Letters (Jan. 11, 2017)

• A Full Service ATM In AV? What A Concept
• Brown, Then Newsome — Twin Disasters
• Foster A Homeless Pet
• Make Public Lands A Priority
• Bad Bruce! Down Boy!
• The Brain Police

A FULL SERVICE ATM IN AV?  WHAT A CONCEPT

Editor,

There is a move underway in Anderson Valley to persuade Redwood Credit Union to install a full service ATM in downtown Boonville.

Signup sheets have been circulating from Yorkville to Navarro, and nearly 100 people who are already RCU members, including business accounts and multiple memberships, have signed. So have 30 people who would potentially become members if an ATM were accessible.

A meeting with RCU executives will take place in early February to discuss a possible site, the numbers of new and existing members that would be required to influence their decision in favor of an AV ATM, and a potential installation date if the project is approved.

The number of potential new members will weigh heavily toward an executive decision in favor of the ATM.

If you would like to add your name to the list, leave a message at (415) 513-0292 or email ldiamondstone@yahoo.com and provide the following information:

1. Name (please spell if leaving a phone message)
2. Are you already a Redwood Credit Union member?
3. If you are not a member, might you become one if AV had an ATM?
4. Number of RCU members or potential members in your household
5. Number of RCU accounts or potential accounts in your household

Calls/emails should be made before the end of January.

Jill Hannum

Yorkville

BROWN, THEN NEWSOME — TWIN DISASTERS

Editor:

I would like to get something off my chest. It is about the governor of our state of California. He is no different than Hitler back in the 30s and 40s. He is trying to run the state by making laws that the people don't get to vote on. He has people like Mary Nichols who ruined our timber industry with their stupid, ridiculous, business-destroying laws and regulations. Several thousand jobs have been ruined and as well as thousands of businesses, especially contractors and timber companies and transportation industries. The governor and the state are completely out of control. And after Brown here comes Gavin Newsome. Who's worse. We need to cut the state in half at Sonoma County and these people can have Southern California to themselves!

Jerry Philbrick

Comptche

FOSTER A HOMELESS PET

Editor,

Urgent! Our Ukiah Animal Shelter needs your help!

Our homeless pets need our help! The Ukiah animal shelter is overcrowded and to prevent further infectious disease outbreaks the dog population needs to be reduced. Please contact us if you can foster or if you are interested in adopting and please make a contribution in any amount, so that we can transfer dogs to other rescue organizations. Mendocino Shelter Pets Rescue is a non-profit dedicated to saving animal lives. All donations are used 100% toward saving dogs from being euthanized. Visit the website for more info on how you can help! or send us an email to: info@mendoshelterpets.com,  http://mendoshelterpets.com/

Thank you!

Monika Fuchs

Boonville, CA

MAKE PUBLIC LANDS A PRIORITY

To the Editor:

In my life, I’ve served four different terms on the Round Valley Tribal Council and worked for years as a K-12 teacher. I believe in the need to care for all our land and waters. I am an educator at heart, and that’s why it means a lot to me to teach people of all backgrounds — and especially children — about our public lands and how we can protect and restore these special places for future generations to enjoy.

That’s why I was delighted to learn that school children have gone on field trips over the past months to explore places like the Black Butte River in Mendocino County and other places in the region. The Round Valley Indian Tribes helped lead elementary and middle school students on streamside hikes so they could learn about the area’s geology and aquatic biology. I’ve had the honor of talking to several classes afterwards about the geography, the history, traditional fishing, and natural cycles of weather and geology of the rivers they visited. What an opportunity to inspire and teach young people about the importance of our rivers!

These trips were organized to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the Northern California Coastal Wild Heritage Wilderness Act, which was signed into law in 2006. Congressman Thompson championed this effort, along with Senators Boxer and Feinstein.

This landmark legislation protected public lands and water in Northern California, including 273,000 acres of wilderness and 21 miles of the Black Butte Wild & Scenic River. The Black Butte provides some of the best habitat for Chinook salmon and steelhead trout in the entire Middle Fork Eel River watershed.

This is particularly important to me as a member of the Wylaki Tribe. Our Round Valley reservation is right in the heart of the entire Eel River watershed. My ancestors learned to fish in a back eddy of the Eel River, like many others native to this region. The area’s tribes once thrived on its abundant salmon, a traditional source of food for the Round Valley Tribes and other First Americans. The salmon have been sacred to us since we were the only human inhabitants of this beautiful, outstanding watershed.

The habitat of our salmon has since been critically damaged over time, after others moved into the area to extract resources. There are natural things that happen that change the flow of water, but there are unnatural things like farming practices, livestock management, and timber industry practices that have changed the watershed for the worse. Devastating logging processes and battles over sheep and cattle grazing have caused terrible erosion to our sacred lands.

Legislation like the Northern California Coastal Wild Heritage Wilderness Act is essential when it comes to restoring our river and fisheries back to health. We’re already seeing major progress just 10 years later. Stream restoration has made a major impact, since preserving even part of a stream moves the needle for the entire river system. We’re seeing more Chinook salmon, we’re seeing steelhead coming in earlier, lamprey eels in abundance, and we’re even seeing schools of green sturgeon — once all but wiped out due to years and years of pollution and overfishing greed.

I’ve even seen a difference in the creek that runs by my house. I’ve watched that creek for over 70 years, and how it meanders around creating pools at the bends where salmon and steelhead stay to spawn and rest. My community, the Round Valley Tribes, has been restoring this stream for several years. Seeing our sacred fish come in earlier and earlier each year lets me know we’re headed in the right direction.

There’s still a lot of work to be done, and continuing to protect our public lands and the rivers that run through these places is at the top of my list. The 10th anniversary of the Northern California Coastal Wild Heritage Wilderness Act is the perfect time for us to come together and reflect on what we can do to heading into the next decade and century. The consciousness of the human world is changing. We need to think cosmically about saving the world then act locally, close to our homes.

I urge our community leaders to continue making the protection and funding of our public lands and rivers a priority. And I encourage all of us to find ways to educate our children about the importance of these places. After all, they will be the next generation to enjoy, experience, and steward these special places.

Ernie Merrifield, Covelo

(Elder of the Round Valley Indian Tribe and four-time tribal councilmember)

BAD BRUCE! DOWN BOY!

Editor,

Really Bruce?

WOW is all I can say Bruce.

Deeply, deeply,  disappointed in you. I thought we were friends. I thought you were a logical, intelligent, compassionate human being. Capable of critical thinking and not succumbing to manipulation.

No, I'm not taking it personally at all. You have not even witnessed the "tip of the iceberg."

You would faint in shock if you witnessed what I have. You're a journalist Bruce. So research!! Get your evidence--FOR BOTH SIDES!

Unless of course, you don't believe cats and dogs are living things, deserving of food, comfortable shelter and love.

IT "SOUNDS LIKE"...that's the path you take. So just say that and be honest Bruce.  Animals end up in so called shelters through no fault of their own. Because of irresponsible human beings. They ALL deserve a chance at a loving home.

Our shelter is NOT A NO KILL SHELTER BRUCE. Three healthy pittbulls were put down for no reason at all last week. Another two dogs were going to be put down for no valid reason last Friday. That's a kill shelter Bruce. I did not see anyone posting what you claim you saw.

I'm pretty good at catching these posts. Where  was it? On Facebook?  I haven't seen anyone say the 25 urgent were getting put down. Just that they were urgent (per Sage....by the way. )

They WILL  kill the ones that don't go to rescue. Especially the pitties!!!!. Molinari is not a fan of pitties. THE REASON DOGS STAY TOO LONG IS BECAUSE SAGE AND AMY DON'T DO THEIR JOBS . PERIOD THE END . THEY ALSO INTERFERE WITH PEOPLE WHO ARE TRYING TO EXPEDITE dogs. I WAS ONE OF THEM.

A HEARTFELT NOTE TO A "SO CALLED" FRIEND.

That's it.’

Name Withheld

Ukiah

Ed note: In my defense, I want to tell all of you that when I was a small boy and a coed team of my peers was blowing up frogs with firecrackers, I told them to stop. And I treated my late dog, Cough, better than I treated my two-footed friends. I yield to no anthromorph my commitment to the welfare of animals. I'm offended that you're offended.

THE BRAIN POLICE

To Fred Gardner;

Your article: One Flew Over Harvard Med School (AVA, 1/4/2017) fits in well with what I’ve been reading this winter. These three books all touch on what you’ve brought up:

The Dehumanization Of Man by Montagu/Matson, 1983

The True Believer by Eric Hoffer, 1951

Nineteen Eighty Four centennial edition.

I appreciate you bringing up these terrifying and current projects being carried out by the descendants of Skinner and his ilk. They’re still going at it trying to modify behavior on the special, gifted, peculiar, and ultimately everyone. Here’s a quote from The Dehumanization Of Man by a hard core Behaviorist, Peter Breggin, 1972: “New methods are available to destroy parts of the brain by ultrasonic waves, electric coagulation, and implantation of radium seeds. The technique is promoted for the sedation of the elderly, to render their institutionalization less costly; for the control of hyperactive children; and to reduce erotic fantasies and the tendencies to gamble.” Wow, that about covers everyone! To paraphrase Aldous Huxley — he said that: “when the psychological revolution toward which we are rapidly moving, is complete; the human race will give no further trouble!” Thank goodness for those humane new drugs that will save your teeth and skeleton while in the electric therapy lab. Where would we be without all the kind liberal technocrats!? The military-industrial-university-complex is a long standing enemy of civil society, democracy, sanity, and life in all its forms. When the Behaviorists invade brains and grains for ill gotten gains, twisting thought and twisting food, twisting rain and water into crude, then the basic fabric of life is little but a tattered flag. Again, thanks for your wise and well placed words.

Ross Dendy

Elk