Mendocino County Today: Tuesday, March 20, 2018

• Offshore Storm
• K Deadline
• Del Fiorentino
• Dry-shed Demolition
• Basketball Whisperer
• Candidate Night
• AV Watchamacallit
• Farm Update
• Frost Fans
• Singularity
• Supervisor Pinches
• Little Dog
• McKinley Tchotchke
• Poppy
• MCRPD Meetings
• Equal Justice
• Succulent Poaching
• Yesterday's Catch
• Postal Banking
• Priorities
• Playdohnuts
• Hour Ahead
• Russteria
• Social Suicide
• Advisory
• Imitation Day
• Salmon Season
• GJ Application

AN OFFSHORE STORM will bring periods of light to moderate rain to Northwest California through much of the week. Cooler air and lower snow levels are expected toward the end of the week into the early portion of the weekend. (National Weather Service)

CLASS K DEADLINE LOOMS

by Robert ‘Captain Rainbow’ Salisbury

Heads up Mendocino County. The onslaught on Class K (the more relaxed building standards for owner built limited density rural dwellings) is well on its way and won't stop now. The spirit and intent of Class K has been breached.

The news of immediate importance is that there were changes approved by the Board of Supervisors March 13th that will go into effect 30 days from that date, April 12th or thereabouts (unconfirmed as of press time). Some of the proposed changes the public was able to beat back. So, under Class K, water sprinklers will NOT be required and a solid perimeter foundation will NOT be required. Good so far.

However some changes that were approved may affect your future planning. The big bugaboo that slipped into the ordinance (seemingly unnoticed) was the "updating" of Class K standards to the current UBC code. This may not seem like a big deal but there are major consequences. Head of Building inspection, Mike Oliphant, acknowledged that there were hundreds of new code requirements that Class K applicants would be expected to follow. Not only might the owner-builder have difficulty understanding these new requirements, but it would be much more expensive for the homeowner. This obviously flies in the face of the intent of Class K.

So, folks, you’ve got less than three weeks to apply for a Class K permit or go for amnesty under the original Class K regs! If you don't apply before the changes take effect, you will be faced with way more, and way more complicated and expensive, regulations. It never should have come to this but here we are.

We hope to hear something from the county justifying these changes and explaining what they are, when they come into effect, and how it's going to cost you more. But pretty much you’re on your own. Call your supervisor, call the building department, and ask what is the NEED for these changes and what does this MORE REGULATION mean to the idea of Class K. Beware of the “happy talk” answers. Learn what these changes mean to you and know that you still have a few weeks to sign up for amnesty or a new Class K home permit under the original rules.

And here's a revelation: Class K is not tied to the Energy calcs, this from Mike Oliphant himself. Apparently Chris Warrick, previous head of Building, arbitrarily said so and we all believed him. Now Mike Oliphant a respected long time and experienced official.

The reasons for the NEED to "amend" Class K still remains a bit of a mystery. When asked, the Supervisors and Building and Planning staffers were not able to bring up a single case where a Class K permitted structure failed. There have been NO reports of ANY injuries, fires, or structural problems caused by Class K buildings! If it ain't broke don't fix it!

So why? What is the reason?

Usually you can follow the money, though how the county will make out on this is not obvious. What with the same charges for permits and with the added costs to the owner builder the county will only be creating more outlaws of people forced to be so regulated (safe?) that they can't afford to HAVE a home approved by the county.

How about politics? Certainly a lot of what created Class K in the late 70s/early 80s was political. But now? There does seem to be a residue of resentment at work. Do the bureaucrats fit in here? The Building Department has never embraced Class K. They are not innovators, they would prefer everything to be cookie cutter, one size fits all. It's understandable, their job is much easier if they don't have to think and can just point to a rule in a book. We could wish for a building department that would assist builders to build safe affordable homes, but the word from contractors and owner builders is that the new batch of inspectors is being trained to follow the rule book to the letter and the 16th of an inch. Mike Oliphant is assuring us all that the new crop of inspectors will be trained in Class K as well as regular code. How that plays out remains to be seen.

Somehow embodying some of all the reasons mentioned above is one guy, Lee Howard, associated with the North Coast Builders Exchange. Over a year ago he caught the ear of Michael Lockett. Who is Mike Lockett? He was head of Building and Planning a year or more ago, he lasted less than six months on the job. They felt that Class K needed "updating." Not because of any failure in the original ordinance but, in the ordinance's own words (chapter 18.23.442 (2), "The amendments proposed by the ordinance adopting this section of this chapter are reasonably necessary to place additional limits on the types of property and buildings to qualify for building permit processing under this Chapter 18.23, update certain building code requirements while still providing for the flexibility of allowing limited density rural dwellings a performance standard of evaluation, and require additional inspections to insure conformance with plans submitted."

WHAAAAAA? Excuse me? What are the reasons again?

At any rate, Howard and Lockett got it on the agenda of the Health and Safety Standing committee made up of Supervisors Hamburg and McCowen (who has NO Class K properties in his district). By the time the public got wind of what they were up to the committee had come up with quite a laundry list of restrictions. It became a struggle not so much of "Hey, there's no reason for this so cut it out," but having to argue each point as if it was already going to happen, the question being how many of their bullet points could be stopped? There also was a question of the state requiring certain regulations that would override our Class K. County counsel finally came up with the opinion that no, Class K COULD STAND AS IS! with the Wildland Urban Interface requirements being very difficult to override but still possible. But the train was out of the station.

The public finally woke up somewhat and began calling and emailing Hamburg and McCowen. Perhaps 20-25 people showed up at the final meeting of the Health and Safety committee. There was the Anderson Valley Housing Association who's argument (along with others) was a plea to maintain one of the few avenues for affordable housing left in the county, as the new changes proposed would increase the cost to an owner builder by an easy $40,000. There were several contractors who supported Class K as it is. They said it brought them work they otherwise wouldn't get.

WE WILL NEVER FORGET...

Fourth Anniversary Of Losing Ricky Del Fiorentino

It seems other coast media outlets don't remember, but MSP will certainly never forget this tragic day in northern CA history.

MSP received a message that former Fort Bragg Police Lt John Naulty & his wife were seen placing wreaths she made on the highway signs honoring Deputy Del Fiorentino Sunday.

Naulty exchanged gunfire and put down the Oregon madman who assassinated Del Fiorentino — who was only 48 years old and a 26-year veteran of law enforcement when he lost his life that day four years ago in Cleone.

May he forever rest in peace.

(Courtesy, MendocinoSportsPlus)

MARIE JONES SCORES FOR GP

by Rex Gressett

It is 450 acres. Behind the chain link fences and the barbed wire, there are trained bobbies all set to take you down. There are armed guards in pickups racing along the perimeters. There are signs and warnings posted at intervals along the fences. There are stagnant swamps where the white-tailed deer graze, the waterfowl feed, and the world’s most dangerous toxic pollutants are buried in the mud. To the east of the 450 acres of vacant lot is the little town of Fort Bragg. To the west, along the edge of the ocean, there is a pedestrian trail skirting the big property. On the trail, you can turn your back to the fenced-off emptiness and watch the crashing waves. The trail is new and very popular, already beloved. Strolling the trail, about midway, you come to the local sewage treatment plant. You can’t see it but a long underwater pipe carries effluent away from the sewage treatment facility and discharges it into the ocean. The stink is only intermittent. The ocean is still blue. The pipe was recently rehabilitated. It will be with us for a long time.

At the northern end of the mill site, there is a building so large and ghostly it seems improbable. Dry shed #4 is the last structure on what was once the largest lumber mill on the California coast. The building is another 67,000 square feet of emptiness. The combined emptiness is a dud property and perennial headache, for the nation’s second largest holding company. Koch International is $800 billion of corporate and political power. Maybe you have heard of them. All they want is permission to keep the toxins in the mud, the fences in place and the emptiness intact. To be consistent, GP is pushing hard to tear down the biggest building ever built or likely to be built in our small coastal community. Fort Bragg Development Director Marie Jones is running the ball.

From our side of the barbwire, Dry shed #4 seems to float in the midst of desolation like a dream. I guess every future is a dream before it is a future. It seems like a crazy thing to ignore or to discount what might be with a little vision and intelligence a future. In an officially economically disadvantaged community letting the big building go without a try seems extravagantly foolish. In the words of ex-mayor Dave Turner, “when its gone its gone.”

Monday night in Fort Bragg the lights burned brightly in Town Hall. The regular City Council meeting was swearing in the new City Manager but other than the items on the consent calendar the City Council had one item on the agenda. There were some mysteries and a few deceits concealed in the consent calendar, there always are, but the City Council had come to Town Hall to kill one dragon. They were there to administer the last rites to the city’s largest building.

There have been seven meetings that dealt directly with the Dry shed #4 demolition permit. Observers who have followed the regulatory ping pong have seen the city’s Planning Commission toss the ball to the Council and the Council toss it back through four Planning Commission meetings and three City Council meetings. Marie Jones has orchestrated the discussion throughout. She has browbeaten, cajoled, misrepresented and spun to a fabulous degree. In the face of Council dismay, objection and finally exhausted acquiescence she has pushed for the GP demolition permit with a determination that must have earned her the gratitude of the Koch Bros and has certainly alienated at least part of the City Council. The Planning Commission resides permanently in the zone of comfortable cluelessness. They like the self-assured Development Director and see nothing at all wrong with being led by the nose.

Monday night in her advocacy before the Council, Ms. Jones was stolidly dismissive of the poor dry sheds. They are barely able to stand, deteriorated and economically useless. The engineers say otherwise and Ms. Jones herself has not always felt that way.

In 2009 the city under the guidance of Dave Turner our then-Mayor entrusted the Development Director with a project to rehabilitate the dry-sheds as an “industrial arts facility.” They envisioned a working space for local artists and artisans. The Development Director was tasked with the planning. Jones hired consultants and designers who drew up rather idiotic plans for the division of the building into little cubicles. She was very proud. The cost was projected to be $4 million. The proposed project was paraded before the public, then in the inimitable style of the Development Director, after the planning and envisioning dust had settled, the project was simply scrapped. Hiring consultants is one thing, actually doing something is just not her style. Ms. Jones has a substantial record of elaborate projects that go nowhere. Marie Jones’s specific plan for the mill site entire cost $2.5 million. That went nowhere. The aborted dry-shed project was cheaper but of course, it went to the same place. Both were costly empty gestures, underlining the on again/off again, in the end, do nothing philosophy which is Marie Jones’ unique trademark. It is something to which the city has gradually become accustomed.

Selling expensive exercises in nothing to the City Council is her specialty. Getting in and getting out with no practical result is her forte. The dry sheds are her magnum opus of unqualified failure. Naturally, she was eager to wrap it up and get on to something else. Monday night was victory.

When the vote on the dry-shed demolition went down. Dave Turner and Mayor Lindy Peters were aghast at the Development Director's write off of the dry shed, and extremely severe in their censure of the department. Turner, a loyal defender of city hall administration, was visibly angry. Mayor Peters was strong in his advocacy of the potential of the dry shed as a possible engine of civic prosperity. When the council split they were the losers. It was the three reformers on the council, the ex-newbies who had been elected on a platform of opposition to City Hall machination and manipulation. who finally pulled the plug on a try for the future. Bernie Norvell, Will Lee, and Cueball Cimolino backed the Marie Jones plan to do nothing. It was a demonstration of puerile cynicism something like shooting a hole in the bottom of the boat because you are too far out to swim. They had seen no real plan from the Development Department and declined to engage in fantasy. They did not trust their own city administrators, so they vetoed pretense. There was a terrible consistency in it. I have never felt worse at a city council meeting.

FOLLOW UP ON PACKIE TURNER

Previously: https://www.theava.com/archives/80407#8

* * *

It turns out Packie played basketball with his older brother Dewey. "I played basketball growing up in high school. Packie was my little shadow from the age of 6 or 7. I taught him how to shoot, one on one, and treated him as a peer, not as my little brother. He was the most coachable kid I ever ran across. He'd go to my high school games, learned the NBA stats, put in long hours as a student of the game and kept getting better.

"He trained with a kid in Marin whose parents had a little money and sent him to the hoops camp in North Carolina. He already knew the moves they were teaching him. When they asked him where he learned them, he referred them to Packie. That was his lucky break."

Dewey described moving from Redwood Valley. "As a new kid in town, I didn't know anyone, so I started playing basketball and always wanted to get better. Tim Anderson, head varsity coach had a big impact on me." And it was Dewey's impact on Packie that won Steph Curry's "seal of approval" and an invitation to join the Warriors coaching team, running NBA elites through paces he learned from older brother Dewey.

"My little brother was, and still is a student of the game. He can see things others don't. He's like the basketball whisperer if you will. He's got something special. All I did was be a big brother who was extremely hard on his little brother. I taught him how to shoot and the fundamentals. He has far surpassed me with his skill level and it is who he is as a person that has got him where he is today."

(Pebbles Trippet)

FIFTH DISTRICT Supervisor Candidates' Night at the AV Grange on April 9^th starting at 7:00.

The election will be June 5^th.  All five candidates: Arthur Juhl (Gualala Real Estate Broker), David Roderick (Hopland business owner and farmer), Alan Rodier (Ukiah farmer and attorney), Chris Skyhawk (Albion youth/family counselor), and Ted Williams (Comptche computer programmer and Albion-Little River Volunteer Fire Chief) will each talk about why they think they are the most qualified for the position, answer a set of general questions, and then respond to questions from the audience.

BRUNO P. FONTAINHA, owner of the Rancho Navarro property at 3500 Seabiscuit, is being foreclosed on by a Sherman Oaks outfit. I bring it up not to embarrass Bruno but because Bruno could stave off these proceedings if he points out to his creditors that the formal notice of his mortgage arrears, was published in the ICO, Gualala, not the legally adjudicated paper for Navarro to Yorkville. It should have been posted in, the Anderson Valley Watchamacallit.

BUT FARMING in the Anderson Valley continues: “It feels as though we've taken a month off. With daily frost and hail and rain and sleet we've spent very little time in the gardens lately except to weed them and feed animals. And there's little need to be in the commercial kitchen since the produce from last year has all been  processed and the only full freezers are those containing meats...pork, beef, squab, chicken and rabbit...and those are quickly being depleted. So, we've spent our time catching up - cleaning out files and burning many pounds of paper; inputting numbers into our tracking system; fixing all the damaged and broken things that accumulate in a year; catching up on unfinished business; planning for the future; and being politically active in any way we can. Many of the starts for this year are being sown by a friend in Ft Bragg, since the weather is more stable on the coast. In preparation for planting once the weather settles, 5 flats of onions, which she started and recently delivered, are hardening off outdoors. In the greenhouse we sowed several flats of greens which are just coming up. The garlics are doing well in the field as are the overwintered onions. Otherwise the kale, collards, favas, arugula, choy, and mustards are all going to flower - our favorite part to eat. We've harvested all the cabbages for  sauerkraut and are still harvesting a small amount of broccoli each week. The plum trees have finished blooming (hopefully a few bees managed to pollinate them), the peaches are flowering now and the pears are about to pop. The most beautiful bloomer, the quince hedge, is loaded with buds. We hope your spring has sprung and that you too had time to take care of unfinished business. (Nikki and Steve at Petit Teton)

FROST FANS battered pre-dawn South Boonville early Monday morning to destroy the sleep of some three hundred nearby residents, and some not so nearby. These fans are clearly in violation of the County’s 50-decibel, max, sound ordinance. Which remains unenforced because the wine industry calls the political tune in Mendocino County. We suggest that the many persons disturbed by these early morning aural assaults call 911 to demand the persons responsible be cited. But, but, but… aren’t the wineries exempted from the noise ordinance because they’re farming? No, they’re exempted politically. The right to farm protection they cite shouldn’t apply because the affected residential neighborhoods pre-date the Anderson Valley wineries. The frost fans are four years old, although a lot of them were installed a couple years prior to being turned on. SoBo has been residential (and quiet farming) since Boonville was Kendall City, circa 1856. Right to Farm says people moving into a noisy area can complain about racket that pre-dates the newbies. Of course the frost fans are far worse than, say, a boom box belting out moron music at top volume. If you’re within a mile of a frost fan the din is so loud it’s impossible to sleep through even with ear plugs.

ATTENTION ATHEISTS: Science’s eternal problem has always been trying to explain first causes, what happened to create the vast whirlygig of which planet earth is an infinitesimal outback speck. The Big Bang started from a singularity, i.e., 0 dimension, infinite mass. Where did that come from? And if you explain that, where did that come from? Somewhere, sometime, something had to go poof! That poof is God in whatever form you want to conceive.

A READER WRITES: "I just read the interview with John Pinches today. He was the Supervisor when I was there. He sat down next to me once at the tribal center. He seems like a Good Old Boy, but often he makes sense. I once went before the Supes to lower my taxes. They really don’t know the conditions in the hills. He finally said, "Come on people, she doesn’t even have a bridge to get to her place. She is fording the stream!!!" I got the reduction. I expected Hamburg to be better, but he didn’t do much."

LITTLE DOG SAYS, “Yeah, I'm picking up a lot of Spanish. Try me. How's this: woofito-woofito? Or  bow-wow sanchez?”

THE MCKINLEY STATUE IS A CHEAP TCHOTCHKE, AND WE SHOULDN’T FEEL BAD ABOUT TOSSING IT IN THE TRASH

by Hank Sims

The most jarring thing about watching last month’s Arcata City Council meeting on whether or not to move the statue of President William McKinley from the Plaza was person after person talking about the Spanish-American War, or about the annexation of Hawaii, or about the generally imperialist legacy of our 25th president. You couldn’t help but think they were missing the point somehow. Before the most recent outbreak of hostilities, when was the last time a peek at the statue last set you to musing on history?

But then you remember: Oh, yeah! That big, goofy man-shaped hunk of bronze is theoretically supposed to represent something. So full marks to the statue’s opponents for actually looking at the thing and taking it at face value. It might seem like kind of a nerdy thing to do, and someone more versed in it than I could probably question the depth of their scholarship, but they win the argument. They have thought about President McKinley more — much more — than anyone else around here has, and they take the statue seriously as a representation of the man.

And yet supporters of the McKinley statue lament that their opponents are out to “erase our history.” What history are they talking about? Statue opponents aren’t out to censure someone who actually played a notable part in the particular history of this place. This isn’t a statue of L.K. Wood, or Ki-we-lat-tah, or Bret Harte, or Ulysses S. Grant. McKinley’s role in the story of Humboldt County is pretty insignificant. McKinley’s role in the story of the United States is pretty insignificant. (And to the degree that it is significant, it is most significant for … what? That’s what I thought.)

What the statue supporters are upset by, if they’re being honest with themselves, is that statue opponents might erase the history of the statue. They lament the coming end of their own relationship with a whimsical artifact that for some reason has stood in the Plaza for a century, glowering down on generations of Arcata children as they play on the grass. If fate had placed a statue of Chester Arthur or Martin Van Buren there, the statue’s supporters would feel exactly the same feelings for it. The statue, to them and to most of us who have lived here long enough, signifies nothing but itself. That’s because it isn’t a historical monument at all anymore, if ever it was. It’s a tchotchke.

The McKinley statue is a cheap tchotchke, and we shouldn’t feel bad about tossing it in the trash.

There’s a snow globe of Mount Rushmore on your windowsill. It’s been sitting there for years. Where did it come from? You’ve never been to Mount Rushmore, but you’ve had this thing forever. You’re reluctant to chuck it out in case it might mean something to someone, so the thing survives another day, and another. The mystery of it amuses you.

One day you remember to ask your mom about it. The two of you have a long think, and finally she comes up with the answer: Your great-aunt must have bought it for you when she went there with her tour group! You’ve heard a story or two about your great-aunt, but you don’t actually remember her. Whatever.

Time goes by. You get married. Your husband moves in. You have three magnificent children of your own. One day your husband says: Hey, Mount Rushmore is an abomination. Can we please get rid of this piece of junk?

You have two choices, here. You could thrust out your chest and hold forth on the deeds and virtues of Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln, Roosevelt. You could do some Wikipedia research on the history of the snow globe industry and the peculiar place of such objects in the history of American popular culture. You could invoke the spirit of your sainted great-aunt and the sacred place you suddenly realize she has always held in the story of your family. You can hope all this fends off your husband, who is doing the same research in reverse, throwing his findings back at you. You could do all that.

Or you could just say: Yeah, OK. Next time I go to the thrift store I’ll see if they want it. Or else we can tuck it away in the junk box up in the attic. You can choose this second course because you’re an adult now, and because you care about your husband more than you care about the object of his displeasure. If he wanted to throw out your family photo albums, that would be one thing. But the snow globe? C’mon…

We find ourselves in a moment when all America is ready to do some spring cleaning. You can feel it, right? It’s been quite a while since we last rearranged the furniture and gave the carpet a proper shaking out, or stripped the kitchen linoleum of its waxy yellow buildup. It shouldn’t be surprising, at this time, that people have cast fresh eyes on the Plaza and asked: What is this thing? What is it saying? Why is it there? Is it necessary?

Countrymen, it is not.

Old George Zehndner was heartbroken when his political idol was killed. Do we need to memorialize his grief forever? Clearly we don’t. The McKinley statue has been nothing but a figure of fun and an object of mockery for decades. You might be fond of the outsized geegaw bequeathed to us by a forgotten town father, and if so you might have the most honest of the arguments for keeping it where it is until the end of time: I just like to point at him and laugh! He has to stand there and take it!

But if you choose, instead, to stand up and assay a puffed-up case for McKinley as not such a bad guy, or for the statue as an object of significant historical importance that must be preserved for the edification of our descendents, then you have fully earned the vaudeville hook that is now inching toward you from stage right. It just isn’t that. It’s a tchotchke. We shouldn’t feel bad about tossing it in the trash.

Do it!

(Courtesy, LostCoastOutpost.com)

LONE POPPY

(by Judy Valadao)

CREEPING BUSHANSKY-ISM?

Your recreation input to MCRPD Mar 24th

Mendocino Coast Recreation & Parks District is holding a series of meetings about their Ten Year plan. They say: “The purpose of the meeting is to receive public feedback in regards to recreation needs for the next ten years as part of the district’s current strategic planning process.” The only strategic planning process I have heard of is for the OHV (Off Highway Vehicle) park. There is going to be a meeting on March 24 in Albion at the Albion School House, 30400 Albion Ridge Road. There was already a meeting in Elk at the Greenwood Pre-school on February 24 and one in Point Arena on March 3. I could find no information on the website about what happened at these meetings. There will be a meeting on April 7 in Caspar at the Community Center, 15051 Caspar Road and one May 19 in Fort Bragg at CV Starr. All public meetings are scheduled from 10:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m.

Rixanne Wehren

THE REAL ATROCITY

Letter to the Editor

I do not know Tai Abreu, or who he or his friends murdered, or why, but I’ve read his letters and your defense of him over and over in the AVA. Mr. Abreu wound up with an incompetent attorney and was sentenced to life in prison, while his buddies plea-bargained for long prison terms. Was the “gross miscarriage of justice” because Mr. Abreu was not guilty and did not participate in what appears to have been a horrendous crime? Or was it because Mr. Abreu got a longer prison term than his murdering friends? You refer to Mr. Abreu’s sentence as an “atrocity,” but it seems to me that whatever Mr. Abreu and his friends did was the real atrocity.

L.C. Lewis

Willits

ED REPLY: Yes, as you say it was murder most foul, but whatever Abreu's involvement — he was the lookout man and unaware murder was the intent of one of the other two youths with him — it's an injustice to Abreu that his co-perps get another shot at life but he doesn't simply because his lawyer, Ms. Thompson, was and is grossly incompetent. Ditto for the judge (Henderson) who presided over Abreu's farce of a trial. The Abreu case raises the fundamental question of equal justice, not to say proportionality. We probably disagree, but I don't think a kid of 19 should get the essential death penalty of life without the possibility of parole no matter how heinous his crime.  Who among us is the same person he was at 19?

A NEW KIND OF COAST POACHING: SUCCULENTS!

MSP received this post from CA Fish & Wildlife:

"Last week Wardens contacted two men poaching succulents on private property between Point Arena and Anchor Bay.

It is the second contact Wardens have had with succulent poachers in the last month.

This particular incident found that the two men had rented a minivan and had filled it with over 1,400 (approximately 800 lbs.) of the succulent 'Dudleya Farinosa.'

This succulent is a long-lived plant that can live up to a 100 years. It is known to be present from Southern Oregon to Monterey County and is found along the bluffs along the coast. It is believed that the plants are being sold to vendors catering to the boutique succulent market in Korea and China.

Wardens ask that you contact the Cal Tip number at 1-888-334-2258 if you see any suspicious activity."

(Courtesy, MendocinoSportsPlus)

CATCH OF THE DAY, March 19, 2018

NATHAN HENRY, Ukiah. DUI.

ERIN KEALY, Santa Cruz. Suspended license, forged vehicle registration, stolen property.

CODY LADD, Ukiah. Parole violation, probation revocation.

VANCE LANGENDERFER, Ukiah. Domestic abuse.

ANTHONY LOPES SR., Willits. Disorderly conduct-alcohol, probation revocation.

MASON MCGEE, Ukiah. Disorderly conduct-alcohol, probation revocation.

THOMMY NACE, Ukiah. Probation revocation.

JEFFREY NORTON, Ukiah. DUI, hit&run with property damage.

JULIAN SALAZAR, Rio Linda/Ukiah. Parapheralia, burglary tools, concealed weapon, loaded firearm, felon-addict with firearm.*

RICHARD SULLIVAN, Laytonville. Under influence, interference with police communications.

TODD TAYLOR, Ukiah. Domestic abuse.

* * *

*Armed Man Arrested Outside Ukiah Market

An armed man carrying a loaded handgun, hatchets and burglary tools was in custody in the Mendocino County Jail after a Ukiah police officer spotted him late Sunday night outside a market, police officials said Monday.

pressdemocrat.com/news/8131041-181/police-armed-man-arrested-outside

THE WAR ON THE POST OFFICE

The U.S. banking establishment has been at war with the post office since at least 1910, when the Postal Savings Bank Act established a public savings alternative to a private banking system that had crashed the economy in the Bank Panic of 1907.

truthdig.com/articles/the-war-on-the-post-office/

PRIORITIES

Editor:

A dog dies while being transported in the overhead bin on a United Airlines flight. Within a few days legislation is introduced in Congress to make sure such a thing can never happen again.

Seventeen high school students are massacred by a troubled teenager who was easily able to purchase a semiautomatic rifle. This has happened many times before. Congress takes no action to prevent it from happening again.

There you have it — our country’s priorities.

John Mason

Santa Rosa

ON LINE COMMENT OF THE DAY

I’m gonna miss daylight savings time. I never set my clock back last fall, so I was an hour ahead of everybody else. That comes in handy sometimes.

IF YOU COME TO A FORK IN THE ROAD, TAKE IT

by James Kunstler

Various readers, fans, blog commenters, Facebook trolls, and auditors twanged on me all last week about my continuing interest in the RussiaRussiaRussia hysteria, though there is no particular consensus of complaint among them — except for a general “shut up, already” motif. For the record, I’m far more interested in the hysteria itself than the Russia-meddled-in the-election case, which I consider to be hardly any case at all beyond 13 Russian Facebook trolls.

The hysteria, on the other hand, ought to be a matter of grave concern, because it appears more and more to have been engineered by America’s own intel community, its handmaidens in the Dept of Justice, and the twilight’s last gleamings of the Obama White House, and now it has shoved this country in the direction of war at a time when civilian authority over the US military looks sketchy at best. This country faces manifold other problems that are certain to reduce the national standard of living and disrupt the operations of an excessively complex and dishonest economy, and the last thing America needs is a national war-dance over trumped-up grievances with Russia.

The RussiaRussiaRussia narrative has unspooled since Christmas and is blowing back badly through the FBI, now with the firing (for cause) of Deputy Director Andrew McCabe hours short of his official retirement (and inches from the golden ring of his pension). He was axed on the recommendation of his own colleagues in the FBI’s Office of Professional Responsibility, and they may have been influenced by the as-yet-unreleased report of the FBI Inspector General, Michael Horowitz, due out shortly.

The record of misbehavior and “collusion” between the highest ranks of the FBI, the Democratic Party, the Clinton campaign, several top political law firms, and a shady cast of international blackmail peddlars is a six-lane Beltway-scale evidence trail compared to the muddy mule track of Trump “collusion” with Russia. It will be amazing if a big wad of criminal cases are not dealt out of it, even as The New York Times sticks its fingers in its ears and goes, “La-la-la-la-la….”

It now appears that Mr. McCabe’s statements post-firing tend to incriminate his former boss, FBI Director James Comey — who is about to embark, embarrassingly perhaps, on a tour for his self-exculpating book, A Higher Loyalty: Truth, Lies, and Leadership.

A great aura of sanctimony surrounds the FBI these days. Even the news pundits seem to have forgotten the long, twisted reign of J. Edgar Hoover (1924 – 1972), a dangerous rogue who excelled at political blackmail. And why, these days, would any sane American take pronouncements from the CIA and NSA at face value? What seems to have gone on in the RussiaRussiaRussia matter is that various parts of the executive branch in the last months under Mr. Obama gave each other tacit permission, wink-wink, to do anything necessary to stuff HRC into the White House and, failing that, to derail her opponent, the Golden Golem of Greatness.

The obvious lesson in all this huggermugger is that the ends don’t justify the means. I suspect there are basically two routes through this mess. One is that the misdeeds of FBI officers, Department of Justice lawyers, and Intel agency executives get adjudicated by normal means, namely, grand juries and courts. That would have the salutary effect of cleansing government agencies and shoring up what’s left of their credibility at a time when faith in institutions hangs in the balance.

The second route would be for the authorities to ignore any formal response to an evermore self-evident trail of crimes, and to allow all that political energy to be funneled into manufactured hysteria and eventually a phony provocation of war with Russia. Personally, I’d rather see the US government clean house than blow up the world over an engineered hallucination.

(Support Kunstler’s writing by visiting his Patreon Page.)

ON LINE COMMENT OF THE WEEK: How many times have you seen young couples walking together or intertwined on public transit, each grinning not at one another but rather at their own smartphone-devise. Think of it. The young guy has his inamorata right beside him and he’s paying NO attention to HER. And vice-versa. We’ve given up kin-clan-tribe for the rugged-individualist model. While you can say that this is a result of wide historical forces or maybe claim that the individual freely makes choices for himself, and while the choices might seem rational for him alone, they have wide-spread societal consequences when taken in aggregate. So you can say that the process of social atomization started a long time ago. And you can say that it was sped up with the onset of radio broadcasts. While you can say that the broadcasts brought the family into close proximity to listen, their attention was focused on the broadcast, not one another. You can say the same about the widespread adoption of TV sets. But then you add in social media. And now you have people in close proximity and they’re not even paying attention to the same thing ie the same radio or TV program, never mind to one another. The logical result? Social echo-chambers, a multitude of closed off head-spaces. Not only does the young fella have no discernible life-path aside maybe from minimum-wage, part-time shifts at the coffee shop, but now he’s not even a member of a wider society, he exists on his own or maybe attached to an on-line subculture, the individual members maybe never even meeting face-to-face. People were not evolved in this environment. There’s consequences to de-personalization and societal atomization so maybe it’s no wonder that natural selection is keeping apace with a proliferation of people with Asperger’s, especially working in the tech business. After all what do social skills and social interactions matter if you’re not interacting? Decisions are made with one thing in mind and that’s the bottom line and with no other thought as to what these decisions might threaten.

AHOY AMERICA, GIVE TRUMP A TASTE OF HIS OWN MEDICINE STARTING ON TRUMP IMITATION DAY

by Ralph Nader

Trump Imitation Day will take place online on April 1, this April Fools’ Day, 2018 — a day driven by the vast and varied online networks of America with all of their imagination and organizational capability.

Here is the rationale behind this special style of giving Trump a reverse dose of Trumpism. Trump has proven repeatedly that he is a serial prevaricator, bully, cheater, boaster, malicious myth-maker, racist, abuser of women, slanderer, violator of laws and the Constitution and emerging war-monger.

Openly, through his appointees, he is destroying crucial, long-held health, safety and economic protections for consumers, workers and the environment in the service of Big Business. He is dictatorial and loves brutal dictators in numerous foreign countries.

No matter how many serious exposes, critiques, corrections of his hundreds of false statements (fake facts), entreaties to be truthful and connect with reality, along with the heartfelt pleas of aggrieved Americans, Trump doesn’t relent or admit and correct his fictions. He refuses to recognize blatant wrong-doing and continues his foul-mouthed attacks on anyone who arouses his thin-skinned ire. Even more, he doubles down on his deficiencies of character and personality — all relayed by a supine, ratings-driven mass media that mostly denies his targets their rebuttals.

Maybe we can get through to him by giving him a taste of his own medicine, turning his style of aggressive personal attacks against him.

Take, for example his juvenile use of pejorative nicknames. It started with “Low Energy” Jeb Bush, “Lyin” Ted Cruz and “Little Marco” Rubio during his primary campaign in 2015-2016. His repertoire expanded to “Crooked” Hillary in the main campaign, spread as President to “Liddle Bob Corker,” “Cryin’ Chuck” Schumer, “Flaky” Jeff Flake, “Pocahontas” Elizabeth Warner, “Low I.Q.” Rep. Maxine Waters, and “Lamb the Sham” for Pennsylvania House of Representatives winning candidate and Marine veteran Conor Lamb.

He even labelled NBC’s Meet the Press anchor as “Sleepy Eyes Chuck Todd” while calling the media the “enemy of the people.” Never in American history has a President of the United States stooped to his gutter level. Why is this so troubling? Because the mass media repeat these outbursts and make these slurs and insults stick in their ditto-heading, day after day “reporting.” It is as if he owns the mass media. This mindless echoing of Trump even includes the otherwise critical New York Times and the Washington Post.

That is why, for Trump Imitation Day, nick-names have to be announced for Trump — say, “Corrupt Donald,” “Cheating Donald,” or “Tall-Tale Trump" — until the press recovers its senses and stops being Trump’s nick-name bullhorn.

Wherever Trump brags and boasts about himself in demonstrably false ways he should be countered with truthful monikers. When he talks of being a fabulous businessman, he gets back the moniker, “a failed gambling czar whose companies went bankrupt.” When he says he loves and respects women, he gets back, “female assaulter in chief.”

When he talks about how rich he is, ask him to prove it by finally releasing his tax returns, like all other modern Presidents have done. Is he refusing to disclose because he has evaded taxes?

When he boasts about how academically smart he was, ask him to prove his academic credentials. Fordham University has him listed as “failure to complete.” Also, how does the public really know he was born in the U.S. since he hasn’t released his birth certificate, as he demanded Barack Obama do. Tit for tat.

When he refers the deadly, air-poisoning mineral, as “beautiful clean coal,” demand that he go down into a coal mine, as I did while pushing for the Mine Safety Act of 1969. Tell him to visit coal miners dying in hospital rooms from “black lung” disease. (Hundreds of thousands of miners have lost their lives from this occupational disease since 1900.)

Bring him back to reality by hurling concise, memorable facts and truth against his lies and insults. Be pithy, clever, and unrelenting. When he repeals or fails to enforce lifesaving, health protecting regulations, don’t just accuse him of “de-regulation” in wonky terms. Tell him he is killing, injuring or sickening consumers and workers, and tell him he is poisoning the water, air and food where children and families are trying to live. Otherwise, Trump — riding on tweets and a sensation-crazed mass media – will dissolve the rationality of our society and intimidate many good people into silence.

Trump knows how to intimidate and play the bully. In 1990, he told Playboy magazine, “When somebody tries to sucker punch me, when they’re after my ass, I push back a hell of a lot harder than I was pushed in the first place….Those people don’t come back for seconds.”

OK America, give him some of his own medicine and watch him flail, bellow and smear until his ugly persona crumbles beyond the sixty percent of the American people who already reject this Electoral College selectee.

Don’t give up. Repetition is key to countering his revolting behavior, like lancing a giant boil. He will either come to his senses or he will check out and retire to Mar-a-Lago. There he can watch the rising ocean and contemplate his repeated description of climate change as a hoax.

(Ralph Nader is a consumer advocate, lawyer and author of Only the Super-Rich Can Save Us!)

APRIL OCEAN SALMON SEASON OPENER CANCELLED ON MUCH OF CALIFORNIA COAST

by Dan Bacher

The opening of California’s recreational ocean salmon season from Point Arena to Pigeon Point on the first Saturday in April has been a fond tradition for anglers for many years — but it won’t happen this year, due to low numbers of Klamath and Sacramento River salmon returns three years in a row. The Pacific Fishery Management Council (PFMC) at its March meeting in Rohnert Park, California, made the decision to open only a limited section of the California coast on April 7.

The low numbers of fish were spurred by a combination of drought conditions, water diversions and poor water and fish management by the state and federal governments.

California’s recreational salmon fishery will open in ocean waters on Saturday, April 7 from Pigeon Point south to the U.S./Mexico border, according to the California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW).

The season in that region, including both the Monterey North and Monterey South management area, will be open to fishing for all salmon except coho, with a limit of two fish per day. The Chinook minimum size limit will be 24 inches total length; and the same gear restrictions will apply as in 2017. However, this fishery may be modified at the March Council meeting, according to the PFMC.

The recreational salmon fishery will remain closed in all other areas off California during the month of April.

The PFMC meeting followed a March 1 salmon fishery information meeting in Santa Rosa where many anglers left scratching their heads, due to favorable counts of two-year-old salmon (jacks and jills) that have been used to forecast ocean salmon abundance, offset by three years of low Klamath and Sacramento returns that didn’t meet their conservation goals.

Salmon fishing will be closed in the month of April in the Fort Bragg management area, from Horse Mountain to Point Arena, and the San Francisco management area, from Point Arena  to Pigeon Point.

This is the first time that the season from Pigeon Point to Point Arena hasn't opened on the first Saturday in April since the Central Valley salmon collapse of 2008-2010, a disaster caused by a “perfect storm” combining poor ocean conditions, massive water exports out of the Delta and again, poor water and fish management by the state and federal governments.

On a positive note, the Klamath Management Zone will be reopened in both California and Oregon this year, due to improved forecasts of Klamath River fall Chinook abundance in 2018 compared to 2017.

All recreational and commercial fishing for Klamath River fall Chinook salmon was closed last season, along with the inland recreational season in the Klamath and Trinity rivers and the Yurok Tribe’s commercial salmon fishery. The Yurok and Hoopa Valley tribes had a very limited subsistence fall Chinook fishery in 2017, while the Karuk Tribe decided to limit its traditional dip net fishery at Ishi-Pishi Falls.

The Council developed alternatives for 2018 fisheries to allow for spawning escapement in excess of what is required under the Salmon Fishery Management Plan in an effort to begin rebuilding both Klamath River fall Chinook and Sacramento River fall Chinooks.

“California’s recent drought combined with poor ocean conditions has resulted in three consecutive years of low abundance for Sacramento River fall Chinook and Klamath River fall Chinook, pushing both into ‘overfished’ status,” said California Department of Fish and Wildlife Environmental Scientist Kandice Morgenstern.

Morgenstern said fishing seasons “are being curtailed this year in an effort to increase spawner escapement to the Sacramento and Klamath river basins in 2018.”

Morgenstern also noted that for the first time, state ocean salmon fishing regulations will “automatically conform” to federal ocean salmon fishing regulations using the new process described in the California Code of Regulations Title 14, section 1.95. In the past, the California Fish and Game Commission needed to adopt the April season recommended by the PFMC.

California is not the only state that will see salmon fishing cutbacks. Salmon seasons in Oregon and Washington have been crafted to protect coho runs and lower Columbia River natural tule fall Chinook.

“Although some abundance forecasts are improved over last year, the 2018 salmon runs still present a challenge for ocean fishermen and managers throughout the west coast,” said Chuck Tracy, Executive Director of the PFMC.  “In the north, low returns of some Puget Sound and Washington coastal coho runs and lower Columbia River natural tule fall Chinook will constrain fisheries. In the south, the conservation needs of Sacramento River fall Chinook and Rogue/Klamath coho will constrain fisheries.”

Council Chair Phil Anderson added, “Once again, the Council adopted a range of management alternatives for public review designed to conserve and rebuild a broad range of Chinook and coho stocks of concern. Commercial and recreational fisheries will face restrictions in areas along the entire west coast in response to the Council’s conservation efforts.”

“I’m very disappointed but not surprised by the cancellation of the opener,” said Richard Pool, the Secretary for the Golden Gate Salmon Association (GGSA). “The runs are in bad shape. It’s not the fault of the fishermen, but I’m not surprised that adjustments have to be made this season.”

“The problem is the low survival of the juvenile salmon in the rivers and in the Delta. There are solutions and the State and Federal Governments need to step up and implement them while it is still possible,” said Pool.

2017 adult spawning escapement of Sacramento River fall run Chinooks was only 44,574 adults in 2017, well below the conservation goal range of 122,000 to 180,000 fish.

This is the second lowest return ever. In 2009, when the fishing industry was shut down, the return was 40,873.

The 2017 Klamath Basin fall Chinook run was the 5th lowest in 39 years of records and 43 percent of the 39-year average.

The adult Chinook returns to the basin were 173 percent of the projected forecast — 18,410 versus 31,838 post.

On a more promising note, 2017 Sacramento River jack counts were well above normal. A total of 24,375 jacks returned to the Upper Sacramento, Feather River and American River Basins in 2017, reported Vanessa Gusman, CDFW environmental scientist.

The number of 2-year-old grilse (also called jacks and jills) in the Klamath is 21,903, above the long term average and a precursor for age three abundance.

Jack counts are employed to model the ocean abundance forecasts for the year. Forecasts by Michael O’Farrell of NOAA Fisheries presented at the March CDFW meeting suggest there are 229,400 Sacramento River fall Chinook adults and 359,200 Klamath River fall Chinook adults in the ocean this year.

Commercial season alternatives south of Cape Falcon to Humbug Mt. also face further restrictions this year to protect Sacramento and Klamath River fall Chinook. Chinook salmon seasons open May through October with closed periods in May through August.

Commercial season alternatives south of the Klamath Management Zone are also restricted this year to protect Sacramento River fall Chinook. All areas are limited to about two to three months of fishing or less, according to the PFMC.

Salmon seasons beginning on or after May 1 will be decided during the April 5-11 PFMC meeting in Portland, Oregon. The PFMC is considering alternatives for California’s 2018 commercial and recreational ocean salmon regulations, including season dates and size limits.

The public is encouraged to comment at a hearing on Tuesday, March 27 at 7 p.m., at the Laurel Inn and Conference Center, 801 West Laurel Drive in Salinas. Comments can also be submitted through the PFMC website at www.pcouncil.org <http://www.pcouncil.org/>.

The Council will forward its final season recommendations to National Marine Fisheries Service for its approval and implementation by May 1.

Public notification of any in-season change to conform state regulations to federal regulations is made through the NMFS ocean salmon hotline at (800) 662-9825.

THE ROBES WANT YOU (NOT REALLY BUT THEY FAKE IT PRETTY GOOD)

Recruitment for the 2018/2019 Mendocino County Grand Jury 

“All qualified citizens interested in serving on the 2018/2019 Mendocino County Grand Jury are invited to submit their applications to the Superior Court for consideration,” announced the Honorable Jeanine B. Nadel, Chair of the Grand Jury Recruitment/Selection Committee. The deadline for application submission is Friday, April 27th, 2018. The 2018/2019 Grand Jury will be sworn in at the end of June, 2018 (date to be announced).

Service on the Civil Grand Jury is an excellent opportunity to learn about the inner workings of government, while providing a valuable service to the community. The 19 members of the Grand Jury serve for one year and are empowered to investigate the operations of county, city and district governments; provide civil oversight of local government departments and agencies; and respond to citizen complaints. The Grand Jury sets its own agenda and meeting schedule. Much of the work is performed in small committees allowing for considerable flexibility in the work schedule and meeting locations.

Grand Jurors are compensated $25 per full panel meeting, $10 per committee meeting and committee attendance at public meetings. Mileage is reimbursed at the current County of Mendocino rate. There is free onsite parking. Prior to being nominated, each qualifying applicant is interviewed by a Superior Court judge. Training for Grand Jurors will be provided.

To serve as a Grand Juror, the following requirements must be met:

• At least 18 years of age
• United States citizen
• Resident of Mendocino County for at least one year
• Sufficiently fluent in written and spoken English
• Not currently serving on any other governmental board or commission during the term
• Not presently holding a public office
• Not personally active in any campaign of a candidate for elective office

Applications and related information are available on the Internet at: www.mendocino.courts.ca.gov/general_info/operations/grandjury.asp. The application may also be obtained in person at the Superior Court, 100 North State Street, Rm. 303, Ukiah or by calling the Grand Jury at (707) 463-4320.

For more information contact:

Kim Weston, Administrative Assistant
Superior Court of California, County of Mendocino
100 N. State Street, Room 303
Ukiah, CA 954825
(707) 467-6437