Valley People (December 7, 2022)

DID ANYONE SEE THIS ACCIDENT?

I am wondering about the following:

I was involved in a car accident last Monday, 11/28, in Yorkville, at approximately 1:15pm. 

The accident occurred directly in front of my home. I was waiting to turn into my driveway. I was in the northwest lane (towards Boonville) waiting for the oncoming vehicles to pass, to make my turn. 

I was rear-end by a UPS delivery van. 

I’m asking if anyone has pictures of the accident seen and/or did anyone witness any part of the accident?

I could not tell if any vehicles were behind the UPS vehicle.

If yes to any of the above, please contact me-Thank you

Gary Margolis

By the grace of God and local, marvelous, trained, dedicated volunteer-fire, ambulance, EMT-(Anderson Valley Rock Stars), & Reach-pilots, nurses, etc-I am ok.

Alive, functioning, and forever Grateful and Blessed.

TWO BOONVILLE QUIZZES IN DECEMBER…

But not this week. We shall present The General Knowledge and Trivia Quiz at Lauren’s at The Buckhorn in downtown Boonville on the 3rd and 5th Thursdays of December: Dec. 15 and 29.

Hope to see you there. Happy Holidays,

Cheers, Steve Sparks, The Quizmaster.

THUNDER is only half the fun without accompanying lightning, but we had some nice rumbles Sunday night into early Monday morning. But so far, this rainy season has begun like last year’s rainy season — more sun than rain.

JESSICA ANDERSON-LAFRENZ, AVHS class of ‘86, has been named Associate Vice President, Creative Design and Strategy at the Federal Reserve Bank in San Francisco. 

AV JUNIOR & SENIOR HIGH STUDENTS COMPETING TO FEED THE COMMUNITY!

Students at Anderson Valley Junior/Senior High School in Boonville, California are stepping up to feed their community. Over the next few weeks, they are having a class competition to collect food for the Anderson Valley Food Bank. 

SENIORS IN THE LEAD (as of Friday, December 2)

ELK STORE BREAK-IN

Holiday season bummer. Someone broke our front door last night and stole thousands of dollars of merchandise. They also broke our “antique” built-in counter cash drawer, which only holds a nominal amount of change. That drawer doesn’t even lock, and they didn’t take anything from it. We are bummed, it’s a hard time of year for small businesses on the coast as it is. Thanks to Elk neighbor/friend John Zucker for alerting us this morning, and for showing up with plywood and screws before we got there. …

THE ELK STORE SAYS THANK YOU: 

“We are overwhelmed with gratitude. Humbled by the support of the Elk Store community near and far. Thank you to Chef @dphopps and @aka_weezy of @izakaya_gama for putting together a gofundme to help us out after the burglary, and to all of those who donated, stopped by, texted, commented, bought sandwiches for their entire staff, and called. Faith in humanity restored.”

FROM THE ANDERSON VALLEY VILLAGE: Join us for a short volunteer training and learn more about the Anderson Valley Village and how you can give back to the elders of our community. The work of volunteers is vital to our mission of supporting seniors as they age in place, providing all manner of help, from basic chores, transportation, tech support and errands to check-in calls and visits to skilled services. It’s up to you how, and how often, to volunteer. Because we are working with a vulnerable population, we require our volunteers to have the COVID vaccine, thank you (please bring your card). And if you would like to be a volunteer driver, please bring your Driver’s License and proof of insurance card. Volunteer applications are available at the training, Senior Center, Health Center and/or our website, andersonvalleyvillage.org  

THE VILLAGE also offers us low-tech geezers practical assistance with cyber-world. Check with the Anica or the Senior Center for the next session. And when you do, bring your smartphones, tablets, iPads, etc. and volunteer AV High School students will be available to help with tech support. Students will all be masked but not all are vaccinated. Please consider staying and enjoying the Senior Center’s lunch — it’s the best deal in town!   

OAK FIREWOOD: I have seasoned Madrone and Black Oak for sale! Also, if you have trees that have gone down at your property, and you want removed, give me a call. If you have brush you want removed, roads that you want built, drive ways that need to be re-graveled, trees trimmed, brush burning, stump removal, carpentry, fencing, irrigation, excavation work, septic installation, etc: give me a call at (707) 621-2066

INTRODUCING GLEN RICARD’S ROADSIDE ART GALLERY

Ricard, who lives in barbarous splendor in Mendocino where abandoned buildings are not tolerated, has maintained this major eyesore and fire trap in Boonville for almost fifty years, thanks to a combination of bureaucratic sloth by both the county of Mendocino and Anderson Valley’s Community Services District board. One of these hot, windy summer days Ricard’s major hazard to the entire Haehl street area will go up in flames, taking the entire neighborhood with it.

ON APRIL 18, 2012, the Community Services District Board voted 5-0 to send this letter to slummeister Glen Ricard of Little River:

“Dear Mr. Ricard,

This community and this Board believe that your abandoned and rundown building is a blight on the town of Boonville and a threat to the health and safety of the neighbors and neighboring properties. It also gives an initial bad impression of the town of Boonville to visitors approaching from the south which can affect local commerce. It is clear that your structure presents a fire danger because of the decrepit condition of the building, siding and internal collapse, and because transients can easily, and apparently have, broken in and entered the building in the past. Transients are known to occasionally start cooking fires which could easily get out of control. They are likely to conduct illegal drug activity in the building. We ask that you either:

1. Simply demolish the building because it appears that it has no economic value and the property would probably be worth more if the building were removed.

2. Refurbish and remodel the building for beneficial occupancy (as apparently preliminarily applied for several years ago).

Or 3. Sell the property to a willing buyer at a reasonable price.

Are you and/or your insurance carrier aware of the liabilities the building presents? We may be able to advise or assist you in arranging for the safe demolition or destruction of the building and removal of debris.

We encourage you to work with the local community to arrange for beneficial local occupancies that would become the basis for the construction of a new or remodeled building that would then provide income to you, while providing additional residential or commercial space in Boonville. We would like the courtesy of a reply to these concerns and requests with an indication of what your plans are for the property.”

NO RESPONSE from the Little River slum magnate. Rev up the bulldozers.

IN THE DEPTHS of the Depression, when civic responsibility was a social given….Katy Tahja, Mendo historian, commented on a picture of the Golden Gate Bridge on opening day with a huge crowd of people packed onto the bridge in celebration: “My in-laws, Andrew and Marjorie Tahja, were on the Golden Gate Bridge on opening day. I really liked the photograph. I wonder how many of we local seniors had family on the bridge that day?”

“THE GOLDEN GATE BRIDGE was constructed using a $35 million bond, well below early construction estimates of up to $100 million, due to ingenuity on the part of chief engineer Joseph Strauss and his team. The bond issue was supported by San Francisco-based Bank of America.” But BofA wouldn’t have “supported” the bond issue unless NorCal people put up the collateral.

“ON NOVEMBER 4TH 1930, voters within the Golden Gate Bridge and Highway District’s six member counties (San Francisco, Marin, Sonoma, Del Norte, and portions of Napa and Mendocino) went to the polls on the question of whether to put up their homes, their farms and their business properties as collateral for a $35 million bond issue to finance the construction of the Golden Gate Bridge (Bridge). For some, the timing of the bond election was considered economically reckless as it would create bonded indebtedness during the Great Depression. Others said bridge construction represented the economic relief needed from the Great Depression. After the vote, it was clear the people believed in Chief Engineer Joseph Strauss’ vision – 145,057 voted in favor and 46,954 against it.”

JOHN TOOHEY has brilliantly pulled off the resumption of the Redwood Classic basketball tournament, the Northcoast’s oldest hoops tourney. He even made the trophies! “I made them last night about 2am - learning how to put on a tournament for the first time, some details slipped through the cracks, like trophies, so I scrambled to put them together. Fortunately, the school has a laser etcher and a router. In coming years I want design classes to design and build all the awards for the tournaments - imagine an entire redwood round c n c routed or laser etched with the championship message - this tournament could have a lot of cross academic application - students on campus could see their work matter and mean something. This tournament has huge potential for the community.”

PRIORY (Woodside) won the tournament, defeating Stuart Hall (SF) for the championship

Valley Christian (San Jose) knocked off Pinewood (Los Altos) for third.

Averroes (Fremont) beat CSD (Fremont) in the consolation round. Boonville was valiant throughout, as was Covelo featuring yet another Whipple. 

All Tourney players: #4 Chris Donker, Valley Christian Academy; #5 Thomas, Pinewood; #2 Sterling Luddington-Simmons, Stuart Hall; #1 Rostand Olama Abanda, Priory; #24 Steve Emeneke, Priory

AND KUDOS to AVHS’s on-the-case media liaison, Lucy Espinoza, who got all the tourney news out to the wider world in a timely manner.

PETE BOUDOURES on the Classic: “Bring the tribes to the Redwood Classic. The Joe Smiths from Hupa made the games exciting (a legend in the all-native Bball tourneys in California) Hoopa, Round Valley, Point Arena before the prep schools.”

ED NOTE: The great athletes of Mendocino County have invariably been Native Americans. Up through the middle 1970s before dope and thug-reverence made its evil way into Round Valley, Round Valley High School was a small school powerhouse.

I’M PRETTY SURE tourney director John Toohey wants to get back to a tournament without Bay Area and LA private schools coming to Boonville to play each other. Our Redwood Classic being the Redwood Empire’s oldest high school hoops extravaganza, the Boonville gym used to be packed for games featuring Northcoast teams except Ukiah, who got run outta the gym by tiny Boonville, then run outta their own Ukiah gym a second time by Boonville in the Jerry Tolman years, and haven’t dared play a Boonville team since.

THE REDWOOD CLASSIC has seen many great basketball players since that first Classic in 1958 when the late Sam Prather of Boonville was named to the all-tourney team, but for me I’ll always remember the 1976 championship game played by Point Arena’s Mario Oropeza and his brother Lupe — known on the Coast as the Flying Oropeza Brothers — against heavily favored Cloverdale. Mario single-handedly defeated Cloverdale, scoring 29 points, rebounding at both ends of the court, smothering Cloverdale on defense, and generally playing the best game of basketball by an individual I’ve ever seen with my own eyes. He was so good that night, so perfect, it was kind of eerie, like you weren’t seeing what you were seeing.

AT CLASSIC TIME, I always think of the late Eddie Whipple, who passed in 2017. He coached in Covelo for decades, and it was more than fitting, and long overdue, that Coach Whipple has been remembered by naming Covelo’s Whipple Classic Basketball Tournament after him. The inaugural Whipple Classic didn’t quite come off this year but we’re assured it will roar into life in 2023.

SUPERINTENDENT SIMSON: REDWOOD CLASSIC IS BACK, and the food, Oh My!

So wonderful to see the teams back in action. So proud to see the banners our students made for all of the teams playing. So amazing to see the community members that paid for banners around the gym. A huge shout out to all of the students and staff involved and Coach Toohey and his mom, Palma. Burgers are for sale to support Mariah Perez’s senior project, ornaments, coasters, and T-Shirts that are super cute are on sale for a class benefit. Come on out and watch a game. No charge. A donation can be made to the food bank, but is not required. Our retirees filled the stands. Great to see JR Collins who related it was his 45th Redwood Classic and Coach Flick too! We want you back in our gym. Our heaters work and it isn’t cold in there anymore. Come have some fun and support the kids!

And as far as our food drive, my heart is happy. Amazing what you and your kids are doing for people who don’t have enough. I think we already have 700 pounds of food. We have two more weeks. What can we do?

ICE SKATE IN UKIAH: November 26-January 15 you can actually ice skate in downtown Ukiah on  Alex Thomas Plaza. $10 @ person. for more information call 707 4763-6231

BEWARE POSTAL SCAM: Do not respond if you receive a text or e-mail telling you that the United States Postal Service is having trouble delivering a package and asking you for credit card information to charge you $3.00 or some other amount for redelivery. The Post Office does not do business this way. They are scammers. Check out the URL; if it is not a United States government URL they ARE NOT the Post Office and they could steal your credit card information. (Terry Sites)