Mendocino County Today: Thursday, Jan. 18, 2018

• Embezzling Mendo
• Class K Revisions
• Ed Notes
• Little Dog
• Shopping Carts
• Molgaard & Miller
• Yesterday's Catch
• Composite Characters
• Lookalikes
• British Educated
• Prisoners of War
• Lint Life
• Joe Frank
• Outspoken Athletes

JUST IN: EMBEZZLEMENT CHARGES FILED AGAINST VISIT MENDOCINO EXEC

Felony charges have been filed by the Yolo County District Attorney’s Office against Alan Humason, former executive director of Visit Yolo and current executive director of the Mendocino County Tourism Commission. Humason, 63, may have embezzled as much as $50,000, according to sources familiar with the incident.

ukiahdailyjournal.com/general-news/20180117/embezzlement-charges-filed-against-visit-mendocino-exec

SAVE CLASS K

Response to Proposed Revisions to Class K Ordinance

by Stephanie Gold

The Mendocino Board of Supervisors is looking to change our Class K Building Ordinance and require all manner of new building materials and techniques, despite the high cost, and despite the fact that California building regulations still offers amended options for owner-built rural dwellings. With the aim of preserving affordable housing options in our county, we’ve done a bit of research into California’s building codes, to better understand the issues and to offer a more educated defense of maintaining affordable and creative building opportunities in Mendocino.

The Class K Building Ordinance exists to “provide minimum requirements for… limited density rural dwellings and appurtenant structures” and “to permit the use of ingenuity and preferences of the builder.” The Class K Ordinance further states that the adoption of these amended regulations “is reasonably necessary because …Mendocino County has a severe housing shortage. Low cost housing is especially hard to find in the County and the adoption of regulations for limited density rural dwellings will encourage the further construction of such dwellings. State law mandates the County of Mendocino to adopt a General Plan which makes adequate provisions for housing its citizens.” And finally, these amended building regulations are “necessary so that County residents may be provided housing at a cost affordable to themselves and to the county of Mendocino”.

These articulate arguments, based on and sanctioned by California’s Title 24 Building Standards Code and Title 25 Housing and Community Development Regulations, were written in the 1980s by our County Supervisors to explain the need for amended building regulations that support California affordable housing mandates and help address Mendocino housing shortages. In the nearly 40 years since this was published, our housing needs have become more extreme, and our state government more adamant that counties must make affordable housing options available to their residents or face legal consequences. Today’s Titles 24 and Title 25 still endorse those Class K goals.

On February 6, the Board of Supervisors will be entertaining proposals to change Class K in ways that would significantly hamper owner/builders from constructing affordable housing. We would like to address the proposed items point-by-point to make certain, while still adhering to the State’s health and safety standards, that no unnecessary regulations are added, no undo costs are incurred, and no building hurdles imposed that might deepen our housing crisis and make our county vulnerable to penalties and legal challenges.

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A new single family residence shall be limited to 2,000 square feet of habitable space under Class K. An additional 800 square foot attachment would be permitted.

• This is a good idea. Capping the size at 2000 square feet is quite compatible with affordable housing goals, and limiting the size will significantly lower fire risks.
• This would, furthermore, close a loophole for people who would take advantage of Class K and create fire hazards by constructing excessively large structures.

A perimeter foundation, as required by California Building Code (CBC), shall be required under all new single family residences, and all accessory structures greater than one story in height, unless otherwise determined by an engineer.

• The California Residential Code [Title 24, Part 2.5, Chapter 9, R301. 1.1.1] specifically states that for limited-density owner-built rural dwellings, “Pier foundations, stone masonry footings and foundations, pressure-treated lumber, poles or equivalent foundation materials or designs may be used provided that bearing is sufficient.”
• So perimeter foundations are NOT required by CBC, and owner-builders of rural dwellings seeking affordable housing may opt for less expensive foundation types.

Wildland Urban Interface (WUI) requirements apply to all new family residential structures.

• Title 24, Part 2.5, Chapter 9 specifies that for limited-density owner-built rural dwellings, owner-produced or used lumber may be used.⁷
• Class K and Title 25 encourage and support ingenuity and builder preferences.
• Title 24 Building Codes allow for alternative methods of achieving the goals of the minimum standards.
• The Building Department should have educational literature to share with Class K applicants on standard and alternative building materials that limit fire spread.
• Any costly building requirements should be offset by property tax incentives.

All future Class K structures come into compliance with CA State Law and require automatic fire sprinklers in all single family residential structures.

• There are many ways to reduce fire risk, but sprinkler systems are one of the more costly, adding $10,000-$14,000 or more to construction costs (for a 2000 square foot home) and requiring them is therefore not in keeping with CA affordable housing goals.
• Title 25 specifies that limited density owner-built rural dwellings are to be allowed to use their ingenuity in the pursuit of health and safety. Title 25, Article 8’s purpose is to facilitate alternative approaches to meet building health and safety goals.
• The leading advocate for fire sprinklers is the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA), a trade union that was formed in 1896 for the express purpose of lobbying for fire sprinkler systems! They keep strong statistics on fires and deaths, but they no longer record and report instances of sprinkler failure They are a biased source.
• California is one of only three states that require fire sprinkler systems for standard residential construction, 31 states have no fire sprinklers legislation, and a whopping 17 states that actually prohibit state and county requirements of fire sprinklers!
• Indoor fire sprinklers have no impact on wild land fires.
• Multiple other factors can contribute to flammability. House size is a key factor, and a square footage cap, if adopted, will greatly lower the risk of adverse effects of fire.
• If owner/builders of low-density rural dwellings would prefer to apply their ingenuity to the goal of protecting themselves and their property from the adverse effects of fire, the Building Department should accept their proposals.
• The State political tide favors housing advocacy.

Three (3) inspections will be required to obtain a Class K permit.

• Title 25 (§ 108-112) and Class K (§ 18.23.170) already provide for at least one single inspection and any additional inspections that may be needed.

Class K Ordinance shall state that the most recently adopted version of the Uniform Building Code (UBC) would be the operative code. This would avoid the necessity of having to re-adopt Class K revisions.

• This is an alarming proposition. Any changes to Class K Ordinance require amending the General Plan, and for good reason. Class K Ordinance is currently part of the Mendocino Housing Element of the General Plan.¹⁸
• General Plan protocol encourages public input and maintains transparency of purpose.
• Let’s not curtail democratic principles for convenience sake or to avoid public input.

(Attached: Footnoted version Response to Proposed Revisions to Class K)

 

ED NOTES

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PERSONNEL: We understand that Kathy Wylie and Bryan Barrett are candidates to succeed Warren Galletti as Superintendent of County Schools. Ms. Wylie has done a very good job as Foreperson of the County Grand Jury and was a candidate for Superintendent when the scrappy little second sacker from Point Arena, Warren Galletti, won election in 2014 and almost immediately picked up a DUI, equivalent to an honorary degree on the South Coast.

BARRETT'S abilities are described in this memorable story by Bruce McEwen. Presumably, the ace Ukiah School District administrator has brushed up on his basic English vocabulary since memorably joining Mendocino County's other edu-intellectual, Paul Tichinin, to declare “niggardly,” as deployed by a Ukiah teacher's rep, a term of foul racist abuse.

THE SUDDENLY MISSING Assistant Superintendent of County Schools, Joens-Poulton, according to the County Office, has "retired." We understand he was in fact shoved out the door for reasons that no one will reveal.

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ONE OF THE REPUBLICAN frothers running for governor is John Cox. During a debate last week when the two Democrats came out for Single Payer, Cox shouted, "Why stop at health care? Why don't we have single-payer food? Why don't we have single-payer housing? I'll tell you because the free market is the solution, not socialism."

WHENEVER I hear something like that, and some ignoramus somewhere says it every day and on Fox they say it all day long, I wonder if the speaker knows anything at all about socialism in its many incarnations, from the Leninist variety as installed by Stalin in Russia to the tepid version as represented by the liberal Democrat, Bernie Sanders, not to mention the commonsense social insurance socialism as practiced by Trump's favorite people, the Norwegians.

SANDERS said he wanted our oligarchs taxed at 36 percent. There were gasps from the rightwing. The capitalist Depression-era president Franklin Roosevelt put it at about 96 percent on the big incomes. Of course the super-rich, from whose class Roosevelt rose or, according to them, descended as a "class traitor," screamed that their money was being confiscated. Which it was and, hopefully, will be again when Americans finally realize how badly the rich are ripping off the rest of us. Roosevelt's socialist programs saved capitalism from itself, re-distributing just enough wealth in the form of Social Security and a federal jobs program to stave off serious insurrection. World War Two employment also helped pull the US out of the Great Depression. Single Payer, despite what the yobbos like Cox claim, would save millions and put an end to the current medical fraud dominated by the pharmaceutical companies, the medical insurance combines and the corporatized medical centers now feasting on America's cheeseburger-fattened flesh.

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DAVE CHAPPELLE'S NETFLICKS special is highly recommended, although he does throw in some gratuitously vulgar bits that are dramatically unfunny. Overall though, and as always, Chappelle is hilarious. Here he is, speaking seriously, on Trump and the class war: "I've never had a problem with white people ever in my life, but, full disclosure, poor whites are my least favorites. We've got a lot of trouble out of them. And I've never seen so many of them up close when I stood with them in line ... and I listened to them say naive, poor white people things about how Trump will help them once elected. I'm standing there, thinking in my mind, 'You dumb motherfuckers. You are poor. Trump's fighting for me!'"

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FIRST the sirens then the medical helicopter overhead, and everyone in Boonville hopes it's not someone they know. The dual alarm sounded just after 3pm today.

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WALMART GOLDFISH. For the second Wednesday in a row I stopped in at WalMart hoping to buy some cheap-o goldfish. And for the second week in a row, the sign on the fish tank said "No fish for sale before 8pm." I asked a stooped lady clerk who looked too old to be working full time, "Excuse me, but can I buy some goldfish, the $1.98 jobs?" She tottered over to the tanks. "I'm sorry, sir, not until 8pm." She suddenly whirled to a man in a wheelchair. "Do you have a question?" she asked. He said, "No, I'm talking to myself because I'm the only one who understands me." The elderly clerk said she was pretty sure if I came back at 8 I could buy goldfish. I suspect they just stick that sign up there because it's a bummer for clerks to fish the things out of the tank. One afternoon a fat kid broke into a sweat trying to scoop up the ten fish I wanted. The net was way too small and there were only 11 fish in a large tank. Netting them required serious hand-eye coordination, which he did not have. "Can I try?" I asked. "Sorry, sir, there are liability issues. We can't allow it." I told him I'd try again another day. He was much relieved.

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LAST WEEK I'd noted the defeated army of the homeless clustered between WalMart and Taco Bell. It's not Taco Bell, it's Jack In The Box, although nutritionally there's no diff and both will kill you.

LITTLE DOG SAYS, “Dog flu's going around, so I asked one of these guys to get me checked out. He just laughed. ‘Sorry, Little Dog, we're outta dog thermometers. All we’ve got is this horse thermometer.’”

I BRING 'EM BACK

To the Editor:

I read in paper about the shopping carts issue. May I say, I am one of few homeless who gathers shopping carts and brings them back to the store owner’s property.

As I’ve only gathered and pushed maybe 8 to 12 carts at a time and roped them together for return to pay back the society as well. I do not ask for anything in return. Some increased amount of carts have been either vandalized or wheels removed from certain carts made it hard for me continue to help society. I am guilty myself for taking one cart to move recyclables to recycle centers but often I push back a long train 8 to 12 carts to the store owner — “Lucky,” “Walmart,” and “Home Deport.” I only wish more homeless folks who have nothing better to do than getting into trouble would take the time and give back to society by helping shopping centers out. If they do maybe they would see how much more appreciative the society would be and perhaps give the benefit of doubt to everyone in society that something good would come from the person or homeless person trying to fit within society.

I also want to add that this community may need to think or consider the San Francisco shopping cart law: if a person has it more than 8 to 12 hours he would be fined or incarcerated. As for those locked wheels at Safeway, it’s a good idea, but sorry to say many people removed those locked wheels and put regular cart wheels on it so really it’s not any different. I strongly think if community and society come up with utility garden tool wagons or carts for homeless then maybe the chances are homeless society would leave the shopping carts in parking lots. Don’t just blame homeless, kids and neighbors have abandoned carts near their homes or in creek beds.

James D. Hoffman, Sr.

Mendocino County Jail

MEET ANNE MOLGAARD, CFO of Mendocino County Health and Human Services, and Jenine Miller, Director of Behavioral Health at the AV Unity Club meeting, Thursday, February 1, 2018, Dining Room at the County Fairgrounds in Boonville. The Community is invited to join us at 1:30 for complimentary cookies and coffee during Anne Molgaard’s presentation. Questions: Call Hostess Valerie Hanelt, 895-3526.

CATCH OF THE DAY, January 17, 2018

JEREMY AUMAN, Laytonville. Probation revocation.

JOSE BANUELOS-BARRIGA, Redwood Valley. DUI, suspended license for DUI, probation revocation.

DANIELA FAVILA, Ukiah. Disorderly conduct-alcohol.

JUSTIN GARNER, Ukiah. Grand theft of money/labor, taking vehicle without owner’s consent.

JOSHUA GUEVARA, Ukiah. Petty theft-bicycle, petty theft-retail, disorderly conduct-alcohol, resisting, probation revocation.

CHALESE MCCHESNEY, Ukiah. Harboring a wanted felon, controlled substance.

MICHAEL MENDEZ, Ukiah. Failure to appear.

JUSTIN OLSON, Willits. Willits. Transportation of controlled substance.

MICHAEL OLVERA-CAMPOS, Ukiah. Domestic abuse, paraphernalia, protective order violation.

CHARLES PINA JR., Covelo. Fugitive from justice.

JASON PRATT, Fort Bragg. Unauthorized entry into dwelling without owner’s consent, community supervision violation, resisting.

IMMIGRATION LESSON

"Would you describe yourself as a Russian or a British author?" I've been asked this question on many occasions. The answer depends, of course, on who is asking. For the officer at border control in the United Kingdom, I'm that hybrid creature, a British citizen. I don't mind when people ask me where I'm from, unless they are implying, "When are you going home?"

In nightmares I used to find myself stuck again behind the Iron Curtain, unable to return to England. I'm rather fond of the plea made by Kipling's Roman centurion: "Legate, I come to you in tears--my cohort ordered home/I've served in Britain forty years. What should I do in Rome?"

I have often been told that Britain is a nation of shopkeepers--but shopkeepers are a welcoming lot; they like newcomers as potential customers. England has cured me of a fear of encounters with the alien aspects of life, a Soviet fear of the unknown and unfamiliar. I'm a British citizen with an exotic past.

We are all composite characters. Kipling was born and grew up in India. Should we call him an Indian writer? Pushkin had black African ancestors. He never traveled abroad but wrote first drafts in French. We don't call him a French poet of African origin born in Russian exile. Conrad's second language was French--he had learnt his English while serving in the British merchant navy, but he is a British writer...(What should I do in Rome?)

Zinovy Zinik in the Times Literary Supplement

SEPERATED AT BIRTH

WARREN GALETTI & PAUL JOENS-POULTON

(Former Superintendent and Assistant Superintendent of the Mendocino County Office of Education)

ON LINE COMMENT OF THE DAY

I’ve been working in this plant 8 years now, on the graveyard shift, sometime on a split shift. (I like working at night, more relaxed atmosphere, easier commute. At any rate a lot of work in printing is nights.) About half of my co workers are black. Never once in these 8 years have I heard any of these guys talk about race, complain about racism, show any hostility toward me, the country, the country’s history, or anything. Also sitting around the break room last night did I hear anybody mention Martin Luther King Day. It just doesn’t seem that important to them. Granted, most of these guys are West Indian, whose main concern seems to be to make enough money to send something to their families at the end of the month, and to save enough in order at some point to get the hell out of here and set themselves up back in the islands. A few months ago I was reading Redeker’s book about pirates. An old Jamaican guy saw the book and went into a long discourse about piracy in the Caribbean, Port Royal, Henry Morgan, Blackbeard, Ned Low, Madagascar, etc. … he knew what he was talking about. When I said to him “Chamberlain, I’m impressed with your knowledge” he drew himself up and stated proudly “Marlin, I was educated under the British system”.

HEINZ DOST, RADIO OPERATOR, Melnik, near Prague, Wednesday, May 9, 1945

As radio operator with the First Tank Corps Signal Detachment 457 I was detained by the Czechs on May 8, 1945. Place of detention: Melnik, near Prague. My mechanic was detained at the same time. We were taken prisoner by Czech partisans who had armed themselves with discarded German weapons and after being briefly searched, they put us up against the wall to be shot. On the order of the partisan leader, the rifles were loaded. We were ordered to lower our heads slightly. Then the execution was aborted. People whose language we didn’t understand approached from the road. But we could understand enough to know that they were former Russian prisoners of war. These Russian prisoners of war had also armed themselves with German weapons and were ordered by the Czechs to bring us to the nearby farm, about 100 to 150 meters away. By now other German prisoners of war had also appeared, officers, Wehrmacht officials and civilian staff with their wives and children. The unit leader of the Czech partisans now stirred up the Czech population against us shouting, “Here come the ones who raped your women and girls.” Whereupon the Czechs laid into this little group of prisoners of war with cudgels and stones. Many were injured. When we had left the farm we were divided by sex. We men had to strip to the waist. They checked us to see if we had SS tattoos on our upper arms. Some of my fellow prisoners had this tattoo and were summarily shot by the Czechs in front of the stable.

(From Swan Song: A collective diary of the last days of the Third Reich, 1945, by Walter Kempowski.)

I'M HAUNTED this evening by feelings that have no vocabulary and events that should be explained in dimensions of lint rather than words. I've been examining half-scraps of my childhood. They are pieces of distant life that have no form or meaning. They are things that happened just like lint.

— Richard Brautigan

A READER on the Coast Listserve wrote: Joe Frank, whose radio monologues on Santa Monica College Triple A-News-Talk KCRW/Santa Monica ranged from humorous to surreal and served as an influence for many broadcast storytellers, died (1/15) at 79.

MARCO MCCLEAN REPLIED:

God dammit. Well, he was in great physical pain for much of his life, and he's not in pain anymore.

We're setting up to run all of Joe Frank's recorded monologues on KNYO. Part of it is a participating radio station has to agree to play everything on the list, on a regular schedule, without cutting out any problematical material and the swearing, nor editing the shows in any way, and play them in the exact order they were recorded. Which KNYO can and will do. Joe Frank's death reminded me to email Bob and goose that along. I think it's just a matter of another couple of pieces of paper needing to get signed and go back and forth.

The thing about a Joe Frank story for me was the shape of events. He'd tell the story of someone's inner and outer problems in a situation, and it would get bad and/or complicated for him or her, darker and darker, until everything was as wonderfully bad as it could get, and that had to be the end of the story. And he'd pause for a moment, and start from there, and things would get worse and even more complicated, and reach another obvious place that had to be the end of any normal story. And there'd be a pause, and he'd start talking again, in that insistent basso whisper/rumble of his, and everything up to that point was just the back-story for everything getting even worse.

I have a few favorites, but all it takes to think of one as your favorite is to think of any one at all: 1. The one where he tells about cleaning his apartment and gives the feeling of how futile the activity is, and that's funny and sad, and you get it, and then he relates this to the slow dissolution of his own health and internal organs. 2. The one where he visits his escaped-from-Nazi-Germany mother in an old-folks' hospital, and on every visit he goes outside to smoke a cigaret, and he becomes fascinated by the drama of small creatures dying in the swimming pool no-one swims in. Insects--he rescues an insect. And the landscape ducks begin to disappear one by one, predated upon by a racoon, until they're gone, and that's sad and horrible, but he can't rescue everything, it's the natural world, red in tooth and claw, and he's thinking about a Chinese restaurant, and how "There's nothing better than crisp. Duck. Skin." 3. The one where he takes 15 minutes to tell about the movie The Incredible Shrinking Man, and then he does all the voices of adenoidal, fatuous people at a faculty cocktail party pontificating about what The Incredible Shrinking Man really means. 4. The Eye In The Sky...

THE NBA HAS BECOME A SITE OF RESISTANCE AGAINST RACISM AND TRUMP

by Dave Zirin

Howard Bryant, author of the forthcoming book The Heritage: Black Athletes, a Divided America, and the Politics of Patriotism, once said the following to me, and it has tattooed itself on my brain: “The difference in the sports world between today and 20 years ago is that in the 1990s, if something horrifically racist happened, we would have been shocked if Michael Jordan said something. Today we would be shocked if LeBron James and others didn’t say something.”

Monday saw the collision of the national holiday to honor Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. with the aftermath of yet another racist dirge from the Oval Office. As a bonus, the president branded himself as “the least racist person.” Again, the shock would have been if LeBron and other voices of resistance in the NBA had said nothing. When King James was asked about Dr. King he said, “He literally took a bullet for us.” Then LeBron — and again, I would have been surprised if he had done otherwise — transitioned without prompting to the current moment, saying, "And for us to stand here even though we’re trying to be [divided] right now by somebody, today is a great day for people to realize how America was built and how we all have to stand united in order to be at one…. Like I said before, we are in a difficult state right now as Americans as well with the leader of our country. But us, like I said, no matter the religion, no matter the shapes and sizes, we all have to continue to come together and shine a brighter light on, you know, I mean, (I don’t want to) use the word stupidity, but that’s basically what it comes down to…. The guy in control has given people and racism, and negative racism, an opportunity to be out and outspoken without fear. And that’s the fearful thing for us because it’s with you, and it’s around every day, but he’s allowed people to come out and just feel confident about doing negative things…"

It wasn’t just LeBron. Spurs Coach Gregg Popovich, in obvious reference to Trump’s “least racist person” comments, said, “Every time I hear somebody say they’re not a racist, you know they are.”

Pistons Coach Stan Van Gundy spoke about how the current moment is both aggravated by Trump yet also bigger than one person, saying to The Undefeated: "Sadly, though, I think the 50th anniversary of his death finds us going backwards on the issue of racial equality. The Voting Rights Act has been largely dismantled. Men of color, and even boys of color, face systemic inequality in the justice system, and we used the war on drugs to lock up a generation of black men. Affirmative action is being torn down. Police are killing men like a modern-day Bull Connor, and economic equality is headed in the wrong direction.

Marches like Charlottesville are disturbing. It used to be that the KKK wore hoods, embarrassed to reveal their identity. Now people with racist beliefs proudly march in the open and are not even repudiated by our president. So yes, we honor King and all that he sacrificed and all that he accomplished. But if we truly want to honor him, we must get back out and fight like he did against the now-resurgent voices of racial injustice, discrimination and hate. I think 25 years ago King might have been happy to see some progress. My guess is today he would be in tears over where we are headed."

Even Shaquille O’Neal, who has hardly been out front on this emerging consciousness, quoted King in the NBA’s pregame broadcast and said, “A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual doom.”

The list goes on. These comments reflect a push by very-high-profile players in the NBA to push beyond what Cornel West calls the “Santa Clausification” of King. They also put the league in stark opposition to this administration, which spent the day tweeting admiration for King while practicing ugly racism in word and deed.

As this administration deteriorates, there is now an expectation that these players and coaches will articulate our anger at the reality of racism-without-consequence in the White House. It’s not fair and certainly not healthy for a functioning left to have its eyes constantly turned to the sports world. Protest is not a spectator sport, and athletes historically have been most effective at amplifying already existing fightback in the streets, not substituting for struggle.

But at this moment, nature abhors a vacuum and these players are filling that absence of leadership along with unions and various social movements, and voicing a rage that is still finding physical expression. The NBA community has, consciously or not, taken on a serious burden because the thing about political leadership is, once you exercise it, people will begin to expect it.