Mendocino County Today: Friday, Oct. 7, 2016

• Two States
• Anticipating Legalization
• Chomo Clowns
• Marijuana Measures
• College Plants
• PD Sale
• Onan
• Rexed Out
• LakeCo Chumming
• Trash Ninjas
• Pastor Hortense
• Emergency Shelters
• Huff Klatch
• Get Off
• Ballots Coming
• Yesterday's Catch
• Will Triumph
• Cotton Candy
• Salad University
• Pence Creep
• Canclini's Spaghetti
• Trump Phenomenon
• Tunnels Unpopular
• Dog w/Book
• Island Living
• Broadband Updates
• PA Agenda

CAN’T BLAME ILLINOIS REPUBLICANS!

Editor,

Two states in the middle of America — Illinois and Oklahoma.

I thought these two states made for an interesting contrast. The first part is about Illinois and the second part is about Oklahoma!

Part 1, Illinois. "A state with no Republicans"! Some interesting data on the state of the State of Illinois. There are more people on welfare in Illinois than there are people working. Chicago pays the highest wages to teachers than anywhere else in the United States. Their average pay is $110,000 per year. Their pensions average 80-90% of their income. Wow, are Illinois and Chicago great or what? Perhaps the United States should pull out of Chicago?

Body Count: in the last six months, 292 killed (murdered) in Chicago, 221 killed in Iraq; and Chicago has one of the strictest gun laws in the United States.

Here's the Chicago chain of command: President Barack Hussein Obama. Senator, Dick Durbin. House Of Representatives, Jesse Jackson Jr. Governor, Pat Quinn. House leader, Mike Madigan. Attorney General, Lisa Madigan (daughter of Mike). Mayor: Rahm Emanuel. All the leadership in Illinois are 100% Democrats.

Thank you for the combat zone in Chicago. Of course they're all blaming each other. Can't blame Republicans -- there aren't any!

Let's get all the facts out while we're at it: the Chicago school system is rated one of the worst in the country. The state pension fund is $78 billion in debt, the worst in the country. Cook County/Chicago sales tax is 10.25%, the highest in the country. Can't blame Republicans, there aren't any!

This is the political culture that Obama comes from in Illinois. And he is going to "fix" Washington politics for us? George Ryan is no longer governor, he is in prison. He was replaced by Rob Blogojevich; he is also in prison. And Representative Jesse Jackson Jr. resigned and he and his wife are both in prison. The land of Lincoln where our governors and representatives make our license plates. And as long as they keep providing entitlements to the population of Chicago, nothing is going to change except the state will go bankrupt before the country does. "Anybody who thinks he can be happy and prosperous by letting that the government take care of him, better take a close look at the American Indian."

Don't forget Detroit, another great example of the Democratic Empire.

With all the bad news, there may still be hope.

So let's go to Part 2, Oklahoma. Oklahoma may soon have plenty of new residents!

Oklahoma is the only state that Obama did not win even one county in the last election. While everyone is focusing on Arizona's new law, look what Oklahoma has been doing! Oklahoma law passed 37-9 an amendment to place the 10 Commandments on the front entrance to the state capital. The feds in DC along with the ACLU said it would be a mistake. But hey, this is a conservative state based on Christian values. HB 1330, so guess what? Oklahoma did it anyway. Oklahoma recently passed a law in the state to incarcerate all the illegal immigrants and ship them back to where they came from unless they want to get a green card and become an American citizen. They all scattered. HB 1804. This was against the advice of the federal government and the ACLU. They said it would be a mistake. But guess what? Oklahoma did it anyway. Recently Oklahoma passed a law to include DNA samples from any and all illegals to the Oklahoma database for criminal investigative purposes. Nancy Pelosi said that it was unconstitutional, SB 1102. Guess what? Oklahoma did it anyway. Recently Oklahoma passed a law declaring Oklahoma as a sovereign state, not under the Federal government directives, joining Texas, Montana and Utah as the only states to do so. More states are likely to follow: Louisiana, Alabama, Georgia, the Carolinas, Kentucky, Missouri, Arkansas, West Virginia, Mississippi and Florida. Save your confederate money; it appears the South is about to rise up once again.

HJR 1003. The federal government has made bold steps to take away our guns. Oklahoma a week ago passed a law confirming people in this state have the right to bear arms and transport them in their vehicles. I'm sure that was a setback for the criminals. The Liberals did not like that but guess what? Oklahoma did it anyway.

Just this month the state voted and passed a law that all driver's license exams will be printed in English and only in English and no other language. They have been called racist for doing this, but the fact is that all the road signs are in English only. If you want to drive in Oklahoma you must read and write English. Nothing could be more simple. By the way, the liberals don't like any of this either. Guess what? Who cares? Oklahoma is doing it anyway.

Jerry Philbrick & Daullton Abernathy

Comptche/Ukiah

A READER sends along some fine reporting from the Willits Weekly by Damian Sebouhian. Sebouhian's piece is called, "Cannabis Causes Council Commotion."

OUR CORRESPONDENT calls it, "China Invades Crank Town," highlighting the following paragraphs describing a presentation to the Willits City Council by a man named Kevin Shi: Shi's company, SWS Consulting, has purchased the old AM&D site on East Hill Road:

"SHI urged the council to act swiftly in formulating its new cannabis ordinances, stressing the importance of allowing cultivation in industrially zoned areas. Shi highlighted the economic benefits of allowing such activity on the property.

"OUR PLANS are to invest more than $30 million into the city," Shi said. "This will create more than 150 jobs, of which 80 percent will be local. Where else can you find more talent in this resource than right here?"

SHI went on to make rosy predictions for his pot op which, he said, has already employed local contractors to prepare the sprawling AM&D plant for conversion to cannabis production.

THE GREEN RUSH is rushing in to Mendocino County. This guy is promoting only one of many industrial grows in the works.

"I WANT to remind you, the industry is not waiting for any city, Shi said. You see Santa Rosa, you see Fort Bragg, you see Oakland jumping in."

WHICH IS WHY we recommend NO votes on all four pot propositions on the November ballot. Any move in the direction of legalization is bad for lots of reasons, but the primary one is that legalization will destroy the small growers of the Emerald Triangle as people like Shi take over production.

SHORT TAKES

NORTHCOAST DEMOCRATS have taken to calling themselves "progressives," another term made meaningless by people who, at their very best, can barely be called liberals, let alone Super Libs as implied by "progressive." Used to be we had real liberals. Strange as it may seem today, we even had a bona fide Kennedy liberal representing us in Congress — Clem Miller. He was the last one, and he died in a plane crash in what? '63?

NOW WE HAVE Congressman Huffman whose legislative triumphs include getting the Confederate flag banned in public places. I've never seen one in a public facility on the Northcoast but, hey!, way to go Huff. Huff's a lockstep vote for the Hillary line — war forever on the Arabs, literal blank check for Wall Street — and, here in his district, he represents the wine industry and occasionally brings home some federal bucks for nutty projects like the Smart Train, which is gearing up to run from nowhere to nowhere.

BUT HUFFMAN is a veritable portrait in political courage set alongside our Assemblyman, Jim Wood, and our State Senator Mike McGuire, both out of Healdsburg or, as some people call it, "the Carmel of the North." Wood and McGuire both abstained on the recent farmworker overtime bill. Natch, the warm wonderfuls of the wine industry opposed the bill, and Wood and McGuire wouldn't dare vote no. But abstentions? These guys give gutlessness a bad name.

PENCE Every time I hear the name I think of Hunter Pence, the Giants’ right fielder, and I'd vote for him for Vice-President right now.

I'VE ALWAYS THOUGHT clowns mildly creepy myself, but it seems some bona fide chomos are among the benign nuts donning clown suits around the country these days, popping up around schools. Everyday, there are episodes of major weirdness somewhere in the land. And while we're in tabloid mode here, I bet the Kim Kardashian robbery will prove to be an inside job.

THIS MORNING'S pot discussion on KZYX — pot is very, very central at our local public radio station — was an impenetrable fog of fine print parsing of the pending marijuana measures. The guest speakers on Jane Futcher's bi-monthly cannabis hour were Pebbles Trippett and 4th District supervisor, Dan Gjerde, with KZYX's Valerie Kim in the mix. If I had to take a test on what I heard I'd flunk. And from the callers-in they were as confused as I was. But then, the entire pot discussion, to me, is sooooooo tedious I tend to tune out at the very mention of the miracle drug.

* * *

ANOTHER READER WRITES: I tried to listen to Jane Futcher’s Cannabis Hour Show on KZYX Thursday. It was billed as some kind of debate between Supervisor Dan Gjerde and Coast marijuana grande dame Pebbles Trippett. They were supposed to be debating the Mendo pot measures that will be on the November ballot: Measure AF, the pot growers’ 60-page deal; and the County’s two measures, AH and AI I think, that have to do with taxing marijuana along with an advisory measure about how to spend the marijuana tax revenue.

Frankly, I never quite got what the dispute was over. Mr. Gjerde sounded level headed. I still have no idea what Pebbles and her crowd really object to. Something about "deeming," I think. I guess Pebbles is for AF (The Heritage Act) because the County, she insists, is continuing to treat stoner-growers as second class citizens via the old misdemeanor "nuisance" provision of enforcement that used to be in County code. (I’m not sure if it still is. I don’t think anyone has ever actually been charged or convicted under this provision which Pebbles hates so much.) I got Pebbles’s recent letter on the subject off the AVA website and attached it below; you can read it for yourself. Her letter says she's down on the County "deeming" pot violations as misdemeanors which, she says, means no court of law to dispute. Etc. All very tedious. Gjerde says, No, the Treasurer will collect the tax like all other County taxes and the Ag Commissioner will administer it, not the Sheriff. Gjerde had to repeat that several times because it didn’t appear that Pebbles was injesting the point. I also gather that Pebbles thinks the pot sellers, growers and dispensaries, are being overtaxed because they are selling either medicine or food and therefore should not be taxed. Ho-hum. I did sort of get that the County's measure is simply a tax measure, not a larger measure to legalize or regulate — that's much bigger but separate and coming up next. I simply don't understand Pebbles's typically overly legalistic position and am not particularly interested in exploring it. She's not high on my Like list. We are not facebook friends. Given the two measures, the County one is clearly superior. There are tax provisions in both and the County's tax is higher and could get even higher if the Supes vote to increase it later at set dates at set amounts. So if they both pass they'll have to figure something out about which tax applies. Boy, do I NOT care. BTW, I remembering hearing at a Supes meeting recently that the County stands to gain upwards of $50 million from their tax measure — a seemingly ridiculous amount. If the accompanying advisory measure passes, all those millions are supposed to go to mental health, roads and marijuana enforcement — maybe even that damn “deeming.”

For fairness, here's Pebs's recent letter. But I think you have to be a stoner to even read it, much less understand it.

Attached: STONER VOTE SPLIT FACTION REFINES THEIR POSITION

Editor,

Mendocino Medical Marijuana Advisory Board/MMMAB has become a dissident voice within the Heritage Campaign, regarding policies and strategies we believe are best suited to further the cannabis community's goals and interests. We present ideas from a different perspective that we hope will make you a more informed voter. MMMAB is recommending No on AI, the Cannabis Tax Initiative, and Yes on AF, the Mendocino Heritage Initiative, contrary to the Heritage Campaign's message to vote Yes on Both.

Both can't win in Winner Take All. If AI gets the most votes, it will win and void the relevant tax sections in AF in their entirety, and leave us with a new cannabis crime -- a criminal misdemeanor for 'any' violation of the cannabis tax code. The Mendocino County Board of Supervisors Cannabis Tax Initiative reads as follows:

VIOLATION DEEMED MISDEMEANOR

Any person violating any of the provisions of this Chapter shall be deemed guilty of a Misdemeanor and shall be punishable therefore. The BOS has sunk to a new low by creating a new cannabis tax crime, "deeming" "any" violations of the tax code criminal misdemeanors instead of civil infractions with punishments of jail or fines or both.

Having done our research with due diligence, MMMAB has uncovered a trend of prohibitionist public officials around the state, who are adding the clause: "any violation is deemed a misdemeanor" to their new cannabis tax measures, as an ingenious way to extend cannabis prohibition in perpetuity via tax law, just when it looks like it's ending. MMMAB sent out a question thru CA NORML, asking attorneys if any of them knew of a new cannabis misdemeanor embedded in cannabis tax law?

NORML Attorney Richard Rosen responded and confirms that this is also happening in Monterrey County which enacted regulations for commercial and personal cannabis cultivation. "Section 7.95.140 for personal cultivation provides 'any violation of the regulations is a misdemeanor'. No proof of knowledge, intent or other mental state is required to establish a violation. Similar provisions are included in regulations for commercial grows. A county tax ordinance is on the ballot this November. I believe this also includes provisions making all violations misdemeanors.

"These regulations are recriminalizing actions that the state has decriminalized. The provision for personal grows removes the requirement of mental state and creates a criminal offense that is more onerous than anything in the CA Penal Code or Health & Safety Code. All state and criminal regulations require proof of knowledge and general criminal intent. This is outrageous public policy and I hope we can show it is unconstitutional as well." MMMAB supports plaintiffs filing a court challenge to enjoin the new cannabis crime on constitutional grounds, so that it never gets off the ground on appeal.

The misdemeanor bomb in Measure AI's Cannabis Tax Act is reason in itself to vote No!! A Yes vote for AI is a vote to subject the entire cannabis community to a new misdemeanor crime and the prospect of cultivation recriminalization instead of reasonable regulation. This ruse is designed to trap well meaning growers who want to be legal into a situation they may not realize awaits them with the slightest misstep in the regulatory process, for instance lateness... "any" violation. These are intended consequences.

Vote No on AI to stop the new misdemeanor crime in the Cannabis Tax Act and Yes on AF, the Heritage Act, to save and protect the family farm, the economic backbone of the cannabis future.

Pebbles Trippet, Paula Deeter, Ralf Laguna

Mendocino Medical Marijuana Advisory Board/MMMAB

MENDO COLLEGE has announced its annual plant sale as I annually wonder why local nursery businesses don't complain about unfair competition.

AS NOTED BY MIKE KOEPF: "I knew it. In the end for Bosco and his money boys, it was all about real estate and not the lofty bullshit about a responsible, regional newspaper Bosco was slinging."

http://www.pressdemocrat.com/business/6161248-181/press-democrats-rohnert-park-property

WHY DO THESE CREEPS EVER GET OUT?

Arrest: Indecent Exposure With A Prior Conviction; Parole Violation, Masonic Avenue & Geary Boulevard, 09/30/2016 5:19 pm

While at home with her two small children, the victim was understandably alarmed to find the suspect looking into her window and performing a lewd act. This predator even continued the sordid behavior after making eye contact with the victim, and had the nerve to wave. The victim called her husband, who immediately went home.

The victim’s husband located the suspect a short distance away from his home. The suspect was still engaging in the lewd behavior in a public place. The police were then called and Officers responded to the scene.

Upon arrival on scene, the suspect was identified and detained by Officers. Officers learned that the suspect was a registered sex offender on parole for a serious sexual offense.

This suspect was booked at County Jail on felony charges. Hopefully he stays there for a very long time.

(SF Richmond District Police Blog)

FORT BRAGG DOES A CANDIDATES' NIGHT

by Rex Gressett

I attended the MCTV Fort Bragg candidates’ forum last night as a candidate and there were some interesting developments.

Earlier in the day I rode my moped down to the TV studio that Terry and his wife Marianne McGee are putting together by sucking up city money and building a private business with it. I stopped down thinking it a mere social courtesy to tell them I would be attending as a candidate as we had already arranged by email and in person.

When I arrived I was surprised (first surprise) to be told that no indeed Sue Ranochak of the County elections office had declared by (surprise) edict that I was not to be allowed to participate in The Forum. I demurred. This I thought is at the very least highly unlikely. No, no, that’s not it, burbled Mr. Vaughn apparently retrieving something from deep memory. It was your campaign manager that told me you were out. Well, I suggested, put me back in. At that point Mr. Vaughn had a little tantrum and a little pushing and shoving was involved. My personal composure was not affected. I could have easily kicked the little marshmallow’s ass. But politics and public advocacy are rough games. Lose your temper and they very certainly will bury you. I am in this for keeps, I am winning and I mean business therefore I simply left, but left wondering not a little.

I sent out a flurry of emails including one to the mayor who replied with platitudes. And most of all I sent out emails to the other candidates. Various people called various other people and when the hour appointed came, I went.

To my mild surprise they let me in. The seating was prearranged for me to be on the very end of the line of candidates.

It was a call in show. I was permitted to explain that although I was a legal candidate and would be on the ballot I was exercising my firm political right and moral obligation to support the better candidates as I called it, Bernie and Will. I told the audience that the nomination process for the city council is a secret process, and in fact the two candidates that have far the widest support, did not file officially until the last possible day. I explained to the audience that I originally ran because I thought that I had to, reluctantly and knowing better than anybody that I would probably suck at it. But at the time there just did not seem to be any choice. When I met Bernie Norvell, I was immediately a supporter. I am just slightly less enthusiastic about Will Lee, but damn. This is it. This is what we worked for. Here were two men who understood not how, but that city hall had been stolen by criminals.

They got that. And very clearly they had the guts to do something about it. Perhaps not as histrionically as I might have done it. But I also knew they would be more effective, and critically had no less violent indignation at the crass presumptions of a brazen political machine. I said that under these conditions my obligation was to not split the vote but to support the stronger candidates. A No frills political decision. A regular thing in political life.

The forum was a call in show. And again to my surprise there were a lot of callers. I was expecting the KZXY/Z thing where they have call-in shows and then the callers don’t call. But no. The lines were comparatively hopping.

As the night progressed one clear idea emerged from both the discussions among the candidates and from the preponderant number of callers.

The subject of grants kept coming up. One caller after another referenced the CDBG grants [Community Development Block Grants]. The grants that have been the excuse for everything. People were saying they were not what they seemed.

One person after another commented in their various ways that this money was given only to economically disadvantaged communities.

A number of points were raised. Will Lee pointed out that the city got to keep some of the money their own wicked selves. And gradually it emerged that the reduction of our city into a ghost-town due to the destruction of prosperity from the City’s declination to develop the mill site. That the lack of progress and the increasing addiction to drugs, all of these wonderful things and our stolid immovable poverty rate of 50% has been hell on the most of us, but they got us grants.

Without poverty Linda Ruffing could not have held the medical/mental illness power structure and the newspaper and the city council, together in a single constituency,

There were tangential discussions. The insanely complicated and obstructive city zoning ordinance was pointed out to be a major, indeed legendary business stopper, and that it had little use other than as a tool of disempowerment for the community. Everybody knew where they mete out injustice according to the inland plan.

When it was his turn Scott Menzies, the darling of the Ruffing machine, rambled unintelligibly about his obsession with martial arts and by a long leap of comparison thought it would stand him in good stead as our leader. That is if I understood him. He did not say much else.

After the cameras were off we all had that moment of bonding that comes with participating in the extremely inconvenient and time-consuming task of self-governance. Usually there is coffee. And we went home.

In the morning we found out. I was being surgically removed post-appearance from The Forum. Being on the end of the lineup of candidates, my image was easy to edit out. And apparently although The Forum had gone out live, it was going to be released with all of my remarks, contributions, inane blunders and everything else wiped from the program as if they had never occurred.

Later in the day, the pressure from social media must have been acute. I am told that it was. But at the last they allow you to see the whole thing if you log on. Otherwise you get the edited version. I am told that the unedited version has a bunch of technical intrusions. Loud noises and so forth, weird.

I damn sure know that I should write a bit more about this. But I hardly know what to think. Maybe it is evidence that we have pushed them to the point where they are reduced to desperate measures like this.

This is manipulation of the public perception with Soviet Style brutality, this is the obstruction of free speech so bald and brazen that we must really be grateful to be given a window through which to observe the range and power of the system of disinformation that we have in Fort Bragg.

Given that, it as certainly worth it.

LAKE COUNTY: THE HELP ISN'T GETTING TO THE PEOPLE WHO NEED IT

by Betsy Cawn

Several aspects of the Lake County post fire-emergency services situation deserve serious exposition, such as the consistent refusal to provide non-personal (“aggregate”) data for creating a realistic plan by FEMA, Cal OES, and County of Lake — as well as affiliated responsible agencies such as California departments of Housing & Community Development and Social Services (both of whom conducted their own disaster assessments in the immediate aftermath of the catastrophic remains, when said efforts were supplied during the FEMA-run disaster management period ending on November 23, 2015).

As it turns out, the County of Lake “refused” (heresay but directly from the FEMA source) to provide this extremely basic information to FEMA’s “National Disaster Recovery Coordinator” (source) with access to multi-million dollar federally-trained Disaster Case Management services (including a greatly needed fiscal analyst), and as a result the State of California (CalEMA/OES) did not seek that funding.

My complaints to upper echelons of FEMA disaster management (beginning in early 2016) triggered the impetus for excluding me in the allegedly inclusive, FEMA-defined “long-term recovery committee” — run by a former County Supervisor with a long-standing enmity toward me as a thorn in the side of the Local Agency Formation Commission (in which he is their chosen representative of “the public” as their hand-picked “member of the public at large”).

Should he succeed in having me “officially” removed from the General Member Assembly (all the so-called “partner” organizations “coordinated” by the FEMA-advised long-term recovery group), I will then be free of any prohibitions limiting my ability to speak about the situation on my weekly radio broadcast covering the subject.

Even then, I will not want to reveal (and do not discuss on the air) the larger “investigation," if I may use that term without blushing, into the local misuse of public funds by the intertwined relationships among government grant recipients fronted by NCO, and in the Lake County concealment of long-standing emergency management neglect (led by Supervisor Rob Brown) and anti-poverty fund diversions supported by NCO. Rather, I am seriously attempting to uncover sufficient “evidence" warranting a federal grand jury, Department of Justice, or Office of the Inspector General inquiry — because this is the only opportunity to engage the federal agencies responsible for allowing the state and county to ignore their statutory requirements.

The cruicial tie between NCO and my County’s non-attention to emergency management lies in NCO's authority delegated by CalOES to provide volunteer services, for which there are no official agreements with either Lake or Mendocino County OES agencies,* and no consequent services allowing non-governmental volunteers to participate — only the hand-picked friends of NCO staff and donor groups. And then there is the waste of public funding for superficial websites and postcards to encourage people to eat better and exercise more, while our truly important public health and emergency response (non-OES) agencies are defunded or underfunded by County management/administration.

*NCO’s established “Volunteer Program” provide federally-funded “Community Emergency Response Team” training and deployment in Mendocino, which has successfully revived that effort in the last year; the program manager admitted to me that there are no official agreements with the Mendo County OES, and no promised funding for providing “spontaneous emergency volunteer” services that NCO is the designated state authority for providing. Ho hum, nobody cares anyway.

[Mr. Kramer’s comments are the first I’ve heard that don’t heap praises on NCO for their faux public service programs — reflecting the mass illusion perpetuated here that NCO is the emissary of Mother Theresa; perpetuated of course by the fawning and PAID executive directors of programs in part funded by Community Action Agency grant awards.]

In the course of dialogues with some high-level national organization members who serve as FEMA disaster service managers, one or two relatively candid problem solvers in CalOES, and unnameable American Red Cross staff, it is unequivocally clear that all of the “responsible” agencies outside of the County of Lake are fully aware of the local county governance problems. Less well known or understood is the NCO-delivered front for County-abdicated public services. This relationship goes a way back and includes the theft of public funds under former Supervisor-directed board of directors for the previous Community Action Agency. [A tax-payer funded public service agency lost about seventy grand to a suspected former executive director, but was told that the theft would not be prosecuted because of the Supervisor-represented board failures.]

The nifty little soap opera that ties this all together, and which is the unseen impetus behind the effort to oust me from the FEMA-advised long-term recovery group, is a triumvirate of disaster “experts” (two from FEMA and one of their old pals from previous disasters across the country — the “Hope City” CEO). “Hope City” was officially rejected from a state-level, nationally-recognized long-term disaster management organization and forbidden to use the federally-recognized agency’s affiliation in Hope City promotional literature of any kind. [For this I have actual documentary proof.] The former Chair of the local long-term recovery group concealed that validated information, and resigned a month later, but the Hope City CEO knows that I have it and provided it to the Chair in the first place — ergo, I must be officially scorned although I have not made that information public in any way. The way this two-bit drama worsens by association with NCO is that the former Chair sits on the Board of Directors of NCO and falsely claimed that the NCO board approved a Memorandum of Understanding for “fiscal sponsorship” of the long-term recovery group by NCO [for this I have secondary documentary proof, i.e., minutes of NCO’s board meetings] — and none of the legitimate partner organizations are aware of the “flaws” either in the content of the agreement or the conflict of interest inherent in the agreement process or ensuing administration.

So while the machinations and maneuvers of each of these “partners” are increasingly fascinating, I’m really after the big fish, and the purpose of that endeavor is to get those Community Action Agency funds in the hands of the people who need them. I’ll take you up on your invitation to chum the waters, with glee. Meanwhile, here’s the agenda for tomorrow’s event, produced by former Lake County Supervisor Ed Robey:

Happily enough, I’ll BE on the air, on Sunday, and most likely have the next installment for chumming on Saturday.

ATTENTION ALBION 'TRASH NINJAS' — BAG BOBBING IN NAVARRO

The good-spirited folks from the Schooner Landing Campground in Albion took upon themselves to collect 7 large bags of trash some idiot(s) tossed into the Navarro River after MSP discovered them and posted photos.

They were too far out in the river and a "vessel" was needed to collect them. While headed north to Mendo Wednesday, we noted one bag (west of the bridge) had escaped their diligent efforts and was sitting smack dab in the MIDDLE of an algae bloom (top photo).

(Courtesy, MendocinoSportsPlus)

101 HORTENSE

To the Editor:

Support the students.

As Pastor of Ukiah United Methodist Church, I was contacted by one of the neighbors who is trying to find housing for the students leaving the house on Hortense and Perkins. Ukiah United Methodist Church has helped with housing advocacy in the community such as the Winter Shelter and works with others in the community in addressing poverty and hunger.

I’ve met most of the students in the house many of whom are from out-of-state and far away from home for the first time. I’ve met with Coach Frank Espy and Athletic Director Matt Gordon. I’ve talked with the landlord about some of his concerns. There are different perspectives and complicated communications between the people who have been involved in this situation. There are clearly some well-meaning people involved. I’ve heard frustration, distrust, and hopelessness. I’ve read the UDJ articles and letters to the editor about this household and community complaints. I’ve also heard from neighbors that said they have not had trouble with the students in the house at Hortense and Perkins. I’m not an investigative reporter. I’m a pastor.

As for my part, I’m asking the community to support students who are trying to get a college education, and who need to find housing mid-semester during their successful football season.

For the whole community, I encourage you to go see the next home game Oct. 22 at 1 p.m. here at our Mendocino College.

Judy Shook, Pastor at Ukiah United Methodist Church

FORT BRAGG PUZZLES OVER THE MEANING OF 'EMERGENCY SHELTER'

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OMG!!!!! BOONYVILLE

You're Invited! Coffee with Congressman Huffman in Boonville on Oct. 18.

As part of my ongoing public outreach throughout California's 2nd Congressional District, I will be hosting "Coffee with your Congressman" at the Boonville Hotel on Tuesday, October 18. I look forward to answering your questions and sharing recent updates from Congress on the work I’m doing on behalf of California’s North Coast. Grab a cup of coffee or tea and join me for what I hope will be an informative and lively discussion.

If you have questions, please contact my San Rafael District Office at (415) 258-9657.

Hope to see you there,

Congressman Jared Huffman

https://www.eventbrite.com/e/coffee-with-congressman-jared-huffman-tickets-28293080365

VOTE BY MAIL BALLOT AVAILABILITY & VBM PROCESSING

Vote By Mail (absentee) Ballots and our Sample Ballots will be mailed out to voters on October 11, 2016 and will be available in the County Clerk's Office, for the PRESIDENTIAL GENERAL ELECTION to be conducted on NOVEMBER 8, 2016, according to Susan M. Ranochak, Assessor-County Clerk-Recorder. The County Clerk's Office is located in Room 1020 of the County Administration Building located at 501 Low Gap Road, Ukiah. If voters who normally vote by mail have not received their vote by mail ballot by Wednesday, October 19, 2016, please call our office to arrange to receive a replacement ballot. Susan M. Ranochak would like to remind voters that the last day applications may be received for a Vote By Mail (Absentee) Ballot is 5 p.m. on November 1, 2016. If for any reason a voter will be unable to appear at their polling place and vote on Election Day, November 8, 2016, they may apply for and vote a Vote By Mail Ballot. For those interested in observing the Vote By Mail process, we normally begin getting voted ballots back the week after they are mailed. Our office processes (we check signatures & file in precinct order) these ballots on a daily basis once we have received our mail. We get our daily mail at approximately 11 am on Mondays and 10 am Tuesdays – Fridays. The public is invited to observe this process, as well as our other processes. Normally the last week of October through November 14 is the highest volume for our office receiving and processing voted ballots. Please call our office for schedules. For additional information please contact the Election’s Office by calling 707 234-6819.

CATCH OF THE DAY, October 6, 2016

MARK BURLEIGH, Miranda/Ukiah. Probation revocation.

MATTHEW CALDERON, Fairfield/Ukiah. Drunk in public.

RAUL CALVILLO, Kelseyville/Potter Valley. Pot cultivation, possession for sale, personal use of firearm, resisting.

JOY DAVIDSON (Frequent Flyer), Ukiah. Controlled substance.

ALEJANDRO DEJESUS-LOPEZ, Nice. Pot cultivation, possession for sale, armed with firearm, resisting.

ALEJANDRO GARCIA-ROMANO, Ukiah. Pot cultivation, possession for sale.

ROBERT HAGGARD, Willits. Probation revocation.

HOPE JARVIS, Baberton, Ohio/Ukiah. Failure to appear.

CLINT JEWELL, Willits. Probation revocation.

JESUS LOPEZ-SALGADO, Ukiah. Pot cultivation, possession for sale, armed with firearm, resisting.

NATHEN MARTIN, Willits. Under influence, possession of paraphernalia, controlled substance.

JOSE NORIEGA, Ukiah. Pot cultivation, possession for sale, armed with firearm, resisting.

ANGEL PENA, Ukiah. Pot cultivation, possession for sale, interfering with police communication, resisting.

MARK RANDOLPH, Ukiah. DUI, probation revocation.

ANDRES RONDON, Potter Valley. Pot cultivation, possession for sale, armed with firearm.

PHILLIP WREN, Newfield, New York/Ukiah. Soliciting in public.

EITHER WAY…

Editor,

Hitler, Goebbles, and Himler dot com

Although I did not agree with the Editor at Boonville Central regarding that a real communist or a true dictator was not part of the Hillary/Trump discussion, after watching "Triumph of the Will" (rent it on Netflix), I came around, and though neither Hillary nor Trump display the true cunning of Hitler, the possibility does exist when the implosion occurs to have the propaganda's meaning of the film present itself at our doorstep; unless Kunstler is correct in his writings with such works as "World Made by Hand." Either way, I think we are headed for a world we never knew. So, Boonville Central, I think I will do as McEwen says: "Bend your head over and kiss your ass goodbye," and head over to hang in Boonville until the wineries go under for lack of a better reason to remain intact. Or maybe Point Arena where I can rise to Governor of the state. Either way, rent the movie. It is truly eye opening.

Randy Burke, Gualala

ON LINE COMMENT OF THE DAY

The choice is stark. The strident strong man who will extend the empire ad nauseam with brute force, military actions, and gangster government. The other is a compromise candidate, negotiate and extend. A my way or the highway candidate, or a kumbaya candidate. Everyone, well present company excluded, wants the party to go on for as long as it can go on. That pregnant pause the empire is experiencing, like cotton candy at the fair, ghastly pink, with each moment sticking to the impossible next. But there it is. How much sugar is left on Sugar Mountain? Bottom line is no one really knows. I think the trigger will be a shortage of some important commodity. Over the next 3 years, it is unlikely it will be oil. American production recently peaked just short of the 1970 peak. The key will be the trajectory and slope of that curve on the downside.

FLOODGATE FARM ON HEART MOUNTAIN is offering a Salad University class on Sunday October 16th. Wild greens are growing back, and much of the summer salad ingredients should still be around (barring frost). In addition to health-giving and medicinal properties of the plants, and hints on growing them for abundant harvests, we will also look at some of the rainwater harvesting earthworks and tanks, and what works and doesn't work as understory plants for fruit and nut trees. The class will end with a potluck; we provide the salad we all pick, a main dish, kimchi, olives, maybe a treat or 2, and you can bring a side dish or favorite seasonal specialty to share. The cost is $30 which includes information-packed handouts. Some seeds and cuttings will be available, free or for a donation.

The class meets at 12:45 PM Sunday October 16th at the east side of the West Rd/Redwood Valley exit 557 off US 101. We will caravan/carpool to the mountain farm 5 miles away so if you arrive after 12:55 (not recommended however), please call 707-272-1688 for directions. The class will go to about 4:30 PM including the potluck.

We hope to see you!

Bill Taylor and Jaye Alison Moscariello, Floodgate Farm on Heart Mountain

707-272-1688

edibleland@earthlink.net

www/floodgatefarm.com

ALSO. Artist Jaye Alison Moscariello's storybook Chase the Monkey is in a Kickstarter Campaign. Here is what she says in brief, the url below has details. --Bill

My restructured campaign: Capture the Moon 2 is now up! The book is about a young monkey, Chase, who loses its way in the world and finds it through the power of listening within. I am passionate about the idea of children experiencing intolerance of any kind, having a copy of this book in their hands. It is also a sweet book for any child or adult. And you get to see the whole book in my video! There are thank you gifts for various levels of support. Here is where to learn more:

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1718280964/capture-the-moon-2

The goal is to pay the balance of printing 500 books and sending 250 copies to inner city libraries and reading rooms. The artist/author can be reached at 707-272-1688 or artisall@earthlink.net, and her work is at chasethemonkey.org or jayesite.com (this one is under construction).

Bill Taylor, Redwood Valley

A READER WRITES: Governor Pence is creepier than I even imagined. Reproductive rights still have to pass through the eye of a theological needle. Can Women Be Trusted on Abortion? Two Men Weigh In:

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/06/opinion/campaign-stops/can-women-be-trusted-on-abortion-two-men-weigh-in.html

WHITESBORO GRANGE SPAGHETTI DINNER BENEFIT FOR ALBION-LR VOLUNTEER FIRE DEPT.

The Albion-Little River Volunteer Fire Department will be the recipients of funds raised from a Spaghetti Dinner at the Whitesboro Grange this Saturday, October 8th from 4-7. Dinner is $8 for adults, $4 for ages 6-12, and under 6 eats free. Dinner will feature Bob Canclini's famous spaghetti sauce (meat or vegi), salad, garlic bread, dessert and beverages. The community and guests are invited to come and meet their firemen, enjoy the company of their neighbors, and eat a hearty dinner. Whitesboro Grange is located 1.5 miles east on Navarro Ridge Road.

— Ronnie James

ARLIE RUSSELL HOCHSCHILD’S VIEW OF SMALL-TOWN DECAY AND SUPPORT FOR TRUMP

by Benjamin Wallace-Wells

Kevin Thompson, a police officer in East Liverpool, Ohio, a town on the West Virginia border, was driving along St. Clair Avenue on September 7th when he noticed a Ford Explorer veering between the road and the shoulder. Thompson followed. Up ahead, a school bus was discharging students, and the driver of the Explorer seemed slow to notice this; he had to brake sharply, and then he started drifting into oncoming traffic, before coming to a stop. Thompson parked his car and walked over. Both the driver, a forty-seven-year-old man named James Acord, and his passenger, a fifty-year-old woman named Rhonda Pasek, looked as if they were high. Thompson wrote in his police report, “I noticed his head was bobbing back and forth and his speech was almost unintelligible.” Acord tried to put the car in gear to drive away; Thompson had to turn off the ignition and take away the keys. Eventually, both Acord and Pasek passed out. In police photographs of the scene, Acord’s mouth is open and his chin is up in the air; Pasek is slumped over to her left. What made the photographs go viral, what made them part of the iconography of the opiate epidemic, was the presence in the back seat of an alert four-year-old boy.

News organizations, in circulating the images, blurred out the boy’s face. But the city of East Liverpool did not, on its Facebook page, and you can see the boy, who turned out to be Pasek’s grandson, clearly. He is blond, with blue eyes and ears that stick out slightly, and he is wearing a blue T-shirt with dinosaurs on it. I have a four-year-old daughter, and she has what looks to be the same car seat; despite all the dysfunction around him, some care was taken with the boy. In the photos, the boy is looking directly at the camera and his expression is calm and evaluative. He is trying to figure out what is going on.

These are moralizing photographs; maybe all police photographs are. There was a choice to use the photo, taken from the passenger side of the car, that showed the slumped grandmother’s bra strap sliding off her shoulder. There was a choice to place the boy in the center of the frame. There was a choice, most of all, by the police and by civilians, to circulate and recirculate the images of this traffic stop, rather than those of many others. A line of commentary is embedded in each of these choices: that the adults in the car, in their selfishness and irresponsibility, have imposed burdens on everyone else. Thompson ended his report by noting that the boy had been transferred to the custody of social services. It is the same line of exasperation and condescension that motivated the opposition to welfare, except that everyone in these photos is white.

One confusing aspect of Donald Trump’s campaign has been the fact that conservatives are so animated by a message of law and order at a time when national crime rates are lower than they have been in decades. But this must owe something to the experience of the conservative heartland, where, at least in part because of the chaos of the opioid epidemic, laws and social order are much more pressing concerns. As heroin and prescription-drug abuse has spread through small towns, their citizens have at times shown an empathy for the addicts that did not much surface when the addicts were black; at other times, they have simply cracked down. Earlier this month, the Times, using numbers from the National Corrections Reporting Program, found that a swath of white, conservative, rural territory, extending through Texas, Oklahoma, Missouri, and Indiana, sent the highest proportion of their citizens to prison. Either the addicts are seen as victims of larger forces or as creatures of moral decay. What is unresolved, in these places, is who is to blame.

Arlie Russell Hochschild, a sociologist at the University of California, Berkeley, has just published a book, “Strangers in their Own Land,” that tries to understand the emotional roots of the Tea Party movement and the Trump phenomenon. To do this, Hoschshild spent much of the past five years in rural parts of southern Louisiana, where the population is mostly white, poor, and, by national standards, badly educated. Hochschild noticed that Tea Party enthusiasts and traditional conservatives gave her accounts of American society that boiled down to a single “deep story.” This story was that America, which was once characterized by hard work, was now characterized by cheating; the image that Hochschild chose was that of people cutting in line. For Hochschild’s subjects, the line-cutters were African-Americans, promoted by affirmative action, she writes, but also “women, immigrants, refugees, public-sector workers—where will it end? Your money is running through a liberal sympathy sieve you don’t control or agree with.” President Obama, in this vision, was the man controlling the line, waving the line-cutters ahead—“their president, not your president.” Hochschild shared this analogy in e-mails to the plumbers and insurance brokers she had met. “I live your analogy,” one wrote back. “It’s my story,” another said. A third wrote, “You’ve read my mind.”

Hochschild developed a particular interest in why people who had suffered so much from deregulation were working so hard for politicians who wanted more of it. The energy and plastics companies that employed many of them were turning southern Louisiana into a gigantic chemical dump. Hochschild spent time with a plumber who had emptied toxic waste into a river, only to suffer years of guilt and regret, and with fishermen who coped with pollution by studying which fish flushed out the chemicals quickly and might still be O.K. to eat. She met local environmentalists, village ideologues who holed up in remote cabins, measuring the quality of the water—but they were often Tea Party supporters, too. Leaving the cabin of two environmental activists, Hochschild noticed a bundle of lawn signs for the local Tea Party congressional candidate, awaiting distribution.

At a Tea Party focus group on Lake Charles, Hochschild met a woman named Jackie Tabor. “Pollution is the price we pay for capitalism,” Tabor, the wife of a contractor, told her. While proudly showing Hochschild her subdivision house, Tabor explained that she had grown up poor in Chicago. She relied on welfare as a child and was briefly homeless. Tabor had a strong sense of the fragility of her own position. “This could all vanish tomorrow!” she said, gesturing around her living room. Tabor wanted clean air and water, Hochschild writes. But she also felt that she benefitted from things staying as they were. “Sometimes you had to do without what you wanted,” Hochschild writes, from Tabor’s point of view. “You accommodated.”

At the same focus group, Hochschild met an insurance saleswoman named Sharon Galicia, who moves the sociologist closer to the Trump phenomenon. Galicia had spent some years working as the management agent for a trailer park, and the lives of her mostly white renters there, Hochschild writes, “appalled and unnerved her.” Some of them had “matter-of-factly admitted lying to get food stamps,” Galicia told Hochschild. Hochschild also spoke to a woman named Janice Areno, who said that she knew construction workers who quit their jobs “so they can draw unemployment to hunt in season.” This evidence of social decline had complicated how Galicia and Areno saw their communities. The failings of their neighbors had become more obvious to them.

The Tea Partiers whom Hochschild writes about sense a collapse in the work ethic of their neighbors, but they also still hold the conviction that social decay is worse in other places. They are sure that some inner-city welfare recipients arrive to pick up their checks at the wheel of a Lexus; they are convinced that the federal government employs four out of ten working Americans, when the real figure is about one in seventy-five. For these voters, “Trump, the King of Shame, has covertly come to the rescue,” reaffirming their proud anger at people from other places, and displacing a shame that might otherwise work its way inward. Hochschild writes, “He has shamed virtually every line-cutting group in the Deep Story—women, people of color, the disabled, immigrants, refugees. But he’s hardly uttered a single bad word about unemployment insurance, food stamps, or Medicaid, or what the tea party calls ‘big government handouts,’ for anyone—including blue-collar white men.” Hochschild continues, “In this feint”—by making it seem that white people who accept welfare are only taking advantage of what everyone else gets—“Trump solves a white male problem of pride.”

In this election season, increasing attention has been paid to the particular class of people who carry Hochschild’s story: white men and women who live in places that are under pressure but who themselves have middle-class lives. In July, Jordan Rothwell, an economist with Gallup, published what may be the most comprehensive public study of Trump’s supporters. When Rothwell matched his company’s voluminous polling and opinion data with demographic information, Zip Code by Zip Code, he found that the highest levels of Trump support came from places where health was poor and economic mobility stagnant. Within these places, the most intense support for the casino mogul came from those people who are doing comparatively well economically: the insurance agents, the wives of contractors—the people Hochschild met. If you were applying a moral gloss, you might say that these are responsible people in irresponsible places. If you were not, you might just say they were lucky in places where many others were not.

The conservative language of inequality is not yet mature, in part because it is muddied by racial and national resentments, but it exists, as an intense sense of precariousness. The United States just enjoyed a record year of income growth, according to census figures released last week, and it was most dramatic for those at the bottom of the scale. The University of Michigan economist Justin Wolfers noticed that income jumped more than it ever had in a single year for those in the tenth, twentieth, thirtieth, fortieth, fiftieth, sixtieth, seventieth, and eightieth income percentiles. The gains were especially dramatic for blacks, Hispanics, and immigrants. But they were weakest for Americans who lived outside of metro areas. If the relatively successful people of southern Louisiana feel that minorities and immigrants are passing them in line, and fear that their children will not have the same relative position that they did, they may be right.

Conservative politicians have long flattered their voters by insisting that small towns are virtuous and constant, a metronome against which the rest of the country plays. George W. Bush and his partisans talked about the values of “Real America.” Mitt Romney repeatedly insisted, on the campaign trail in 2012, that in Michigan “the trees are just the right height.” But the politics of small-town virtue, and of Christian conservatism, have been almost entirely absent from this election. Back in January, I asked James Davison Hunter, the sociologist who popularized the term “culture wars,” about the current position of the Christian right. “As a rhetorical matter,” he said, “they’ve given up on the notion that they represent a moral majority.”

Instead we have seen the rise of the rhetoric of Donald Trump, who insists that these places have been “crippled.” There are reasons to think that Trump’s view might be a placeholder for some more complicated politics to come. One is that Trump is not describing the actual problems of the communities where his support is strongest—these are not places that have suffered exceptionally from global economic competition or from immigration. In dark moments, some of Hochschild’s subjects express misgivings about Trump. “Is he going to be a dictator? My gut tells me yes, he’s an egomaniac,” Galicia said, though she also intended to vote for him. But up close there is a depth to the concerns of Hochschild’s subjects that is missing from Trump’s campaign. They are concerned about pollution, and about the social decay that we see most vividly in the opioid epidemic. They are aware, in a way that he is not, of facts on the ground.

JERRY BROWN ADMITS DELTA TUNNELS IS "UNPOPULAR" AS LEGISLATORS SLAM PROJECT

by Dan Bacher

On the same day that Governor Jerry Brown jokingly praised former Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger for saddling him with the Delta Tunnels and other “unpopular policies,” four Northern California Congress Members and twelve state legislators issued letters strongly opposing the tunnels project.

Brown lauded Schwarzenegger for focusing on environmental issues at the tenth anniversary celebration of the passage of Assembly Bill 32, the legislation that established the state’s greenhouse emissions reductions, in the California Museum in Sacramento on Wednesday, October 5.

“Arnold, thanks for being for climate change, cap and trade, the tunnels project, high speed rail and all the other unpopular policies that I’m saddled with,” quipped Brown.

You can listen to Brown’s comments here 1:01:24: bit.ly/...

Restore the Delta (RTD) responded to Brown’s quote, noting that “ Jerry Brown thanked former Governor Schwarzenegger for saddling him with unpopular issues such as the Delta Tunnels -- even though, since he was first elected, he's been pursuing the tunnels like Captain Ahab pursuing Moby Dick!”

As an acknowledgement of the growing resistance by Californians to the WaterFix, Brown for the first time recognized the Delta Tunnels as "unpopular, according to RTD.

Of course, neither Schwarzenegger nor Brown mentioned the many other controversial neo-liberal environmental policies that they are responsible for.

These include authorizing record water exports out of the Delta; driving Delta and longfin smelt, winter run Chinook salmon, Central Valley steelhead, green sturgeon and other fish species closer and closer to extinction; overseeing the creation of faux “marine protected areas” under the oil industry-lobbyist overseen Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA) Initiative; appointing Big Oil executives, Big Ag lobbyists, and other corporate officials with numerous conflicts of interest to state agencies and regulatory bodies; and doing everything they can to weaken the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) and other environmental laws.

Nor did Schwarzenegger and Brown mention one of the least discussed issues in California environmental politics – and one of the most crucial to understanding the Delta Tunnels Plan - the clear connection between the Marine Life Protection Act Initiative and the California WaterFix, formerly called the Bay Delta Conservation Plan (BDCP). In spite of some superficial differences, the two processes are united by their leadership, funding, greenwashing goals, racism and denial of tribal rights, junk science and numerous conflicts of interest.

To read my report, Deep Regulatory Capture Exposed: The Links Between Delta Tunnels Plan & MLPA Initiative, go to: www.dailykos.com/...

Congress Members ask for responses to Dr. Jeffrey Michael’s cost-benefit analyis

As Brown, Schwarzenegger and other state officials were delivering their comments at the AB 32 anniversary commemoration, Representatives John Garamendi, Jerry McNerney, Mike Thompson and Doris Matsui (D-CA) sent a letter to the Bureau of Reclamation and the California Department of Water Resources (DWR) calling for responses to a recent cost-benefit analysis of the California WaterFix Tunnels project conducted by Dr. Jeffrey Michael at the University of the Pacific (UOP).

Michael’s analysis raises “key questions” about the plan, according to a joint news release from the Representatives. The letter also raises a number of questions based upon another recent and unofficially released cost-benefit analysis prepared by David Sunding for the California Natural Resources Agency.

“Both reports confirm what we’ve long suspected –WaterFix doesn’t make good financial sense for California,” said Rep. Thompson. “Under these analyses, water users and even federal taxpayers would be on the hook for investments in a project that can’t promise better water deliveries. State and federal water agencies must not be allowed to squander taxpayer dollars on infrastructure that would devastate the Delta without any guaranteed benefit.”

“The analysis done by Dr. Michael shows that the advertised benefits of the Twin Tunnels simply don’t hold water,” said Congressman Garamendi. “Both cost-benefit breakdowns of the WaterFix that have been released to the public raise major questions about the viability of the project, and its funding sources.”

“The numbers don’t pencil out for farmers south of the Delta,” said Congressman McNerney. “Delta farming operations could be severely disrupted, and endangered species are at risk of not surviving the consequences of this massive project. The WaterFix plan’s costs do not outweigh the alleged benefits and would require a large federal subsidy, while causing irreparable harm to Delta and Northern California communities who have not been adequately included in project negotiations.”

McNerney urged the state to “move away” from Governor Brown’s flawed WaterFix tunnels plan and “implement the cost-effective policy solutions already outlined in the California Water Action Plan – like conservation, recycling, increased efficiency, and storage – that will ensure sustainable water supplies for a healthy Delta ecosystem and California’s farmers and communities statewide.”

You can view the letter here

12 Delta/Bay Area legislators slam proposed California Water Fix diversions

Also on Wednesday, twelve state legislators representing the Delta and Bay Area regions urged the State Water Resources Control Board to reject a petition to change water rights that would reduce fresh water flows to the Delta as part of the controversial WaterFix proposal, a move the lawmakers say will “cause catastrophic damage to the environment and economies of the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta and San Francisco Bay region.”

The letter by Senator Lois Wolk (D-Davis) and 11 other legislators denounced the proposed water diversions, citing evidence that doing so will cause “serious and potentially irreparable harm to hundreds of plant and wildlife species, and also significantly damage the agricultural, fishing, tourism and recreation industries that rely upon the Delta.”

“Contrary to its name, the WaterFix fixes nothing," said Wolk, who represents four of the five counties in the Delta, in a press release. “The project won’t provide any additional water supply or increase water deliveries, and will only exacerbate conditions in the Delta. Further reducing fresh water flows to the Delta will cause serious and potentially irreparable harm to the Delta’s fragile ecosystem, as well as its communities and economy. That includes the Delta’s $5.2 billion agricultural economy, as well as the iconic Delta and Coastal fishing industries, which are worth billions annually.”

The Department of Water Resources and the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, the principal backers of the California WaterFix Project, submitted the petition to the Water Board to add three new points of diversion from the Sacramento River.

Wolk, a long-time opponent of the Tunnels project, was the lead author of the letter to the Water Board. The letter’s other authors include Senators Mark Leno, Loni Hancock, Jerry Hill, Cathleen Galgiani, Steve Glazer, Dr. Richard Pan, and Bob Wieckowski, and Assembly Members Bill Dodd, Susan Eggman, Catharine Baker, Ken Cooley, and Phil Ting.

Wolk and the other legislators urged the Water Board to consider the effects of diverting up to two-thirds of the Sacramento River from the Delta, including increased salinity that would contribute to further declines in species including the critically endangered Delta Smelt, the endangered Sacramento River winter-run Chinook salmon, and the Greater Sandhill Crane.

Wolk said the letter notes the “widespread concern from scientific bodies including the federal Environmental Protection Agency and the Delta Independent Science Board that flawed science is being used to advocate for the WaterFix’s proposed benefits to the Delta environment and water quality.”

“Current water diversions are already overtaxing the Delta ecosystem. Reducing stress on the Delta by reducing reliance on fresh water exports is a fundamental and necessary step to ensure the sustainable and resilient water supplies needed by the economies, communities and ecosystems in the Delta and throughout the state. It’s time for a Plan B that can succeed where the WaterFix has failed, a plan that help us achieve the coequal goals established by The Delta Reform Act, while protecting the Delta as a place,” Wolk stated.

Winnemem Wintu: Shasta Dam Raise, Sites Reservoir and Delta Tunnels are one project

While the state and federal governments and mainstream media try to portray the Shasta Dam raise plan, Sites Reservoir proposal, and Delta Tunnels as “separate” projects, Caleen Sisk, Chief and Spiritual Leader of the Winnemem Wintu Tribe, believes they “need to be considered as one project.”

“Without one, you can’t have the others," Chief Sisk told me during the historic Run4Salmon prayer journey from Vallejo to the McCloud River from September 17 to October 1. “If the tunnels are built, there will be no water to put in them. You need Sites Reservoir to provide the water for the tunnels and the Shasta Dam raise to provide water for Sites.”

“Although the state and federal governments are saying they are separate projects, they are all really one project,” noted Sisk. “Why do you think Westlands Water District, the Resnicks, Metropolitan Water District and other water districts are all pushing for the Shasta Dam Raise, Sites Dam and the Delta Tunnels?”

“We consider Shasta Dam a weapon of mass destruction,” said Chief Sisk. “It has already taken our homes, sacred sites, burial sites, and stopped the salmon from returning to their historical spawning grounds. If these tunnels are built, Governor Brown’s so called ‘California WaterFix’, they will not only cause more death and destruction to the already endangered salmon, but they will encourage and motivate plans to enlarge Shasta Dam. An enlarged Shasta Dam will flood what remaining sacred sites, and cultural sites that we still use today.”

In written testimony submitted to the State Water Resources Control Board for the ongoing hearings regarding Reclamation and DWR’s water diversion change petition required to build the California WaterFix, Winnemem Wintu Governmental Liaison Gary Mulcahy asks:

“Drowned cultures, dead and extinct fish, broken promises, stolen lands, environmental destruction, water grabs, and years and years of litigation – is it truly worth it?”

LITTLE DOG WITH BOOK: Art Photography by the Anderson Valley Advertiser.

(Note to animal lovers: No animals were injured, killed, tortured, beaten, shot, thrown, incited to fight, insulted, teased, dissed, drugged, kicked, sold, flamed, starved, slandered, neglected, kidnapped, ill-housed, run-over, tattooed, trashed, slapped, nagged, eaten, falsely accused, kidded, fooled, robbed, used in any kind of testing, penned up, ridden, hugged, or abused in any way during the set-up, rehearsal, production, editing or posting of any of the art in this fine canine series.)

JUST IN FROM WAIKIKI

Honolulu 4 A.M. — Awoke feeling just excellent, and commenced to chant OM, the weather being an ideal cool and everything outside is peaceful. Island living is different than anything previously discovered. The basics are the same but the nuances are somewhat indescribably unique. Spent yesterday at Waikiki Beach, amidst a throng of jewelry wearing Japanese and surfers. Walked around drinking a freshly made cup of pineapple juice. Later, sat on a bench looking out at the vast blue Pacific Ocean, with no reason to get up and do anything again. Stopped watching the mental factory manufacture thought scenarios, most of which are reruns about rather stupid situations of the past with organizations which ought to have known better. Bored to near death with the remembrances, I just looked out at the far horizon in the direction of French Polynesia. Spent the whole afternoon with the mind stilled, accruing a sun tan. I am in no hurry to leave Hawaii. [Bleep] the 2016 American presidential election. What is important here in November is the surfing championships on O'ahu's north shore. Other than environmental issues which revolve around conservation, nobody in Honolulu whom I've met expresses any interest in anything political. I can't quite figure out what exactly people here are interested in. They seem to be pleasant all the time. Maybe they are enlightened, which would explain the whole shebang.

Craig Louis Stehr
Honolulu, Hawaii
Email: CraigStehr@inbox.com

BROADBAND ALLIANCE UPDATE & NEWS

I want to share some important updates, and since the next Broadband Alliance Public Outreach meeting isn't for another month still (Nov. 4th).

Our website has had some major revisions and lots of new content added! Please check it out <http://www.mendocinobroadband.org>.

I'm still changing things around, fixing broken links, and adding content, but a lot has been done already that I hope you'll find interesting and useful. I'm also always open to suggestions and feedback.

New content examples includes:

* About 25 additional "Crossing the Digital Divide"

<http://www.mendocinobroadband.org/crossing-the-digital-divide-by-joseph-feigon/>

articles

* Lots of new content under the Legislation Menu * New "sliders" (the slowly moving photos at the top) on the Home page.

After all the Public Participation Hearings held around the state, including in Ukiah, PUC Commissioner Sandoval issued a ruling asking for comments on the topics addressed in the hearing. Mendocino County submitted comments

<http://www.mendocinobroadband.org/wp-content/uploads/County-of-Mendocinos-Comments-10.4.16.pdf>

(181 pages, although only about 15 pages are comments, the rest are attachments) that you'll probably find interesting.

Mendocino County just joined "Next Century Cities.

<http://nextcenturycities.org/member-cities/#post-2027>"

Read more to learn why.

Good news to report! You may have seen some articles in local papers about the AT&T network upgrades. You can read the AT&T Press Release

<http://www.mendocinobroadband.org/wp-content/uploads/North-Coast-project-completion_MENDOCINO.pdf>

that talks about these upgrades which they claim will reduce the potential for widespread outages by 90%. You might also want to mark your calendar for Nov. 1st, 10 am in Ukiah when AT&T will make a presentation to our Board of Supervisors

<http://www.mendocinobroadband.org/topics/special-sessions/>

on their CAFII funding plans.

And while you have your calendar out, mark down Nov. 4th for the next Alliance meeting

<http://www.mendocinobroadband.org/topics/public-outreach/>.

Contact me if you like to see something specific on the agenda, or you'd like to make a brief presentation yourself. If you live outside of Ukiah, remember that you can always participate via "call in."

Okay, that's enough news for one email. As you can see, all this information is on our website :)

Thanks

Trish Steel
<www.MendocinoBroadband.org>
707-354-3224
Find us on Facebook! <https://www.facebook.com/BroadbandAlliance>

* * *

MENDOCINO COUNTY JOINS SANTA CRUZ COUNTY AND CALIFORNIA CITIES AS NEXT CENTURY CITIES LEADER FOR HIGH-SPEED INTERNET

Fifth District Supervisor Dan Hamburg announced today that Mendocino County has joined Next Century Cities, a bipartisan initiative dedicated to ensuring the availability of next-generation broadband Internet for all communities in California and across the nation.

“The Board of Supervisors has long recognized that in order for Mendocino County to thrive economically in the 21st century, and to be a place where our kids can have good jobs and raise families, affordable high-speed broadband is essential. Cities and towns that are able to offer high-speed broadband have experienced tremendous benefits. We need to create such opportunities for Mendocino County residents,” said Hamburg.

The county is currently in the process of forming a Broadband Working Group to develop “Goals and Strategies” for the County, and to develop a Broadband Plan. Next Century Cities can provide needed resources to assist with these efforts.

“Next Century Cities welcomes Mendocino County, the latest community to join us in support of high-speed Internet,” said Deb Socia, Executive Director of Next Century Cities. “We encourage all cities and counties that recognize the benefits of these investments to join this initiative.”

To date, over 130 cities and their elected leaders have joined Next Century Cities in recognition of the importance of leveraging gigabit-level Internet to attract new businesses and create jobs, improve health care and education, and connect residents to new opportunities. Next Century Cities will support communities and their elected leaders across the country as they seek to ensure that all have access to fast, affordable, and reliable Internet.

For more information, see their website at http://nextcenturycities.org & http://nextcenturycities.org/member-cities/#post-2027

Carmel J. Angelo
Chief Executive Officer

POINT ARENA CITY COUNCIL

(Please Hold Your Applause)

Mayor Jim Koogle ~ Vice Mayor Scott Ignacio

Councilmember Richey Wasserman

Agenda - October 11, 2016

ADJOURNED REGULAR MEETING – 6:00 P.M.

1. CALL TO ORDER & ROLL CALL
2. APPROVAL OF AGENDA

III. PRIVILEGE OF THE FLOOR (PUBLIC COMMENT PERIOD) This is the time for members of the public who wish to be heard on matters that do not appear on the Agenda. City Council policy is to limit each speaker to three (3) minutes. Such time allotment or portion thereof shall not be transferred to other speakers. The public will be allowed to speak concurrently with the calling of an agenda item following the staff presentation of that item. Pursuant to the Brown Act Section 54954.3, the City Council may not take action on an item that does not appear on the Agenda.

1. ORDINANCE
2. A) ORDINANCE 229 - AUTHORIZING THE IMPLEMENTATION OF A COMMUNITY CHOICE

AGGREGATION PROGRAM BY PARTICIPATING WITH THE SONOMA CLEAN POWER AUTHORITY

Recommendation:

1) Waive reading and introduce Ordinance 229 by title only

2) Adopt Ordinance 229

1. ADJOURNMENT

NOTICES:

* The City Council agenda will be posted at City Hall and on the City’s Website, www.cityofpointarena.net by 5:00 P.M. Friday prior to the Tuesday meeting.

* Supporting Documents will be posted for public review prior to the meeting as they are available at the City Clerk’s Office, Monday — Thursday, 9 a.m. — noon and 1:00 p.m. — 3:00 p.m. and on the City’s Website.

* Interested parties may subscribe for the City Council Agendas and agenda packet by contacting the City Clerk’s office at 882-2122.

* The numerical order of items on this agenda is for convenience of reference. Items may be taken out of order upon the request and consensus of the Mayor and Council.

* Any writing that is a public record not exempt from public disclosure and relating to an agenda item for open session of the City Council is available for public inspection at the Office of the City Clerk, 451 School Street, Point Arena, CA.

* The meeting rooms are ADA accessible. Accommodations and access to City meetings for people with special needs must be requested of the City Clerk at (707) 882-2122; 72 hours in advance of the meeting.

* All persons in attendance at public meetings are requested to observe the following rules of civil debate:

1. We may disagree, but we will be respectful of one another.
2. All comments will be directed to the issue at hand.
3. Personal attacks are unacceptable.

* Applauding or other displays of approval/disapproval are discouraged.

* To minimize distractions, please be sure all personal communication devices are turned off or on silent mode.

Questions? Please e-mail pa-admin@mcn.org or contact the City Clerk’s office at (707) 882-2122.