Hemorrhaging Jobs, We Limp On

Ukiah, the city where failure knows no bottom and where ineptitude goes unnoticed, is once again failing and those in charge are shrugging it off.

The town is coming apart at the seams. Businesses are dying off, moving out or giving up. JC Penney’s has been a fixture in town since buffalo roamed Highway 101, a road that hadn’t yet been built.

And today Penney’s is going the way of the buffalo, along with the brontosaurus and the snipe.

What next? The city doesn’t have many more retail merchants to spare, not that anyone at city hall is counting. But just for fun you and I can list a few stores that no longer call Ukiah home:

Skate City, Curry’s Furniture, North State Cafe, Bank of America, K-Mart, Beverly’s Fabrics, East Perkins BBQ, Village Books, Palace Hotel, ye olde Post Office, Dig Music , Satellite Motel, GNC Health, D Williams Jewelers, Perkins Street Grille, about 20 bars, pubs, tavern and saloons, Carl’s Jr., Ukiah Bowling Alley, NorCal Dermatology, Freedom Skates. In the next 60 seconds you’ll think of 10 more.

You and I might assume all these closed businesses and boarded-up shops are important. We might think lost jobs will result in significant unemployment, family stress and suffering, reduced “Shop Local!” opportunities and loss of tax revenues, but City Hall could see things differently.

No city administrator would ever be caught dead in JC Penney’s, and none have ever considered rollerskating or bowling. They think BBQ is for backyards and rednecks.

Taxes? Why shouldn’t the city just balance retail tax losses by jacking up utility rates a few bucks per family? It’s not like cable TV. Citizens can’t just drop PG&E and purchase utilities from one of its competitors.

Now let’s talk marijuana. Until recently weed was the foundation and backbone of Ukiah’s economy, as outlaw growers spent money where it counts: local shops, stores, bars and restaurants. Government got shorted. Boo-Hoo.

I’d rather car lots, farm supply outlets, nurseries, clothing stores and restaurants get the money than have the city, county or state chew it up and vomit the money back up on nonprofit grants, pointless homeless expenditures and all the other follies clever politicians find to spend tax dollars.

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Dave Nelson For The Defense

Last I spent time with Dave Nelson was among friends at an afternoon lunch in Hopland, him mired in the sticky web of Parkinson’s decline. I drove.

We’d known each other many decades. My daughter and his were friends and went to Mariposa School together. He was steady, quiet, reserved, smart and funny He laughed a lot and cried a lot; everyone has a Dave-bursting-into tears-story.

He’d been a high school sports star and a defensive back on very good Stanford football teams; in Ukiah he was a stud in softball and basketball. It might have been enough for most of us, but Dave was destined for more.

Prior to being appointed judge, he was among the best criminal defense lawyers in Ukiah, and Ukiah was blessed with a bunch: Richard Petersen, Bert Schlosser, Teri Capriolo, Jan Cole-Wilson, Ann Moorman, Keith Faulder, John Behnke, Jonna Saxbe and, briefly, Dave Eyster.

But in 2024 the gap between what Dave Nelson had been compared to his present state was a wide one. His health wasn’t good, and getting worse. He whispered, he shuffled, hadn’t much stamina and his appetite wasn’t so hot.

The irony was stark. I told him his plight was the stuff of literature: By story’s end A) the Olympic sprinter has a leg amputated, B) the great artist goes blind, C) a beautiful actress has botched facelifts and loses her looks and D) the philosopher loses his mind.

Harsh? Insensitive? I meant neither. Dave was silent 30 seconds, a bit long for a comfortable pause. Then he turned and grinned:

“Should I have lived a different life? Been like you? A heart attack and fall over dead?”

We laughed and laughed.

He lived a great and decent life, achieved lofty goals and earned the respect and admiration of all who knew him.

(Tom Hine also recalls Dave as a principled, non-hysterical Democrat and a major Bob Dylan fan. TWK envisions him in the big courthouse stadium in the sky.)