Mendocino County Today: Sunday 1/5/2024

By AVA News Service on January 5, 2025

STEPHEN DUNLAP (Fort Bragg): A cloudy 47F on the coast this Sunday morning. A bit cloudy but dry to start the week otherwise no rain in the 10 day forecast.

INTERMITTENT LIGHT RAIN is expected today in Del Norte with additional periods of light rain tonight and early Monday along the Redwood coast. Dry weather and warmer temperatures are expected starting on Tuesday and lasting through much of the upcoming week. (NWS)

AN UNSETTLING ENCOUNTER

Early this morning, [Saturday, Jan 4] a rural property along the 24000 block of Sherwood Road near Willits became the scene of an unsettling encounter that has left residents on edge. According to the Mendocino County Sheriff’s Office, a man rang the doorbell of a rural home asking for gas and money. The homeowner, alarmed by the stranger’s presence, contacted authorities.

“He was completely unknown [to the homeowner],” Captain Quincy Cromer of the Mendocino County Sheriff’s Department explained. “No clue who he was and why he was in the driveway.”

Benjamin Miller [booking photo March 2024]

Deputies quickly identified the man captured on the home’s Ring camera as 46-year-old Benjamin Miller, a fugitive with multiple felony warrants. Of particular concern, Cromer told us was that the suspicious man “mentions a firearm on the Ring camera,”

Authorities arrived to find Miller’s truck abandoned in the driveway, but the wanted felon had already vanished into the surrounding area. Despite an extensive search, deputies have been unable to locate him. Cromer said, “After numerous hours, we did not find him.” He pointed out that Miller knows he is wanted and probably was avoiding law enforcement.

The sheriff’s office issued two Nixle alerts to warn the community. The first, sent at 4:28 a.m., advised residents to avoid the area due to law enforcement activity. A second alert at 4:40 a.m. described the suspect as a white male adult with neck tattoos, wearing a sweatshirt, blue jeans, and a baseball cap, and potentially armed.

The suspect’s truck was later towed from the scene, and Cromer assured residents, “We would still be up there searching if we thought there was a risk to the community,” he said.

We requested a photo of the wanted man but because of recent changes to the law, MCSO cannot release booking photos without approval of county counsel.

UPDATE 9:58 a.m.: Captain Cromer updated us that a Nixle message lifting the alert has been issued and also told us, “We will not be releasing a photograph on this situation.”

ANDERSON VALLEY VILLAGE NEWSLETTER, Jan 2025 [excerpts]

Last Month's Gathering: It Was a Spectacular Gathering In December!

Thank you to all who made this happen!

Upcoming Village Events!
See these events and more listed on our Events Calendar
Please Note: Our gatherings are open to Everyone, but we recommend staying current on your vaccinations. Thank you!

Cold Weather Clothing Drive
The Ukiah Branch Library is hosting a Cold Weather Clothing Drive starting in November 2024 and continuing through the month of January 2025. Donate your clean and lightly used coats, sweaters, scarves, hats, and belts to the Ukiah Branch Library. These items will be set out for individuals to find new-to-them clothing during this cold and wet winter season. For more information, please visit www.mendolibrary.org or contact the Ukiah Branch at 707-463-4490.…

https://mailchi.mp/88399ab7d724/anderson-valley-village-newsletter-august-5848669?e=358077c1c9

DANIEL BORGHI

October 2, 1950 October 22, 2024

This obituary is late, as is fitting as Dan Borghi was eternally (and often extremely) late. But, boy, was he a delight when he showed up.

Dan was born October 2nd, 1950 in Oakland to Zelda and Gaetano Borghi and was the eldest of three dauntless, wild brothers. He had an unmistakable, mischievous sparkle to his eyes. He filled his life with love; never compromising nor missing an opportunity to celebrate. He passed away on October 22, 2024 in Milan, Italy.

In the early 1970s Dan attended Sonoma State University and trained to be an English professor. He studied Latin, Spanish, and Russian all of which he considered romance languages. On the brink of graduation, and with only one credit separating him from his degree, Dan left college: Inspired by a poem, he moved to Mendocino to escape the trappings and banality of a pre-templated, tie-wearing, indoors-based life. Dan found freedom and adventure on Navarro Ridge, embracing his love of all things outdoors and western. He built his own house, two domes, mastered horseback riding, and developed a passion for archery, antique guns, and Aikido. Dan worked as a carpenter and later as a sawyer, traveling around Mendocino County with his sawmill.

He joked with and teased his friends relentlessly. He had a nickname for everyone. He renamed his friends’ dogs, if he deemed the original unfitting. He seemed to be constantly winking, teetering on the edge of the next quip. He was someone to count on for good stories told over whiskey on a porch. He gave freely to others. He brought firewood to neighbors in the winter, drove others to and from their doctor’s appointments, hosted beach barbecues, and served as a volunteer firefighter for many years.

For a friend who lost his legs, he made eggs, bacon, and coffee each morning. He cooked pancakes or french toast for his daughter Sierra every single day leading up to college. He traveled all over Northern California during his daughters’ volleyball seasons, rarely missing a game or tournament.

He was a devoted, and supremely proud father. And, he took every chance to tell his family that he loved them. Dan had a style all his own – a combination of cowboy, gold-panner, wrangler, and pirate. He was never without a mustache. His jacket pockets carried the weight of many odd, potentially useful things: pocket knife(s), licorice, matchsticks, papers for hand-rolled cigarettes, a joint, and always a flashlight.

Boys in town wanted him to adopt them, and his daughters’ friends considered him a second dad.

More than anything, Dan loved the “Navarra” Ridge, his Border Collie, Rida, his two daughters, Sierra and Diana Borghi, his brother Brian Borghi, his compagna Janferie Stone, and this community. He is deeply missed by everyone who knew him.

“This fall weather makes me want to toss a sleeping bag in the truck and head up to the Klamath River or the Sierra Range. I hope to run away and camp in the month of October. Hope all is going well and full of good food and new knowledge and of course fun.” – Dan Borghi

We’d bet he’s out there now, on the Range – horsepacking with his old horse Heidi, his brother Ernie by his side, laughing about something one of them just said.

A celebration of life will be held in Mendocino, date and time to be determined.

UKIAH SHELTER PET OF THE WEEK

Attention! Attention! There’s another fun-loving dog in the house! Johnson is a happy, playful, young dog. He loves amusing himself (and those observing him!) with all toys, but tennis balls are his ultimate favorite (so make sure you befriend a tennis player!) Johnson knows how to walk on-leash and enjoys going out to explore, meet new people and other dogs. What can we say? This dude is always up for an adventure! Mr. J is a 1 year old, mixed-breed dog, weighing in at a jolly 55 pounds. To see all of our canine and feline guests, and the occasional goat, sheep, tortoise, and for information about our services, programs, and events, visit: mendoanimalshelter.com. Join us the first Saturday of every month for our Meet The Dogs Adoption Event at the shelter.

Please share our posts on Facebook:

https://www.facebook.com/mendoanimalshelter

For information about adoptions please call 707-467-6453. Making a difference for homeless pets in Mendocino County, one day at a time!

COUNTY NOTES: ‘DISRUPTIVE BEHAVIOR’?

by Mark Scaramella

Next Tuesday’s Supervisors meeting mostly concerns inconsequential housekeeping items: meeting schedules, committee assignments, board rules, etc.

There are some seemingly innocuous but significant changes buried in Item 4c, the adoption of some new provisions for this year’s version of the Board’s “Rules of Procedure.” It’s not clear who proposed these particular additions or who they’re aimed at. According to the agenda item the “sponsor” is the Clerk of the Board who also happens to be CEO Darcy Antle.

Rule 3 has a new paragraph called “Supervisor Role,” which basically says that once a board majority has taken action on something, any subsequent dissent is “inappropriate.”

“One of the fundamental tenets of County governance [sic] is recognizing that the Board acts as a body [but without a head?]. No individual Supervisor has extraordinary powers beyond those of other Supervisors. Although the Chair and Vice-Chair have additional parliamentary and administrative responsibilities as described elsewhere in these rules, with respect to the establishment of policies, voting, and in other significant areas, all members are equal. While individual Supervisors may disagree with decisions of the majority, a decision of the majority binds the Board to a course of action and provides County staff with direction to follow.”

Are there rogue Supervisors that this rule is aimed at? Has Supervisor Williams been throwing his weight around and bothering the CEO or some department heads?

Another proposed new rule says that Supervisors should not spring questions on unprepared staff at a board meetings, but should “resolve” such questions in advance. It also claims that Supervisors should “refrain” from giving direction to staff because it would “undermine the authority of the Department Heads.”

This odd rule implies that Department Heads are so stupid that they would run off and do something questionable or time-consuming without confirming that the entire board wanted it done first. Then there’s a new requirement that Supervisors do not have “the right to require that staff insert particular material in the staff report or Agenda packet.”

Yes they do, unless the material requires a lot of prep work, in which case the staff can simply ask for confirmation. Here again, we suspect these proposed new rules are thinly veiled attempts to rein in Supervisor Williams somehow.

There’s a big block of new rule text prohibiting “disruptive behavior” in the Board chambers. Here’s just a small part of it:

“In the event that there is a disruption of the public meeting by an individual who actually disrupts, disturbs, impedes, or renders infeasible the orderly conduct of the meeting within the meaning of state law, prior to removing any individual, the Chair shall warn the individual that their behavior is disrupting the meeting and that their failure to cease their behavior may result in their removal. The Chair or their designee may then remove the individual if they do not promptly cease their disruptive behavior. No prior warning is required before removal of an individual whose behavior constitutes a use of force or a true threat of force…” And on and on and on at considerable length.

We have not seen anything remotely “disruptive” in the Board chambers for years, unless you count the time coastal activist Sherry Glaser bared her breasts at the Board back in 2017 during her “breasts not busts” protest of a proposed cannabis permit policy she didn’t like. At that time Board Chair John McCowen first tried to gavel Ms. Glaser and her sizeable protest down. When that didn’t work he cut off her mike after which she composed herself before stomping out of the Board room in a huff.

It would be nice if whoever is proposing these overbearing and seemingly unnecessary rules would explain why they’re so paranoid and what problems, if any, require such extra attention. The Board Rules don’t even come up very often in ordinary Board business, so we don’t see the point.

Another proposed new rule regards what items can go on the consent calendar. The new rules say that equipment or service contracts of less than $750,000 can go on the consent calendar. $750,000? Why not $1 million? Hell, why not just put all the contracts on the consent calendar? The threshold should not be more than $50k. And retroactive items should never be in the consent calendar. They are also proposing that “Public Works project change orders that are $100,000 or less regardless of the cumulative project cost” can be on the consent calendar. Why “regardless of the cumulative project cost”? Small change orders can be on the consent calendar of course, but all such consent items should include the impact on the total project cost and whether it’s within budget.

VIRAL VIDEO FROM JULY ABOUT ATTACK ON A HOMELESS PERSON

A local viral video purports to show a Fort Bragg person driving by throwing a firecracker under the care of a homeless person, causing flames and screams. The poster indicates the screaming to be funny.

I just found out for sure this happened in July. But its an issue today. Don’t make threats. Not sure if it was reported back then. Many folks have seen it for the first time in 2025 and are NOT happy. I’ve seen threats made against the person who supposedly did this. The internet is home to fakes, deepfakes, and virtually nothing real. The cops have been contacted. I am sure they will deal with this seriously. Don’t get involved other than to report anything you know about this. I know nothing. I can’t find out where or when this happened. At first people were saying it just happened. Then I found a post about it from July 8. Regardless, it's going around this Saturday morning and people all have very strong opinions. Some are fit to be tied and literally need to tie themselves down and wait till the cops get back to all of us.

The internet is virtual reality, but real crimes from the real world can be prosecuted, but only after a thorough investigation is done. And making threats to a named person online is also a crime. So don’t.

Suggesting vigilante action is as bad as what she is supposed to have done. Social media obviously brings out the worst in some, let's not let it make us into a gang of criminals. Everyone concerned who knows anything should contact the police and pay attention to the case, not take the law into their own hands. Just because the rule of law has been suspended and mostly eliminated in DC does not mean we have also to be anarchists.

I have consulted my superb pal Marty about whether we can remove the names and show the video. I won’t post the video with names in it.

Frank Hartzell

Fort Bragg

NORCAL PREPS WRESTLING RANKINGS: Top 10 trio remains; other locals rise…

Maria Carrillo senior Logan Bruce and Cardinal Newman junior Jonah Bertoli are the top two North Coast Section wrestlers at 175 pounds.

by Gus Morris

Three locals remained in the top 10 of the newest state high school wrestling rankings released this week and several others saw their stocks rise.

Maria Carrillo senior Logan Bruce and Cardinal Newman junior Jonah Bertoli are the top two North Coast Section wrestlers at 175 pounds. Bruce is ranked No. 9 in the state and Bertoli No. 10. Bertoli has also wrestled at 190 pounds this season.

Ukiah junior Jordan Schwarm moved up another spot this week to No. 8 in the state at 285. He’s also still No. 1 in the NCS. Coming in at No. 2 in the NCS at 285 is Cardinal Newman junior Devon Bertoli, also ranked No. 19 in the state.

Montgomery senior Ryan George rose four spots this week to No. 16 in the state at 215 after placing first in the Lou Bronzan Invitational last weekend. George is also No. 1 in the NCS.

Windsor has three wrestlers ranked in the state top 50. Junior Antonio Garaventa dropped three spots to No. 33 in the state at 106 and No. 2 in the NCS, freshman Cole Schmidt was ranked No. 36 at 132 and No. 1 in the NCS and senior Chase Claassen came in at No. 47 at 138 and No. 2 in the NCS.

Casa Grande also has three wrestlers ranked in the top 50. Senior Ezekiel Fellman rose nine spots to No. 38 in the state at 138 and No. 1 in the NCS, senior Camden Bushey also rose one spot to No. 22 in the state at 165 and is No. 4 in the NCS, and junior Caleb Quintua was ranked No. 48 at 157 and No. 2 in the NCS.

Ukiah senior Dane Rensen is No. 42 in the state at 165 and No. 6 in the NCS.

Honorable-mention selections were Windsor freshman Joey Guanella (113) and Piner senior Juan Nunez (215).

Local wrestlers will be back in action next weekend at tournaments across Northern California. North Bay League dual matches are set to begin next week and the Vine Valley Athletic League will enter its fourth week of dual matches next week.

(Santa Rosa Press Democrat)

NATIONAL WOMEN'S MARCH JANUARY 18TH INCLUDES UKIAH

On Saturday, January 18th towns and cities across the United States will hold Women's Marches. Mendocino County participation starts at Noon at the Courthouse in downtown Ukiah, then we march to Alex Thomas Plaza where there will be music with Wendy DeWitt and the Inland Women's Choir. In addition, speakers will cover a wide range of relevant topics including immigration, women's reproductive rights, funding genocide in Gaza, health care, education, organized labor, Black Lives Matter, climate change, LGBT rights, and civic responsibilities.

The sponsoring groups, Mendocino Women's Political Coalition, Cloud Forest Institute, Community Action Alliance and Mendocino Gaggle of Raging Grannies, plan a positive event with a focus on common ground within our communities and the power of love over hate.

Everyone is welcome. For more information text or call Lynda at 707 272-0580 Lynda McClure

https://mendocinowomen.org

Val Muchowski

THE 32ND ANNUAL PROFESSIONAL PIANIST CONCERT IS COMING TO TOWN!

Saturday, Jan 25th at 7:00pm & Sunday, Jan 26th at 2:00pm~

Two concerts featuring the finest regional pianists playing jazz, classical, boogie-woogie, blues, ragtime, and a whole lot of unpredictable more!

Mendocino College Center Theatre, 1000 Hensley Creek Rd, Ukiah. Call for questions and info: 707.463.2738

Artists performing on Saturday evening, January 25, at 7:00 pm: Spencer Brewer, Carolina Cavalache, Barney McClure, Ed Reinhart, Ben Rueb, Janice Timm

Artists performing on Sunday afternoon, January 26, at 2:00 pm: Spencer Brewer, Wendy DeWitt, Elena Casanova, Tom Ganoung, Elizabeth MacDougall, John Simon

The musicians are terrific, the humor runs high (and low!), the performances are always full of surprises.

How not to miss a single memorable moment? Get tickets for both shows!

Tickets are on sale now at the Mendocino Book Company in Ukiah, Mazaharin Willits, and on the UCCA website (ukiahconcerts.org) through Brown Paper Tickets

$25: Purchased in advance; open seating; $35: "I Wanna see the Hands" section; $30: Tickets at the door (if available)

WES SMOOT

Interviewed by Steve Sparks

(Wes Smoot of Boonville has died, December 19, 2024, in a Cloverdale rest home. In lieu of an obituary we are posting this interview by Steve Sparks from 2011.)

Wes Smoot is fluent in Boontling, but didn't learn the lingo until he was in his 30s. He says that he had to pick it up for "self-defense," so he could decipher the gossip all around him.

Having had lunch with Wes and his companion, Marianne, at the AV Senior Center recently, we adjourned and went over to Wes’s home on Anderson Valley Way where we could enjoy a chat sitting at his dining table.

‘Wes was born in June 1932 at the county hospital in Ukiah to Laura Bell Price, an unwed mother of sixteen who lived with her parents Charlie and Sarah and her three older sisters in Navarro in the ‘Deep End’ of Anderson Valley. “That was the end of the road. There was no way to the coast; you had to go in land to Comptche and then out to the coast from there. There was one sawmill in town, three bars, and five hotels, mainly for the timber workers but it was the Depression and times were very hard but the family tried their best to take care of me. However, when I was a year-and-a-half old my mother met a man named Edward Hopper of Navarro and they wanted to marry but he told her he wouldn’t as long as she kept me so I was put up for adoption. The Smoots, Ray and Dorothy, took me in and I was raised and grew up with them in Yorkville. My mother would visit occasionally but she had a new family of her own and that stopped after a few years.”

Wes went through grade school east of Yorkville at the Gaskill School on Highway 128 — a one-room schoolhouse at which there were never more than twelve kids, and which still stands today.“There was one teacher for the whole school and some of the other kids there at my time were Carolyn Prather, Richard Carlson, Marilyn and Missy Hiatt, Joyce Christen, Lucille Skillman, and my good friend Stanley Johnson, who was paralyzed at a very early age but who was as shrewd as anyone and who has lived close to the school on the Johnson Ranch his entire life. I was always playing around Dry Creek, fishing and exploring, and knew the whole area like the back of my hand. I remember Stanley and I borrowed an old purse from my stepmother, filled it with paper, tied it to some wire, and put it in the middle of the road. Cars would come by, see the full purse in the road and stop. By the time they got out we would have pulled it into the bushes some way off to the side of the road and they were left standing there with nothing. We got a real kick out of that. We had all the usual livestock to live off — chickens, calves, pigs, and Dad would shoot wild goats or deer and we’d have venison. If it had not been for the venison we’d have starved to death! We canned the chicken for the winter months and the eggs were in water glasses and kept sealed to keep them from going off; we had our own butter and cream too. We would sit around and listen to the radio at night if we could get reception and my favorite show was ‘Jack Armstrong — All American Boy.’ If the radio wasn’t working well we’d read and once a month we’d get in our Model A, four-door sedan and go into Healdsburg to see a movie — normally a Charlie Chan film. This led to me forming an opinion of Orientals that they would cut you up if given the chance. As a result, when I later joined the Army I really did not want to go to the Far East — guess what? — I ended up in Korea! We would go to Cloverdale for the shopping and sometimes to Boonville but not very often — there wasn’t much there. I remember a wonderful childhood and being part of a very happy family.”

In 1946, Wes began to attend the High school in Boonville, where the Elementary School is now located. “My Dad drove the school bus for the Anderson Valley school district and so I went into school with him. It was quite a transition going to this new school. Four of us graduated from the school in Yorkville. That left just two kids there, and here in Anderson Valley High there were 74 students. By the time I graduated in 1950, following the arrival of the many Arkie and Okie families, there were about 140. I was not too fond of many of the subjects at school and my big activity there was Band where I played the tuba, never getting less than an A- in four years. We marched and played in the County Fair every year and a certain Marian McAbee played clarinet with us. Almost 60 years later we have now become companions. Others at the school during my time were people such as Gloria Ornbaun (later Abbott), Marietta Hulbert, who died last week, Johnnie Ross, Bob Paul, Eva Pardini (later Holcomb), and Edwina Knivila. The Arkies and Okies were very different people to us. Their accent was the first problem and they didn’t like us making fun of them. There were lots of 'disagreements' shall I say. Mills sprung up all over the Valley in those post-war years and depending who you talk to and how you count, there was somewhere between 36 and 54 in the length of the Valley. They used to say ‘there is a sawmill behind every tree.’ The sheep industry was in very quick decline although the apple orchards stuck around for a time.”

In May 1947, Ray Smoot had a heart attack and died. “I was 15 and my mother and I were notified by the owner of the ranch that we would have to move. We moved to the west end of Doby Lane, just south of Boonville, into a house owned by Bill Nunn. He was a very kind gentleman and helped us as much as he could while my mother found work cleaning rooms at the Boonville Hotel. Then we were told my father had been buried in the wrong plot and that his body would have to be exhumed. I guess my mother couldn’t face any more and in October that year I came home from school and found her in the front seat of our ’37 Sedan, dead of asphyxiation — she had run a garden hose from the exhaust into the back window. The car was still running when I found her. Arrangements were made for me to stay with my father’s sister and her husband, Naomi and Lloyd Ornbaun. I moved in and helped Lloyd with the sheep on his ranch and they took very good care of me and put me through the rest of my school years.”

After a couple of years Wes found he was not getting along too well with Lloyd so he moved out and went to live with his father’s brother and his wife — Emmit and Doris Smoot.

“Emmit was a carpenter and I helped him build cabins at the mills for the workers. They were shabby looking things but they worked. I believe there is only one left in the Valley, it was Wally Weeks’ house and it was probably the sorriest one we ever built - it should not be standing today but it is. We also built barns and I gathered a great deal of knowledge from working with Emmit. I had left school by this time and the town was a very lively place with all of the new people here. There were lots of fights between the new people and us and many people would go out on a Saturday night in Boonville just to watch the fighting outside the bars — the Boonville Lodge, The Track Inn, and Wiess’s Valley Inn — it was our big entertainment for the week. There had always been a drinking scene in town. Back in the 1800s, where the Lodge is now, there was The Anytime bar. So called because you could get a drink there at 'anytime.' Then in 1906, following a ‘revolt’ by the women of the Valley who were concerned about the amount of drinking around here, there was an introduction of a local ‘no drinking’ law and the bar was closed down. However, they jacked the building up and took it south of the town limits and they called it The Anyhow — ‘cause you could still get a drink ‘anyhow’! Some years later they jacked it up again and it was placed back in the center of Boonville, becoming a restaurant at that point, opposite where The Boonville Lodge is now. Finally that same building was moved to Philo in the thirties where it remained a restaurant, eventually becoming, many decades later, what is now Libby’s Mexican Restaurant, opposite where another bar used to be — The Last Resort. There have been many fights in bars over the years, and in fact Donald Pardini wrote a wonderful poem about a big one in Philo and called it ‘Monkey Joe’s Ball’. If you can understand our local dialect, Boontling, it is hilarious.”

In 1951, Wes got work in the woods in the timber trade working for Tom Sterling. “I earned $1.45 hr working from 4am to noon in the summer, later in the day during the winter. I was setting and driving wedges to fall trees, swamping out brush, and measuring logs. It was quite a chore but Tom was an easy man to work for and again I learned a lot. While I was felling timber out on the coastal road in October 1952, I received a notice from the draft board to report for induction into the army. It said, ‘Your friends and neighbors have chosen you to serve in the U.S. Army.’ Along with a friend of mine from high school, Bob Paul, I reported to the induction center in San Francisco and went through basic training together before I went off to radio operator’s school and he went to the motor pool. About a month and a half later I was in Korea although nowhere near a radio as I was put in an office helping with various Army publications. Bob had gone down with yellow jaundice but I got a call from him a few months later and he was stationed just twelve miles from me. We got together for some drinks and we chased a few Korean girls but I never caught one. I did my one-year tour of duty before returning to the States and being stationed in the Presidio in San Francisco. When Bob was sent home, six months after me, he landed in Seattle where he was released from active duty. I was released the same day and he flew down to the City and I picked him up at the airport. It was November 4th, 1954 and we started a two-month long party, remaining drunk until January 1st 1955! We certainly had some great times together.”

“We had met a couple of girls who happened to come from Mendocino County. After we sobered up and returned to the Valley, Bob and I arranged to take them to the movies in Ukiah. Well my girl had to work at the last minute and asked me to take her sister, Leola Drake, That was the beginning of a 52 year relationship. We were married in June 1955 and I went to work for her stepfather Harry Avila, who was a logger, and I stayed with him for three years, doing anything and everything from setting chokers to driving logs trucks. Harry had a ’48 Peterbilt that was eleven foot wide and very tough to drive on some of the narrow roads so when I got the chance to move on I did and took a job paying $2.25 hr at the Philo Mill working for Deady Farrer and Leola and I moved out from the little mill cabin at Harry’s to a house behind the Methodist Church in Philo.”

One day, Wes was hauling some logs on the Fish Rock Road when he had to stop while some County Road workers unloaded some gravel. One of them, Bill Holcomb, informed Wes that there were openings for jobs with the County.

“They only paid $1.80 hr and I wasn’t going to go for that but Bill pointed out that with the County it was year-round work, whereas the logging stopped in the winter. I worked it out and found that I’d be much better off with the County and it was much easier work so I took a job and stayed for ten years as a heavy equipment operator, spending over seven of those years working on Highway 253.”

During that time Wes and Leola moved from Philo to the house on the corner of Highway 128 and the Manchester Road and then two years later they bought a house at the corner of Hutsel Lane and Highway 128, near to the junction with the Ukiah Road (253).

“It cost us $11,500 but I’d come to realize that paying rent was like paying for a dead horse. Meanwhile, at work I’d reached a situation where I could not get promoted apart from to a supervisor's position and there were too many politics involved with that so in 1969 I put in for a job with the State at the California Department of Highways — now called CalTran. I knew I could be sent anywhere in the state but I wanted a change and ended up in Willow Creek, east of Eureka, in the far north of the State… I left saying I’d never work on Highway 253 again.”

Wes and Leola found that they could not afford to keep the house up in Boonville, even with renters, so they put it on the market asking for $14,000.

“I got a call saying the realtor had accepted an offer for $12,500. That was disappointing but he then added it was cash so I told him to get the papers signed quick! As it turned out, the renters, Clyde and Pat Doggett, bought the house. I hated living up there in Willow Creek but I did enjoy the work. After been there for nearly two years we heard that the operation was going to be shut down — we worked with a prisoners honor camp and they were going to close the prison. This meant that we would be dispersed around the State and I had heard that a new yard was going to be established in Covelo, not far from Anderson Valley and so I put in for a job there and began there in the spring of 1971.”

By this time Wes had become reacquainted with his mother, whom he had not seen for 32 years and of whom he had no memories, being less than two when she had him adopted.

“Around 1966-67, Leola and I were in Fort Bragg one afternoon and I decided to see if my half-sister, Lucille Hopper, was in the phone book. She was and I went to her apartment but she was not in. However, a lady there said that Lucille’s mother (and mine) would probably know where to find Lucille and she was a cook at the old coast hospital. We went over there and a fellow worker went to get her. When she came out of the door we just stood and looked at each other for a moment and then we grabbed and hugged each other tightly and this brought tears to us both. She was busy and could not talk but we made arrangements for her to come and see us in Boonville and to bring her children with her. There were three boys as well as Lucille. This was very exciting to me — to learn that I was part of this family for all of those years and didn’t know it. We eventually got together and went out to dinner and all got acquainted. They were all very nice and we got along together. Over the next few years we would gather at mother’s place and she would fix dinner or we would take her and her husband Andrew out to a restaurant. After leaving for Willow Creek in 1969, we did not see much of them over that period but tried to get together whenever we visited the Valley.”

Wes worked in Covelo for three years before moving on in 1974 to Mendota, about 40 miles north west of Fresno in the San Joaquin Valley. He received some intermediate promotions in the department before finally taking the plunge and going for a supervisor’s position at Chilao Station fifty miles east of Los Angeles. He got the job and he and Leola moved there in 1976.

“Unfortunately, as a supervisor I was not allowed to drive or work the equipment. That disappointed me and I hated the country down there too. We lived at the yard and rarely went into the metropolitan area. However, I had a fine crew and we worked at high elevations so there was lots of snow in the winter — a whole new ballgame for me. I had been around four inches or so but this was somewhere between five and ten feet deep! After three years there I had had enough and began applying for vacancies anywhere north of Sacramento. One day I received word that the supervisor in Boonville was moving away. This was Chuck Haffley and he had been there for several years. Of course I immediately set the phone wires on fire in Ukiah where the superintendent and his assistant were located who were in charge of the Boonville area. The super was Bob Elkins and I had worked for him back in my days in Covelo. I told him that I knew a fellow who knows the roads and the area really well. He asked me who that was. ‘It’s me you damn fool!’ I replied. Anyway, we heard nothing for two weeks so I called again. They called me in for an interview that lasted over an hour and in which we talked about nothing except hunting and fishing and at the end of it he told me I had got the job — we were heading back to God’s country.”

That was to be Wes’s final work move and he returned to Boonville for good in 1979.

“We first moved into a duplex owned by Bud and Evelyn Berry and then we bought a place right next door to the state yard on the south end of Anderson Valley Way, just north of town, where there was a nice house and an acre of land. I had been hoping to find something for about $25K but everything had changed. Things were over $100K but this place we found was very reasonable at $64K and we moved in 1981. I said to Leola, ‘The first order of business — we are unpacking and we ain’t gonna move no more’.”

Wes did ten more years for the State before retiring on July 1st, 1991 at the age of 59. During those last ten or so years working back in Boonville, Wes and his biological family got back on schedule once again. However, around 1987 his half-sister Lucille passed away with cancer 52.

“About three or four years later my mother came down with cancer too. She fought it for about eight years but it finally took her as well. Now we brothers have kept in touch with each other on a pretty regular basis. As for my father, well my mother took that information to the grave with her but my curiosity kept working on me and I spoke to some old-timers in the Valley and this led to some inquiries beyond the Valley which led me to the postmaster in Talmage — a woman by the name of Florence Zimmerman. I called her. She told me to get over to her house immediately and when I got there she said there was no doubt I was her brother’s son — a man by the name of Walter Miller who had died about eight years earlier. I met his four sons who all said there was a great resemblance to their father in me. Since then we have got together on occasions and I have also managed to get this side of the family together with my mother’s side and we have had some very good times together — me being the oldest of nine with my eight half-siblings.”

“Since retirement I have worked around the house and also did small engine repair for several years. Leola and I traveled but she was in bad health for the last ten years or so until she passed in 2008. I guess through my life I have managed to survive a few tragic events but the most difficult thing I had to overcome was Leola’s death. We were married for 52 years and she had stayed by my side through a lot of difficult times while I worked for the State. I managed to take care of her the best I could. After her death I could see that I could not survive in a big empty house by myself. The days got longer and the nights never seemed to end. After some time had passed I got in touch with a very lovely lady who I had known most of my life and she had lost her husband some year and a half earlier. He was Burt Crosby, a friend from my late teens and an old drinking buddy of mine and she was Marian Crosby, or McAbee as she was when she played the clarinet in the AV High School Band. We were both the same age, and as we got more acquainted we decided that what few years we had left in this life we should not go through them all alone. She is now living here with me — the house where she grew up as a girl! It is so comforting to have her here to talk to and go places with as we try to live life to the fullest. Marian has been the best thing that could have happened to me.”

“I still see many of the other old-timers either at the Redwood Drive-In or the Senior Center. I used to go to the early morning gathering at the Drive-In but now I do the 4pm ‘meeting’ where I regularly see Donald Pardini, his son Ernie Pardini, Frank Wyant, Gene and Berna Walker, who is Marian’s sister, Howard Morse — we call him Mouse, Mancher Pardini, Mary Ann Kinnion, Harold Hulbert, and others.”

ED NOTES

YOU CAN IGNORE the following of course, but I can't resist and I own the site so I can be as tiresomely preachy as I like even if I'm only talking to myself.

THE BASIC political argument in this country for many years, all the way back to FDR, and before that all the way back to the Founding Fathers, was the fundamental beef between the wealthy who don't want to give up a dime and the wealthy who understand that unless there's a basic social floor the country will get crazy and violent, which it already has, and then violently crazy until the entire privileged edifice comes down.

DUDE, it's happened before.

JEFFERSON thought there ought to be a revolution every few years just to keep power from becoming too entrenched. We're way overdue but something seems to be brewing. Luigi Mangione may have fired the first shot in the correct general direction.

BUT THE PREVALENT MEDIA, and the dominant media at Fox that specifically got Trump elected, assumes the choice is between a little fine tuning — the Democrats — and bigger breaks for the rich with a persecution of the defenseless as a sadistic sideshow — Trump and his Magas. THE blow-dried fools at Fox and their look-alike blondes are only slightly more corrupt than the blow-dried fools and their blondes at ABC etc, both insisting that Medicare for everyone, for instance, is socialism — Fox; or that it's merely one of Bernie's undoable notions — Democrats. MEDICARE for everyone would save everyone money, a lot of money, and why should old people like me be its only beneficiaries while everyone else who needs medical care has to go to a Go Fund Me page? Or dies because they can't get care? (Short answer: geezers vote, ten year olds with leukemia can't)

THE BASIC CHOICE IS THIS: You want a social floor or do you want Big Trouble such as we haven't seen since the 1930s, only this time the Big Trouble will be a lot bigger? There were a lot fewer of us in 1930 and a lot of us still lived on the farm. We didn't have automatic weapons and nearly as many bad attitudes either. And everyone assumed things would get better. Who assumes that now?

TO PROVIDE a social floor means people with money will have to pay higher taxes, much higher, like they used to with Roosevelt and pay now in the stable countries of the world where citizens assume fundamental social obligations, among them universal health care, free education, in-home care for the elderly and the rest of it.

BUT HERE in Liberty Land we have the propagandists for billionaires electing a lunatic blowhard who will make the rich richer while most of the people the blowhard claims to represent are certain to get poorer and poorer.

WHY WERE OBAMA and Hillary, conservative liberals on their best days, and even the pathetic Biden (and his giggling handmaiden), constantly denounced as “socialists”? To make millions of people vote against themselves, that's why, to convince everyday people they don't need the basic civilized guarantees. Not that Hillary, Obama, Biden and Giggles were for any of it.

ASSUMING I'm vertical a year from now, I'll check back with you to see if the above turned out to be more or less true.

HENRY SHAW AT THE MENDOCINO CENTENNIAL CELEBRATION, 1952.

A frequent participant in local parades, Shaw’s striking appearance - draped in fur skins, complemented by a long white beard and flowing hair - earned him admiration as the embodiment of a primitive man.

Born in Liverpool, England in 1880, Henry immigrated to the United States in the early 1900s, settling in Elk in 1906. He was a graduate of Oxford University and a cousin of the famed playwright George Bernard Shaw.

After arriving in Mendocino County, Shaw tried his hand at a wide variety of jobs. He worked at the Mendocino Mill for a while. In 1911 he became an ordained minister of the Christian Church in Ukiah. Later he returned to the coast, becoming a licensed embalmer who owned his own funeral business in Fort Bragg. After selling his business, he worked for J. D. Johnson, the Mendocino undertaker.

Later in life he moved back to Fort Bragg. Although nicknamed the “Hermit,” he was a very sociable person. He was interested in civic improvement, attending city council and other government meetings. He was an honorary member of the Fort Bragg Volunteer Fire Department.

Shaw died in Ukiah in 1955 after a lengthy illness. Friends remembered him for his generosity. A pensioner in his later years, he saved from his limited income to aid those less fortunate, offering not just financial help but also a place to stay in his modest apartment.

(kelleyhousemuseum.org)

GONE BUT NOT FORGOTTEN, 2024

Tyler Neil, Yorkville

John Mark, Yorkville

Larry Carr, Yorkville

Angelo Pronsolino, Yorkville

Wes Smoot, Boonville

Carolyn Wellington, Boonville

Carolyn Eigenman, Boonville

Steve Rubin, Boonville

Pete Benville, Boonville

Ricky Adams, Boonville

Eva Johnson, Boonville

Scott Fraser, Philo

Gene Herr, Philo

Tom English, Navarro

Randy Bloyd, Navarro

Linda D. Barton (Henke), Stephanie Marcum's mom

Patti Guarachi, Des Moines, sister of Cyndi Hollinger of Boonville

Lou Fortin, former Boonville Principal

Bill Chambers, formerly of Boonville

Dennis Miller, formerly of Boonville

Martin Hafley, formerly of Boonville

Jim Johnson, Elk, former Boonville Superintendent

Elizabeth Weaver, Comptche

Larry Fuente, Comptche

Dan Borghi, Navarro Ridge

Bill Bradd, Ten Mile

James K. Larsen, Fort Bragg

John Shandel, Albion

Max Schlienger, Ukiah

Jim Martin, formerly of Fort Bragg

Tony Craver

Eleanor Adams, Mendocino

David Nelson, Ukiah

Jason Cox, Ukiah

‘Marchie’ Summit, Ukiah

John Perrill, Mendocino

Jim Larson, Ukiah

Bob Ayres, Albion

John Knoebber, Mendocino

Kathleen Kirkpatrick, Willits

John Mayfield Jr., Ukiah

Eddie Vedolla Jr., Redwood Valley

Priscilla Hunter, Coyote Valley

Alfred Bolton, Elk

Margie Handley, Willits

Lisa Walters, Gualala

Fred Sternkopf, Caspar

Irv Sutley, Glen Ellen

Kate Coleman, Oakland

Larry Bensky, Berkeley

Michael Weist, Berkeley

Ed Denson (Humboldt County)

This was pre Albion River Inn restaurant. James Athey proprietor. Early 1950’s.

Have been looking for this shot, seemingly forever!

Jackie and Jim Athey were students at Mendocino High School.

CATCH OF THE DAY, Saturday, January 4, 2025

MANUAL AMADOR, 49, Willits. Failure to appear.

ALEXIS ARREGUIN, 23, Redwood Valley. DUI, resisting.

SELENE GONZALEZ, 29, Ukiah. Controlled substance for sale, false compartment, unspecified offense.

JAYSON JOHNSTON, 34, Fort Bragg. Domestic violence restraining order violation.

NOLAN LAWSON, 56, Ukiah. Paraphernalia, unspecified offense, probation revocation.

ERIC SEALE, 49, Fort Bragg. DUI, shoplifting, probation revocation.

NICHOLAS TAMBOURAS, 53, Willits. DUI.

JUSTIN TIMBERLAKE, 41, Ukiah. Domestic violence restraining order violation.

DONOVAN WILLIAMS, 46, Ukiah. Felon-addict with firearm, ammo possession by prohibited person, county parole violation.

Dietary/Health advice from local saloon. (Clement St.) (via Steve Heilig)

MEMO OF THE AIR: Say qapla, Gracie.

"This thing that you do, Ted, where you come into a place and push people out, you should know those people worked really hard to build this magazine. They believed in it. And I get it, you've got your marching orders and you have to do what you have to do, but you don't have to be such a dick."

Here's the recording of last night's (Friday, 2025-01-03) 7.5-hour Memo of the Air: Good Night Radio show on 107.7fm KNYO-LP Fort Bragg (CA) and KNYO.org (and, for the first three hours of the show, also 89.3fm KAKX Mendocino): https://tinyurl.com/KNYO-MOTA-0625

I was still at Juanita's for that show, where her downstairs neighbor has had some health problems, so the tiniest of noises at night are hard for her, so you'll notice my mumbly-whispery tone, with the mic close, so it sounds like my hot breath is right in your ear. That explains that. Next few shows I'll be back in Albion, reading in my normal voice, unless you tell me you like it this way better. I don't have a preference.

Coming shows can feature your story or dream or poem or essay or kvetch or announcement or whatever. Just email it to me. Or send me a link to your writing project and I'll take it from there and read it on the air.

I've been doing my show on various radio stations every Friday night since February of 1997, when I stopped publishing /Memo/ on real newsprint. This involves 20-plus hours a week of concentrated prep and then a couple of all-nighters, one to get ready and one to go. If you appreciate the show and want to help me out personally, I could certainly use it. You can be sure I won't be spending your money on drugs or cigarets or candy: https://paypal.me/MarcoMcClean

Besides all that, at https://MemoOfTheAir.wordpress.com you'll find a fresh batch of dozens of links to not-necessarily radio-useful but worthwhile items I set aside for you while gathering the show together, such as:

Rerun: The Secret Life of Walter Mitty (2013). I love everything about this film including the opening and closing credits, also the way they incorporate story text into the landscape. I've seen it at least ten times. I already identified with Walter Mitty from the James Thurber story when I was a little boy. And it's perfect how they used Sean Penn here; in fact everyone is perfectly cast. This movie, set at the corporate takeover and destruction of a fictional version of Life Magazine, came out very close after the time that a royal piece of shit from Florida named Claude "Hoot" Hooten bought up real-life KMFB, showed up one day, called a meeting, gave a little speech to everyone about how he just loved this little radio station exactly the way it was, and /what a lovely little town/, and so nothing would change and we were all gonna have such a lotta fun, and the next day he fired everyone, went to near 24-hour automation, affiliated with Fox News, changed the call letters to KUNK, and then immediately sold it off to somebody else and flew away. So you can grasp the parallels I saw between the film and fresh, raw events. Even without that, it's a great movie. It's a love story as well as being a trove of useful advice and indelible lines, like when Patton Oswalt (Todd) is sitting across from Ben Stiller (Walter) in the airport. They're eating cinnamon doughnuts. Todd says, "You know, you aren't what I expected." Walter says, "What did you expect?" Todd says, "I pictured you as this little gray piece of paper, but now I see you and it's like Indiana Jones decided to become the lead singer of The Strokes or something." Here, see for yourself, free: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EmGf0W50DAk

It goes well, oddly, with both /Benjamin Button/ (and contains a reference to it) and /Mr. Nobody/, not the Val Kilmer one of that title but the one with Jared Leto, from 2013. Here are a couple of places to watch /Mr. Nobody/ for free. If one doesn't work, or they've removed it, try the other one. This is a magical, slow, dreamy, touching film made by a collaboration of studios from Belgium, Germany, France, and Canada. I think about Mr. Nobody every once in awhile, especially the part where the boy and girl are sitting next to each other on a summer resort beach, and the girl leans slightly so their bare shoulders just touch– and you're right back there, the first time you were with a girl you liked, feeling those feelings all over your skin (in addition to the tingly sunburn), and the butterflies in your stomach. And how vivid and precarious and important and mysterious everything was. The multiple overlapping timelines of the story, the character's three whole lives with three different partners, and the different kinds of joy and heartbreak of each one, especially the mentally ill one. "I love you. We'll get through this." No. You won't. And the reveal at the end, of the source of all of it. https://watch.plex.tv/watch/movie/mr-nobody

The worst wreck of the Peter Pan story was not /Hook/, nor even the BBC's /Goes-Wrong Show/ version, but came in the otherwise wonderful teevee series /Once Upon A Time/ near the end of its second season, where they made Peter a psychopathic mind-controlling demon from Hell. When the characters of /Once Upon a Time/ went to Neverland, the series bogged down… although, I just looked up the review charts, and most other viewers seemed to continue to enjoy it at a consistent level then and for years after. I bailed when I couldn't stand it anymore, so. In my experience, the best Peter on stage was Lavender Kent in Gloriana Opera Company's production in Cotton Auditorium (Sandy Glickfeld played Tiger Lily the Indian princess), and the best film is 2003's /Peter Pan/, written and directed by P.J. Hogan, a story whose center is the innocent but fraught first-love dynamic between Peter and Wendy. Anyway, here's the original 1924 silent /Peter Pan/ film, found, repaired and restored. And look up and learn about Anna Mae Wong*, because she played Tiger Lily here; the 1920s were her heyday. (100 min.) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xOHp5AJxU18

And in the real world, police killed 1,251 people in the U.S. in the year 2024 (that we know of). Here's a short animation of that, that looks like bubbles in red sauce simmering in a pan, because it is. https://mappingpoliceviolence.us

Marco McClean, memo@mcn.org, https://MemoOfTheAir.wordpress.com

DRAKES BEACH: ELEPHANT SEAL BREEDING SEASON

by Adrian Rodriguez

Drakes Beach in the Point Reyes National Seashore is temporarily closed to accommodate elephant seals that have set up camp for the breeding season.

The annual ritual has brought at least 30 males to the shore in front of the Kenneth C. Patrick Visitor Center as of Thursday, with more farther down the beach, said Earl Perez-Foust, a member of the park’s staff.

At least four pups have been born near the overlook area of the beach, Perez-Foust said. The first was spotted on Dec. 20.

“Closures are a critical way to protect both elephant seals and the visiting public,” Perez-Foust said. “The unpredictable nature of elephant seal behavior, coupled with potential impacts to their health and well-being, means that sometimes the best way to protect wildlife and visitors is to prevent the potential interaction between the two.”

Each year, hundreds of elephant seals fan out across Marin’s beaches for the winter pupping season.

But until recently, the blubbery beasts preferred the secluded south-facing pocket beaches of the Point Reyes Headlands. That changed in the 2018-2019 season, when they began expanding their claim on not-so remote locales, such as Drakes Beach….

(Marin Independent Journal)

INTERNATIONAL ACTIVISM, WEST MARIN STYLE…

AS CALIFORNIA TRIBES SUE THEIR GAMBLING RIVALS, CITIES COULD BE THE LOSERS

by Ryan Sabalow

On their first opportunity since a new law took effect Jan. 1, seven casino-owning Native American tribes filed suit in Sacramento County Thursday against dozens of California card rooms, opening a new front in one of last year’s most expensive political battles. Now, millions of dollars of tax revenues that pay for city services such as police and road repairs could be in jeopardy.

The tribes’ suit alleges that the gambling halls scattered across California are illegally offering card games such as black jack and pai gow poker that cut into the tribes’ gambling revenues.

“Defendants brazenly profit from illegal gambling,” the tribes said in the opening line of their lawsuit. In a statement, a card room industry representative said the cardrooms are “in full compliance with the law.” “This attempt by tribal casinos to shut down lawful competition by tax-paying California businesses will fail,” the statement said.

The suit would not have been possible if Gov. Gavin Newsom hadn’t signed Senate Bill 549 in September. Tribes say California voters years ago gave them the exclusive rights to host the disputed table games, which they use to benefit historically disenfranchised tribal communities. But because the tribes are sovereign governments, they lacked legal standing to sue the state’s 80 or so privately-owned gambling halls.

The bill gave tribes a three-month window to sue card rooms starting Jan. 1. They filed the lawsuit on the first day California courts opened for business in the new year.

Under the bill, tribes cannot receive any money or attorneys’ fees from the lawsuit. Instead, judges will only decide whether card rooms can continue to offer the disputed games. The stakes are high since some cities receive nearly half of their budgets from taxes on cardrooms, meaning a tribal victory in court could jeopardize money for police, firefighters and other local services.

For example, nearly two thirds of the budget for the small city of Hawaiian Gardens and almost half for the city of Commerce, both in Los Angeles County, come from local card rooms.

San Jose City Councilmember Sergio Jimenez told lawmakers in July that the city receives $30 million each year from card rooms, enough to fund 150 police officers or 133 firefighters. Jimenez said that money’s in jeopardy if the tribes end up prevailing in court.

The card room industry claims the games are legal and that the attorney general’s office has approved each of them over the years.

The suit comes after tribes persuaded lawmakers last year to pass SB 549 in what was one of the most costly political fights of the two-year legislative session that concluded last summer. A bipartisan coalition of lawmakers, many of them with large tribal casinos in their districts, pushed for the gambling measure, while a smaller group of lawmakers with card rooms in their districts opposed it.

It followed a failed 2022 sports betting initiative that the tribes spent millions of dollars to sponsor and that included a similar provision that would have let the tribes sue.

The opposing gambling interests donated at least $4.3 million to the 120 members of the Legislature since January 2023, according to the Digital Democracy database. Facing what they saw as an existential threat, card rooms responded to SB 549’s introduction with a massive lobbying blitz. In 2023, Hawaiian Gardens Casino alone spent $9.1 million on lobbying, the second highest amount reported to state regulators. Only the international oil giant, Chevron Corp., spent more.

Then, despite losing the battle over SB 549, the card room industry spent more than $3 million in the lead up to the November election in retaliation against four lawmakers who played key roles in the bill’s passage.

Three of the candidates targeted by the card rooms ended up losing, including the bill’s author, Democratic Sen. Josh Newman of Fullerton.

(CalMatters.org)

BILL KIMBERLIN

I don't generally like re-posting my articles but it has been five years and this has gotten so much attention on the Marin site where I originally posted it that I will make an exception. Not that anyone but me gives a damn.

Bill Kimberlin: “When I was young and growing up in Marin, I went to A.E. Kent school in Kentfield where I lived. I knew the girl in this photo, her name was Janet Rigsbee. We went to Kent school together. As you can see she was very easy on the eyes. This was eighth grade. Unfortunately, for me and all the other male classmates, she had a boyfriend. He was older and came from a wealthy family that owned Bon Air Shopping Center among other things. His parents gave him a jet black T-Bird, the one with the porthole windows in the removeable top. Naturally, he had it pin-striped and it looked really cool. He used to pick Janet up in that Bird. All we had were our bicycles. I didn't hear about her again until I was in college in San Francisco. She now had a new name. It was Janet Planet and she was with Van Morrison, who is the fellow in the photo. Van Morison wrote several songs about her, but my favorite is, ‘Brown Eyed Girl’.”

BOB DYLAN AT THE MASONIC AUDITORIUM IN 1964

My 13-year-old sister — I was 21 — talked me into going to this concert. I'm an old man now, so my memory is hazy about whether I had even heard anything Dylan had done, though I at least had heard of him. My sister probably had one of his early “vinyl” albums.

It was interesting to note that most of the audience in the Masonic Auditorium was also young girls. That was true too of the advent of the Beatles. All of those screaming audiences on TV, like their Ed Sullivan appearance, made it hard to really hear the music and understand what all the fuss was about. Like Dylan, they were so good I soon came around to liking the Beatles.

At the Masonic, only Dylan was on stage in front of a microphone with a guitar and that harmonica rig. Joan Baez joined him at the end of his set to do a duet, which isn't on this recording. (Later: Wrong! I didn't listen to the whole thing. She's on the last cut.)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sFlPuYt6Hjg

Baez also joined a sparsely attended anti-war demonstration in front of the federal building in San Francisco, as the Johnson administration was signaling an escalation of the US attack on/invasion of Vietnam.

— Rob Anderson, District5Diary

“When I sit down to write a book, I do not say to myself, 'I am going to produce a work of art.' I write it because there is some lie that I want to expose, some fact to which I want to draw attention, and my initial concern is to get a hearing.”

– George Orwell, Why I Write (1946)

NOT HARDLY…

Editor:

Donald Trump will be inaugurated president because he won the majority of votes in the Electoral College, where each state gets votes under specific rules including population. I have seen writers claiming that Trump won the majority of the popular vote as well, with Trump himself calling it an “unprecedented mandate.” Examining the numbers, however, one finds this is not the case. Recent vote totals show that, out of approximately 156.3 million votes cast, Trump received 49.8% while Kamala Harris got 48.3%, a difference of a mere 1.5%. Records reveal this is the fifth-smallest such margin among the 32 elections held since 1900.

These results reveal two things. First, Trump received a plurality, but not a majority, i.e., he got more votes than anyone else but failed to get over half.

Second, although Trump called this an “unprecedented mandate,” his relatively small margin in the popular vote as well as small GOP margins in Congress would dictate otherwise. If one wanted to put a label on the election, one might be generous and call it a “mini-mandate,” but certainly nothing close to the unprecedented one Trump declared.

Sherman Schapiro

Eureka

GASLIT NATION

From drones to terrorists, authorities are having a laugh at the public's expense

by Matt Taibbi

If you’re in the growing population of Americans that is tired of being fed streams of sensational and inexplicable news stories, while authorities that appear to delight in public confusion sit back with buttoned lips, yesterday might have been the last straw. We are officially Gaslit Nation:

Friday, January 3rd 2025, was one of the weirder news days in recent history. In late afternoon former Navy Seal and CIA contractor Shawn Ryan interviewed former intelligence officer Sam Shoemate, who revealed what he alleged to be an email from suspected Las Vegas Cybertruck bomber Matthew Livelsberger. It read like the answer to the AI chat prompt, “Design the ultimate conspiracy theory”:

In case I do not make it to my decision point or on to the Mexico border, I am sending this now. Please do not release this until 1JAN and keep my identity private until then…

What we have been seeing with “drones” is the operational use of gravitic propulsion systems powered aircraft by, most recently, China in the East Coast, but throughout history, the U.S. Only we and China have this capability… China has been launching them from the Atlantic from submarines for years, but this activity recently has picked up… The ‘so what?’ is because of the speed and stealth of these unmanned AC. They are the most dangerous threat to national security that has ever existed. They basically have an unlimited payload capacity and can park it over the WH if they wanted. It’s checkmate.

USG needs to give the history of this, how we are employing and weaponizing it, how China is employing them, and what the way forward is. China is poised to attack anywhere in the East Coast.

This introduction was just the appetizer. The note went on:

I’ve been followed for over a week now, from likely Homeland or FBI, and they are looking to move on me and are unlikely going to let me cross into Mexico… they know I am armed and I have a massive VBIED. I’ve been trying to maintain a very visible profile and have kept my phone and they are definitely digitally tracking me… I have knowledge of this program and also war crimes that were covered up during airstrikes in Nimruz Province Afghanistan in 2019 by the admin, DoD, DEA, and CIA. I conducted targeting for these strikes of over 125 buildings… that killed hundreds of civilians in a single day.

In unfurling his scoop Ryan announced “my family and I are disappearing for a few days,” since what he’d released was “mind boggling and will raise a lot of questions.” Whether it was real, nonsense, or a combination of both, all this was brilliant theater, on par with Alfred Hitchcock’s marketing of Psycho. Rumors circulated that Livelsberger left other messages behind. Shoemate warned Joe Rogan and Fox News that if they “scrub their emails right now, they could probably find a message from this guy.”

As has been the case with many recent news stories, it couldn’t have been scripted better. The Livelsberger story had already been seeded with the public (with podcast partner Walter Kirn and I perhaps unwitting participants) as riddled with ridiculous contradictions. Family members and even Las Vegas Sheriff Kevin McMahill expressed doubt that the corpse “burned beyond recognition” that was recovered from the exploded Cybertruck this week was, in fact, Livelsberger. Meanwhile, images of text exchanges between Livelsberger and an ex-girlfriend included mention that “I’m building drones in my new position you would love it”:

About an hour after Ryan’s broadcast, FBI Agent Spencer Evans stood at a podium in Las Vegas and addressed the development. This was the moment that sent me smacking my forehead in frustration.

“In terms of the so-called manifesto that’s circulating online, we have strong evidence to suggest that it was the subject that wrote it,” Evans said. “That evidence relates to other evidence that we’re finding that we’re able to compare that lead us to believe it was in fact him who sent it.”

If you’re keeping score: a Special Forces “supersoldier” rumored to be able to blow up a suspension bridge with a match and bubblegum detonates the world’s most amateur car bomb in Las Vegas, leaving behind a manifesto alleging knowledge of both civilian massacres in Afghanistan and a coverup of Chinese “gravitistic propulsion” drones buzzing New Jersey. For good measure, the manifesto adds he’s carrying a “massive VBIED,” i.e. a vehicular bomb. The FBI, which opened its presser confirming different Livelsberger manfestos (more below), only later, and offhandedly, says it has “strong evidence” the more cinematic Ryan/Shoemate letter was also written by their subject.

I live in Morris County, New Jersey, not far from the Picatinny Arsenal, the location of enough recent drone sightings to prompt a statement from the Department of Defense. Last night, my son and I booked a court to play tennis in a nearby town. In the drive there and back the sky was filthy with low-flying things. I was like Ray Liotta at the end of Goodfellas, craning my head under the dashboard, scaring my little boy with staccato guesses about how far above us visitors were hovering. By the time we got home I was furious. For how much longer is the government planning on yanking our chain over this stuff?

Since this preposterous ordeal began I’ve been double- and triple-checking official statements in an effort to keep from imagining things. If this is a mass psychogenic event, many officials are caught up in it. Stewart airfield in upstate New York shut down in mid-December due to “drone activity,” and an Air Force base in Ohio did the same. Ocean County, New Jersey Sheriff Michael Mastronardy described launching his own drones to chase after 50 flying objects a deputy saw “coming from the ocean” off Island Beach State Park. “The drone came up to our drone, shut off its lights then took off at 60 mph,” Mastronardy said, in a pitch-perfect imitation of the old reports about “cigar-shaped objects.”

Governors and a slew of local legislators have complained to federal officials, who’ve essentially stonewalled everyone from the public to sitting Senators, issuing “remain calm” notices. Homeland Security chief Alejandro Mayorkas gave my favorite statement: “I want to assure the American people that we are on it.” That was three weeks ago, and after the Department of Defense reportedly shot down and retrieved one of a “large number” of drones caught trailing a Coast Guard vessel earlier last month.

To preserve mental health, I try to ignore all news after work hours, silencing notifications and enforcing a strict sports-only Internet rule after dusk. But no one can ignore weird blinking aircraft zooming over your state, especially if they scare your kids. So, we have an unignorable news phenomenon expanding in a conspicuous vacuum of official explanation, into which we’ve now injected this Livelsberger story.

While I do believe in DOD civilian massacres, I don’t believe in “gravitistic propulsion,” nor do I believe there’s a Men in Black-style squad out chasing and perhaps assassinating rogue Green Berets. I refuse absolutely to bite on that part of the story. But there’s no longer any way to ignore the proposition that the government is playing mind games with the public when it comes to the release of information.

The FAA this past week imposed new bans on drone usage in nine New Jersey towns, the latest in a string of 57 such edicts issued since late November “at the request of federal partners.” These moves scream Gaslight to me. Are we to believe “federal partners” are concerned about drone hobbyists? What do FAA bans accomplish?

(To those asking why an investigative reporter doesn’t answer some of these questions on his own: as Racket readers will see next week, I’m still slogging through papers from eight or nine scandals ago, and don’t have a lot of sources I can call about mystery drones. But it’s a fair point.)

The official media response to the recent terrorist incidents is equally bizarre, and feeds the drone lunacy. The New York Times this morning covered Livelsberger, but naturally didn’t mention the alleged drone/massacre manifesto. Instead, it built a story around the other manifesto-type writings from Livelsberger’s phone the FBI discussed yesterday. In “notes recovered by investigators from one of his phones,” the Times wrote, Livelsberger:

Praised President-elect Donald J. Trump and wrote that “our soldiers are done fighting wars without end states or clear objectives…”

“This was not a terrorist attack,” the note said. “It was a wake-up call. Americans only pay attention to spectacles and violence. What better way to get my point across than a stunt with fireworks and explosives?”

The Times went on to note Livelsberger said he “needed to cleanse my mind of the brothers I’ve lost and relieve myself of the burden of the lives I took,” adding:

The writings found on Sergeant Livelsberger’s phone suggest that he had been increasingly concerned about politics. In one note shared by the police, Sergeant Livelsberger said that people should “try peaceful means first but be prepared to fight” to get Democrats out of the federal government.

In another, he said that “masculinity is good and men must be leaders,” adding that people should rally around Mr. Trump and Elon Musk, Tesla’s chief executive and a top donor to the Trump campaign…

The writer of the first “manifesto” doesn’t sound much like the other, which would make sense if Livelsberger wasn’t the author of the email sent to Shoemate, as has been theorized for a variety of reasons. The canny reader will also notice the twin sets of Livelsberger manifestoes seem perfectly tailored for left and right audiences, with the Shawn Ryan deep state action-flick jetting across conservative media, and the PTSD-stricken toxic-masculinity bomber tale getting full play in papers like the Times and Washington Post. There is very little coverage crossover. This is how the Washington Post summarized the “gravitistic propulsion” story:

In the days before the explosion, Livelsberger had corresponded with a social media account popular with military veterans in an apparent attempt to raise concerns about military drone technology, incidents he observed in Afghanistan, and his certainty he was being followed by law enforcement as he drove the Cybertruck from Denver to Las Vegas.

“Corresponded… in an apparent attempt to raise concerns about military drone technology” is a pretty odd paraphrase of “Alleged the New Jersey drone phenomenon is a Chinese invasion being covered up by the state.” Why edit that out? It makes it seem less ridiculous, not more.

Agencies like the FBI and the CIA have been effective in the Trump era in deflecting criticism by pumping cosmpolitan audiences full of conspiratorial bosh about things like Russian collusion. They’ve struggled with the Trump audience for obvious reasons, but I’m beginning to wonder if someone hasn’t realized one can paralyze skeptical audiences with ostentatious displays of incompetent or contradictory behavior. Last week’s string of bizarre official statements were like a container ship of conspiratorial catnip, which will leave millions asking questions like, “What do they know?” or “Why are they letting reporters into crime scenes?” or “Are we really supposed to believe they just found those notes?” perhaps instead of being angry about other issues or abuses.

I don’t know what officials are up to, when they leak like sieves about some issues (Russiagate, Luigi Mangione) and refuse to provide even basic answers about others (New Jersey drones, Thomas Crooks, Covid origins). All we know is there’s an elaborate media strategy at work, one that in the content moderation age extends to outright removal of certain materials, like Shamsud din Jabbar’s Facebook videos. Trying to unwind the logic of these decisions is tiring enough when it’s voluntary, but living in a country that won’t explain things flying over your house is absurd. I get that the president is a corpse, but can’t someone be found to give an old-fashioned Oval Office speech? Why leave us to chew over so much crazy?

(racket.news)

JADE TIPPETT

A rough of the cartoon that the Washington Post killed, that led to cartoonist Anne Telnaes leaving the Post. The characters paying homage to Scrump are Mark Zuckerberg/Facebook & Meta founder and CEO, Sam Altman/AI CEO, Patrick Soon-Shiong/LA Times publisher, the Walt Disney Company/ABC News, and Jeff Bezos/Washington Post owner.

JOHNSON ATTRIBUTES PRAYER TO THOMAS JEFFERSON, but there’s no proof he said it

by Azi Paybarah

Shortly before Mike Johnson was sworn in as House speaker on Friday, he stood in front of the incoming members of Congress and offered what he said was “a prayer for the nation” that was said every day Thomas Jefferson was in the White House and “and every day thereafter until his death.”

Johnson attributed that detail to a program distributed at a bipartisan interfaith church service where he spoke earlier that day.

Johnson told the lawmakers, it is “quite familiar to historians and probably many of us.”

“Endow with Thy spirit of wisdom those whom in Thy name we entrust the authority of government, that there may be justice and peace at home, and that through obedience to Thy law, we may show forth Thy praise among the nations of the earth,” Johnson said, reading from a piece of paper.

Historians do know the quote — because it has been falsely attributed to Jefferson for years. There is no proof Jefferson ever said it, according to the Thomas Jefferson Foundation, which has a page on its website dedicated to correcting this notion…

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2025/01/04/johnson-attributes-prayer-thomas-jefferson-theres-no-proof-he-said-it/

Denis Frémond, Interior with a Pianist, 1993

ON-LINE COMMENT OF THE DAY

Had some skittles a few years ago. Very sugary. Not horrible. Nice to try once again after decades. Never been a Cheeto eater but like those Jalapeño Cheddar puffs and Buffalo Ranch cauliflower puffs as a mature adult. Is Newsom a food grinch? Sure seems like it. I bet he munches down on Mint It’s Its and Doritos all the time. Should a child never get to sample Cheetos or skittles or Big Hunks? WTF? What’s next, banning SPAM?

LEAD STORIES, SUNDAY'S NYT

Congestion Pricing Begins in New York City. Here’s How It Works.

The Twists and Turns That Brought Congestion Pricing to New York

‘A Day of Love’: How Trump Inverted the Violent History of Jan. 6

Trump Sees the U.S. as a ‘Disaster.’ The Numbers Tell a Different Story.

As Democrats Reel, Two Front-Runners Emerge in a Leadership Battle

Potent Storm Blasts Parts of U.S. With Sleet, Snow and Freezing Rain

BIDEN TROLLS MAGA WITH PRESIDENTIAL MEDALS OF FREEDOM FOR HILLARY CLINTON, GEORGE SOROS & RICH DONORS

Outrage as pardoned Hunter Biden is invited to lame-duck Joe's last Presidential Medal of Freedom ceremony…

by Auren Acton-Taylor

Hunter Biden's attendance at his father's last Presidential Medal of Freedom ceremony has prompted outrage online.

Hunter was seen at the medal ceremony just one month after he was pardoned from his legal troubles by his father, who has recently been trolled for his final list of recipients of the nation's highest civilian honor.

Hunter shook hands with those who attended, including Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, and applauded those awarded with former President Bill Clinton.

He attended with his wife, Melissa Cohen Biden, and his son Beau Jr. whilst chatting with others in the crowd.

His presence at the ceremony stirred users on X, who hinted at the ever-apparent nepotism between the president and his son.

'Hunter already got the Grand Prize when his dad pardoned him for everything possible. So much for, "No one is above the law",' wrote one user.

'The look of someone who knows he broke the law repeatedly. Got extremely wealthy because of it and will face zero consequences because of it,' said another.

'I'm surprised his daddy didn't give him a medal,' said a third tweeter.

Another wrote: 'Is Joe Biden also giving Hunter a medal of freedom? That would be about right.'

Among those receiving the highest civilian honor include Hillary Clinton, the former first lady, New York senator and Secretary of State, who was President-elect Donald Trump's 2016 White House rival.

Biden also awarded George Soros, considered the boogeyman of Democratic super donors, and restaurateur Jose Andres, who pulled out of a Trump hotel project due to the Republican's anti-immigrant comments prompting a years-long legal battle.

Soros received the award, the White House said, due to his foundation's work to 'strengthen democracy, human rights, education and social justice.'

Andres was awarded the distinction due to his charity World Central Kitchen's efforts to feed people in war zones and in the aftermath of natural disasters.

'A proud immigrant dedicated to building longer tables, his World Central Kitchen has revolutionized the way food aid reaches communities affected by natural disasters and conflict around the world,' the White House said.

The 82-year-old gave a posthumous medal to Robert F. Kennedy, the late attorney general, senator and Democratic presidential candidate who was assassinated in 1968.

RFK is the father of Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who ran for president against Biden, then ran as an independent, and finally joined forces with Trump. Trump has since nominated RFK Jr. - a prominent anti-vaxxer - to serve as his Health and Human Services secretary.

The White House did not respond to DailyMail.com's inquiry on whether RFK Jr. was invited with other family members to the ceremony.

Biden also posthumously honored former Michigan Gov. George Romney, who also served as the country's third secretary of Housing and Urban Development.

George Romney is the late father of former Republican Sen. Mitt Romney, the GOP's 2012 presidential nominee who became a vocal Trump critic.

Romney concluded his single term in the U.S. Senate this week after twice voting to convict Trump on impeachment charges.

Biden also presented awards to benefactors who've been good to him.

Billionaire philanthropist David Rubenstein received the honor - after letting the Bidens use his Nantucket waterfront home every Thanksgiving the Democrat was in the White House.

Rubeinstein has also poured his millions into American cultural institutions - helping firm up the Washington Monument, provide for the panda program at Smithsonian's National Zoo and purchase a copy of the Magna Carta that was at auction.

Fashion designer Ralph Lauren was also presented with the medal.

He designed granddaughter Naomi's wedding dress for her November 2022 White House wedding.

Lauren received the award, the White House said, due to his influence over 'culture, business, and philanthropy, notably in the fight against cancer and the preservation of the Star-Spangled Banner.'

Anna Wintour - who oversaw a glamorous Vogue spread of said White House wedding - was also honred.

She's long been associated with Democratic causes and hosted fundraiser for Biden while he was still running in the 2024 campaign.

'A champion for philanthropic causes, she is also the leading architect behind the annual Met Gala fundraiser and chief content officer of Condé Nast,' the White House said.

A number of Hollywood types were also included on the list.

Actor Denzel Washington received the medal, as well as U2 frontman Bono - who's done a lot of work in the HIV/AIDS space.

Back to the Future star Michael J. Fox - who actually supported Biden rival Pete Buttigieg's 2020 presidential bid - also received the distinction.

'He is a world-renowned advocate for Parkinson’s disease research and development,' the White House said.

Bill Nye the Science Guy also received the award, along with conservationist Dr. Jane Goodall.

Biden wrote that Nye 'has inspired and influenced generations of American students as 'Bill Nye the Science Guy.'

From the athletic world, Earvin 'Magic' Johnson was honored.

Tim Gill received it for advancing LBGTQ rights.

Fannie Lou Hamer was honored posthumously for her civil rights work in the segregated south.

Co-creator of the Kennedy Center Honors, George Stevens, Jr., received the medal from the president.

Additionally, the late Secretary of Defense Ash Carter was honored posthumously.

Biden made the shock announcement to pardon Hunter in December of 2024 for any crimes he may have committed 'from January 1, 2014 through December 1, 2024'.

The move came after Biden said in June he would 'not pardon' his son, in an attempt to take moral high ground over president-elect Donald Trump who said he wants to pardon January 6 rioters.

'From the day I took office, I said I would not interfere with the Justice Department's decision-making, and I kept my word even as I have watched my son being selectively, and unfairly, prosecuted,' Biden said in a statement.

The president claimed that people are 'almost never brought to trial on felony charges solely for how they filled out a gun form… It is clear that Hunter was treated differently.'

Biden raged against 'several of my political opponents in Congress' who he claimed made the charges a public spectacle 'to attack me and oppose my election.'

He added that the plea deal Hunter, who has since pledged to 'make amends' for his crimes, agreed to with the Department of Justice was a 'fair, reasonable resolution of Hunter's cases.' But that deal fell through at the last minute under political pressure.

'No reasonable person who looks at the facts of Hunter's cases can reach any other conclusion than Hunter was singled out only because is my son - and that is wrong,' he continued.

Biden says that there has been an effort to 'break Hunter' and destroy what he says is five-and-a-half years of sobriety.

'In trying to break Hunter, they've tried to break me - and there's no reason to believe it will stop here. Enough is enough.'

The president didn't shy away from pointing out that the love of his son guided his decision-making but stressed that he was being 'fair-minded.'

'Here's the truth: I believe in the justice system, but as I have wrestled with this, I also believe raw politics has infected this process and it led to a miscarriage of justice - and once I made this decision this weekend, there was no sense in delaying it further.'

Hunter released a statement of his own, credited to his full name, 'Robert Hunter Biden.'

'I have admitted and taken responsibility for my mistakes during the darkest days of my addiction - mistakes that have been exploited to publicly humiliate and shame me and my family for political sport,' he said.

'Despite all of this, I have maintained my sobriety for more than five years because of my deep faith and the unwavering love and support of my family and friends.'

'In the throes of addiction, I squandered many opportunities and advantages. In recovery we can be given the opportunity to make amends where possible and rebuild our lives if we never take for granted the mercy that we have been afforded.'

'I will never take the clemency I have been given today for granted and will devote the life I have rebuilt to helping those who are still sick and suffering.'

The pardon will cover both the gun charges and Hunter's guilty plea. CNN reported that the judges overseeing his cases will most likely cancel the sentencing hearings he was due to attend on December 12 for the gun case and December 16 for the tax case.

The broad pardon also absolves him of any crimes since 2014 until 2024, which covers his entire tenure on the board of Ukrainian gas company Burisma, as well as much of his other overseas work including in China.

(DailyMail.uk)

18 Comments

Mike Jamieson January 5, 2025

RE: racket news’ “Why leave us to chew over so much crazy?”

This is one chew that is likely to be a forever chew so for that it might be wise to find a forever-pipeline to some coca-leave chew. Of course at some stage, this particular chew is certain to result in a full blown dementia. I think this is a forever chew because it’s hard to see how we arrive at any answers that will finally clear the air.

Reply
Chuck Dunbar January 5, 2025

BRAVO, BRUCE

You are still The One—saying it exactly like it is!

“TO PROVIDE a social floor means people with money will have to pay higher taxes, much higher, like they used to with Roosevelt and pay now in the stable countries of the world where citizens assume fundamental social obligations, among them universal health care, free education, in-home care for the elderly and the rest of it.

BUT HERE in Liberty Land we have the propagandists for billionaires electing a lunatic blowhard who will make the rich richer while most of the people the blowhard claims to represent are certain to get poorer and poorer.”

Reply
- Call It As I See It January 5, 2025
  
  You and the editor are a complete joke!
  First off, the liberal media got a dementia diaper wearing moron elected President, who by the way just gave Soros and Clinton medal of honors. Are you f$&!ing kidding me?
  
  This Country elected Trump not Fox. People are tired of watching this Country go to hell because of people like you, Chuckie. And that includes your hero, the esteemed editor.
  
  You know Chuck, I hope you have good insurance, if Bruce Anderson makes a sharp turn, you might break your nose!
  
  Reply
  - Chuck Wilcher January 5, 2025
    
    Just like after Kissinger received the Nobel Peace prize, Trump devalued the medal of freedom by awarding it to the former drug addict and supreme blowhard Rush Limbaugh.
    
    “Trump has used the country’s highest civilian honor to reward his most fervent supporters — angry, divisive partisans like Rush Limbaugh (who coined the term “feminazi”), Rep. Jim “Shouty” Jordan and, of course, his favorite cow-suing congressman, Rep. Devin Nunes.”
    
    https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2021-01-16/column-how-trump-cheapened-one-of-americas-highest-honors-the-medal-of-freedom
    
    Reply
  - Chuck Dunbar January 5, 2025
    
    Good that you are still around, CIAISI, watching out for us. Not sure why so much vitriol today, but there it is. We shall see how things go after a year or so with the new leadership…talk more then?
    
    Reply
  - Bruce Anderson January 5, 2025
    
    Well, Call, if Trump accomplishes nothing else, I hope to hell he can protect America’s household pets!
    
    Reply
  - Do Not Comment January 5, 2025
    
    Maybe before you call it, you should actually read it – perhaps even read it twice.
    
    Reply
Harvey Reading January 5, 2025

AS CALIFORNIA TRIBES SUE THEIR GAMBLING RIVALS, CITIES COULD BE THE LOSERS

The “pioneers” just wanna continue their domination of Native Americans. As far as I am concerned, they can take their “card rooms” and stuff them where the sun don’t shine!

Reply
Me January 5, 2025

Silly me, I thought the BOS were the bosses not the CEO. Apparently not. Thank you for bringing this to your readers attention.
And, a potentially armed and wanted felon is roaming the hills of Willits, knocking on doors in the middle of the night and we aren’t allowed a photo so we know who the enemy is? Good God Almighty! Protect the guilty and sacrifice everyone else. Weird correlation in these two stories, is there not? Thank you for finding the photo of the wanted man and having the courage to print it. Also Thank you for keeping the deeds of government in the light of day for all to know vs. leaving them in the dark where they are purposefully placed.

Reply
- Chuck Dunbar January 5, 2025
  
  COUNTY NOTES: ‘DISRUPTIVE BEHAVIOR’?
  
  Mark Scaramella does us well to highlight these issues. I think often of my education in the whims and wiles of County bureaucracy (and no doubt true of most other such organizations world-wide) over 18 years. Control and power were the major dynamics in play, as I slowly had my eyes opened to how the place functioned. Another dynamic of major import was the use of obstacles and barriers to truth and reality when the obfuscation of such knowledge was of value to the bureaucracy. “You don’t really need to know that information,” and “Just trust us, we know what we’re doing.” were the messages often passed down through the ranks, as well as to the general public.
  
  Reply
  - Chuck Dunbar January 5, 2025
    
    I should clarify the above– I am speaking about administrative types–managers, directors and such. I found most line staff in Social Services positions to be caring, committed, hard-working, and dedicated to their missions of helping citizens. It was the admin folks–many of them, but not all of them– who got lost in the above dynamics, and as a result losing focus on why they were hired (or elected), losing sight of their mission to serve the public interest. Ego issues were markedly prominent in the power dynamics. It was disheartening to watch these dynamics, and to see their disruptive impact on services to the public.
    
    Reply
Paul Modic January 5, 2025

The NYTimes articles I’m printing and reading today:
Paul Theroux On The Hard Reality American Expats Quickly Learn
Bad Fitness Advice
Philippines Hit Man (For Duterte) On The Run
Your First Step To A Better Mood

Reply
Craig Stehr January 5, 2025

Warmest spiritual greetings, Awoke early at the homeless shelter in Washington, D.C. and began chanting OM. Following morning ablutions, took two bus rides to Whole Foods on H Street for a superb breakfast, and then moved on to the MLK public library. It’s snowing lightly here and much cooler. I’ve no idea what is next, except that I am in the “belly of the beast”. Perfectly situated, ready for spiritually source direct action, not identified with the body nor the mind. Contact me anytime. Craig Louis Stehr (craiglouisstehr@gmail.com)

Reply
Betsy Cawn January 5, 2025

“Disruptive Behavior?”

Lake County’s Board of Supervisors has for several years (most prominently starting in 2021) taken the “initiative” to sponsor “management” programs and used its quasi-judicial powers to create Joint Powers Authorities (with minimal responsibility for BoS “oversight”), several multi-agency Task Forces, ad hoc Advisory Committees, and Municipal Advisory Councils.

Lake’s Administration was transformed largely by our former CAO, who had been the Director of Social Services during a multi-decade buildup of her department — on the same trajectory as Mendocino’s “Health Services” empire, the one that finally folded in Mendocino — and attempted to merge three similar departments (Behavioral Health, Public Health, and Social Services) but thankfully was “promoted upstairs” after a two-year fiasco as the County’s post-Valley Fire Long Term Recovery director.

Our former’s DSS director’s forte being budget and staff control, she quickly moved to consolidate management departments under her umbrella starting with Human Resources, but ran afoul of the Registrar of Voters (who eventually prevailed in keeping that office independent). She then sought to absorb the three fiscal agencies — Auditor-Controller, Assessor-Recorder, and Treasurer-Tax Collector, who successfully resisted the CAO’s demands.

Just before ending her County career (having lost a discrimination lawsuit against the government and her self) she did succeed at taking over Community Development with the help and backing of new Supervisor Jessica Pyska in 2021.

Pyska’s liberal use of ad hoc workgroups, taskforces, and subcommittees enabled pairs of Supervisors (in compliance with the Brown Act) to meet with the influential and empowered leaders in various “external” forums to generate popular support for her ambitious priorities.

The great disaster decade of 2015 to 2025 launched the new economic approach to rebuilding enterprise and residential assets, which then took a severe hit during the pandemic (and its political battles for control and direction, with two Supervisors refusing to support our Public Health Officer’s “orders” — you remember him, surely, Dr. Gary Pace).

On the cusp of adaptive technology’s meeting alternatives (“remote” workplace operations and multi-platform real-time, interactive “virtual” events), one thing the Board needed to do was endure the harangues of public commenters who opposed any public health measures such as masking, vaccinations, and social distancing; schools were especially taxed to find ways for all students (some of whom did not have and could not afford computers) to “stay in school” and “cope” with social isolation. Parents who could not afford to stay at home to supervise their student children were stressed further by the need to earn a living and the necessity of ensuring their kids “attended” streamed classes.

Early editions of virtual meeting software (Granicus had been in use already for many years) were vulnerable to disruptions that broke into BoS meetings, sometimes hideously, but the platform inventers quickly upgraded the systems to control who is and who is not allowed to “enter the room.”

Fiscal management being the top priority for these elected and appointed officials, “spending” of staff time on serving the needs of individual Supervisors — carefully orchestrated as “administration” services with the primary objective of getting funding for their “initiatives,” most of which was handed off to non-profit contractors — is governed by one of the many new Board “Policies & Procedures.”

Using the County’s purchasing rules, department heads were given signature authority through various resolutions defining the threshold under which BoS review/approval could be obviated by setting top dollar amounts for each, just as is being proposed on your upcoming BoS agenda.

I don’t remember when our Board, years ago, started the 3-minute public comment limit (probably “suggested” by the 2015 Valley Fire Recovery director, whose second attempt to become CAO succeeded after her predecessor had to “leave the county” — in fact, he left the state entirely — due to major pre-disaster errors). [That scandal garnered no local press attention, and the resulting loss of $12.5M in General Fund reserves was barely mentioned in the 2016-2017 annual budget hearing.]

Our current CAO, a professionally recognized practitioner of public administration arts, raised the bar quietly but effectively with many offerings to the Board for “leadership” training, participation in government lobbying institutions (CSAC, RCRC, NACO), and updating of our Board’s “Policies & Procedures” Manual.

During the December 10, 2024, hearing for Board action on whether or not to support the name change in/for the town of Kelseyville, former Supervisor Brown took the Board to task for their 3-minute rule, saying that the Board’s rule discouraged public input that used to enable members of the public to ask questions of the Board, and then respond to their answers. Convenient for the Board, hamstringing for citizens whose three minute utterances are then dismissed by the Board’s “non-response” rule — unless, as sometimes happens, a Supervisor wants to, and has the “last word” with or without “consent” from the other Board members.

A considerable gap exists between the public and their elected officials (who choose, without restriction, those “constituents” they meet with during their unofficial hours; no record is kept of those contacts or matters discussed) who are “assisted” in their efforts to address governance issues by an Administration-filtered “Citizen Complaint” process. Individual “complaints” are typically routed to department heads who reply cordially but seldom provide answers to their concerns.

But over time, thanks to on line services, county-wide crises, and ever increasing “stakeholder” “engagement,” a broader dialogue is forming among local activists and independent citizens involved in challenging our County’s cannabis legalization rules, Planning Commission conflicts, and General Plan update processes.

From every encounter I’ve witnessed over the last couple of years, our Administration and Department Heads have used the Board of Supervisors agendas to great effect, although there are numerous minor infractions of the Brown Act that surpass even the attention of an agenda hawk like me (terrible explanations of grant and contract items). Anyone can request that a consent agenda item be pulled for discussion but everyone knows that if it’s on the consent agenda it’s a virtual done deal.

Individual Supervisors are pretty meticulous about having Board and Admin approval of their requests for “staff support,” but they have deflected so many issues through their assignments to standing or ad hoc committees over the years that the public is hard pressed to keep up. The further cementing of policy positions at state-level agency “stakeholder”forums (i.e., elected officials “representing” the County’s interests) and in private conversations with higher officials (both elected and appointed) bolster the Supervisors’ confidence in their individual autonomy for working with hand-picked supporters of their chosen domains. Pyska’s is clearly the long-term recovery of our economic and organizational authority (as though Lake County ever got out of the permanent shadow of “severely economically-disadvantaged” designation from US HUD in the late 1960s’ implementation of Lyndon Johnson’s “War on Poverty” and Ladybird Johnson’s “Highway Beautification” programs).

Exhibiting their authorities over incoming Supervisors, our Board demanded an amendment of their “Policies & Procedures” to prevent their use of “Supervisor-elect@lakecountyca.gov” in their post-election contacts where, through “error” or ignorance, they might exceed the authorities granted by state law, and create unforseeable “liabilities” that threaten the organizational status quo.

Junior members of the Board will face a steep learning curve (less so for newly retired Lakeport Police Chief) as the Supervisors take up dozens of unfinished matters from 2024 — postponed from last December meetings and carried over from multi-year projects.

The usual rigamarole of “housekeeping items” and shuffling of the deck chairs under the breezily “elected” positions of Chair, Vice-Chair, and ex officio Boards, Commissions, and Committees will suck up next Tuesday’s love fest while the Administration begins the cannonade of Q3 activities — annual review of budget unit obligations by every department head, and (separately) the Board’s annual legislative priorities hearing. Quickly followed by “mid-year” budget review, adjustment of position allocations, and dedication of the Board’s discretionary funds, punctuated by self-congratulatory proclamations and “recognition” ceremonies.

While the hopeful newly elected Supervisors get to carom around in the novitiate freedom of their first year, a new election cycle begins for District Supervisors Crandell and Sabatier and the public tries to get a word in edgewise.

Thanks as always to the perspicacity and perseverance of our beloved Editor, Mr. Scaramella, for never flinching or losing track of Mendocino’s bigshots and their oddly inept “management” of your CEO.

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Ava Maria January 5, 2025

I think it’s

The little car
La petite voiture

The little cars
Les petites voitures

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Marshall Newman January 5, 2025

Sorry to hear about Wes Smoot. His occasional history pieces for the AVA were always good reading.

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David Stanford January 6, 2025

Lots of talk about nothing, so sad, the only way to express yourself is on a “Leave a Reply” post. We need to get a life and enjoy it, we only have one.(-:

Reply
- Bruce Anderson January 6, 2025
  
  Would you mind explaining your comment? I don’t get it.
  
  Reply

Mendocino County Today: Sunday 1/5/2024

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