Mendocino County Today: Thursday, Sept. 1, 2016

• Yorkville Social
• Warren's Sendoff
• Marijuana Measures
• Takeover Act
• Wine Math
• Bill/Katy
• Angry Cunningham
• MCDH Priorities
• Coastal Tour
• Labor Champion
• Yesterday's Catch
• God & Country
• Tree Loss
• Success
• Common Beliefs
• Downsized Vacation
• Foggy Night
• Dogface
• Broadband Update

26TH ANNUAL YORKVILLE ICE CREAM SOCIAL

It’s that wonderful time of year again. Kids go back to school and it’s Yorkville Ice Cream Social time! Let’s celebrate a great summer, sip an ice cold root beer float, devour a delicious ice cream cone while dancing around the Cake Walk, dive into a great grilled hamburger all while socializing with your friends. And don’t forget all the other awesome stuff, cookies, cakes, pies, homemade salads and there is always the famous BarBQ oysters. The truly awesome pulled pork sandwiches will be flying out the door, be sure to get there early to catch one.

Early birds will get the first crack at the book sale. Hundreds of books for only $1 an inch! You can’t beat that. This year’s arrivals are exciting this year, bestsellers, blockbusters, fiction and non-fiction alike. You can pick up some great CDs and books on tape too.

One of the highlights of the Social is the Cake Walk. Imagine musical chairs without chairs. You stroll around a numbered circle to great music, when the music stops, if you’re on the right numbered spot, you Win A Cake! An entire cake!

Get you tickets early for our HUGE raffle! You can take home some wonderful prizes from all over the Anderson Valley - wine, gift certificates for local restaurants and services and t-shirts. The Silent Auction will be even better than last year’s, local art, wine, olive oils and unique stuff that you’ll just have to come see to believe.

Come socialize, catch up on the happenings, and just have fun. The kids always have a good time too, they can cool off in shower of cool water from the fire hose, eat hot dogs and stuff themselves on ice cream.

All the proceeds from the Ice Cream Social benefit the Yorkville Volunteer Fire Station and the YCBA Scholarship Fund. If you’d like to donate something or your time, give us a call 707-391-4928.

Date: Monday Sept. 5st
Time: 10 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.
Location: The Yorkville Post Office and Fire Station
25400 Highway 128, Yorkville, CA 95494

CITY BIDS FAREWELL TO JOURNALIST WARREN HINCKLE

by Steve Rubenstein & Kevin Fagan

With his basset hound howling mournfully from the front door of the church, rapscallion journalist Warren Hinckle was remembered Tuesday as a “larger-than-life thorn in the side of self-serving big shots of all stripes.”

“He was a high-performance journalist,” recalled his friend, historian Kevin Starr, “and a flamboyant, take-no-prisoners investigative reporter.”

Thorn or not, Hinckle was eulogized and praised Tuesday by a lot of the self-same big shots who had, from time to time, felt the sting of his typewriter pounding. Mayors, supervisors, a fire chief, cops, movers and shakers were on hand at SS Peter and Paul’s Church in North Beach — along with three officers astride San Francisco police horses — to bid an unconventional farewell to the editor, columnist and raconteur, who died Thursday in a San Francisco hospital at the age of 77.

A slew of them were decked out in eye patches — a Hinckle trademark after having lost his left eye in a childhood accident — that an old pal had been handing out from a bag at the church door. Along with the city’s finest were scores of drinking companions, old schoolmates, colleagues and a retinue of newspaper editors whose deadlines the notoriously up-against-it writer had observed largely in theory.

It was what Hinckle would have called a “five priesta,” or a funeral presided over by five priests. The clergymen granted Hinckle’s basset hound, Toby, special dispensation to accompany his master’s coffin down the center aisle, between the packed pews.

“He taught us all not to be afraid of the world,” said his daughter Pia Hinckle in her eulogy. “He was a curmudgeon who would cry at old movies (and) a writer who hated writing.”

Of her dad’s legendary habit of gleefully burning through a magazine publisher’s capital, Pia Hinckle smiled and said Hinckle “had a checkbook when what he really needed was a treasury.”

She recalled how her father scribbled notes for future stories on cocktail napkins, held court on barstools and “never opened his mail.”

At times, the eulogies began to sound like a guide to the taverns, saloons and watering holes of San Francisco where Hinckle preferred to practice his craft. From the pulpit, heartfelt praise was heaped not only on Hinckle but also on Gino and Carlo’s, Jack’s, Sam’s and Cookie Picetti’s. Hinckle, said his daughter Hilary Hinckle, believed there was “little in the job of editor that could not be accomplished in a good saloon.” She recalled how, as a 6-year-old schoolgirl on a field trip, she led her classmates into Cookie’s tavern, where her father was conducting business, to the horror of her school chaperones.

She also recalled falling asleep to the sound of her father’s typewriter, and she remembered how Hinckle comforted her when she confessed to him that she was a terrible speller.

“‘That’s what they have editors for,’” she recalled her father telling her. “‘Most people can spell but not everybody has an idea.’” Hinckle, a former editor of Ramparts and Scanlan’s magazines and a former columnist for The Chronicle and the San Francisco Examiner, was as much a showman in person as a craftsman in print. His feuds were legendary. Once, incensed by police raids on the Mitchell Brothers strip club, he arranged to post the private phone number of then-Mayor Dianne Feinstein on the theater marquee — “for a good time, call Dianne,” the marquee said — and Feinstein responded by dumping a drink on his head in public. Hinckle could not have been more pleased had he consumed the beverage himself. Following the eulogies, songbird Renée Lubin — a longtime cast member of “Beach Blanket Babylon” — performed a slow, mournful rendition of “San Francisco” and Hinckle’s body was borne from the church as the mourners stood and wiped tears from their eye patches.

The Green Street Mortuary brass band led the funeral cortege on a final rolling tour of Hinckle’s favorite North Beach taverns and cafes, while family members sat in an open-top convertible black hearse. The extended North Beach jaunt, which attracted a small crowd of street people and hangers on, ran overtime, said Hilary Hinckle, with obvious delight. “Dad was late for his burial, which he would have loved,” she said. “He’d have been pissed if we were on time.”

Hinckle was to be buried at Woodlawn Memorial Park in Colma, two rows from Emperor Norton.

(The San Francisco Chronicle)

THERE WILL BE FOUR marijuana measures on the November ballot, one state measure, three arising out of Mendocino County. You won't go far wrong voting NO on all of them. One, Measure AF, is totally nuts and the other three assume a marijuana reality not likely to exist. Ever.

AS SOON AS POT is legal even a teensy bit, supply goes way up, prices come way down. The small-scale growers who make up the majority of local pot farmers are local people invested in their communities. Open the door and here come the "undesirables" and the high flying big boys of dope with their massive indoor grows and eco-destructive practices, not to mention guns and criminal cartels.

WHICH IS ALREADY happening in northern Mendo, and has been happening the last few years in Humboldt County, which is suffering terrible consequences from its Green Rush, consequences ranging from wholesale eco-damage and a rise in hard drug abuse among both the transient homeless and the more or less rooted population drawn to the Northcoast by semi-sanctioned drug production.

PROP 64 is a state initiative that would legalize hemp and recreational use of the miracle weed. It would impose a sales tax, a cultivation tax and even a tax on shake. Presently, medical marijuana is more or less legal, although at the federal levee marijuana remains zero tolerance in all forms.

MEASURE AI is the County's wacky initiative that would tax cannabis businesses on the assumption they'd volunteer to sign up and be taxed, which we think is unlikely. The Supervisors, veering off into pure fantasy, say they'd even peg their tax rates to the consumer price index!

MEASURE AJ is more fantasy from our supervisors, but merely advisory. It discusses how the pot tax bonanza would be spent. Roads? Mental Health? Hell, maybe even drug counseling and chemistry classes for the honey oil producers.

MEASURE AF is the crazy measure, the one legalizing honey oil production and putting growers in charge of grows, all of it protected by state level Right To Farm which means pot growing can not be declared a nuisance.

BONNIE AND THE MAOIST are among the people organizing against AF. It's one of the more peculiar affiliations we've seen lately in Mendocino County. We've got Bonnie Carter (of Jared and Bonnie Carter) and Mike Sweeney, the former are prominent Republicans and hippie bashers from the day the first hairy beast appeared in Ukiah back in '66, and the latter is a former cult communist and the sole suspect in the car bombing of his former wife, the late Judi Bari.

MRS. CARTER and Sweeney have teamed up with Ukiah businessman Ross Liberty, Willits attorney Chris Neary, and former County supervisor Hal Wagenet, to lead the charge against Measure AF. In a scattershot e-mail (below) Mrs. Carter writes of herself and her colleagues as "four solid citizens who have some real concerns about this initiative." Uh, that assertion, Mrs. Carter, might not bear scrutiny, but we'll give you the benefit of doubt on three of the four.

BONNIE AND MIKE have a point about Measure AF. Several points, in fact. Boiled down to its fanciful essentials, Measure AF would have a committee of growers oversee themselves while all complaints about their operations would be smothered by the County's Right To Farm ordinance.

INCLUDED IN AF? The manufacture of honey oil, which would mean even more idiots blowing themselves up.

WE RECOMMEND NO on all four.

BONNIE & JARED CARTER SAY NO

Re: Marijuana Takeover Act on Mendocino ballot

Friends,

For many of us who do not share any enthusiasm for marijuana it looks like it is time to start paying attention to this initiative on our ballot this November. This “'call to pay attention/get informed” comes from four solid citizens who have some real concerns about this initiative.

Bonnie Carter, Ukiah

* * *

Subject: Marijuana Takeover Act on Mendocino ballot

Dear Neighbor,

Initiative Measure AF, written by marijuana growers, has qualified for Mendocino County's November ballot. It is named the "Mendocino Heritage Act," but would more accurately be called the "Marijuana Takeover Act."

It appears to us that Measure AF would give marijuana growers an open field to do anything they want in Mendocino County. It would legalize commercial marijuana production in every zone, including residential neighborhoods. Marijuana plantations of up to 1 acre of plants could reach within 30 feet of a neighbor's property and within 100 feet of a neighbor's house.

It would abolish the right of anyone to complain about the odor of marijuana, since marijuana growers would be covered by the Right to Farm ordinance which effectively blocks nuisance complaints.

It would allow marijuana cultivation and sales 400 feet closer to our schools and parks.

It would cripple the enforcement of rules of any kind by replacing the sheriff with a civil procedure that would be so weak and slow as to be non-existent.

It would allow an unlimited number of dispensaries in any commercial zoning.

Incredibly, it would make butane processing of marijuana a "principal permitted use" in all industrial zones, even though this dangerous practice has caused innumerable fires.

It would be yet another loud siren call that if you want to make a fast buck growing lots and lots of marijuana, come to Mendocino County. The rules for marijuana growing shouldn't be written by the marijuana growers but instead by our Board of Supervisors who can ensure that our community is protected from bad practices.

You can read the "Mendocino Heritage Act" at

<https://mendocinoheritageinitiative.files.wordpress.com/2016/03/an-initiative-of-the-people-of-the-county-of-mendo_032216_v7.pdf>

We are organizing a committee to oppose the Marijuana Takeover Act on the November ballot. Please join us. Defeating Measure AF will take a lot of time and money from concerned citizens. If you can offer support of any kind, please contact one of us directly or email to NoMeasureAF@yahoo.com.

You are also invited to an organizing meeting on Thursday, August 25 at 6:30 p.m. at Factory Pipe, 1307 Masonite Road, Ukiah.

Sincerely,

Hal Wagenet, Willits
Chris Neary, Willits
Ross Liberty, Ukiah
Mike Sweeney, Ukiah

WINE MATH. We were discussing the giant mechanical grape harvester spotted at Golden Eye vineyards earlier this week. One guy thought it was a labor saving machine because the industry is having trouble getting Mexicans to pick grapes and even with plentiful and exploitable labor the machine would save the millionaires of Golden Eye some money.

MAYBE, but that argument doesn’t make sense for several reasons. We did some rough back-of-the-envelope numbers.

FIELD WORKERS make $12-$15 an hour for hard, skilled, hot work and they have to do it exactly when the vineyard wants it done and in a short period of time when the sugar levels are optimal and the grapes are at their peak. And they have to do it with minimal damage to the “fruit,” deftly excluding leaves and stems and rotten grapes. And this is accomplished under time pressure over long shifts (with no overtime) during harvests which occur over two or three weeks.

NARROWLY CONSIDERED, there are obvious theoretical advantages of machine harvesting. Industry experts say that having field workers harvest grapes costs about $150-$200 per ton and that machine harvesting costs less than $100 per ton depending on how many workers are used to operate and maintain the machine and its supporting vehicles.

IF YOU SELL the grapes for at least $2000 per ton or more (like most pinot is sold in Anderson Valley these days) you might save in the range of $100 per ton with machine harvesting. If the quality results are comparable, which they frequently are not.

IF YOU HAVE, say, 40 acres of grapes at 4 tons per acre you could save up to 40 x 4 x $100 = $16,000 out of $320,000 worth of wholesale grapes. If you convert those grapes into wine at 2.5 pounds of grapes per bottle, that’s $2.50 worth of grapes in a $20 - $40 bottle (or more). And if you sell your own wine you can convert your 40 acres of grapes into 160 tons of yield or 320,000 pounds which becomes 128,000 bottles. At $20 per bottle that’s about $2.5 million worth of wine, and upwards of $5.0 million at $40 per bottle.

SO THAT MEANS that you might save $16,000 worth of labor out of your $2.5 to $5.0 million gross on the assumed 40 acre vineyard.

BUT SAY you doubled the pay to get more workers for field harvesting. It might cost you another $100 per ton for the 160 tons or another $16,000 out of your $2.5 million to $5.0 million gross (less than one percent of the value of your wine).

THE POINT is that grape harvesting is a very small part of the cost of a vineyard/winery operation. Trying to nickel-nose labor that’s only used for a week or two a year and is a very small portion of your cost/gross with an expensive, unproven machine then whine about labor cost and availability while you spend tens if not hundreds of thousands on winery equipment and tasting rooms and marketing and taxes and interest and non-field staff is the kind of thinking that we have come to expect from the local wine industry.

AND WHEN THE FOG lifted…

Dr. Bill Rohr, Coast Hospital Trustee, has decided he's a woman named Katy. He's resigned his/her seat and is leaving the area, going back to Maine!

http://www.mendocinobeacon.com/general-news/20160804/transitioning-a-local-love-story

DOUBLE ANGER MANAGEMENT FOR YOU, NICOLE

On August 27, 2016 at approximately 3:31pm Mendocino County Sheriff's Office Deputies were dispatched to a physical altercation in the area of Carousel Lane and North State Street in Ukiah. While in route to the location, Deputies were advised witnesses had to pull Nicole Cunningham, 32, of Ukiah, from her vehicle and detain her after she drove her vehicle into another occupied vehicle. Deputies and CHP officers arrived on scene as Cunningham fled the location on foot and Deputies subsequently apprehended Cunningham. During the investigation, Deputies learned Cunningham engaged in a verbal and physical altercation with a 61 year-old female and a 22 year-old female. Cunningham entered her own vehicle and rapidly accelerated from about 150 feet away colliding head-on into the victim’s parked vehicle. Both vehicles sustained major damage in the collision. Cunningham exited her vehicle and engaged in another physical altercation with the 61 year-old female who was still seated in the vehicle. The 61 year-old female was transported to the hospital for medical treatment. Cunningham was arrested for attempted murder and assault with a deadly weapon. Cunningham was booked into the Mendocino County Jail where she was held in lieu of $ $300,000 bail.

COAST HOSPITAL TRIES TO STOP THE BLEEDING

by Malcolm Macdonald

Mendocino Coast District Hospital's Planning Committee met on August 16th in Fort Bragg. By meeting's end the six members of the committee, chaired by retired nurse Kitty Bruning, reached consensus on a priority ranking of strategic planning goals. The goals fall in to these categories: Financial Viability, with subtopics such as a potential parcel tax on property owners within the hospital district; a possible conversion to a “hospital fee structure” for the institution (which may or may not lead to millions of dollars more for the hospital per year); capital maintenance (this includes everything from the long delayed nurse call system repair/upgrade to sterilization improvements in the OR to $15 million or so of other short and long term maintenance repairs and upgrades); an Operational category, which includes the recently contentious issue surrounding the Obstetrics (OB) Department — it is budgeted for 2016-2017 — as well as subcategories like “Quality of care” and “Patient experience;” and a Community Relations category, which essentially boils down to the hospital positively marketing itself to the populace it serves. If credit is due for this list of priorities that credit goes to the hospital's Chief Executive Officer, Bob Edwards, and his leadership team. The final consensus list of planning goals is relatively similar to that proposed by Edwards.

Readers (along with some Planning Committee members) might wonder why “quality of care” and “patient experience” aren't the highest priorities for Mendocino Coast District Hospital (MCDH). The counterpoint would argue that without attention to the financial viability issues there will be no hospital for the patients to experience. A recent survey of California's hospitals gave MCDH a score of two in the category of overall patient experience (on a scale of one to five, one marking the low end and five the high). Almost anyone who has lived along the Mendocino Coast for any period of time can probably recount both positive and negative experiences at Mendocino Coast District Hospital. We all have favorite doctors and nurses. Some of us have had to endure less than adequate performances and behaviors by specific employees or providers associated with this hospital. I could recite my own positive experiences with the ophthalmologist Kevin Miller or recount recent cases involving hospital errors. Much of that is beside the point right now.

MCDH is one of the largest employers on the coast. It is the place private physicians and clinics refer patients to when health care matters get serious. Yes, if there is time to elect an alternative over the hill or in the Bay Area alternative, many folks take that option. I wouldn't begin to argue with them. However, if you have essentially taken MCDH for granted, that is tantamount to taking the mill in Fort Bragg for granted about fifteen years ago.

MCDH probably has three choices: 1) Grow itself out of its recent bankruptcy woes; 2) downsize, which would mean cutting certain departments (see recent articles on obstetrics department); 3) shut down entirely. That last option is not so far-fetched if one looks at the number of hospitals that survive bankruptcy. Note that just muddling along doing things in roughly the same way they have been done for the last few decades is not an option.

The current administration may have their priorities straight for MCDH, but they have also shown an ability to proverbially shoot themselves in the foot then try to tie a pretty ribbon around the wound. Case in point: Readers may have noticed something advertised as “Immediate Care” at North Coast Family Health Center (NCFHC), the hospital affiliated clinic. There's even a big banner to that effect over the front doors. The reason there is “Immediate Care” at NCFHC is that this program is a repackaging of a “Fast Track” plan for the Emergency Room (ER) at MCDH itself. It is being repackaged (perhaps NCFHC would have been a more appropriate starting point) after the ER Fast Track essentially failed in its first few months due to poor planning and implementation.

Of course, smaller, rural hospitals like MCDH have their hands tied by federal regulations and reimbursement, particularly the lack of the latter. Small hospitals and their clientele will continue to struggle, at best, for adequate care and compensation until we adopt something very, very close to universal health care.

Financial viability is the bottom line for MCDH, but how much money comes in will decidedly depend on the word of mouth brought about by individual patient experiences. Those need to become more consistently positive for this hospital to pay its bills let alone grow into the future.

Here's a little known, outside of hospital insiders, money factoid: Along with all those repairs and upgrades ($15, $16, or $17 million worth) and the legally required new facility in thirteen years, MCDH has been limping along with hybridized, jury-rigged Electronic Health Records (EHR) for several years. The hospital has been granted waivers for its out-of-date system due to the recent period of bankruptcy. Those waivers are coming to a close and if deadlines are not met MCDH will face heavy monetary fines for its faulty EHR system. The best ballpark guess for an up-to-date EHR replacement system: $2.5 million.

When this writer first started covering MCDH in earnest about two years ago the Hospital Foundation, main fundraiser for MCDH, stated on its website that it was proud of raising about seven or eight million dollars for the hospital, total. Seven to eight million dollars in approximately 30 years. That doesn't cut it. If the so-called Hospital Foundation can't up that ante significantly it should be disbanded and the MCDH Board of Directors should look elsewhere for money raising assistance that can make an actual difference. Don't get me started on how the Hospital Foundation's main attempt at fund raising is essentially a wine and booze event for the semi-wealthy who obviously are drinking too much and donating too little.

The public will get their most straightforward input this November when three MCDH Board of Directors seats are up for election. Two years remain for the seat recently vacated by the resignation of Kate Rohr. Three candidates have announced for this seat: Tanya Smart, a community college instructor and spouse of the lone obstetrician left on the coast; Dr. Kevin Miller, an ophthalmologist with NCFHC; and Patricia Jauregui-Darland, registered nurse and current Vice-President of the Hospital Foundation. Running for the two four-year seats on the MCDH Board are current Board President Tom Birdsell; Steve Lund, interim appointee replacing Dr. Rohr and recent past President of the Hospital Foundation; Dr. Lucas Campos, physician; and Kaye Handley, a retired investment manager and current member of the MCDH Planning Committee.

BOB DEMPEL WRITES: After stopping in at the AVA offices recently, we continued up Anderson Valley finally getting to the magnificent redwood tree tunnel. My intent was to stop at Dimmick Park, a place I had visited when I showed livestock at the Boonville Fair. The 4-H Youth Advisor would take us down there to see the big trees and have a little time to do whatever. But as we got closer to the park I had this terrible feeling, and sure enough Paul Dimmick State Park is Closed. Driveway is boarded up. WTF? I visited there 70 years ago. We continued west to Little River for our favorite Dennan's B and B. Jo and Fred greeted us with open arms.

We went into Mendocino and stopped at the Kelly House. Fortunately the research wing was open. Katy Tahja had indicated that they may have more information on Dr. Preston. What they do have is limited and could not really help me. I wrote two articles on Dr. Preston that were published in the AVA. Dr. Preston died while they were filming East of Eden. His last wish was that they continue to use the house for the film. That was in 1954. The Preston House burned down in 1959. I was never clear who occupied the house from 1954 until 1959. Dr. Preston had a couple live in the house and take care of all the domestic duties. They had two daughters, Carol Ann and Bonnie who were both in the local 4-H club. They have both recently died and are buried in Fort Bragg. Their obituary mentioned having grown up in the Preston Home, which I found interesting.

I had an expected great dinner for our 57th wedding anniversary at Little River Inn. The waitperson who served us has been there 40 years. The next morning after a great breakfast from Jo and Fred we headed south to explore Point Arena. Point Arena has been one of my destination points for an 80-year-old from Hopland.

We stopped at Manchester State Beach. Another disappointment. The campsites were all closed. You could drive down to the beach by avoiding the potholes. Looks like a nice KOA right next to the road.

Well, let's move on down towards Point Arena. We saw Walt and Donna Stornetta's Jersey cows on their nice green pasture. They own the only two dairies in Mendocino County. I had dinner with them last Thursday night at the Ukiah Fair opening night dinner. Very nice couple.

Right off Hwy one a large sign caught my attention: Arena Justice Court. I thought and wrote about all of the Justice Courts being closed in Mendocino County. In fact Judge Jim Luther (ret) wrote a companion article using my article as a reference. But the sign is right there.

On top of it is Point Arena City Hall sign. Certainly this is the place I can stop and get some local information. There had to be 15 cars on one side of the metal building. I tried all of the doors until I got the north side and it read “Point Arena City Hall.” But this door was also locked. I further read “closed from 12 to 1pm.” It was only 12:50. I could see lights on inside. I knocked hoping some would open up. I guess the work ethics of the current City Manager have trickled down to the door monitor. So we forged ahead and wound up at the Point Arena Pier. This place has some activity. We could see the old Coast Guard lighthouse buildings up on the hill. We parked and went into a coffee shop in a large old building that had several shops. We were served by a knowledgeable young lady who not only had answers to our questions but supplied us with a map. So the old Air Force Base is closed and guarded according to her and it’s a long drive up the hill. There is no road to the old Coast Guard station. It was given to the college who recently wanted to sell it. There was some resolution on that. Paul Poulos lead that charge from the Historical Society.

So for a Guy from Hopland I did gather a small amount of history about Point Arena and the surrounding areas thru my cataracts, I grant you. (That is my favorite saying from ARGO.)

WILL PARRISH WRITES:

Nice Piece on SoCo Rent Control Struggle, Wine Industry

I met Gervacio Pena Lopez, the subject of this story, last year in Rohnert Park at a Wine and Water Watch event. To my mind, he is connecting all the right dots and doing some of the most important work of anyone north of the Golden Gate.

http://www.yesmagazine.org/people-power/meet-the-farmworker-who-helped-win-rent-control-in-californias-wine-country-20160830

CATCH OF THE DAY, August 31, 2016

DELBERT ALFORD, Ukiah. Parole violation.

WILLIAM BOATWRIGHT, Ukiah. Suspended license, probation revocation.

JOHN BOLTON IV, Willits. Probation revocation. (Frequent flyer.)

RICHELLE DEDOLA, Mendocino. Domestic battery.

KENNETH EWING, Ukiah. Drunk in public.

CHRISTOPHER HASTINGS, Rohnert Park/Ukiah. Pot sales, conspiracy, drug proceeds.

NANCY HENLEY, Oceanside/Ukiah. DUI, no license.

MICHAEL HIGGINS, Ukiah. Drunk in public.

CRYSTAL KNIGHT, Ukiah. Petty theft, suspended license, probation revocation.

PATRICK MCCONNON, Fort Bragg. Drunk in public.

BRUCE MCKEE, Redwood Valley. Domestic battery, kidnapping etc., vandalizing communications lines, probation revocation.

MATHEW PEAK, Fort Bragg. Controlled substance, failure to appear.

CHARLES REYNOLDS JR., Willits. Murder, assault with deadly weapon with great bodily injury.

ORLANDO RODRIGUEZ, Willits. Under influence.

HERMUNDRE RUTELEDGE, Ukiah. DUI, criminal threats.

JORGE SANCHEZ, Fort Bragg. Controlled substance, paraphernalia, community supervision violation.

ANTHONY WILBURN, Covelo. County parole violation.

MARK WRIGHT, San Francisco/Ukiah. Drunk in public.

NICOLE WRIGHT, Ukiah. Probation revocation.

THE PRAYER, THE PLEDGE & THE ANTHEM

by Jeff Costello

Sports have never been of much interest to me, outside of baseball to a small degree. Growing up in Connecticut, I saw Yankees and Dodgers games on the local TV stations. My uncle Art lived in Brooklyn and was big on the Dodgers. He had a baseball autographed by the entire 1955 team, Art took me to a game at Ebbets Field, and when he yelled at the players it was as if he knew them personally. Maybe he did. But I didn't feel his excitement, his enthusiasm, and the game was rained out in the fifth inning. The view from the stands was such that you couldn't see what was going on very well, it was all far away. Watching the games on TV was much better.

I remember of course the singing of the Star Spangled Banner, but not who sang it, or whether I did my patriotic duty and stood with my hand on my chest. This meant as little to me then as it does now.

In those days school kids were required to say the Pledge of Allegiance every morning in class, and recite the Lord's Prayer as well. We didn't question this but I for one didn't believe any of it any more than the national anthem at the baseball games. I didn't think to question the other kids' level of sincerity on these things. Maybe the ones who did buy into it joined up and went to Viet Nam later, I don't know. For God and country I guess.

For a brief time in the 80's I paid some attention to football, the Joe Montana 49ers. Montana seemed to elevate his actions as quarterback to an art form, unlike the crude and prosaic nature of everything else in the game.

I never regained interest in football after that period, and the spectacle of the Super Bowl has become obscene. Also, pro sports apparently have added another song to the program, God Bless America, conflating patriotism with religion. As an old friend of mine would say, it's past the point of being just plain ridiculous.

So if the current quarterback of the 49ers won't stand up for forced patriotism and risks loss of a very lucrative job, I say more power to him, no matter what else his circumstances. It's like voting for a third party candidate - someone, sometime, has to start defying the bullshit.

SUDDEN OAK DEATH WIPING OUT MILLIONS OF TREES, ALTERING ECOSYSTEM

by Julie Cart , CALmatters

Until recently, strolling through a California forest meant walking in dappled light along a path strewed with leaves or pine needles. But across the state, once towering pines have collapsed, their desiccated limbs sprawled across forest floors. Toppled oak and tanoak trees, their trunks decomposing from the inside out, litter the ground.…

Full Story: http://www.chicoer.com/article/NA/20160827/NEWS/160829787

ON LINE COMMENT OF THE DAY

I hate this multiculturalism crap. Before I am painted as a bigot, I am all for families or groups celebrating their ethnic or national backgrounds (St. Patrick’s Day, celebrating Ramadan, whatever), but when it comes to daily life and adherence to a set of common values as they apply to governance and a decent and polite national life, it seems to me it is impossible to include every perspective. There has to be a common language, a common belief in the rule of secular law, and common goals. I believe the lack of these things sow the seeds for national disintegration, or at least internal strife.

For example, if you hold beliefs that you should kill people who do not buy into your particular religious beliefs, I think that is a hindrance to governance and a decent and polite national life.

ONE FOGGY NIGHT

 

The fog has captured the moon,

Captured the moon mightily.

Taken the moon, taken the moon

Into the woodland deity.

Diffused the moon,

Diffused the moon rightly

And painted the wood,

Painted the wood brightly.

 

Everything is gray green,

Gray green lightly.

It is a wondrous sight to see,

Sight to see humbly,

How grey green is the wood,

Dense and thick and lovely,

Save for the fringes of the pines

Which shine like silver needles.

 

The fog has captured the moon

And sewn it to the backs of beetles.

Now a beetle trails the moon

Under an elder cedar,

It is surely a sight to see

The moon on tether.

Oh, how the beetle loves the moon

And creates with it the weather.

 

Under the cedar rooted to the earth

Rises a spring to quench its thirst

Here tows the beetle its milky moon

where it flows in rivulets down to the lake,

to amass in opalescent dunes,

and puddle in pools of pearl snakes.

 

My, but the moon is lonely

For its aerie nest.

It caps into peaks of sorrow

And sinks men's boats in jest.

Reckless the moon, now watery,

Pining for where it ought to be.

 

The owl grasps the plight

of the luminous moon

And soars it to the skies

The fog prolapses in a spent cocoon

As the early morning hies,

Clear as a diamond set in gold,

The sun rises warm,

the moon sets cold,

The sun melts the fog into vaporous dew

and paints the morning sky pale blue.

 

Ann Kyle Brown
Point Arena
June 27, 1997

AVAILABLE FOR ADOPTION, UKIAH ANIMAL SHELTER

BROADBAND ALLIANCE UPDATE

Hello fellow broadband advocates,

I can’t believe summer is already over, but I hope that it was a good one for everyone.

I want to ask you to put your creative thinking caps on in regards to an important opportunity (that doesn’t necessarily involve broadband, but could). There’s a lot of background and acronyms, but I’ll try to make it simple.

Sonoma and Mendocino have joined forces to create an Economic Development District (SMEDD <http://www.sonomamendocinoceds.com>), and will be submitting an application to be recognized as such by the federal Economic Development Administration (EDA). Part of the application process is to produce a Comprehensive Economic Development Strategy (CEDS <http://www.sonomamendocinoceds.com/2016/08/15/final-draft-ceds-available-for-public-comment/>), with specific goals in mind. You can download a copy of the final CEDS here <http://www.sonomamendocinoceds.com/2016/08/15/final-draft-ceds-available-for-public-comment/>. There are currently 4 goals: (1) economic diversification (resilience); (2) human capital; (3) innovation and entrepreneurship; and (4) inclusive economic development. As part of the CEDS, we want to include potential projects that would help us reach these goals, and so there is currently a “Call for Projects <http://www.sonomamendocinoceds.com/2016/08/15/call-for-projects/>”. This Call for Projects is intended to solicit ideas from the community that align to the goals and strategies in the CEDS—i.e. the action items in a plan explaining “how” the goals will be achieved during implementation. So for example, what sort of project can you think of that would inspire innovation and entrepreneurship? Having projects part of the CEDS does not guarantee grant funding by the EDA, but there are benefits to having your project included in the CEDS. Priority projects found in a CEDS are one of several criteria EDA considers when making decisions on future applications.

The Call for Projects <http://www.sonomamendocinoceds.com/2016/08/15/call-for-projects/> is only for a simple 2-page maximum proposal, but the deadline is coming up quickly - *Sept. 15th.* Check out the SMEDD website for how to submit your proposal, and other information. And please, share this email far and wide - with all non-profit organizations who might be interested, and also for-profit organizations (which could partner to apply).

Also, we have a Broadband Alliance meeting <http://www.mendocinobroadband.org/topics/public-outreach/> coming up next week - Friday Sept. 9th at 10 am in Ukiah. Attendance was low at our last meeting in May, and the July meeting was cancelled due to the CPUC hearing, so it would be nice to have a strong turnout for this meeting. Send me any topics or ideas that you would like to discuss. This is a time for public interaction, updates from other groups, and sharing of ideas but we need your participation for a successful meeting.

Thanks!

Trish Steel
www.MendocinoBroadband.org
707-354-3224