Attendees at the former Lucerne Castle participated in a two-day workshop on how to prevent wildfires. The Lake County Risk Reduction Authority was at the old New Paradigm College for the event last Thursday and Friday, working with local and national organizations and the Fire Adapted Communities Learning Network. Cal Fire was in attendance along with the Red Cross, North Coast Opportunities, various fire councils and others. There were breakout groups with Ideas including a fire safety summer camp, fire safety in your workforce and continuing these kinds of workshop events and discussions.
Round Valley Tribal members take to the Capitol in support of an Assembly Bill to establish a “Feather Alert” notification system. Like the Amber Alert or the Silver Alert system, “Feather Alerts” would help to locate Native Americans who are either missing or may have been murdered. If that person disappears under suspicious circumstances, then a Feather Alert would quickly go out to notify the public about vital information on the missing individual. A Round Valley Tribal Councilman appeared before lawmakers in Senate Chambers to say they had the Tribal Council’s full-fledged support for the “Feather Alert” notification system. Khadijah Britton’s granddad, Ronnie Hostler, his wife and their daughter Connie were also there and spoke about the failed searches since Khadijah’s 2018 disappearance.
There’s been a breach of some Calif. Dept. of Justice databases that shows the private information of those permitted to carry a concealed weapon in the state. The Fresno County Sheriff’s Office announced the leak on its Facebook page. And the Attorney General Rob Bonta put out a statement saying how the public could look themselves at the agency’s 2022 Firearms Dashboard Portal, because transparency is key to the public trust. But then the dashboard was immediately shut down after the leak. Bonta’s office has reportedly spoken to the Fresno County Sheriff’s Office and says they’re trying to figure out the scope of the breach and will be in touch with those impacted.
A home close to Hopland has burned in a fire. Mendo Fever reports it happened just before midnight last night in the 12000 block of Highway 101. A single-story home was gutted, power lines reported down, but it was out in less than a half hour. No injuries were reported, or a cause known yet.
The Mendocino County Registrar of Voters reports the final results of the June 7th primary are in. Not much changed as the results were finalized. The major races being watched, Superintendent of Schools, Supervisors in the 3rd and 5th Districts and the Sheriff, all stayed the same. 5th District Supervisor and Board Chair Ted Williams kept his lead and seat. The 3rd District Supervisor John Haschak, also way ahead election night, stayed that way. And the Sheriff, Matt Kendall, who had a last minute, write in challenger, held on strong. The surprise that night, was the Superintendent of Schools race, with Nicole Glentzer winning the seat over incumbent Michelle Hutchins. Hutchins was endorsed by the former Sheriff Tom Allman and current DA David Eyster. But, Hutchins lost with under 45% of the vote.
Fun for the whole family as the Round Valley Blackberry Festival returns in person this year. The 39th festival is August 21st and 22nd in Covelo. Organizers are trying to raise more money though to help defray the costs after two years of cancellations because of the COVID19 pandemic. They say they still had expenses because last year they canceled only one week before. Their GoFundMe account will pay for insurance, festival permits, mobile restrooms, renovations and maintaining the festival site, among other items. They hope to raise $5,000.
After the Hopkins Fire last summer, a handful of homeowners applied for permits to rebuild in the fire’s footprint. Mendo Voice reports the county’s division of Prevention, Recovery, Resiliency, & Mitigation said seven homes have applied for the rebuild permits. The fire burned in Calpella last Sept. Nearly a year later, items removed from 21 home sites by the state’s Consolidated Debris Removal Program included contaminated ash, asbestos, propane tanks, and hazardous trees. The Governor’s Office of Emergency Services also announced the county would get back about $60,000 for the removal of the debris. In all 36 homes were destroyed. So, some may not rebuild or are using private contractors for the work.
Since the last Public Health Officer in Lake County, Dr. Erik McLaughlin resigned, we have a new interim officer. Dr. Gary Pace who has held this position before as the permanent officer and interim, is back. McLaughlin resigned June 21st after less than four months on the job, mostly working remotely. Dr. Pace went back to private practice over a year ago but was the interim officer on and off since then. The county had to get a health officer in place immediately to comply with state law. The board voted unanimously for Pace to join once again. The agreement for Pace’s services is from this week until the end of July, for now.
A small-ish earthquake has shaken California. It happened outside Cobb in Lake County. Only about 800 people live in Cobb, proper. The 4.2-temblor hit minutes before 5 a.m. yesterday morning. It was less than a mile deep. And multiple shake reports came in from all the way out to Santa Rosa and Petaluma. There were a bunch of aftershocks too, but they were each under 2.0-magnitude. Earthquakes under about 5.4 magnitude can feel pretty strong and are usually noticed, but usually don’t cause a lot of damage. And the smaller ones, under 2.5 are usually not noticed by most.
The cases of COVID are going up again as there are more variants of the omicron strain. The California Department of Public Health reported a statewide positivity rate at over 13%, up from 11.4% the week before. And the positivity rate has skyrocketed since April. The actual case rate is down, but testing rates are down, so it could be that there are more cases than we know. Hospitalizations are still going up, up 13% for the week of June 18th to June 25th. The BA.4 and BA.5 omicron variants are now the dominant strains per the CDC.
The last bit of renovations are taking place at Willits City Hall. The city council met last week, and the city manager said it’s their final push. They were closing City Hall for a day to paint and move all the furniture in. He said even though the public has been patient with the make-over, they need to wait a tad longer for completion.
