Warlock” Bates for an urgent mission: to bomb a foreign country’s unsanctioned uranium enrichment plant. The plant sits in a deep depression at the end of a canyon and is defended by surface-to-air missiles and 5th-generation fighters operating from a nearby air base.

Why are U.S. Commanders and politicians putting the lives of “elite” pilots at risk when the mission can be carried out by an air launched, such as the AGM-88 HARM or AGM-158C LRASM (Long Range Anti-Ship Missile). A pilot does not need to fly into the Valley of Death to deliver a missile on target.

The movie also ignores the fact that modern combat aircraft can perform better without a pilot sitting inside the cockpit. The modern planes being flown remotely can maneuver at speeds and g-forces that surpass anything a pilot can do or survive if inside the cockpit. In fact, one of the major costs in producing the advanced fighters are the systems installed to keep pilots alive and prevent them from being killed by the force of gravity.

Top Gun: Maverick is a well-equipped horse decked out in all sorts of gizmos being sent to attack a machine gun post. It is because of the machine gun and more precise artillery that the U.S. Army finally stopped fielding horse cavalry units just prior to WW II.

— Larry Johnson (former CIA counterterrorism officer)

GUN SAFETY

Editor,

Gun safety: bringing into effect common sense reform of gun laws has become the top national political issue. Since the mass sootings this weekend killed at least 12 Americans, wounding about 40 others, how in God’s holy name can state or national politicians dismiss the issue by merely saying their “hearts and minds” are with victims’ friends and families?! 

The Uvalde, Texas mass school shooting deaths of 19 third graders along with two of their teachers clearly demonstrated the necessity of changing the age to legally buy some weapons from 18 to 21. While so-called “Red Flag” laws also would help, these alone wouldn’t be near enough of a change. 

The 2nd Amendment made no mention of AK-15s. Minor changes such as the above will not affect any responsible gunowner’s rights. 

If either change saves just one life, then of course it is worth it.

Frank Baumgardner 

Santa Rosa

COLOR LINES

by Herb Caen, 1976

There is a certain kind of San Franciscan — not a bad fellow, really — who is forever sighing helplessly, "Why can't the blacks be more like our Chinese?" I think he is the sort of person who says during Opera season, "If they just did La Boheme and Butterfly I'd go every night," and who thinks the 1929 Seals could have licked the present-day Giants, and who says, "I don't know what the younger generation is coming to," and, "Some of my best friends are —

"I respect the Chinese, I really do," this nice fellow continues, "and I think they respect me. They have dignity and a strong family sense and they mind their own business." He always stops short of saying, "They know their place," but he doesn't have to verbalize it. "What I mean is," he finishes," why can't the Negroes learn something from them?"

The most obvious answer is that the Black is not Chinese, and please observe the "No Smirking" sign. I quote a Chinatown scholar: "In the first place, the Negro was brought to this country as a slave. Even those Chinese who were imported 100 years ago to work on the railroads were free men who were paid wages. The Chinese have thousands of years of culture behind them, and a homeland of great history. The Negro — degraded by the white man, torn from his native land, denied a family role for generations -- is just beginning to find an identity, something the Chinese have always had."

But getting back to my friend, the earnest San Franciscan, with his illusions and delusions. I wonder if he knows how an earlier breed of San Franciscan acted toward the Chinese he professes to respect so much. (I assume he knows that even today certain residential areas are off limits to all Orientals, not to mention Blacks, and that the so-called "Chinaman's room" — for the servant — still exists in the nether regions of some of our finest houses, and that the good American who orders "flied lice" in a Chinese restaurant still considers himself a wit.)

The other night, I was browsing through historian Oscar Lewis's book, ‘San Francisco: Mission to Metropolis,’ and he supplies some salty and painful reminders. In the High Sierra, during the Gold Rush days, mobs of whites attacked Chinese settlements and burned their cabins. Lynchings and shootings were common and went unpunished.

In enlightened San Francisco, a few years later, things weren't much better. Because the Chinese constituted "cheap" labor, workingmen raised the infamous cry of "Chinese must go!" The state legislature passed an Exclusion Act — literally to exclude them — that was later declared unconstitutional, but that didn't change anything. As the Chinese grew more prosperous, especially in the garment and cigar making industries, white businessmen got nervous too.

In 1873, the Workingmen's party, founded on a straight anti-Chinese platform, won the city elections and installed a mayor, Andrew Bryant, who decreed all manner of restrictions on the Chinese: higher taxes, stiffer jail sentences, and even a curfew. (They had to be off the streets at 2 AM). Thus encouraged, a firebrand orator named James D'Arcy organized a mob of 5,000 on market Street that set out, howling, for Chinatown. All night they raided, looted, set fires, and severed the firemen's hoses with axes.

Even Mayor Bryant was taken aback. He called for federal aid and two warships, the Pensacola and Lancaster, tied up at the waterfront with Marines and sailors armed and ready to land. The mob dispersed — for a time — but this was a violent city. In comparison, the riots of late September 1966 at Hunter's Point where a tea party.

Soon, another "Chinese must go!" orator, Dennis Kearney, was working up the mobs on the issue of "coolie labor." No punch puller he: "the monopolists who make their money by employing cheap labor have built themselves five mansions on Nob Hill and erected flagpoles on their roofs. Let them take care they have not erected their own gallows!" At one point, he led a mob of 3,000 to the steps of Charles Crocker's mansion on California Street which must have frightened the old gentleman out of his wits. "If I give an order to hang Crocker," he bellowed at the front door, "it will be done!" Fortunately, he didn't give the order.

One of the ugliest scenes took place along the Bay when white workmen, hired to fill in the tidelands at $1.25 per day, were replaced by Chinese (then known as "Crocker's pets") who would work for half that. A mob of whites attacked them as they worked, killed one, injured 15, and burned their shacks to the ground. This scene of violence was — Hunters Point, to this day the most racially troubled area in the city.

YOU’RE ONLY AS FREE AS YOU ALLOW YOUR WORLD TO BE

by Caitlin Johnstone

The struggle to obtain power is the struggle to gain control over the people around you. Trying to gain more control over a romantic partner, a family member, workers, the citizenry; all of these things are an attempt to obtain power.

Gaining control over others gives us the feeling that we are making ourselves more safe and secure, because, to whatever extent we're able to exert it, it seems like we are able to control what they do and prevent them from creating undesirable outcomes for us.

The assumption that more control means more safety is mistaken, and it's what generates most of the suffering in our world today. It's also what drives the impulse to obtain power.

The largest expression of that impulse is the agenda to control the entire world. The largest manifestation of that agenda is in the US-centralized empire. The people who run that empire continually seek to obtain more and more control over what humans do on this planet, with the official reason being that it makes the United States more secure and the unofficial reason being that it makes the empire architects more secure.

But in reality it does neither. It turns out that maintaining a unipolar world order requires constant violence and the constant threat of violence, and it also requires steadily mounting nuclear brinkmanship against countries who don't want to be controlled which could easily lead to the death of everyone on earth. The assumption is that more control will bring more security, but the reality is that it creates more insecurity.

This is not just true at the largest scale; it's a principle which scales all the way down to the innermost workings of a single human.

The more control you exert over your environment, the more your environment is destroyed. The more control you exert over your citizenry, the more likely they are to put someone else in charge at the earliest opportunity. The more control you exert over your employees, the more likely they are to want to go work someplace else. The more control you exert over your friends and coworkers, the more likely they are to turn against you. The more control you exert over your family, the more likely they are to avoid you. The more control you exert over your lover, the more likely they are to stop loving you. The more control you exert over life, the more likely you are to suffer. …

caitlinjohnstone.com/2022/06/07/youre-only-as-free-as-you-allow-your-world-to-be/

122 YEARS AGO, Thursday, June 7, 1900, famous (or “infamous” if you prefer) American Temperance crusader Carrie Amelia Moore Nation (1846-1911) began her campaign of vandalizing alcohol-serving establishments.

Note: The spelling of Nation’s forename varies; both “Carrie” & “Carry” are considered correct. Official records say “Carrie,” which Nation used for most of her life; the name “Carry” was used by her father in the family Bible.

Carrie A. Nation, who is particularly noteworthy for promoting her viewpoint through vandalism by frequently attacking the property of taverns & saloons with a hatchet, began her career of destruction on the fateful day of June 7, 1900. She gathered a quantity of rocks & broken bricks -- “smashers,” as she called them, & proceeded to Dobson’s Saloon at the town of Kiowa in Barber County, Kansas. Announcing: “Men, I have come to save you from a drunkard’s fate,” she began to destroy the saloon’s inventory with her cache of rocks. It was not long after that Carrie Nation switched from hurling brickbats to chopping her way through the nation’s saloons with a hatchet instead.

A relatively large woman, almost six feet tall & weighing 175 pounds, with a stern countenance, Carrie Nation described herself as “a bulldog running along at the feet of Jesus, barking at what He doesn’t like,” & she claimed a Divine Ordination to promote Temperance by destroying bars.

Not long after Carrie Nation began smashing saloons, many such establishments began displaying signs emblazoned with the slogan “All Nations Are Welcome -- Except Carrie!”

The photograph depicts Carrie A. Nation as the subject of a circa-1901 political cartoon that was published in the Saint Paul Globe newspaper of Saint Paul, Minnesota.

DEMOCRATS AND REPUBLICANS HAVE ONE THING IN COMMON: Both Suck on Free Speech

It's great that FIRE is expanding, and speech has a national champion again. It's depressing as hell that the Democrats have joined Republicans in abandoning free expression

by Matt Taibbi

The Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, or FIRE, announced a major, $75 million campaign to boost free expression today. The move places the longtime agitator against campus speech codes in a role historically occupied by the American Civil Liberties Union, or ACLU. Since its founding 1920, but particularly since its famed 1976 defense of neo-Nazi marchers in Skokie, Illinois, the ACLU has been a face of American liberalism, but shifted in recent years as its once-definitional issue, free speech, is increasingly cast out of the Democratic Party mainstream. 

FIRE’s expansion is great news for speech advocates, but likely wouldn’t have been necessary had attitudes toward speech not changed dramatically among liberal academics and among the ACLU’s primary donors, traditional Democrats. Moreover it’s not as simple as free speech moving now from being a blue value to a red one. What’s actually happened is far worse: tossed overboard by the blues, speech has been left without a consistent, principled champion on either side of the political aisle, as both parties have doubled or tripled down on the most idiotic forms of censorship lately, albeit in different ways.

The Democrats’ collapse on speech is especially tragic because Republicans have almost always been terrible on this issue and weirdly still are now, even when so many of their voters are primary targets of “content moderation” schemes, and “Domestic Terrorism” legislation clearly aimed at its base. 

For decades, you could set your watch by the Republican embrace of censorship. There was nearly always a Republican pol in the vicinity of any campaign against unpopular speech, be it Al D’Amato and Jesse Helms taking on Andres Serrano’s “Piss Christ,” or congressmen Bob Ney and Walter Jones trying in total seriousness to ban the “French” half of what they demanded the House cafeteria call “Freedom Fries,” or even George W. Bush saying “Freedom is a two-way street” and “They shouldn’t have their feelings hurt just because some people don’t want to buy their records” after protesters drove tractors over piles of CDs by the Dixie Chicks.

This script by all rights should have flipped once campuses, the executive ranks of Internet companies, and federal agencies like Joe Biden’s CDC began pushing increasingly draconian censorship concepts to “deplatform” right-wing or conservative ideas. One would think that at least out of rank opportunism, the GOP would get religion on speech principles. No such luck. ...

taibbi.substack.com/p/democrats-and-republicans-have-one