Mendocino County Today: Thursday 6/13/24

Seals | Cooling | Kitten Event | Felon Woo | Mural | CSD Notes | Football Camp | Kidnap Ruse | Shady Nook | Ukiah Construction | Eddie Mitchell | Haschak Report | First Seagull | Eel Friends | Book Openings | Museum Fundraiser | Host Family | Volunteer Opportunity | Boonville 4th | Big River | Arena Project | Coast Views | Parallel Trail | Finding Elizabeth | Bench View | Ed Notes | Yesterday's Catch | Big Time | Lakeport Courthouse | Bookstore Man | Jerry West | Doing Harm | Wood Heater | Un Assimilated | Vet Shortage | Daffodils | Dirty Lighthouse | AI Race | Hunter Comfort | Virtual Existence | Successful Artist | Average Income | Autocratic Slide | American Aid | Go Slow | Another Warning

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DRY WEATHER expected through the weekend. Interior temperatures are forecast to trend down today and moderate to near seasonal levels this weekend. Much stronger westerly to northwesterly winds are expected in the interior this weekend. (NWS)

STEPHEN DUNLAP (Fort Bragg): 47F in the fog this Thursday morning on the coast. I say fog but it's hard to tell in the 5am morning darkness. Our forecast is for mostly clear skies going into the weekend but with the fog nearby you just never know?

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29 YEAR OLD MALE ARRESTED FOR CRIMINAL THREATS AND STALKING

On 06/10/2024 at approximately 6:00 P.M., Ukiah Police Department (UPD) Officers responded to the 200  block of Carleton Drive in Ukiah for a report of criminal threats and vandalism. UPD Officers spoke with the victim, a 26-year-old female from Ukiah who advised Kevin Leonard had arrived at the location where he did not reside. Leonard kicked the door multiple times but was unable to make entry. Leonard fled from the scene before the officers arrived. The victim provided UPD Officers with text messages that included criminal threats and a photograph of a revolver.  

Leonard had previously entered the above-mentioned residence on 06/10/2024 at approximately 3:00 A.M. and assaulted a male subject inside. At the time of the first incident no one desired prosecution but with the escalated behavior and threatening messages, the victim feared for her safety.  

UPD Officers obtained a Ramey Warrant for Leonard’s arrest for stalking, criminal threats, and vandalism.  

UPD Officers later observed Leonard’s vehicle had returned to his residence on Empire Drive in Ukiah. UPD Officers with the assistance from the California Highway Patrol, surrounded Leonard’s residence and attempted to call him out of the residence. Leonard did not exit the residence and UPD Officers entered the residence through an unlocked door and placed Leonard under arrest without incident. 

UPD Officers obtained a search warrant to conduct a search for the firearm. UPD Officers located the revolver that was depicted in the photograph sent to intimidate the victim and more than 400 rounds of ammunition. 

It was determined that Leonard was a convicted felon and unable to possess ammunition or firearms due to a prior conviction for violation of 245(a)(4) of the California Penal Code-Assault with a deadly weapon. The UPD Officer who arrested Leonard requested a bail enhancement from a judge at the Mendocino County  Superior Courthouse and that request was granted in the amount of $150, 000.00. 

Leonard was transported to the Mendocino County Jail where he was booked on the above-mentioned charges.  

The Ukiah Police Department would like to thank the California Highway Patrol for their assistance with this investigation.  

As always, our mission at UPD is to make Ukiah as safe a place as possible. If you would like to know more  about crime in your neighborhood, you can sign up for telephone, cell phone, and email notifications by  clicking the Nixle button on our website; http://www.ukiahpolice.com

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AT WEDNESDAY’S MEETING of the Anderson Valley Community Services District Budget Committee we learned that electric vehicles pose a whole new set of challenges to first responders because of their unique electric batteries. These challengers are only now starting to be addressed by the “firefighting community.” The AV Fire Department has acquired a special electric vehicle fire smothering blanket because in some cases motor/hood fires need to be squelched before conventional firefighting can begin. The Department now also has a unique “extinguishing unit” that slides under a car to inject water directly at the underside of the battery to cool it and extinguish flames. And they have a device to make sure the car isn’t “running” because often the firefighters don’t know for sure what mode the vehicle is in, meaning it could drive itself off without warning. Needless to say this all costs money.

SPEAKING OF MONEY, the County is still dragging its feet in distributing the Measure P money to local emergency services organizations. At last check most local departments have finally received one-quarter’s worth of the funds (about $43k in Anderson Valley’s case), albeit more than a year since the sales tax revenues began to accumulate. There is now more than a year’s worth of proceeds backed up and due local fire districts and the Fire Safe Council and the Chief’s Association. At last check the Chief’s Association which was supposed to get one quarter of the proceeds after the 10% off the top for the Fire Safe Council has yet to receive a penny of the Measure P funds. Apparently the County is requiring a contract, a contract with silly provisions that are changing almost monthly, for each quarter of the distributions. So the first quarter contracts are now in place and money has started to trickle out, but the remainder of the contracts are still being haggled over by the County Counsel’s office. For example, the County Counsel’s office wanted a special provision that required each district to agree to return any unspent money, rather than just letting districts keep their fair share and use it to accumulate funds for (frequently expensive) equipment purchases! Other “rules” have been proposed which, of course, some of which, like the above, have been unacceptable to the local fire districts. When the public voted for this tax (albeit with a narrow margin of 52-48) they were not told that the County would attached petty strings and conditions to the disbursements. As local fire departments attempt to finalize their budgets and equipment acquisition plans (including the expensive new electric vehicle equipment) for this year (ending at the end of this month) and next year (July 2024 to June 2025) they are unable to complete their budgets because of all this folderol that the County Counsel’s office is injecting into the process. We await a Supervisor’s intervention because this is creating some serious political liability for the Supervisors.

(Mark Scaramella)

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TEN YEAR OLD BOY FOUND; NOT KIDNAPPED

On Tuesday, June 11, 2024 at approximately 2:19 P.M., the Mendocino County Sheriff’s Office Dispatch Center received a call from a resident who located a child in the 8100 block of Uva Drive in Redwood Valley. The child was described as a 10-year-old male juvenile who was exhibiting confusion and had difficulty answering questions from the resident and dispatcher.

The juvenile made statements he may have experienced a head injury and was initially unable to provide his name or his parent’s names. The juvenile made statements to the resident who located him that he was possibly kidnapped from Potter Valley by two males who placed him in a truck, drove him to Redwood Valley and left him alongside the road on Uva Drive.

Sheriff’s Office personnel initiated an immediate response to the area, to include numerous detectives and investigators due to the significance of the circumstances reported. Medical personnel were also summoned to check on the child’s physical wellbeing. Upon thorough investigation, detectives determined there was no evidence to suggest the juvenile was kidnapped or injured.

During this investigation, the child’s father was located and advised his son and another sibling were involved in an argument and the 10-year-old male left their residence after the incident. After realizing his son was missing, the father was searching the neighborhood when he ultimately located law enforcement with his child in the neighborhood. The juvenile’s father advised his son had been missing from their residence for approximately 25 minutes, which is consistent with the timeframe for the juvenile to walk from his home to where he was located on Uva Drive.

It was determined the child lived in the surrounding area and was never in Potter Valley on Jun 11, 2024. Detectives located numerous nearby residences with surveillance cameras and spoke with independent witnesses who observed the child walking alone in the neighborhood prior to being found by the nearby resident who contacted law enforcement. Based on all of the circumstances of this investigation, there was no evidence located to substantiate the child’s statements he was kidnapped.

Detectives continued to investigate this incident and determined there was no threat or danger to the public as the evidence located during the investigation indicated the child walked away from home on his own accord after an argument with a sibling. The child was released at the scene to his father after being checked by medical personnel.

On Wednesday, June 12, 2024, Sheriff's Office Detectives were contacted by the parents of the male juvenile involved in this incident. The parents informed investigators they spoke with their child further about this incident, and their son ultimately admitted he fabricated the story about being kidnapped.

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UKIAH STREETSCAPE CONSTRUCTION UPDATE: paving South State Street on Thursday, June 13.

(Sending early because some of this week’s activity wasn’t completely forecasted in last week’s notice.)

Thursday, June 13th: Paving on South State Street between Mill and Gobbi. Full closure during construction hours; open and “driveable” in the evening.

Thursday/Friday of this week: Sawcutting for the median on the north side, between Scott and Norton, followed by pouring and forming the concrete curbs for it. Traffic is not expected to be impacted. Sawcutting for the medians on the south side will begin next week.

Friday’s regular email will contain additional details about future work, but please feel free to contact me if you have specific questions about this update.

Thank you,

Shannon Riley, Deputy City Manager

Email: sriley@cityofukiah.com

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SUPERVISOR JOHN HASCHAK:

Around the County, Memorial Day was celebrated. I would like to thank all the veterans, American Legion posts, Veterans of Foreign Wars, and other groups who keep the memory alive of sacrifices made. My father was in the army. He was in Day 2 of the D-Day invasion. He only talked about it one time and that was the only time I saw him cry. I was fortunate to have had the opportunity to serve in the Peace Corps. As we look forward to 4^th of July celebrations, we honor those who serve our communities, county, and country thru public service, military service, or service making this world a better place.  

The Board of Supervisors passed a balanced budget for fiscal year 2024-2025. Like last year, we had to use $7 million of one time only money. We will have to continue cutting costs wherever possible. We do have labor agreements with all the bargaining units. We cut about $8 million in creating efficiencies and reductions and we will have to continue cost cutting. 

In projects that I worked on directly, these were some of the savings this year. We were able to save over $600,000 in a “golden handshake” incentive and $120,000 in deleting the Cultural Services Agency department head and replacing that position with a County Librarian position who oversees a branch library. The cannabis department lowered their county costs by about $500,000 and offering permit amnesty for Planning and Building Services brought in over 40 new buildings into the tax system. The museum is transitioning to a non-profit agency which will reduce County costs in the future.

The budget going forward will have two year projections. This will help in forecasting how decisions made will play out over a longer period of time. The Teeter Plan, which helps provide stable funding for schools and community service districts, is projected to bring in $1.5 million which is good news since it was a negative on the budget. County facilities have seen a 10% drop in electrical usage and 27% drop in gas utility usage. Cannabis taxes brought in $3.2 million when it was budgeted at $1 million.

Unfortunately, the Board approved a Master Tax Sharing Agreement without proper analyses done of how it would affect County services and finances. I was the lone dissenting vote. The tax sharing agreement allows cities to annex areas. This can be a fairly simple proposition in an area where there is just residential properties. However, when areas that are in the County have sales tax and Transient Occupancy Tax generating businesses, it becomes much more complicated and risky for the County. The County projects a loss of $3 million if, for example, the area north of Ukiah is annexed. This includes Raley’s, auto dealers, motels, and many other businesses (14 of the 25 highest sales tax generators in the County). Yet the County will still be responsible for coroner duties and other law enforcement activities, social services, mental and public health,  and other services. This loss of income will affect the County’s budget unless there is a huge surge of economic development as the proponents claim.   

There will be a Talk with the Supervisor Thursday, June 13 at 10:00 at Brickhouse Coffee in Willits. I am available by email haschakj@mendocinocounty.gov or phone 707-972-4214. 

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CHERISSA JOHNSON:

My Husband was pretty surprised to see this little seagull visiting Anderson Valley Way today. He said he’s never seen one here in the 40 plus years of living in the Valley! Have you ever seen one?

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IS PG&E DELAYING DAM REMOVAL?

Greetings Friends,

Temperatures below Scott Dam have just exceeded 15 degrees C. This is the threshold at which PG&E has requested permission from FERC to begin reducing diversions to the Russian River. But after four months they are still waiting for FERC to grant that permission. See below for more details on how we are pushing FERC to give PG&E the authority to better protect the Eel's native fish while the dams continue to degrade habitat.

And speaking of PG&E's Potter Valley Project, many of you likely saw the news that the utility company is seeking an extension of time to submit their draft license surrender application. Stakeholders were expecting to see that document, a more detailed version of the one they circulated last fall, submitted to FERC this month. The new schedule proposes a draft filed in January of 2025 and a final plan in June of 2025. While PG&E claims that this extension will not delay actual dam removal, we are wary. We understand their logic that a short delay now may prevent a longer delay later, but are concerned that PG&E is walking back their commitment that diversion planning will not delay dam removal. See below for more details.

In other news, the Great Redwood Trail Agency extended deadlines for comment periods on both scoping for their Program Environmental Impact Report and their Draft Master Plan. The deadline for scoping comments has just passed, see below for details and to read our comments. The deadline for commenting on the Draft Master Plan is now open until July 3, click here (https://greatredwoodtrailplan.org/) to read the plan and submit comments.

Finally, we are sad to share that the Northern California conservation world lost a legend last week when Dr. Loyal Martin Griffin passed away after 103 well-lived years serving our community and planet. Marty was a co-founder of Friends of the Eel River and kept in touch even as a centenarian to provide much appreciated guidance. We'll miss you Marty, thanks for your many important contributions to the world of environmental conservation.

FERC Needs to Approve PG&E's Flow Variance Request As many of you are likely now familiar, PG&E is unable to meet the flow schedule for the Potter Valley Project as outlined in their amended license from 2004. This flow schedule is unobtainable in most years due to a variety of factors including strategies employed to reduce dam safety risk, and changes in climate conditions. So, nearly every year, PG&E must ask the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) for permission to deviate from these scheduled flows with a "variance request". To their credit, in recent years PG&E's variance requests have also focused on maintaining cool water temperatures below Scott Dam adequate to protect native fish trapped below the dam.

In 2022 PG&E's variance request was approved in a timely manner by FERC and the utility was able to maintain temperatures at or below 19 degrees C, an important threshold for juvenile salmonids. However, in 2023 FERC delayed approving the variance for five months, resulting in dangerous conditions for salmonids where temperatures exceeded 21 degrees C for nearly a month. The below graph is a great illustration of the effectiveness of PG&E's variance when implemented early in the season.

This year, in an effort to avoid the catastrophe that occurred last year, PG&E submitted a variance request to FERC in February.

Unfortunately FERC has still not approved this request, despite the clear evidence of this management plan's effectiveness in improving the degraded habitat below Scott Dam.

The 2024 variance request is similar to the past two years, except that it proposes that PG&E, in consultation with wildlife agencies, begin reducing diversions when temperatures below Scott Dam reach 15 degrees C. That temperature threshold was passed just two days ago on June 10. There is still time for FERC to do the right thing and approve PG&E's request. Thus, members of our Free the Eel coalition submitted a letter on June 2 urging FERC to take immediate action to approve the variance and give the Eel's native fish the best chance they have while the dams remain in place.

PG&E announced on Friday, May 31 that it will request a 6-month extension from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) in decommissioning the Eel River dams. Stakeholders were expecting the utility to file its Draft Surrender Application with FERC this month, with a final version due in January 2025. PG&E now says it will file the draft plan in January 2025 and the final version in June 2025.

In announcing the delay, PG&E expresses support for the still vague proposal for the New Eel-Russian Facility. This proposal would see a dam-free diversion from the Eel River to the Russian River constructed and managed by the newly formed Eel Russian Joint Powers Authority. PG&E is working with the proponents of the New Eel-Russian Facility (Sonoma County Water Agency, Mendocino County Inland Water and Power Commission, Humboldt County, Round Valley Indian Tribes, California Trout, Trout Unlimited, and California Department of Fish and Wildlife) to develop a surrender application MOU that aligns with PG&E’s Surrender Application and Decommissioning Plan.

It would appear that PG&E hopes a short delay now will prevent a longer delay later. We are wary, however, that PG&E appears to be giving ground on their previous position that arrangements for a potential continued diversion will not delay Eel River dam removal. The Eel River’s native fish don’t have time to spare, and Eel River residents have waited long enough to see the justice that is dam removal.

Meanwhile, residents of Humboldt County continue to demand a free-flowing Eel River as soon as possible. Last month a group of nearly 60 dam removal enthusiasts floated the river from McCann to Dyerville, waving banners of support for freeing the Eel River.

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Scoping Comments on the Great Redwood Trail PEIR

The Great Redwood Trail Agency has just begun their CEQA process for the trail, issuing a Notice of Preparation for a Program Environmental Impact Report (PEIR) last month. The comment period for scoping comments has just ended, but the CEQA process has just begun. Scoping comments are intended to provide guidance about topics that should be evaluated in the PEIR, including impacts to habitat, air quality, cultural resources, and more.

https://mcusercontent.com/1260e76581786d9b486399431/images/b682865c-4e13-b041-3d8e-5a895b20f622.jpg

Once a draft PEIR is available, expected around the end of this year, members of the public will have an opportunity to read and respond to the document.

Stay tuned to this newsletter to be informed of further opportunities for engagement with the Great Redwood Trail planning, or sign up for email alerts from the Great Redwood Trail Agency

(https://lp.constantcontactpages.com/su/bY02ZNg) .

Click here to read our PEIR Scoping Comments.

(https://eelriver.org/2024/06/04/scoping-comments-on-the-great-redwood-trail-peir/)

For the fish,

Alicia Hamann, Executive Director

Friends of the Eel River

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PAUL MODIC: Gonzo Journalism Project

I’m having a book opening party, for my AVA essay compilation project: Friday, June 14th at 6:30pm in Redway in the backyard of Stevo and Rick’s Moosehead Lodge (The Tin Shed), 380 and 402 Birdie Lane, adjacent to the Little League Field. C’mon by.

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Ray Raphael Book Opening

Ray Raphael, our local historian, will be presenting his new book, "A Life in History" on Thursday, June 13 at 5:00 at Tooby Park in Garberville (by the playground). He will open the talk to a discussion about our lives and history here. The picture on the cover is of his first little cabin that still remains in Whale Gulch.

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‘CALENDAR GIRLS’—Fundraiser for Grace Hudson at Ukiah Players Theatre

On Thursday, June 20, from 6 to 9:15 p.m., the Ukiah Players Theatre will present a preview performance of their summer production of "Calendar Girls" as a benefit for the Grace Hudson Museum. "Calendar Girls," which opens to the general public on June 21, is a theatrical version of the 2003 hit film of the same name. (Please note, this show contains mature subject matter and may not be suitable for certain ages.) The evening begins at 6 p.m. with a pre-performance reception featuring hearty appetizers and various local wines.

Showtime is at 7 p.m. At intermission, coffee and desserts will be available.

Tickets are $40 per person and can be purchased online at gracehudsonmuseum.org, or by calling the Museum at (707) 467-2836. Tickets can also be purchased in person at the Grace Hudson Museum and at Mendocino Book Company on School Street. All proceeds benefit the Grace Hudson Museum and will help support its exhibitions, programs, and educational outreach.

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ARE YOU LOOKING FOR A GREAT VOLUNTEER OPPORTUNITY?

Martha Crawford will be working with small groups of students in the summer school program to design and make mosaic tile covered trash and recycling cans for the Community Park. It would be an opportunity for you to use your artistic and creative talents along with helping the students in a fun activity. The program starts 6/25 and takes place on Tuesdays and Wednesdays for 2 hours in the morning and 2 hours in the afternoon for 4 weeks. If you'd like to participate a little or a lot, just let Donna Pierson-Pugh know at 707 684-0325 and thanks for considering helping with this project!

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BOONVILLE’S OLDE TIME 4TH OF JULY EVENT!

Don’t miss The Olde Time 4th of July event at the Boonville Fairgrounds on July 4 from 12 - 4:00. It is coming up soon! This delightful community gathering has a parade for young children, games, food, a chicken clucking contest, a cake auction with cakes from the best bakers in the valley and so much more! We need volunteers to help sell food, take tickets, paint faces, and assist with the parade! Please call Donna at 707 684-0325 if you can help!

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POINT ARENA COAST GUARD HOUSE REMODEL

Hearing Date: June 25, 2024

NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that the Point Arena City Council will conduct a public hearing via teleconference on June 25, 2024 at 6:00 p.m., or as soon thereafter as possible, on the following:

Coastal Development Permit (CDP 2024-02) and Use Permit (UP 2024-02) for repair and remodel of the Coast Guard Inn and installation of sewer and water lines.

Public Hearing will be held Approving/Denying the Following Project:

CASE: CDP# 2024-02, Use Permit# 2024-02

DATE FILED: October 19, 2023

OWNER: Station 314, LLC

APPLICANTS: Station 314, LLC

AGENTS: Station 314, LLC

ZONING: Harbor Commercial (HC)

REQUEST: Coastal Development Permit (CDP 2024-2) and Use Permit (UP 2024-2) to: 1) repair and interior remodel of existing structures; 2) conversion of two structures (one large garage and one house) into lodging; 3) remodel the existing carriage house into a kitchen/bath for adjacent airstream trailer; 4) install three new sewer lines and one new water line to connect existing structures to City water and sewer. Installation of new business sign for Inn.

APN: 027-041-11 and 027-041-47

LOCATION: 695 Port Road, Point Arena, CA

PUBLIC HEARING DATE: JUNE 25, 2024

DOCUMENTS: CDP# 2024-02 - Coast Guard House

(https://cityofpointarena.us14.list-manage.com/track/click?u=c164a8c82a2a5af8db4de85b1&id=ae80a820ba&e=d0e3cdc057)

The Point Arena City Council is soliciting your input. All interested parties are invited to attend and be heard at this time. Applicants or their agents must appear for their hearings. If you challenge the above matter(s) in court, you may be limited to raising only those issues you or someone else raised at the public hearing described in this notice, or in written correspondence delivered to the City Clerk at, or prior to, the public hearing. All documents are available for review in the City Clerk’s Office. The City Council’s action regarding the item shall constitute final action by the City unless appealed to the Coastal Commission. Appeals to the Coastal Commission must be made in writing within 10 working days following Coastal Commission receipt of a Notice of Final Action on this project. Should you desire to request notification of the City Council’s decision you may do so in writing by providing a self-addressed stamped envelope to the City Clerk.

For further information contact the City of Point Arena:

PO Box 67, Point Arena, CA 95468

451 School Street, Point Arena, CA 95468

Telephone: 707 882-2122

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THANKS, MIKE

Editor:

I want to thank state Sen. Mike McGuire for working to move the Great Redwood Trail from a dream toward reality.

The bicycle and pedestrian trail parallel to SMART’s rail line provides safe alternative transportation for Sonoma and Marin county commuters to prevent climate change by reducing vehicle miles traveled.

The draft master plan for the Great Redwood Trail prioritizes construction through the Ukiah Valley, while recognizing difficult terrain south of Hopland will delay a connection to Sonoma County.

Efforts to eliminate the rail line north of Cloverdale may leave Mendocino County’s population centers without the economic and environmental benefits of rail transportation as transition from fossil-fueled to electric vehicles reduces gas tax revenues required to maintain Highway 101 through the geologically unstable Russian River canyon.

Let's hope recognition of the long-term benefits of preserving Mendocino County’s connection to the national rail network discourages the short-term expedient of placing the Ukiah Valley trail segment directly over the existing rails where terrain is suitable for a parallel trail such as we enjoy in Sonoma County.

Mendocino County deserves the same planning for future transportation needs.

Albert Wellman

Santa Rosa

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HOW A BRA LED RESCUERS to a Bay Area woman lost in the woods for days

by Amanda Bartlett

Elizabeth Schenk had been missing for hours.

The Oakland psychotherapist, 70, was somewhere deep in the Mendocino County woods. She had no food. Whatever was left in her water bottle had leaked into the dirt when she fell asleep in the crook of a redwood tree the night before, exhausted from screaming for help and crawling over fallen logs and slippery rocks dotting the steep terrain.

She had taken off her white sweatshirt and swung it in circles from the highest point she could find. She tried whistling through her fingers, but her lips grew too dry.

In her dehydrated state, Schenk couldn’t discern any trail that lay ahead, or the ground in front of her for that matter. It resembled a kaleidoscopic void — mosaic tiles that seemed to go on and on forever, flanked by soft carpeted rugs that allowed safe passage for her feet.

She took a deep breath and tried to focus as the mirages appeared. Streams filled with crystal-clear water appeared just within reach. Rescue teams calling out her name echoed in the distance but never came into view.

She attempted to trudge on but fell hard on one of her knees and again on a hip. It was like bouncing on a trampoline. At that point, she couldn’t feel the pain anymore.

“I understood the dangers immediately,” Schenk said. “By the second night, I knew that if I fell asleep, I may not wake up.”

Late in May, she set off from Oakland to Mendocino County to spend a few days at a spiritual retreat about 10 miles north of Fort Bragg. It was the anniversary of her late husband’s death, to whom she had been married for 42 years, and she was coming to terms with the fact that she was entering a new phase of her life. Her children were now in their 30s, all grown up. Her decades-long career was coming to an end after a recent epilepsy diagnosis, and recurrent seizures made it too precarious for her to continue seeing her patients. She missed all of them.

Mendocino County was where Schenk and her husband had gone on their honeymoon, and she hadn’t returned since their last trip out there six years ago, shortly after he developed terminal cancer. She fondly remembered the logging roads where they had once gotten lost and found their way out together. By going back to the area, she felt like she could reconnect with those memories and be close to him again. “It was tricky, navigating myself and my feelings during that time,” she said. “My grief was very complicated.”

On the morning of May 21, she left a group meditation to go for a walk in solitude. The breeze was calm, and there wasn’t a trace of fog in the air even though she was less than a mile from the ocean. Lost in thought, she took a turn and realized she was going the wrong way.

She called the retreat leader on her cellphone to let him know she would be late for her next session and asked for directions. She had already walked a reasonable distance but described the last landmark she could distinctly recall seeing about 30 minutes earlier: a yellow gate. He told her to go straight downhill from there.

That’s when things went wrong, according to Jared Chaney, the search-and-rescue commander for the Mendocino County Sheriff’s Office. The area had multiple yellow gates, and the retreat leader had misidentified which one Schenk had passed. At the time of the call, she was standing at a three-way intersection, and the only route going downhill was south on an unpaved path through mountainous coastal terrain with dense underbrush.

Schenk started to make her way down but quickly realized there was “no getting from point A to point B.” She checked the Maps app on her phone to see where the property was and noticed how close she was to Highway 1, but any path leading toward it seemed too dangerous to cross. It wasn’t until days later that authorities would learn she was only 1.5 miles from the retreat, but because of the heavily wooded area rife with craggy ravines and thick tangles of ferns and blackberry shrubs, some sections were “simply impassable,” even for experienced search-and-rescue team members, Chaney said.

Schenk was getting thirsty, so she decided to try another strategy: descend further into the canyon, where she hoped to find a creek or another source of water.

“I already knew one of the things that triggered my seizures was dehydration and overexertion,” she said, “and I had both going on from the very beginning.”

Meanwhile, the retreat leader had filed a missing person report, and the 73-volunteer search-and-rescue team was on the ground with seven canines certified in scent trailing looking for her. Their search yielded no clues until about 4 a.m. when they found her hat near one of the gates. Using cellphone forensic analysis, they tracked her last known movements south, where they found faded footprints in the dirt. The team headed down the ridge in the same direction she had gone, blaring sirens on patrol vehicles and flashing bright lights. They called out her birth name over and over again: Betsy.

Schenk never heard a sound. Her cellphone had fallen out of her back pocket while she slid down an embankment in pursuit of water.

She thought they wouldn’t find her until it was too late.

The following day, Schenk started nibbling on wildflowers — not because she was hungry but because she thought they might have moisture that would help her stave off her unbearable thirst. As she continued her journey, she found a few narrow creeks, but when she knelt to wet her lips with the murky water, she realized it was making her stomach sick. She headed east on some of the nearby logging roads: hiking, sliding, doing whatever she could to find a stream with cleaner water.

By nightfall, she found one running along the bottom of the canyon. Too drained to feel relieved, she cupped her hands to take small, slow sips of it under the full moon. But getting back up to a higher elevation where she hoped someone would see her was another story.

“Sadly, all of those old roads just got steeper and steeper and more covered with brush and fallen trees,” Chaney said.

Something slithered past her: a rattlesnake. She froze. It was then and there, she decided, that she would stay put for the night, and she fell into another fitful sleep.

By the third day, Schenk thought she heard the sound of a helicopter but chalked it up to another hallucination. She didn’t have her medication, and she knew she was experiencing trouble discerning what was real and what wasn’t.

Desperate, she tried to look for signs in the shadows of the towering redwoods. Heart-shaped rocks that reminded her of her husband. A wayward horseshoe in the dirt — maybe a symbol of good luck? The humming sound she had heard earlier grew louder.

“I was in full-on survival mode,” she said. “I just kept trying to think of the joy and the love of my husband and feeling he was with me.”

She found a cluster of pampas grass, wrapped some hiking emergency tape around it and marched around with it held high above her head. Then she made a trail of her clothes, tactfully tossing each garment on the ground like a breadcrumb in case someone found it later. She removed her bra and waved that around too.

“I was giving every indicator I possibly could that I was alive,” she said with a chuckle.

Little did she know, that decision would save her. Just after 2 p.m., one of the trail dogs was deployed to the bra and positively alerted, lying down with the garment directly in front of its paws. By then, her sons had joined the search — one of whom had been living with her during the pandemic and had done her laundry enough times to confirm it likely belonged to Schenk.

The search-and-rescue teams saturated the area. All-terrain vehicles with chainsaws led the way, spending hours cutting through the overgrown vegetation to look for her in the vicinity. They still didn’t know if she was alive.

“Our record is 18 days,” Chaney said. “We thought we were going to find and recover human remains, and the guy was conscious and breathing. We were extremely hopeful she was going to be OK, but we were getting to the point where dehydration was a big issue. The longer we waited, the less of a chance we would have a live find.”

The last thing Schenk remembered was standing in the middle of a trail in a daze as her exhaustion set in. Four birds of prey were circling overhead. Then she saw a truck pull up. “Priority traffic!” someone yelled. “Located the subject. Code A!”

Dozens of other rescuers flooded the scene — mutual aid Chaney had ordered through the California Governor’s Office of Emergency Services from at least six different counties. They transported her to the command post, where her vitals were assessed and she was reunited with her family before getting taken to a nearby hospital.

She had survived alone in the woods for two nights and nearly three days.

“I was just in shock,” Schenk said. “I looked at everybody around me. I saw the faces of my sons. They all just seemed stunned that I was still alive.”

The Mendocino County Sheriff’s Office averages between 30 and 65 search-and-rescue missions per year, according to Chaney, who calls the region “very busy” in comparison with neighboring counties. Most people who get lost are not from the immediate area but from larger cities farther south.

“If you leave the Bay Area to find somewhere to get back to nature, Mendocino County is the first rugged mountainous place to do it,” he said.

As hiking season ramps up, he said it’s important to remember a few safety tips. Go out with a buddy if you can, and let people know where you are going and when you plan to be back. If you get lost, stay put and wait for someone to find you rather than trying to find your own way back, especially if you’re in a place where you still have cellphone coverage. Find a nearby spot that’s visible — a meadow, a road, a well-traveled path — and make noise. If you have a lighter, build a campfire, which can send up smoke signals and help searchers find you.

“When people get lost, it’s easy to make rash decisions,” Chaney said. “They get embarrassed or scared and want to solve the problem on their own. But oftentimes, it results in them going to a location they’re even less familiar with, and it’s harder for us to find them.”

Recovering at her home near Lake Merritt, Schenk said she felt an overwhelming sense of gratitude for the people who had saved her life, and she plans to go up to Mendocino County again later this month to see the area with clear eyes and thank her rescuers in person.

She thought about what she could have done differently. She wouldn’t have gone into an area she didn’t know without a guide and doesn’t recommend that people going on hikes or pursuing other outdoor activities exert themselves beyond what they’re capable of.

“I couldn’t believe how long it took me to catch up,” she said. “Psychologically, I’m still processing everything. It’s a bigger impact than I realized.”

Schenk tried everything during those long hours lost in the remote wilderness, from casting the longest shadow she could and leaving a trail of her clothing to making the loudest noises she could muster. Stranded in an impossible situation, her trust in herself and positive thoughts of her loved ones motivated her to keep going.

Schenk rested her bare feet on the stool in front of her, revealing a purplish bruise still blooming across the length of her left calf. She reached for a mug. “I also think I’ve realized I’m not drinking enough water these days,” she said with a smile. “Most of us aren’t staying hydrated enough.”

(sfgate.com)

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FROM A BENCH IN SAN ANSELMO

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ED NOTES

VOICELESS and on the shelf, I have time to rummage through a box of fragments I had forgotten about. Here's a few:

FAINT FEMALE voice on the telephone says, “Hello, my name is Turtle. I'm calling from the Earth First! Journal in Tucson. I want permission to re-print something from your paper that Darryl Cherney told me about.”

TURTLE? Land or Sea?, I demanded. Does it matter?, she asked. I don't suppose, I said, but I draw the line at Cherney. She laughed. Even Earth First! draws the line at Cherney, it seems.

I FEEL kinda awkward calling a human “Turtle,” I said. Can I call you Ann or maybe Fawn? Fawn's still in the animal kingdom.

I REALLY PREFER Turtle, she said. That's my name. If your name was Giraffe, I'd call you Giraffe.

RAFF, I said. I like Raff. Would you call me Raff if my name was Giraffe?

TURTLE sighed, Whatever. So it's ok if we print it?, she asked. Yes, it's ok with me, I said. I'm glad you have a shell to protect yourself from these people.

A GUY asked me the other night, “Gee, aren't you an environmentalist?” I've always wanted to be but I'm not short enough. WE PRINT a lot of stuff we disagree with, but I've always regretted not responding to the letter from an ACLU lawyer who said he thought it was wrong of us to toss NAMBLA's “right” to free speech over the side. I QUIT THE ACLU because I finally got tired of them defending groups that should not be defended, many of them groups that get the ACLU a lot of publicity and probably lots of donations, but a group like NAMBLA that preys on children shouldn't have the right to proselytize. Defending organized chomos right to free speech represents an objective waste of scant civil rights money, especially in a time when anybody can walk into any courthouse or jail in this country and see for him or herself some unknown somebody's civil rights being seriously violated. But here's the ACLU rolling out for a small gang of pervs any other society in the world would put behind bars.

ANOTHER BEEF I have is with the people who argue that banning pornography is a step towards banning unpopular political views. There was a greater variety of unfettered political speech in this country in 1900 when there was a total ban on pornography than there is now, and the pornography then consisted mostly of fat ladies doing it with Turks, not crazy people doing it with midgets hanging off high rises. Ban all pornography, I say, and arrest its perps.

FREE POLITICAL SPEECH? Where's that exist in contemporary America or in Mendocino County? And what do films and photos of sex acts that systematically degrade half the human race have to do with politics or literature or anything else except to titillate voyeuristic men with nothing else to do?

I THINK pornography exerts a socially pernicious influence on what's left of American society. I think it poisons millions of young men. I think it's obvious that the epidemic of sex crimes can be directly attributed to the prevalence of pornographic images available to young men.

BY PREVALENCE I mean that every time that I, a half-dead man in whom the fires of spring are long extinguished, turn on my computer I get at least a dozen lurid advertisements that typically read, “Hello, Ava! Have you ever seen real Russian incest?” No. I can't even recall ever seeing a Russian of any kind now that you mention it, but is Russian incest different than incest any other place, and why would I want to see it? And “Fresh rape site. I bet you've never seen such cruel action, police materials included.” Nope, can't say that I have, but I hope I have my gun with me if I do. Pornography is bad for public morale generally and often fatal to women. It should be banned, its purveyors prosecuted.

WHEN MENDOCINO COUNTY was “discovered” in 1968, and re-discovered every year since, the county's small communities were family-oriented, close without being closed, and friendly. High school sports was weekend entertainment. It was country, it was community, and it was good. Now it's no community, the kids are on dope instead of playing ball, and the people who've made us the fragged tourist target we've become, lament the transient hordes invading Boonville every weekend.

THE NICE WEATHER communities of Mendocino County are now un-family oriented and urbanized, in that their social focus is on frenetic schedules of entertainments and activities for adults, a large portion of whom are single. There are more weekend events in Mendocino County than there are in half of San Francisco

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CATCH OF THE DAY, Wednesday, June 12, 2024

CRISTOBAL BUENROSTRO, Ukiah. Controlled substance, paraphernalia, short barreled rifle, loaded firearm in public, controlled substance while armed with loaded firearm.

MADISON CUSTER, Fort Bragg. DUI-alcohol&drugs.

VANESSA ELIZABETH, Ukiah. Disorderly conduct-alcohol, probation revocation. (Frequent flyer.)

DAVID GARCIA-CRISTOBAL, Salinas/Ukiah. DUI, no license.

CELESTINO GUTIERREZ-CRUZ, Ukiah. Domestic battery.

RAY HOPKINS, Willits. Battery.

CASEY IRELAND, Willits. Probation revocation.

JAVIER RAMIREZ, Ukiah. Domestic battery, false imprisonment, child endangerment.

SHAWN ROGERS, Willits. Narcotics for sale, controlled substance for sale, prior felony conviction.

THOMAS THORSON, Nice/Ukiah. Disorderly conduct-alcohol, probation violation, resisting.

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MAJOR EYESORE FOR LAKEPORT

The new courthouse in Lakeport will be located at the western end of the “Bruno’s Shop Smart supermarket, which anchors a stretch of commercial strip-mall enterprises and is designed to leave unimpeded the view from the Greater Lakeport Chamber of Commerce’s “Vista Point” visitors center just off Highway 29, at the bottom of a hill largely comprised of serpentine soils. Additional beneficiaries of the new courthouse location will be the many small enterprises on Lakeport Boulevard and the cluster of “fast food” franchises at the top of what is locally known as “Hamburger Hill.”

The former “courthouse” building at 255 North Forbes Street will continue to house the county’s Administration, Board of Supervisors chambers, and several key county departments, which was constructed in 1968, and is said to pre-date the state’s seismic building codes.

Internal competition for the newly available 4th floor footage will be fierce and entail further public spending for remodeling former court rooms and services of the judiciary branch of local government.

— Betsy Cawn

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In the photo, you can see a man who, at 95 years old, runs a bookstore that has been open for many decades in Paris. Despite his age, taxes, and various difficulties, this man opens his bookstore six days a week, with extraordinary passion and skill. I would declare it a world heritage site.

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WARRIORS MOURN JERRY WEST, DYNASTY ARCHITECT

by Sam Gordon

The Golden State Warriors’ dynasty probably wouldn’t have been if not for the late Jerry West.

Having lost in the first round of the Western Conference playoffs to the Los Angeles Clippers in seven games, the Warriors in 2014 were at one point considering trading emerging shooting guard Klay Thompson to the Minnesota Timberwolves for All-Star power forward Kevin Love.

West, midway through his stint as an adviser, did not approve of such a trade, valuing Thompson’s shooting and two-way play.

West’s disapproval was so intense that he reportedly would have resigned if the trade were made.

“I don’t take credit for anything,” West told the Chronicle in 2015, “and I don’t deserve credit. I’m just another pair of eyes that have seen a lot, and (the Warriors) encourage me to give my opinions, which I do. But at the end of the day, (general manager) Bob Myers is going to make the decision.”

West died Wednesday at the age of 86. The Los Angeles Clippers, for whom he’d last worked, made the announcement. A 14-time NBA All-Star and 10-time All-NBA honoree for the Los Angeles Lakers as a 6-foot-3 guard, West had a hand in the formation of a few dynasties.

He oversaw as general manager the architecture of the “Showtime” Los Angeles Lakers featuring Magic Johnson, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and five NBA championships in the 1980s. West paired Shaquille O’Neal with Kobe Bryant several years later, forming the foundation of a three-peat in Los Angeles.

And with Golden State, he played a part in the preservation of the era’s greatest backcourt — and in the formation of its greatest single team — and he helped recruit to the Warriors in 2016 free-agent forward Kevin Durant, another all-time great.

From 2011 to 2017, when West was an adviser to Warriors owner Joe Lacob, the franchise broke free from the doldrums of yesteryear and evolved into one of the NBA’s premier organizations.

The last two of his nine league championships — eight as an executive and one as a player — were won with the Warriors.

Former Warriors President Rick Welts remembered West wandering around the franchise’s old Oakland business offices after practices, conversing with seemingly everyone he’d see.

The caring part of his personality was as palpable as the competitive part.

“He had this amazing ability to make everybody feel respected in whatever role it was that they were playing, whether it was a receptionist, whether it was the president of the company and everybody in between,” said Welts, an adviser for the Warriors — adding he has had a statuette of West in a dribbling pose on his desk since 1982, Welts’ first year working in the NBA.

“He epitomized so much of why I fell in love with the game of basketball in how he conducted himself and what he represented.”

West left the Warriors when he felt like “there was nothing left for me to do.”

“When I left there Monday night, after they won the championship, it was probably the worst feeling I ever had in my life as a basketball person. I knew I wasn’t going to be part of that anymore,” West said after his Clippers hiring became official in June 2017.

“The things that have always excited me are the challenges,” West said. “I’m really goal-oriented. I have been all my life. This is another opportunity to compete in a completely different kind of way.”

Thompson, of course, became a five-time All-Star, four-time champion and one of the greatest shooters in NBA history. He posted to his Instagram story a photo of him seated conversing next to West, the text reading “Gonna Miss Mr. West. A true pioneer of basketball and one of them ones” with a goat emoji punctuating the sentiment.

Said Lacob in a statement Wednesday morning: “Jerry had a profound and immense impact on our franchise and was instrumental in our recent decade of success.

“Personally, as a child, despite growing up a Celtics fan in Massachusetts, Jerry was my idol and I loved him. To me, he was basketball. He was not just about the actual game, but he personified competitiveness. He was the most competitive individual I have ever met, settling for nothing short of greatness. He had to win. It consumed him. He was bigger than life. He was an icon. We are devastated with today’s news of his passing and extend our prayers and support to his wife, Karen, his entire family and the NBA community.”

In a video posted Wednesday afternoon to Golden State’s account on X, formerly known as Twitter, Warriors head coach Steve Kerr offered reverence for West and condolences to his family.

“One of the great figures in NBA history. One of the greatest players of all time. One of the greatest executives of ever and, of course, one of the architects of the Golden State Warriors’ past decade in which we won four titles,” Kerr said. “Jerry played a big role in those titles and also in my life. My experience as a coach, he was a valued mentor. Someone I called once a month every season for his thoughts and advice. He was a wonderful man, a wonderful mentor and I’m so thankful to have gotten to know him later in his life.”

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Who Was Jerry West, Really?

by Scott Ostler

The NBA is a crazy, fascinating world filled with amazing characters. I’ve hung around that world for half a century and I haven’t met anyone as interesting as Jerry West.

The tragedy of the fairly recent TV series “Winning Time,” allegedly the story of the 1979-80 Los Angeles Lakers, was that West — who died Wednesday at age 86 — is portrayed as a churlish blowtop, mean and shallow.

When the series started, I phoned West. It went to voicemail, but he called right back, because West always called right back. Not just to me, to everybody.

West was devastated. No doubt he had epic clashes with writers and with people with whom he worked, but that guy on the TV screen was Jerry West’s evil, boring twin. They even got the wardrobe wrong. The TV West looked like he shopped the sale rack at Target. The real West, in a suit or casual sweater, looked like a fashion model.

But what they really got wrong is how West treats people. The TV clowns whiffed badly on the part about his soul.

In 1978, I was a sportswriter in Los Angeles and I subbed for our regular Lakers writer on a long East Coast road trip. West was the head coach. I hadn’t covered basketball above the high school level, so was I a bit intimidated? Lordy. West instantly accepted me as part of the group.

Back then, writers often rode team buses and team flights. One morning, West got on the bus, stopped at the top of the steps and looked down at me. We had hit the East Coast during a blizzard and the players all wore long fur coats, the trend of the time. A SoCal kid who didn’t own a jacket, I wore a short-sleeved summer shirt.

“Can I ask you something?” West said, loud enough for all to hear. “Are you f—ing crazy?”

The fellas on the bus got a good laugh, and I felt weirdly welcomed. Later on the trip, I found myself sitting next to West on a flight. I asked him whether he would do an interview, and he talked my head off for two hours.

West veered all over the map emotionally, but this never wavered: He was acutely aware of his status as the Logo, the lead symbol of the NBA, and was determined not to betray that cosmic trust. He was good to people. Good to the fans who greeted him on the street, good to the people who bagged his groceries.

West was quietly proud of something written 20 years ago by Pat Conroy (“The Prince of Tides”). In Conroy’s memoir, “My Losing Season,” he wrote about how he’d been a counselor at a basketball camp in Virginia in 1962, when West dropped in for a day: “If you are one of those who think that great athletes shouldn’t have to be role models for young boys and girls, I offer you this: I have tried to treat everyone I meet as Jerry West treated those bedazzled boys. … He taught me much about basketball, but he taught me much more about class and the responsibilities of fame.”

West didn’t just like to talk to people, he needed to talk to people. He had opinions on everything. Teammate Elgin Baylor, who nicknamed West “Zeke From Cabin Creek,” also nicknamed him “Louella,” a nod to famed gossip columnist Louella Parsons.

West was a great raconteur and hangout guy. In ’85 or so, he got sick and spent some time in the hospital. When West got out, a sportswriter friend of mine, Tommy Bonk, said, “Let’s take Jerry to lunch.”

We did, a couple of times, and man, was that fun. For West, hanging with two knucklehead sportswriters was probably a healthful escape from the unrelenting anxiety of his life. Losing tormented him. Winning tormented him, because he knew it wouldn’t last. As Lakers general manager, West could not sit in his seat at games. He would pace in a lobby, or get in his car and drive around.

As a player, he was intense.

“I can honestly say I never played a game when I wasn’t nervous before the game,” West told me years ago. “The thing you miss the most is what your body felt like. There was so much adrenaline running through your body, it felt like it was electric. It was the ultimate high. The intensity level, it’s hard to describe, like a controlled fury.”

That emotional state caused West to believe he was unstoppable. He told about a tense timeout huddle, seconds left in the game. Lakers head coach Fred Schaus was designing a play. West cut off Schaus, barking, “Just give me the f—ing ball.”

West was born intense. He talked about being a scrawny, short, lonely kid in backwoods West Virginia, shooting alone on his snow-covered dirt court until his fingers bled, shooting right through dinner time. Not because he dreamed of being a star — he couldn’t imagine making even the high school team — but because putting the ball through the hoop somehow soothed his troubled soul.

West was a man of contradictions. During a phone conversation when he was general manager in Memphis, he told me he paid absolutely no attention to what anyone wrote about him. A few minutes later he said, “I’ve got a drawer right here in my desk where I keep all the articles people have written about how we’ll never win.”

More than once, I dropped by his office, placed a recorder on his desk. We’d chat for a few minutes, then he’d say, “Turn that thing off,” and he would talk. I’d come out of the sessions wondering whether I should bill him as his therapist.

That heart that West wore on his sleeve was for real. When he was GM of the Lakers, West befriended a young public-relations assistant named Raymond Ridder. Ridder was a flunky then, but he worked harder than anyone, and he was upbeat and funny. The two became best of pals. When Ridder left the Lakers to become PR chief of the Golden State Warriors, West bought him an expensive tailored suit and accessories.

“The shirt alone cost more than my old Honda Accord,” Ridder said.

Ridder loves to pull pranks, so West turned the tables. The day Ridder arrived at his Warriors’ job, West phoned the PR department, got an assistant, didn’t introduce himself, and angrily railed at the stupidity of the Warriors for hiring such an incompetent fool. West then paused and said, “Let me talk to Raymond, I want to see how he’s doing on his first day.”

Said Ridder: “Jerry made everybody feel special, like you mattered.”

So TV got it wrong. Way wrong. A million witnesses will back me up on that.

(SF Chronicle)

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"Half the harm that is done in this world is due to people who want to feel important. They don’t mean to do harm, but the harm [that they cause] does not interest them. Or they do not see it, or they justify it because they are absorbed in the endless struggle to think well of themselves.”

— TS Eliot, The Cocktail Party

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ON LINE COMMENT OF THE DAY

I can turn my wood heater into a power source for a big slow cooker. I’ve cooked on it many times making stews, soups, crockpot dishes etc. But a real wood fired cook stove would be better and easier to cook on as well as having the capability of baking pies, biscuits, potatoes, etc.

A clothes dryer? It’s been 30 years since I’ve owned one. In winter I have the clothes on drying racks in the living room where the wood heater is. They dry real quick. In summer I dry clothing either inside or outside depending on the weather. Clothes driers are really not necessary. But I’d bet most of the climate change worriers and cultists have indoor clothes dryers powered by either gas or electricity.

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CAN’T GET A VETERINARIAN APPOINTMENT?

Blame the pandemic surge in pet ownership

by Gianna Matthews

There was already an increased demand for primary, specialty and emergency veterinary care in the U.S. before the pandemic lockdown, when over 23 million additional U.S. households acquired pets.

The subsequent surge in demand for veterinary care overwhelmed providers and crippled their ability to effectively and efficiently serve sick and injured pets. Emergency clinics were forced to go on “service pauses,” closing their doors due to staffing shortages and a high volume of cases. Patients with urgent care issues were being turned away, as the staff-to-patient ratio allowed only the ability to care for the most critical cases.

Burnout surged among veterinary professionals. Many veterinarians and veterinary technicians left the field entirely, their already-strained mental, physical and emotional health overwhelmed. In the early days of the pandemic, many veterinarians chose to retire early rather than risk being exposed to an unknown virus or continue to be subject to verbal abuse from frustrated clients.

Four years later, even as other industries have mostly recovered from the pandemic, the veterinary industry continues to reel. Though some animals purchased or adopted in 2020 were relinquished to shelters, many remain in their households and drive demand for veterinary care.

For example, at BluePearl Monterey, the wait time for emergency service frequently exceeds eight to 10 hours. The clinic still resorts to service pauses, sometimes for long periods, when the staff becomes overwhelmed by patients or the only veterinarian on staff needs to perform emergency surgery. Except for the most critical cases, sick and injured pets are referred to neighboring clinics many miles away. Occasionally, even pets in critical condition will be turned away.

Enrollment in veterinary schools is still relatively low, though it has increased slightly in the past two years. There are huge barriers to becoming (and remaining) a veterinarian. Veterinary schools are difficult to get into and expensive, leaving some new graduates holding $500,000 in student debt or more if they choose to specialize and become board-certified surgeons or internal medicine specialists.

A study supported by Mars Veterinary Health, a subsidiary of Mars Inc., states that, even if every student enrolled or expected to enroll in veterinary school graduates in the next 10 years, there will still be a shortage of 24,000 veterinarians by 2030.

Additionally, fewer students are enrolling in veterinary technician programs — an underpaid, laborious, sometimes dangerous and often emotionally distressing profession, which leads to burnout. A National Association of Veterinary Technicians in America survey revealed that half of veterinary technicians leave the field after five years, usually because of low wages. And, in 2022, over half of veterinary professionals experienced some form of violence in the workplace, according to a survey published by the National Library of Medicine.

As more clinics are bought by corporations like Mars Inc. (BluePearl Monterey, for example, is owned by Mars Veterinary Health, which also owns VCA, Banfield and other veterinary clinics), those corporations are seeing unprecedented revenue growth due to increased spending on pet health care. Revenue is projected to reach $200 billion annually by 2030 in the U.S. alone.

These corporations continue to raise the cost of services, making care inaccessible and cost-prohibitive. Many Californians cannot afford to take care of their pet anymore, leading to increased animal abandonment and pet surrenders, which are straining shelters to the breaking point. The California Veterinary Medical Association recognizes the inaccessibility of veterinary care as a public health issue, one that is rooted primarily in pet owners’ inability to afford care.

This crisis is not happening within a vacuum: Big profitable corporations hold vast resources, and they are aware of the consequences of their business model. The collateral of a profit-driven business model are people and pets. To the corporate owners and investors that own the veterinary industry, as well as state and local governments, I pose the following questions:

What is your highest priority: animal and human welfare, or profit margins?

What will it take to incentivize Mars Veterinary Health and other veterinary corporations to collaborate, rather than compete?

How can the government incentivize corporations to work together to create bolder, more innovative solutions to address the veterinary staffing crisis and to address the overwhelming demand for care, which cannot currently be met with existing or future infrastructure?

How can major corporations, such as Mars Inc., which grossed $22 billion in global candy sales last year alone, provide needed and necessary services to underserved and underprivileged populations of pet owners?

There are ways we community members can compel positive change: Write to government representatives to demand that they escalate the veterinary health care crisis as a priority and demand revision of animal welfare laws to reflect our cultural values that treat animals not as property but as companions and family members. Write to veterinary governing boards and government representatives to condemn the prioritization of profit over quality of care in corporately owned veterinary clinics.

Meanwhile, it is important to prepare for an emergency with your pet. Know that life-saving care can start at a minimum of $1,500 and cost tens of thousands. Familiarize yourself with third-party payment options, such as CareCredit. Research and invest in pet insurance. It can mean the difference between paying $100 or $10,000 to save your pet’s life. Recommend that your employer start offering cost-shared pet insurance as a benefit.

I encourage pet owners to support veterinarians and technicians by choosing kindness and patience in their interactions, knowing that most providers are vastly underpaid, do not set the clinic prices and that their greatest joy in life is helping animals.

(Gianna Matthews is a registered veterinary technician and Monterey County resident.)

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NEW YORK calls to graffiti writers like a dirty old lighthouse. We all want to prove ourselves here. I chose it for the high foot traffic and the amount of hiding places. Maybe I should be somewhere more relevant, like Beijing or Moscow, but the pizza isn’t as good.

— Banksy

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“WINNING the race for AI means economic power, which then lets you influence social policy and ideology.”

— Vinod Khosia, cofounder of Sun Micro Systems

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WE DON’T WANT to do anything with it, we want to erase it, deny that it passes. What is time in cyberspace? And if you deny time you deny space. After all, it’s a continuum—which separates us.

So we talk on a cell phone to people in Indiana while jogging on the beach without seeing the beach, and gather on social media into huge separation-denying disembodied groups while ignoring the people around us.

I find this virtual existence weird, and as a way of life, absurd. This could be because I am eighty-four years old. It could also be because it is weird, an absurd way to live."

~ Ursula K. LeGuin, Interview by Heather Davis

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IT SEEMS TO ME the best way to make money out of art is not to even try. It doesn’t take much to be a successful artist—all you need to do is dedicate your entire life to it. The thing people most admired about Picasso wasn’t his work/life balance.

— Banksy

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WELCOME TO THE THIRD WORLD

by Matt Taibbi

Last Thursday, a federal court ordered former chief strategist for Donald Trump, podcaster, and symbol of All Things Evil Steve Bannon jailed for defiance of a Congressional subpoena. Convicted in 2022 for refusing to appear before a House Committee investigating the January 6th Capitol riot, Bannon on July 1st will join former Trump aide Peter Navarro in a select group of Americans jailed for contempt of Congress since the meat-grinder days of McCarthy and the House Un-American Affairs Committee (HUAC).

Detractors cheered the timely benching of the host of War Room, which generates millions of downloads as the most influential pro-Trump media program. Steve Bannon being off the air is actually very good for the pro-democracy movement,” chortled political strategist Rick Wilson, noting that while Bannon was going away for four months, they’re “four vital months.” A former aide to Dick Cheney, Wilson in his Republican days was best known for an ad questioning whether Max Cleland, who lost three limbs in combat, had the “courage to lead.” He added: “Steve, when you’re in prison, you’re going to want to show dominance on the first day.”

Welcome to the Third World, America. We crossed a big line in the last two weeks, first with the conviction of a presidential frontrunner on comic-book charges, now the revival of a contempt of Congress maneuver we haven’t seen since the Hollywood Ten. Nobody’s been sent to a logging camp or car-bombed or given a hot lead cure in a doorway, but as any current or former resident of authoritarian countries will tell you, the jailing of political opponents is a sure sign we’re on that road.

I returned to America a year after 9/11, following a decade in the burgeoning Russian autocracy of Boris Yeltsin and Vladimir Putin. That experience allowed me to see how quickly even limited freedoms of speech or assembly can be vaporized. People blinded by dislike of Trump or Bannon should imagine trying to summon sympathy for people like Vladimir Gusinsky and Misha Khodorkovsky, oligarchs who got rich in very dubious privatization schemes but were early targets of political prosecutions in the Putin years (Gusinsky was raided by armed agents four months after Putin’s inauguration). For those protesting that Bannon is only headed inside because he’s scum who broke the law, political prosecutions always involve a legal violation, often even a real one. Americans just don’t know what that looks like. Half the country has been conned into looking at the recent lawfare craze in isolation, not as the last stages of a long-developing drift toward autocracy started decades ago by Wilson’s former boss.

The twist that sent the Dick Cheney revolution to new heights was a rebrand. When we switched post-9/11 focus from Islamic terror to Trump and “Domestic Violent Extremism,” left-liberal America suddenly embraced every form of overreach it once opposed. Now, chickens are coming home to roost. Once we started ignoring laws to pursue terror suspects in the early 2000s, it became inevitable the reflex would return to infect domestic politics. Trump accelerated that process, and if the cackling of someone like Wilson doesn’t remind you of how this authoritarian slide started, nothing will. It’s a straight line from there to here…

https://www.racket.news/p/welcome-to-the-third-world-f38

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GO SLOW, JOE

by Maureen Dowd

In Normandy last week, President Biden gave a speech defending democracy that was designed to evoke Ronald Reagan’s famed “Boys of Pointe du Hoc” address in the same spot 40 years ago.

But if Biden wants to make sure democracy is defended from tyrants, he should emulate Reagan in another way: the Gipper’s leisurely travel style.

Nancy Reagan was always on guard, making sure her husband wasn’t being overstuffed with facts or overbooked with travel.

When I accompanied the couple in 1986 to Tokyo for the Group of 7 summit, we wended our way there blissfully slowly. A stop in L.A., a couple of nights in Honolulu, a look-see in Guam, three nights in the paradise of Bali. Nearly a week later, when we finally reached Japan, Reagan was tanned, rested and ready. (By contrast, when Bush 41 — known in Asia for having a frenetic “ants on a hot pan” personality — dashed around the Pacific Rim in 1992, he threw up on the Japanese prime minister and fainted in his lap at a banquet.)

Reagan was 75 when we went on that dream trip, but he never acted as if there was a problem with his age (even though it would seem later that there was, given his subsequent Alzheimer’s diagnosis). He played the ancient king, gliding along at his own pace.

Reagan wasn’t immune from criticism about his age, but he wore his years better than Biden, who seems in denial. And no one is stepping in to schedule him any breathing room; Jill Biden, the Nancy to Biden’s Ronnie, has a schedule that’s even more frenetic than Joe’s.

Biden and his staff always seem to be frantically trying to prove he’s energetic enough to govern. The 81-year-old sometimes jogs to the podium. And he’s trying to exhibit, through a strenuous travel schedule, that he’s up to the job. He arrived back in the United States on Sunday and went to Wilmington, Del. He came back to Washington the next day to host an early Juneteenth concert at the White House. On Tuesday, he gave a gun safety speech at the Washington Hilton — awkward, after Hunter’s guilty verdict on gun charges. He went straight from the Hilton to Andrews Air Force Base, and flew to Delaware where he gave his beleaguered son a hug on the tarmac.

On Wednesday, three days after he left Europe, the president schlepped back to Europe, this time for a G7 summit in Italy, and meetings with Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni and the pope, and a joint news conference with Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine. On Friday, he flies through cascading time zones to L.A.

Nancy Reagan would be appalled. Sometimes for an older president, it’s better to glide than jog.

(NY Times)

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