BILL HOLCOMB DRAWS A PACKED HOUSE SATURDAY To Celebrate His 90th Birthday.
(See Terry Sites report this week for more about this big event.)
SAFFRON FRASER: Hello oo! I did a little Christmas shopping in town. Boont Berry has neat stuff, Mugs and shirts and creams and self-care stuff. Sweets and chocolate too. The Anderson Valley lending library has some cool books, I picked up a few. AV Market has Boontling books and other novelties. Don't get me started on Rossi Hardware! I could get lost in there! Lemons market for shirts and stocking stuffers. I haven't even made it to Gowan's or Jack's yet. Let alone the apple farm, or the Navarro store. There are plenty more shops to visit. Lots of tasting rooms have gift items too, locally crafted treasures. Omigosh, Hanes Gallery, whoah. And I'm not even talking food or drink stuff. Shop local, support local businesses and makers of cool stuff. We have an abundance right here! Comment with more ideas.
ANDERSON VALLEY’S EMERGENCY SERVICES Committee Recommendation this week: to Adopt the 2022 California Fire Code of Regulations, California Code of Regulations, Title 24: AV Fire Chief Andres Avila presented a draft Ordinance for Adoption of the California Fire Code. After discussion, this committee made a motion that the ES committee recommends the CSD Board adopt the Fire Code Ordinance as a formalization of current fire prevention activities. Motion passed 7-0. Chief Avila explained, “There are no new Fire Code requirements within the Ordinance; this is a legal necessity to formalize what is already in place. This will be a CSD Board agenda item at the Board’s December 20 meeting.
ITEM 7(D)3 on next Wednesday’s [Dec 20] Community Services District Board meeting agenda is: “Proposed Motion: In The Interest Of Keeping The AVCSD Board And The Anderson Valley Community Informed About Progress on The Water Projects, The AVCSD Board Instructs The Water Committee To Request Support From The State Water Board And Brelje And Race (Engineers) To Develop A Detailed Project Plan Of The Planning Phase Of The Clean Water And Sewer Projects. The Project Plan Should Show The Project Milestones, Timeline, And Estimated Costs For Each Milestone, And It Should Show Interdependencies (Such As CEQA) Between Project Phases. It Should Also Show Which Milestones Will Be Conducted In The Planning Phase Of The Project And In The Subsequent Implementation Phase. The Project Plan Should Be Developed Using An App Such As Microsoft Project. (Sponsor: Director Francois Christen)
AV FIRE CHIEF ANDRES AVILA: “We did not receive any applications for the District’s mechanic’s position. We are now posting this job as an “open until filled” application period. [Retiring mechanic] Angus Loop has sent the solicitation to peers in Sonoma County, and I am pushing this around with other fire districts. We had a very interested applicant who did not apply because of insurance red tape regarding emergency responder maintenance.”
DEPRESSING STORY IN THIS MORNING'S NYT: “As Frogs Disappear Wordwide, ‘There is no way to stop that killer’.”
THE DISAPPEARANCE of Anderson Valley's frogs coincided with the installation of industrial grape-growing, not that I have scientific confirmation of my simple observation near my old home on Anderson Valley Way. After a rain, thousands upon thousands of tiny amphibs, freshly emerged from lives as roadside tadpoles, filled the pavement to such an extent the squeamish were reluctant to drive until the young creatures got to where they were going. Not anymore.
A LETTER to the editor in a recent edition of the PD begins, “One acre of vineyard uses less than 25,000 gallons of water per year. Watered six times at six gallons each time is 21,600 gallons. The water goes to the vines and then to the water table. Six houses on that same acre would use 1,956,000 gallons.”
I DON’T get this guy’s math, and his biology is demonstrably off. As I understand it, grapevines have very long tap roots that go way the hades down in search of water, stopping only when they get to the agua. The water then goes up the root and out the leaves into the air in a process called aspiration.
VINEYARDS use a lot of water any way you calculate it, and I have no idea how the wine guy came up with household water use at almost 2 million annual gallons for six dwellings. What were they, Motel 6’s? Way too high.
ANOTHER false (and boring) argument the wine mafia inevitably invoke is the one that says the vineyard aesthetic is superior to the one presented by tract homes, which isn’t the choice in most instances, and even if it were, explain to me what is so fetching about the sight of thousands of acres of metal stakes eleven months of the year? Every October we get a little fall color out of the vineyards; the rest of the time we get visuals of agro-industrial squalor
EVERY RAINY SEASON when 128 is closed down by Caltrans, sometimes for days at a time, there is a lot of unnecessary confusion, most of it caused by Big Orange. Caltrans announces these closures clear out on 101 at Cloverdale, then again at Boonville where 128 meets 253. (McDonald's to the Sea and the Boonville-Ukiah Road, respectively, if you prefer romance to numerals.
ANYWAY, these closure announcements unnecessarily deter lots of day trippers and/or people who don't know the area. And small businesses like the Navarro Store, to name one of many local and coastal enterprises who need all the customers they can get in the winter slack season, take big hits.
CALTRANS should inform travelers headed to the Mendocino Coast that they can get there via Comptche or the Greenwood Road between Philo and Navarro. Ditto for the return trip.
WHY are the roads closed? Because 128 floods near Navarro. Before Caltrans put up gates at the Navarro and Highway One end of 128, warning signs were not enough to deter the more adventurous (or drunk or stoned) drivers who plunged ahead and had to be rescued.
THE ROOT of the flooding prob is that the Navarro River, where it reaches the sea, silts up so badly it seals itself, and seems to silt up more impenetrably every year, as it is sealed now with not enough volume coming down the Navarro to bust it open.
USED TO BE locals would voluntarily clear the sandbar as locals had done for years, but that was stopped by State Parks on the following basis — take it away, Renee Pasquinelli of State Parks:
RENEE PASQUINELLI: “State Parks is responsible for management of the Navarro property. We too have received questions regarding the closure of the river mouth. This situation has existed for decades; the difference is the previous tenant of the Mill Keepers house artificially breached the mouth (sometimes in the middle of the night) to protect his chemical shed. Below is a recent response that I wrote to Superintendent Loren Rex regarding the Navarro breaching question: River breaching is subject to regulation by the Army Corps of Engineers, Regional Water Quality Control Board, State Lands Commission, and CA Department of Fish and Wildlife. State Parks does not have the authority to simply breach the mouth. Also, past studies have concluded that artificial breaching without adequate rainfall can be lethal to estuary species. Estuaries contain salt and freshwater; the heavier salt water sinks to the bottom forming a highly saline lens beneath a somewhat freshwater upper layer. Breaching siphons off the top freshwater layer, leaving the highly saline layer beneath. Organisms that were able to escape the toxic saline layer prior to breaching have been trapped at the bottom and killed by the saline “brine.” I have literally seen thousands of dead fish, crabs, and other organisms at the Navarro after an illegal breaching incident several years ago. Unfortunately, the Navarro discussions escalate only when people see the closed river mouth and want access to the beach. This stimulates a perception that something has to be done now. Ideally, we need a long term management plan for the Navarro estuary. As I recall from my past work in the Russian River area, Sonoma County Water Agency ultimately worked with Army Corps, the public, and the other regulatory agencies to develop a river mouth plan that included breaching — but the work was justified to prevent flooding of private residences on the lower Russian River. Also, as I recall, the compromise was that the river had to be monitored such that breaching could only occur when certain ecological conditions existed. I would welcome the opportunity to work with CDFW and the other regulatory agencies to pursue funding for a long term plan. For now, there is little threat to the Navarro facilities from the high water level (the Inn was raised a few years ago), and as I understand, there is a great potential for die off of sensitive species if illegal breaching occurs.”
A READER WRITES: 128 Closure
I am not certain but, as far as I understand CalTrans will not officially recommend any county maintained road as a detour unless it absolutely critical. If they did, the additional wear and tear would be their responsibility and therefore require them to fund the maintenance. Sneaky work-around but typical bureaucratic BS.
That said, if y’all finds yourselves driving through Comptche please slow the eff down and watch for pedestrians crossing near the store! And kids are at school It’s a 25mph zone! Thanks
NAVARRO SANDBAR MANUALLY BREACHED, 128 OPEN. When I arrived to check on the Navarro sandbar at 4:30 PM last Wednesday, I saw two men with shovels had just dug a feeder channel between the estuary and the pit at the head of the natural breach that we've seen slowly advancing for several days. The two carefully tended their channel, pulling out driftwood sucked in from the estuary that might clog it. Within 30 minutes the flow had grown into a raging torrent. The men reached the sandbar in a yellow ocean kayak. I left as darkness fell, with the two still on the sandbar, proudly admiring their handiwork.
A look at the USGS Navarro Gage chart shows a sharp drop from 5 ft. at 5 PM to 2.5 ft. at 8 PM
As a result, Hwy. 128 is already open. But also, based on scientific studies, thousands of estuary dwelling fish and other life will die and float belly up, where they will fatten up a lot of vultures and other scavengers. See the archived Beacon article linked below describing a boat trip up the Navarro in 1962, a couple of days after fishermen had manually breached the sandbar. The boaters saw thousands of dead fish and smelled a horrible stench. They assumed that what they saw resulted from the manual breach coming too late, but in fact it was the premature breach that caused the fish kill by skimming off the fresh water near the surface, leaving only the salty, oxygen-depleted bottom layer of water in which the fish could not survive.
But how long will the river mouth stay open without enough river flow to keep it from closing in? It could close up again in a few days, depending on surf and tide. Fortunately some strong winter storms are expected to begin very soon, and around Christmas and New Year’s there should be plenty enough flow to open the bar and keep it open. Up to 2" of rain is forecast this weekend.
Some people think it's good to manually open the bar so that salmon and steelhead can enter the river to spawn. That may have been the motive for the two men breaching the bar today. But without enough river flow those fish will have trouble reaching and entering the tributary streams where they spawn. Better to wait for the rains to come. It's not nice to fool with Mother Nature. As for Hwy. 128, there's only a 100 yard section near the bridge that gets flooded every year by a few inches of water backed up by the sandbar. Caltrans last year added 6" of pavement through that section, or it would have been flooded before now. Another six inches on top of that should be enough to put an end to the bothersome road closures except when there are genuine high-water floods that put miles of 128 under several feet of water, mud and debris. (Nick Wilson)
BOONVILLE SCHOOL SUPERINTENDENT, Louise Simson:
I loved the picture of the Garden Court tree. [at the Palace Hotel, SF]. Long ago, when I was young, I used to manage shopping centers, and when my son was born, I went to work for a company called Barango. They are an old family firm located in South City, and they made the most exquisite industrial holiday decorations for large shopping malls, hotels, retailers, etc. We did the Neiman Marcus tree, created a carousel for a Sultan in the Middle East, decorated hundreds of malls and hotels, and everything was made in the factory by hand. I used to go all over the country with the lead designer and work in malls in the early winter months to design the decor packages, which would be made and shipped, and installed in November. Those trees are actually built with a metal base like a cone. The bottom is assembled and becomes the frame to work the way up and then the branches, which are fully lighted and decorated, are put into armature sleeves as the assemblers work their way from the top down. One of those trees could be put up by four men in a single night. Pretty wild times. Long ago.
Look at the website, barango.com, it was very cool. Barango had a showroom where they would wine and dine clients that would knock your socks off with old world antique reproductions and a full fairy land of 10,000 square feet of holiday decor.
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