Santa Rosa Wastwater Discharge Hearings NOW

Please scroll down to previous post Santa Rosa Wastewater Discharge EIR Ready to Read for the full story - here are current updates and the Hearing Schedule:


BPU Certified EIR with Unanimous Vote - October 2, 2008. Many residents and experts on river health came to speak. We tried to convince the BPU Board that the most recent changes in the EIR reagarding the Steelhead Beach discharge site needed more time for study - but the board said no. Sonoma County Regional Parks objected to their park as a discharge site, submitted a letter from Director Mary Burns that both Regional Parks and Fish and Game had not been properly informed nor part of the process, but even that failed to sway the board from certifying the EIR. NEXT: Project selection. Although BPU insists that the Laguna is the preferred discharge site, there still needs to be pressure to protect Steelhead Beach. The most recent plans to bring the pipeline further down River Road before cutting over to the Russian River just upstream from Children's Beach, is still unaccaptable to Russian River advocates. If you have thoughts on this subject - this next meeeting is imporant to attend.

BPU Study Session re: Project Selection - November 6, 2008
BPU has a study session at their regular meeting. They will probably take public comments at this meeting as well, but no decision would be made at this meeting.

SR Council Review Study Session Results - November 18, 2008 (about 5 PM) This discussion with probably have time for the public to speak. No decision would be made here.

BPU Project Selection/Approval - December 4, 2008 This is the meeting where they will select a project. This is the last chance for comments and public testimony.

Seasonal Storage Project:

Final EIR available for Review - October 6, 2008
BPU considers EIR Certification - October 16, 2008

The meetings where certification will be considered are held during Board of Public Utilities (BPU) meetings in the Santa Rosa Council Chamber, 100 Santa Rosa Avenue, Santa Rosa.
All meetings will be at 1:30 PM, *except the October 2nd meeting, which will be at 5 PM. Confirm agenda and schedule at http://www.SRCity.org/BPU.

10/7 UPDATE: Information about the Seasonal Storage Project (SSP) and the availability of
the Final EIR follows below.

The SSP Final EIR is available for review October 6.
Available online at www.SRCity.org/SeasonalStorage under
<http://ci.santa-rosa.ca.us/departments/utilities/irwp/storage/Pages/studies
_reports.aspx> Studies & Reports.

The Board of Public Utilities (BPU) meeting at which certification will be
considered is being held at 5 PM* in the Santa Rosa Council Chamber, 100
Santa Rosa Avenue, Santa Rosa.

(*Note meeting time change to 5 PM) Confirm agenda and schedule at
http://www.SRCity.org/BPU.

Where you can find copies of the SSP FINAL EIR:

The Final SSP EIR (as well as the Discharge Compliance Project EIR) will be
available for review at Sonoma County Branch Libraries in Santa Rosa,
Rohnert Park/Cotati, Sebastopol, and Windsor and on the project Web site at
www.SRCity.org/IRWP.

The Final EIRs, appendices and reference material cited in the Final EIRs
will also be available for review at the Laguna Plant Library, located at
4300 Llano Road, Santa Rosa. Hard copies and CDs of the Final EIRs will be
available for purchase by calling ARC at 707.579.9096.

If you have any questions please call 707.836.0300.


NEW NOTES 9/30/08
Mark Millan called to say he has received some panic concerns and questions from people - this is his summary to allay fears:

The Laguna Site is noted in the EIR as the Environmentally Superior Alternative meaning it has the fewest or least significant effects on the environment. See pages 1-10 and 11 of the EIR. Steelhead Beach (Site D1) would be 20 to 30 times more costly (140 to 174 million) than the Laguna site.

The Russian River would not be closed for any period of time if they chose the Steelhead Beach site (D1) - they would use what is called a Coffer Dam that holds water back from where they are working - forcing the river around the dam - not stopping the flow.

Santa Rosa is in serious budget crisis - like the rest of the world - and simply doesn't have the resources to do a large scale project. But - they have to meet NCRWCB regulations for oxygen and temperature, thus the study and project. Plus CEQA (California Environmental Quality Act) requires they study a range of feasible projects.

Calpine (The Geysers) would like just about every drop of water Santa Rosa creates so discharge would only be necessary in wet years when there is too much water coming through the treatment plant.

Leaky Pipes - they finally heard Brenda - are being fixed at a very slow rate - but have increasingly been recognized as a major source of inflow into the treatment plant.

Moving the Steelhead project site up River Road was intended to reduce the environmental impacts to the area. Steelhead Beach and Osprey Trail. - CEQA requires impacts to be avoided where possible.

Reverse Osmosis, also known as Advanced Membrane Treatment (AMT) facilities were reviewed in the EIR for each proposed discharge site including at the Laguna. Consideration for using AMT as a strategy to meet regulatory compliance is evaluated in the EIR and you can find it in the Draft EIR in Volume 4 of 6; Section 3.3.3., on page 51.

Also see Volume 6 of 6, TM-D10 Advance Membrane Treatment Evaluation, which
goes in to great detail how this type of treatment could be used.

All available on line at:
http://ci.santa-rosa.ca.us/departments/utilities/irwp/discharge/Pages/studies_reports.aspx

Source:
Mark Millan
Public Information Coordinator
www.SRCity.org/IRWP
707.836.0300
EM: millan@DataInstincts.com

COMMENTS from Brenda Adelman 9/30/08

Much of what Mark has written is basically correct and what I have been saying for years. What he doesn’t say is why they want concerned citizens to back off just as the big decision is going to be made. They are feeling the heat from concerned citizens now who have been alerted to their pending decisions.

The City has already removed five options from this proposal and were asked repeatedly to take this one off as well and they refused. They are now working very hard to get people in the community to back off at a critical juncture. Yet, the City has spent six years and about $16 million planning this direct discharge into the Russian River. Does it make sense that they would back off this easily?

Mark is a very nice man, but the City is absolutely not to be trusted in this. They have a long history of spinning and ignoring, etc. things we have been saying for years. Why is it, at this critical point in time, they are all of a sudden agreeing with us? Why are trying to diffuse public interest in the up coming decisions that will have very significant legal implications that will seal our fate on river discharge? It is imperative that the people speak out now and not buy into these empty assurances. Until the meetings/hearings are held and the votes are counted, we have NO assurance that what he says will happen.

Brenda

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Readers Endorse Candidates and Share Opinions

This is a collection of LETTERS I have received since the September 18th issue of WCG. The particular collection refers to the upcoming election for Board of Supervisors. For Letters that refer to material in that edition, please go to the HOME PAGE at http://www.westcountygazette.com/, click on CURRENT EDITION and scroll down to the Table of Contents to the LETTERS pages. - V


Dear Vesta,
I read Tom Lynch’s letter accusing Rue Furch’s campaign of slandering, misrepresenting and trying to destroy Efren Carrillo (his words, not mine) in the race for Fifth District Supervisor. Although Lynch’s letter was passionate, it didn’t ring true with me. I know Rue and I have worked for her campaign. In all the time I have spent with her and her supporters, I have never heard any of them speak in a way to “destroy” or badmouth Efren or his character. Quite the opposite, my sense is that Rue and her supporters highly respect Efren and find him to be a personable, charismatic, and intelligent opponent.

I think what Tom Lynch may be sensing, is not so much something that the Furch campaign is doing, but the fact that there are a number of us who live in 5th District who recognize that Efren is strongly supported by powerful groups who, in the past, have lobbied hard against issues we supported. For example, Efren is supported by groups who fought hard to defeat the GE-free initiative and also strongly opposed badly needed riparian (creek) protections during public hearings for the General Pan 2020 Update. Lynch is right when he says West County voters aren’t naive, because people like me, who actually attend Board of Supervisor and Sonoma County Planning Commission hearings, know that the very groups who support Efren are powerful opponents of the environment.

Efren has told me personally that “he will listen” to all sides of an issue before making a decision. This is admirable, but it is not the listening I am worried about, it is the decisions he will make if elected as Supervisor. The 5th District has historically been the most left leaning of the five Board of Sups seats and this is because the 5th District constituency is also the most left leaning. Important land use decisions are ultimately decided by the Board of Sups. For example, if elected, I am concerned how Efren would determine “substantial benefit” on Preservation Ranch, one of the worst environmental and precedent setting (agricultural conversion of timber to vineyard) projects to come before the County in a long time.

Rue is overwhelmingly supported by those of us in the environmental community. Rue has concerns about water, sustainability, the environment, health care, worker benefits and quality of life that are similar to many of us who live here. Rue has a 16 year voting record on the Planning Commission where she has proved herself as a knowledgeable, capable and experienced decision maker. She is supported by the current Supervisor Mike Reilly who has done a great job for 11 years supporting 5th District interests on the Board. It may also interest 5th District voters that Rue is supported by both the United Farm Workers and Centro Laboral de Graton (Graton Labor Hall).

Simply put, although Efren represents himself as “environmental” (in the 5th District it would be political suicide not to), he is strongly supported by groups who are not. He is also young, inexperienced, politically green and does not have a voting record I can look at to figure out where he really stands on the issues that are important to me. In my opinion, Efren is a wild card, and I really have no idea how he will vote if elected.

In the coming years, I would be delighted to see Efren represent the 5th District on a commission, like the Planning Commission, as Rue has done, so we can see what this ambitious young man is all about. But with the facts at hand, I feel that Rue is hands down the best qualified and the more transparent of the two candidates. Please consider supporting her with your vote in November.

Jo Bentz
Sebastopol

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Dear Editor:

When I read Jo Bentz' letter in this weeks Sonoma West Times and News regarding the campaign tactics of her candidate, Rue Furch, I did so with disbelief. Ms Bentz stood in my front yard prior to the primary last Spring and did exactly the bad mouthing about Efren Carrillo and his supposed backing by “evil” business interests that she claims she has never seen or heard in her time in the campaign!

Wow! I've no doubt that Ms. Bentz has good intentions...but the way to elect someone that you believe in should not be to tear down the other candidate and then claim that it never happens...

Efren Carrillo is an intelligent young man with a background that includes political experience, an environmental policy degree from UC Berkeley, and community service in the areas of health care and Santa Rosa's gang task force. The fact that he has support from the business community should only strengthen his desirability. These are the people who write our paychecks and make tough economic decisions on a daily basis...

Watching Efren at our local candidates night, he struck me as energetic, knowledgeable, brave, and open...I believe that he'll be a fine advocate for our district and nobody's pawn.

It is the fact that Ms. Furch showed poor business acumen in her decision to withold property taxes for 5 years and thus incur high penalties and jeopardize her home that makes her unqualified to be our Supervisor. Our County is a leading employer, and their huge budget requires oversight by intelligent people with stamina and business acumen in these very scary economic times.

Efren Carrillo is the most qualified candidate for this vital position in our county government.

Susan Upchurch
Graton

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Dear Editor,

On Sept. 16th, the Sonoma County Board of Supervisors, with two strokes of the pen, showed us the future of Sonoma County, if voters don’t elect Rue Furch and Shirlee Zane for Supervisors in the 5th and 3rd Districts.

First, the Supervisors passed an ordinance that raises the limit on campaign contributions from $1,000 to up to $5,000 per year, to take effect after the final filing date for public disclosure before the election in November. This change of the rules will disproportionately benefit candidates whose supporters have deep pockets: the natural resource-extraction and big development companies supporting Efren Carrillo and Sharon Wright for Supervisor. By establishing the effective date of October 16th, the supporters of these two candidates, who have already maxed out their $1,000 donation limit, would be able to pour as much as an additional $440,000 into those campaigns in the last 19 days before the election. There would be no public disclosure about the identity of the corporations and special financial interest making the contributions until after the election.

Second, the Supervisors completed the picture by giving permission to Syar Industries (a big contributor to Wright’s campaign) to resume gravel mining in the Russian River, despite the fact that their permit ran out in 2006. Retiring Supervisor Tim Smith, who endorses Sharon Wright, voted for Syar’s request. Retiring Supervisor Mike Reilly, who endorses Rue Furch, voted against the request, joined by Supervisor Valerie Brown. If Wright and Carrillo are elected in November to join business-interest-controlled Supervisors Kelley and Kerns, our County Supervisors will tear up the current vision of Sonoma County and replace it with one of gravel mines, rock quarries, industrial vineyards, and rampant commercial real estate developments without restrictions.

Sonoma County is at a crossroads. If you do not want to have “drill baby drill”, “log baby log”, “convert the forests to subdivisions”, privatization of pubic works, services and the commons, then Act Now to protect the quality of life in Sonoma County. Please get involved.
Volunteer and vote for Rue Furch - rue@ruefurchforsupervisor.com and Shirlee
Zane-shirlee@zaneforsupervisor.com

Lynn Hamilton
Chair, Progressive Democrats Sonoma County
Occidental

---------------------------------------------

Dear Editor:

It was interesting to read Tom Manure Man Lynch’s response to Scott Kersnar’s condemnation of candidate Carrillo for alleged ills as a stealth candidate for land rapers, in stream gravel miners, and timber fallers. Since Manure Man raised the spectacle of Ernie Carpenter working on the former Preservation Ranch land as an example of how his candidate is not controlled by nefarious interest because Rue Furch is supported by Ernie and after all he worked on a project that didn’t presumably meet environmental muster. Got it?

Firstly, the conversion project was for 5,000 acres of which roughly 2,500 was bare land and exempt from forest practice rules as there was no standing timber. This includes the land that Preservation Ranch has converted and already planted into vineyards. So, the net effect is that for a 2,500 acre conversion of marginal forest, there was to be extensive controls on 80,000 acres in two counties. That is, the ability to plan 80,000 acres to protect water sheds, do forest renovations, game trails, and so on. Then, 400 existing parcels were to be reduced to 40 parcels. All oak forest and streams including Class 3 were to be protected by easements. I continue to be interested in seeing if Preservation Ranch meets this stringent mitigation and raises the bar on preservation. It is a rare opportunity to plan a large unit to the betterment of the environment and the bar must be high. Oh, the former owner sold 20,000 acres of timber at lower than market to a community based trust in Willits, leaving 60,000 acres sold to Preservation Ranch.

As to "being naive enough to believe the big lie "about his candidate as Manure Man characterizes it, I respond, "Follow the money." Regardless of what any candidate says about position or what any other person states for them, the source of campaign money is a tell-tell sign in the twisting winds of politics. Money from development interest, gravel operators and timber companies do not find a candidate by accident. I am supporting Rue Furch because she is tried and true in the world of environmental politics.

Sincerely,
Ernie Carpenter
Sebastopol

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Open letter to Efren Carillo,

Dear Efren,

When you and Rue Furch appeared together at a candidate's night in Monte Rio, she stepped back and made you take the first shot at answering the opening question. Why? Because during the primary election she had gotten very tired of giving informed answers and hearing all the other candidates take tutelage from her on the crucial issues for the West County. But this time, by making you go first, Rue was able to follow you with a more informed answer. After that Monte Rio debate, I heard listeners say that while they found you very likeable, you obviously knew less than Rue.

I want to remind you of something your friend Sharon Wright said. Sharon has been around for a long time, as mayor of Santa Rosa, as a member with Rue of the Planning Commission, as a friend of the developers in her long tenure with the Sonoma County Alliance. She has been an unwavering ally of your handler Nick Tibbets and the other professional lobbyists of the upstream developer community. Taking aim at her current opponent, Sharon said a supervisor's job is not for rookies. If that's true in Santa Rosa, it is far truer out here in the West County.

Let me stress that you are a nice guy, Efren, a decent guy, and I hope you will stay involved in county politics for a long time. I understand you are an expert kick boxer, so I'd always want to be on your side in a dark alley. But right now I don't want you for my supervisor. Why not? For the same reason I'd look for a surgeon, rather than a promising medical student, if I needed an operation.

What we need in the Fifth District is a supervisor who doesn't have to be tutored, who will stand up to the Sharon Wrights of the world, not one who plants his election signs next to hers, as you do. Sharon Wright supports you, so that means some rookies are okay with her, as long as the rookie is willing to be a cooperative member of a voting block that puts the interests of upstream developers ahead of the West County's. If our Fifth District supervisor should turn out to be a good team player in a Santa Rosa voting bloc on the Board of Supervisors, that's bad news for us. We need a supe who's on OUR team, not theirs, because upstream development will always be a potential threat to our environment, our tourism and our health.

If it ever came time to make Sharon, Nick and the Sonoma County Alliance furious with you, would you do that? I really doubt it, Efren. At critical moments your knee has seemed to jerk in the wrong direction. Here's a case in point: When you showed up at Steelhead Beach and talked to concerned citizens who were gathering signatures on a petition to head off plans to use it as a wastewater discharge site, you shook hands all around. Then you took a petition home with you, but you didn't sign it. That says more than you can take back, though by now you may have signed one. What you should have done, what we expect our supervisor to do in protecting our Russian River, is say, "Over my dead body!" to a proposal like that sewage discharge plan. Rue Furch wouldn't tolerate that plan for a split second. But you went off to study the matter. Only after it became clear that the agencies would turn thumbs down on that discharge site did you say you flatly oppose the plan. You can't be our leader, Efren, if you don't step out in FRONT on an issue like that. Sometimes you can't hesitate before you start kicking the right butts.

Lets talk sustainability. When you've come from Santa Rosa to campaign over here, I've heard you say you are for a sustainable environment, for sustainable agriculture, for a sustainable economy. But when asked what you would actually DO to promote sustainability your answers are extremely vague. For years Rue had worked to encourage healthy and profitable farming practices by protecting agricultural zoning. Why? Because developers and farmers alike love flat land.

If you want to sustain agriculture, that means you defend it from development. Are you prepared to do that? If you are, don't let the Farm Bureau hear you say so, because they want a supervisor who will work to change the zoning for them any time they want to stop farming and start building subdivisions there instead. Agribusiness people like short-term profits as much as Wall Street does. Sustainability is a dirty word to the Farm Bureau, as their positions on past ballot measures have shown. To prove you are in favor of sustainability, what are you prepared to DO, Efren? Since the Farm Bureau had such an important role in creating your candidacy, sustainability is not likely to stay very high on your agenda. Rue, on the other hand, has worked hard over the years to preserve sustainable agriculture. That's why upstream developers and corporate agriculture are fighting so hard to defeat her.

Look, you're nice, and Rue is nice. If this election is about niceness, it's a dead heat. But there's more at stake here than a popularity contest. This is a contest about electing a supervisor who will protect the West County. Rue will do that. I see no concrete evidence that you would, because to do that, sometimes you'd have throw some hard political punches at your developer friends.

Scott Kersnar
Guerneville

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Rue Furch essay on Maintaining Sonoma County Roads

During the Primary and now in preparation for the November election of our new District Supervisors, I have invited candidates to express their views on topics they feel are important to voters. This is one of Rue Furch's essays, this one published in the September 18th edition of WCG. Please read Shirlee Zane's and Efren Carillo's essays as well. Links to their web sites are included in these web essays. - V

Routes to Recovery or Roads to Ruin?

Western Sonoma County has more than its share of older roads that have been neglected. Winter potholes create craters big enough to cause car damage or accidents. For years, maintenance has fallen farther and farther behind. The situation is so bad that the Metropolitan Transportation Commission says Sonoma County roads have the worst “pavement condition index” of all the over 100 Bay Area cities and counties.

As your West County Supervisor, a top priority will be getting our fair share of tax dollars for West County roads, improving rural public transit and ensuring safe student and pedestrian walkways and bike trails.

Sonoma County spends $18.8 million annually on county roads, including growth areas like the County Airport and Industrial Park. Yet when residents of rural Joy Road objected to the rapid collapse of their public road, the County tossed it back saying they may need to create their own tax assessment district to fix their road! That is not an option for residents who rely on public streets to be useable and safe. The County can’t just walk away from street maintenance obligations, particularly if they keep approving development on those same roads.

Where is our Fair Share?

Passage of Measure M approved an increase in sales tax to pay for road improvements. But west Sonoma County is being shortchanged. Forty-five percent of Measure M taxes go to rail and Highway 101 projects, which does little for West County. Measure M allocates 34 percent of the money it collects for local road, transit, bike, and pedestrian uses. But the bulk of that goes into the cities, with rural West County competing for its share.

The biggest road project in the 5th District is improving the Highway 12/Fulton Road intersection, but it does a lot more for Santa Rosa than West County. Bottom line, only 4% of Measure M road project funds dribble their way west of the Laguna de Santa Rosa to projects on River Road, Bodega Highway and the Forestville Bypass. Only 6% of the bike/pedestrian money reaches rural West County.

There are ways to bring more funds into the West County.

As Supervisor, I’ll work to allocate road repair funds to target public safety and substandard roads. The present system distributes repair money based only upon population and miles of road. It doesn’t consider how old or safe the roads actually are - and that stacks the deck against the West County.

As Supervisor, I won’t let developers off the hook for traffic impacts and long-term road repair. With Alice in Wonderland logic, the County says that if the traffic in an area is already bad, then projects that only add 5% more traffic won’t have a cumulative impact that has to be mitigated. As your Supervisor, I will make new development participate directly in fixing road problems, instead of just tossing the money into the County road fund.

And as your Supervisor, I will work to get especially bad sections of rural County roads declared substandard for safety or structural failure, and restrict any new projects that will add significant truck traffic to those roads until a correction plan is in place and funded.

I will go after special funding that fits the needs of our area. The Metropolitan Transportation Commission has public transportation funds for areas like the Russian River with a high proportion of low-income households. Local agencies and non-profits can partner to qualify for those funds. As your Supervisor, I will work to build partnerships to bring in resources that are tailored for our circumstances.

I will work for a bigger percentage of Measure M funds for West County. When the Measure M package was assembled, it allocated 5% for rail as a stopgap until the SMART train had other funding. If a SMART tax measure is approved, that Measure M money can go to expand transit services to give the rural West County residents better access to the SMART train and a more useful transportation system.

Safe roads, sidewalks, paths and bikeways, and adequate transit must be a top priority for West County. It will be a top priority for me as your West County Supervisor.

Rue Furch
Candidate for 5th District Supervisor
www.ruefurch.com

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REAL Change in Campaign '08

I pulled this essay off a national news web site because I think it has value for many readers. Seth Freeman is a professor of conflict management at New York University's Stern School of Business and Columbia Business School. He's asking us to ‘‘Stop hating the other party.’’ - V

Real change in campaign '08: Stop hating the other party.

By Seth Freeman

As angry and politically active as I am this presidential election, I'm starting to notice a problem as I fight for my side: The more engaged I am and the more the polls seesaw, the more I find I have an ugly desire to see the worst in the other side. The technical term for this condition is hate.

Maybe you've had a bit of the same problem?

Try this experiment: Imagine that last week you read a report that the candidate you oppose did something truly awful – assaulted someone, took a bribe – something like that. The polls swing toward your side. Then, today, you learn it's untrue – the candidate is innocent. How do you feel? Disappointed? I think I know the feeling. It's a bad sign.

Here's why: Hate has the annoying tendency to turn into hypocrisy. I laugh with glee when my side catches the other's lies and follies. To a point, that's healthy and cathartic.

But you don't hear me laughing when the other side returns the favor. Then I discount the point and quietly fume at the attack itself. Don't they understand our side is the good one?

And so it goes: They smear us; we uncover the truth about them. They have corrupt contributors; we're creating a badly needed war chest. Their moral difficulties are untenable; ours, if any, are excusable.

Hate also kills thinking. In 2004, my wife and I did a simple exercise with some of our liberal and conservative friends.

We asked each to imagine seeing their side from the other's perspective. "We're not asking you to agree with them," we said, "we're just asking if you can understand them."

Though our friends were educated, compassionate, and capable of great empathy, they found our request impossible. "I can't," they said. "Maybe I should, but I can't. They're just crazy – or evil." Perhaps you felt that way recently as you watched one of the conventions. "Who are those people?"

Why do politics alienate us? It's true we are more polarized now than we once were, but there never was an idyllic age when politics was kind and gentle. It has always been prone to verbal viciousness, and I think I know one reason why: Physical violence is a no-no.

Politics is a field of battle where bloodshed is discouraged, but much is allowed. At its best, politics can ennoble us; more often, it makes us smaller, and there's nothing new about that. In the 1800 presidential campaign, Thomas Jefferson paid a journalist to publish claims his opponent and friend, John Adams, was deranged.

An inconvenient truth of the political heart is that it's prone to bring out in us the very things we say we hate about the other side. "We have met the enemy," said Pogo, "and he is us." That's true even if we say we want hope and change, and it's true even if we say we believe in loving our enemies.

In warning about hatred, am I buying in to naive rhetoric about ending partisan politics? Insisting that, "If you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all?" Hardly.

A Far Side cartoon captures the danger of mere niceness well: "Although skilled with their pillow arsenal, the Wimpodites were favorite targets of Viking attacks." What then?

Fight hard and well. My wife and I discovered something odd about politics recently: Good political activism – as opposed to sitting around stewing with rage – gave us a measure of peace. If our side won, we rejoiced, knowing we'd helped a little; if it lost, we mourned without bitterness, while acquaintances who'd sat on the sidelines stewed.

I've also learned something recently from Olympic swimmer Michael Phelps: anger can be fuel. I plan to be active this season. And I aim to win.

But can I fight hard without damaging my heart, my relationships, or the country I claim to love?

Borrowing from two astute politicians, Martin Luther King, Jr. and Abraham Lincoln, I'm looking for ways to want good things for the other side, see the good in them, and genuinely see the force of their arguments.

Easy to say, hard to do, but I'm trying. I don't think that means I have to give up my favorite comedians; it does mean checking facts. (Factcheck.org, anyone?)

Even more, it means watching out for the times when I'm savoring bad reports about the other side, thinking, "now we've got you, you @#$&!"

Think of it as a kind of counterinsurgency. Or a response to another, more serious, inconvenient truth.

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Vote No on Prop 8 - Equality for All

WCG reader (and columnist) Tish Levee writes on the ‘‘the ultimate rite of love and commitment’’ - a RIGHT for everyone to enjoy. There will be a mobilization event at Congregation Shomrei Torah, 2600 Bennett Valley Rd., Santa Rosa, Oct. 5th, from 3-5 P.M, presented by the lgbt alliance of the Jewish Community Federations of the Bay area.


Equality for All Vote No on Prop 8

by Tish Levee

Pioneer activists married
‘Freedom to Marry’ came just in time for Del Martin. “We’re not getting any younger,” the long time lesbian activist said, a few days before she and her partner of 55 years became the first same-sex couple to legally wed in California. Mayor Gavin Newsom married them at 5:07 P.M. on June 16th. Less than three months later, when Del Martin died at 87, he ordered the flags at City Hall lowered to half-mast. Her widow, Phyllis Lyon, 83, said, "Ever since I met Del…I could never imagine a day would come when she wouldn't be by my side…[or that] there would be a day that we would actually be able to get married,…I take some solace in knowing we were able to enjoy the ultimate rite of love and commitment before she passed."

These two women were finally able to marry when the California Supreme Court overturned Proposition 22, in response to a suit brought by them and others. Proposition 22, passed in 2000, declared, “Only marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized in California.” The Court’s 4-3 decision ruled that people have a fundamental 'right to marry' the person of their choice and that gender restrictions violate the state Constitution's equal protection guarantee.

Proposition 8––a re-run of Proposition 22
Now Proposition 8––the “Protection of Marriage” amendment to the State Constitution, using the same definition of marriage as Proposition 22––is challenging that decision. The arguments offered for Proposition 8, as were those for Proposition 22, bear a striking resemblance to the arguments made in favor of anti-miscegenation laws prohibiting inter-racial marriages. The California Supreme Court, in a precedent setting ruling, declared those laws unconstitutional just sixty years ago. For 65 years a string of post-Reconstruction judicial precedents had upheld these laws, some of which dated back to 1664. In the California Supreme Court’s ruling, Chief Justice Roger Traynor stated, "A member of any of these races may find himself barred by law from marrying the person of his choice and that person to him may be irreplaceable. [italics added]" "Human beings," he continued, "are bereft of worth and dignity by a doctrine that would make them as interchangeable as trains." "The right to marry," Traynor insisted, "is the right of individuals, not of racial groups." Finally in 1967, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled unanimously that, “…restricting the freedom to marry solely because of racial classifications violates the central meaning of the Equal Protection Clause." By and large, Americans adjusted remarkably quickly to the new judicial consensus that interracial marriage, like marriage itself, was, "a basic civil right,” as Chief Justice Earl Warren insisted. However, opposition to interracial marriage didn’t end overnight––Alabama only removed laws against it from the constitution in 2000, the year Proposition 22 passed in California
Sound Familiar?

In post-Reconstruction judicial rulings against interracial marriages, some of the same arguments, now being used to argue against same-sex marriage, were used again and again, especially that interracial marriage was contrary to God’s will and was “unnatural.”

Despite efforts beginning as early as 1913, there was little movement on this issue until civil rights groups began challenging these laws. The first group to do so was a small but very effective pressure group, the Catholic Interracial Council of Los Angeles, founded in 1946. They argued that anti-miscegenation laws violated the constitutional guarantee of freedom of religion. Today, many denominations and religious leaders support the rights of same-sex couples to wed, and, therefore, it would seem clear that laws prohibiting their marriages violate their religious freedom, too.

Protection of Marriage––what does that mean?
Proposition 8 is entitled “The Protection of Marriage Act” by its proponents; in 2000, Proposition 22 was called “The Defense of Marriage Act”. How does denying anyone the right to marry ‘protect marriage?’ The freedom to marry, implicit in the constitution, is as sacred a right as freedom of speech or freedom of worship. In their ballot argument Proposition 8 proponents assert, that, “Marriage is at the core of family security and is an essential element in our society. The [California] Supreme Court effectively rendered marriage meaningless at a time when we should be taking steps to strengthen families.”

Marriage is an essential element in our society, and we do need to strengthen families. However, I fail to understand how the legal marriage of loving, committed same-sex couples can be a threat to anyone else’s marriage. The California Supreme Court’s ruling repeatedly invoked the words "respect and dignity,” framing the marriage question as one deeply affecting couples and their children. In 2000 California had more than 100,000 same-sex families, with 58,000 children.

Like freedom of religion and freedom of speech, the freedom to marry is fundamental to our society. As the No on 8 ballot argument states, “Marriage…conveys dignity and respect to the lifetime commitment of any couple…committed and loving couples who want to accept the responsibility (italics added) that comes with marriage should be treated like everyone else.” Regardless of how you feel about marriage -- for straight or gay and lesbian couples -- it’s wrong to single out one group of Americans and prevent them from having access to the same rights and responsibilities as their fellow citizens.

For more information go to http://noonprop8.com/home. While you are there, you can also take the” Vow to Vote No.”

There will be a mobilization event at Congregation Shomrei Torah, 2600 Bennett Valley Rd., Santa Rosa, Oct. 5th, from 3-5 P.M, presented by the lgbt alliance of the Jewish Community Federations of the Bay area.

© Copyright Tish Levee, 2008. All rights reserved

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Whole Foods, Sebastopol supports Ceres Project

Ceres Project is a wonderful cooperative effort engaging the efforts of young cooks who prepare nutritious meals for people in need. To learn more about the Project - please visit their web site - link below. To help contribute to this project, please shop at Whole Foods Sebastopol from September 29th through December 28th.

Whole Foods Sebastopol has selected the Ceres Project to be the recipient of the Envirocents Program from September 29 to December 28th. This is a great opportunity for us to raise money, but even more to spread the word about our work.

There will be posters in the store featuring Ceres, and our logo will be on the change boxes at each register.

Folks can choose to put their extra change in the boxes, and all of the bag donations will also come to us.

Whole Foods is also giving us three opportunities to table in front of the stores. We will be there on Sunday, October 19 from 11 - 1, and again on the Sunday before Thanksgiving and again in December.

Here's what you can do:

1. Spread the word among your circles and encourage them to take their bags to Whole Foods and to donate their change to us via the change boxes.

2. Put notices up on WACCO and in other newsletters you have access to.

3. Shop at Whole Foods often, take your own bags with you, and donate that $0.05 to Ceres.

4. Help out by volunteering to table October 19, November 23, or pick a date in December.

Thanks for helping to spread the word!

And here's the complete story:

Whole Foods Envirocents Program Helps Get Meals to Local Cancer Survivors

Grab your reusable grocery bag and head to Whole Foods in Sebastopol to help a local non-profit that’s touching a lot of lives with the healing power of food. From now through the end of December, The Ceres Community Project will be the beneficiary of Whole Foods-Sebastopol’s Envirocents Program.

Envirocents gives Whole Foods shoppers the option to donate five cents for every bag they bring in to a local non-profit organization. Change boxes at each register are designed to collect additional donations. Local non-profits get visibility as well as funds to support their work.

The Ceres Community Project, founded in March 2007, provides organic, nutrient-dense meals to families dealing with serious illness while training young chefs in the art of healthy cooking and eating. This year, Ceres will deliver more than 15,000 meals to individuals throughout Sonoma County. More than 100 teens from ten area high schools have worked as chefs in the project’s kitchen.

The majority of the project’s clients are dealing with cancer and the debilitating effects of chemotherapy and radiation treatment. Here’s what one of those clients had to say about the difference that The Ceres Community Project made for her and her family.

“I don't know how to fully express what a lifesaver the Ceres Project food was for me during my chemo. Having food already prepared, tasty food which I knew was good for me and helping me fight the cancer, made my life so much easier during an extremely difficult time. As it came to the end of the treatment, I grew more and more fatigued but there were things I really wanted to be able to do. It was important to me to help with my daughter's 8th grade play and graduation. After nine years of being an active volunteer in her school, especially with the plays, it would have been a shame to not be able to work on her last play. If I hadn't had the Ceres food waiting for me, I wouldn't have been able to handle it.”

Each Wednesday and Thursday afternoon, teen volunteers gather at The Community Church of Sebastopol’s commercial kitchen to chop, sauté, whisk, bake and roast their way through cases of mostly donated local organic food. The teens learn first hand about the relationship between the food we eat and our health, develop their culinary skills and discover how simple it is to make a difference in their world.

If you’d like to learn more about The Ceres Community Project visit their website, www.ceresproject.org . If you know someone who needs food support, call Cherie at 823-2529. If you are a teen or adult who would like to volunteer, call Judi at 829-8295. And from now until the end of December, visit Whole Foods Sebastopol with your reusable bag in hand. Donate that five cents – and whatever change you have – to The Ceres Community Project. If each of us gives a little, we can make a big difference for our neighbors who are struggling with illness, and for the young people who are becoming the leaders of the future.


Cathryn Couch
707-799-7489
www.kitchencosmology.com
"Humans are tuned for relationship. The eyes, the skin, the tongue, ears, nostrils -- all are gates where our body receives the nourishment of otherness." - David Abrams, The Spell of the Sensuous

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Former 5th District Candidate Jim Maresca Endorses Rue Furch

Jim Maresca, former candidate for the 5th District Supervisor position, has officially endorsed Rue Furch. His statement follow:


After a great deal of thought I have decided to support Rue Furch for Fifth District Supervisor. We are all familiar with Rue’s environmental credentials. In addition, I have had in-depth discussions with Rue about the county’s financial situation and am now convinced that she both understands it and is prepared to take the necessary actions to fix the problems.

But that is only part of the reason for my decision.

It is not only important that Rue wins, it is important that the people behind Efren Carrillo be taught that they cannot sell us a Trojan horse. Efren is an intelligent, charming, and articulate young man. But his support comes primarily from the coalition of large home developers, gravel miners, and corporate agriculture that has, for decades, demonstrated their willingness to put their own economic gain above of the good of the county as a whole. The idea that an inexperienced 27 year old could accept more than $100,000 in support of these interests and then not be beholden to them after he is in office is just too much of a stretch to accept. Electing Efren would be like asking the fox to guard the henhouse.

Some of my supporters, disappointed in the outcome of the primary, have told me they would either write my name in or refrain from voting in the supervisor election. I ask them, please not to do either. The stakes are too high to allow for symbolic gestures.

Vote for Rue Furch for 5th District Supervisor.
http://www.ruefurchforsupervisor.com/

Jim Maresca

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Blood Bank LOW on Blood and Platelets - Please Donate

My friend Mary Mount recently encouraged me to come by to Bank of the Redwoods while she donates platelets for cancer patients - get the story and tell our readers how much blood is needed. While I was there I met with Kent Corley the PR manager, and he gave me a good impression of our dire need for blood and platelets, especially with blood needed for Hurricane Ike victims and people injured by the train wreck in Los Angeles. The blood bank always takes care of local patients first and if it has excess inventory it can help those in need outside our community. Below is more information on how you can help - and who is eligible. I was amazed to learn that a mere 37% of the population can give blood. That makes keeping blood supplies full and available much more challenging. The information below comes from their web site - more later - V


Blood Brothers and Sisters
The common bond of blood unites us all. No matter who we are blood sustains us. Since it cannot be manufactured we rely on caring citizens to donate, forever connecting and changing lives with this simple act.

Every 15 minutes someone in our community requires lifesaving blood for a variety of reasons - traumatic accidents, surgery, and cancer treatments. Depending on the injury or form of illness, specific types of blood components are used. For instance, many cancer patients require platelet transfusions as part of their treatment. Platelets must be transfused within five days of donation, which means constant replenishment from dedicated donors is required.

The number of individuals in the U.S. who are eligible to donate blood is far smaller than previously believed - approximately 60 million fewer people. The new figures suggest that only 37 percent of the U.S. population is currently eligible to donate blood, and with anticipated demographic changes, that percentage is likely to drop.

"In the nearly sixty years of continuous operation in Sonoma County never has blood collection been more challenging than it is today," commented Public Relations Manager, Kent Corley. "The industry had the shared belief that 60% of the population was eligible to donate blood. With this new statistic, it makes a little more sense to me why we have had a hard time keeping up with demand. Add to that the huge number of layoffs we've seen over the past seven years in the local manufacturing sector and more in the mortgage industry just this week, you can easily see that we are fishing in a smaller and smaller pool."

As additional donor restrictions are implemented and the population ages, the country could lose more and more willing donors, which could pose an even greater threat to our national blood supply," said Karen Shoos Lipton, chief executive officer of AABB (formerly known as American Association of Blood Banks). "Ensuring an adequate supply of blood is increasingly more challenging, and these new data suggest it is extremely important that eligible donors give blood more frequently."

"Thank goodness for the people who donate on a regular basis," said Ryan Benjamin, Recruitment and Donor Services Manager. "We keep asking our existing donors to give more and they are tired of carrying the load.

Only 5% of our local population donates and that is unacceptable from a community that is so giving in other ways. I think there is a false sense of security out there - that someone else will donate. We need every person over the age of 17 (16 with parental and doctor's consent) to visit a blood drive to see if they are eligible. Some people know they are not eligible and that's fine. If you're not sure, please visit http://www.bbr.org/ and find a drive near you."

Blood Bank of the Redwoods
2324 Bethards Drive, Santa Rosa, CA 95405
(707) 527-5617

Here is the web page schedule - please visit it often as it is updated:
http://www.bbr.org/upcoming.aspx

09/25/08	Petaluma	Plaza North Shopping Center	3:00 PM	6:00 PM	259 B North McDowell Blvd	Parking Lot
09/26/08	Petaluma	Redwood Business Park	8:15 AM	11:15 AM	1310 Redwood Way	Parking Lot
09/26/08	Healdsburg	Grove Street Plaza	9:00 AM	11:00 AM	511 Grove St.	Parking Lot
09/27/08	Santa Rosa	Kawana Elementary Health Fair	3:00 PM	7:00 PM	2121 Moraga Dr.	Parking Lot
09/29/08	Santa Rosa	Friedman's Home Improvement Ct	4:00 PM	6:00 PM	4055 Santa Rosa Ave.	Parking Lot
09/30/08	Petaluma	Lucky - Lakeville	4:00 PM	7:00 PM	939 Lakeville Highway	Parking Lot
09/30/08	Sonoma	Maxwell Village Shopping Ctr	3:00 PM	6:30 PM	19111 Sonoma Highway	Parking Lot
10/01/08	Healdsburg	Latter-Day Saints Church	3:00 PM	6:30 PM	310 Powell Ave	Cultural Hall
10/01/08	Cloverdale	Cloverdale Fairgrounds	3:00 PM	6:00 PM	1 Citrus Fair Dr	Tea Room
10/01/08	Rohnert Park	TCBY	2:30 PM	6:30 PM	7285 Snyder Ln	Parking Lot
10/01/08	Graton	Graton Fire Protection Dist	3:30 PM	6:30 PM	North Main & Ross Rd.	Parking Lot
10/02/08	Petaluma	G & G Market	3:00 PM	6:30 PM	701 Sonoma Mountain Pkwy	Parking Lot
10/02/08	Sebastopol	O'Reilly Media	9:30 AM	12:30 PM	1005 Gravenstein Hwy N	Parking Lot
10/02/08	Santa Rosa	Marmot	11:00 AM	2:00 PM	2321 Circadian Wy	Parking Lot
10/04/08	Petaluma	Petaluma Theater District	12:00 PM	3:00 PM	Suite 109 C Street	Corner of 1st & C
10/05/08	Petaluma	New Life Christian Fellowship	10:30 AM	1:30 PM	1310 Clegg St.	Secondary Room
10/05/08	Healdsburg	Healdsburg District Hospital	11:00 AM	3:00 PM	1375 University Ave	South Side of Main Entrance
10/06/08	Windsor	Windsor Regional Library	3:00 PM	6:00 PM	9291 Old Redwood Hwy	Conference Room
10/07/08	Petaluma	Washington Square Shopping Ctr	3:00 PM	6:00 PM	373 South McDowell Blvd	Parking Lot
10/07/08	Santa Rosa	Sonoma County Water Agaency	7:30 AM	10:30 AM	2060 West College Ave	Finely Ctr Parking Lot
10/08/08	Rohnert Park	Longs Drugs	3:00 PM	6:00 PM	6378 Commerce Blvd	Parking Lot
10/08/08	Forestville	Forestville Fire Dept	4:00 PM	7:00 PM	6554 Mirabel Rd.	Fire Station
10/08/08	Santa Rosa	S.C.O.E.	8:00 AM	11:00 AM	5340 Skylane Blvd	Parking Lot
10/09/08	Santa Rosa	Kaiser	3:00 PM	7:00 PM	401 Bicentennial Wy	Parking Lot
10/11/08	Cotati	Oliver's Market	10:30 AM	2:00 PM	546 E. Cotati Ave	Parking Lot
10/11/08	Windsor	Johnson Pool & Spa	11:00 AM	2:30 PM	9650 Old Redwood Hwy	Parking Lot
10/12/08	Sebastopol	Safeway	10:00 AM	2:30 PM	406 North Main St	Parking Lot
10/12/08	Sonoma	Safeway	10:00 AM	2:30 PM	477 W Napa	Parking Lot
10/14/08	Santa Rosa	Santa Rosa Marketplace	3:00 PM	6:00 PM	1960 Santa Rosa Ave	Parking Lot near Applebee's
10/15/08	Petaluma	Long's Drugs - E Washington	2:00 PM	6:30 PM	365 East Washington St.	Parking Lot
10/16/08	Petaluma	Petaluma Business Expo	4:00 PM	7:00 PM	320 McDowell Blvd	Parking Lot
10/17/08	Santa Rosa	Raley's	3:30 PM	6:30 PM	1407 Fulton Rd.	Parking Lot
10/18/08	Rohnert Park	Pacific Market	11:00 AM	4:00 PM	901 Golf Course Dr.	Parking Lot
10/19/08	Petaluma	Catholic Church of St. James	8:45 AM	12:15 PM	125 Sonoma Mtn Pkwy	Room 9
10/20/08	Petaluma	Kaiser	2:30 PM	5:30 PM	3900 Lakeville Hwy	Parking Lot C

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Homeless Girl grows up to become Outstanding Woman

Constance Bravos earns Hearst Award

I find stories of personal achievement great inspiration for people - especially young people who are bored or lack direction. Some times a few words of encouragement, a goal accomplished or an example of someone else who has risen above obstacles are all it takes to succeed. Constance Bravos is an example of a young woman whose personal strength, attitude and intelligence earned her the William Randolph Hearst/CSU Trustees Award for Outstanding Achievement. She's a rising star at 20 and an excellent example for others to follow - V

Once Homeless, Constance Bravos earns Hearst Award and Aims to Help Troubled Youth

She was an adopted child who not only faced financial problems and but was once homeless, living in a shelter.

Now, Sonoma State University junior Constance Bravos has a 3.61 grade average and won the William Randolph Hearst / CSU Trustees Award for Outstanding Achievement, picking
up the $3,000 scholarship that comes with it. Recipients of the award have overcome challenging odds, to pursue a college degree.

"Asthma has proven to be one of my most prominent and consistent struggles throughout my life. It made my lungs collapse when I was six," says Bravos, 20, who is from Martinez but now lives in Rohnert Park while she attends school.

Bravos lost her home when she was ten, and says it took five years to find a home and see her life get back on track. "You could say it was because my parents didn't graduate to go on to college in order to make a better living wage and not have to rely on their parents to help them with a house," Bravos says.

"But really, I just remember being ten and receiving the two weeks notice and coming to the realization that my life was going to be different and difficult."

During school Bravos feared being teased because she was homeless and so she had only a few select friends that did not know her past.

"Instead of focusing on my peers and my struggles, I began to expedite my energy toward school and my future," Bravos says.

Bravos is a psychology major looking forward to graduating in 2010. Because of her own hardships, she wants to make a difference as a psychologist for Martinez's Juvenile Hall after
completing her degree at UC Berkley where she plans to study counseling and psychology.

She already has worked toward this goal by being a peer mentor and a teaching assistant at SSU, helping the freshman class become more aware of college opportunities. She is involved in
the Educational Opportunity Program, Future Scholars, among others.

Bravos feels blessed by the award.

"I feel honored in knowing that my life and goals are being recognized for their true worth. It's an indescribable feeling to come from a history of being a part of one of the most forgotten populations - the homeless - to end up becoming someone who is not only remembered, but awarded for my efforts," she says.

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Perspective on Politics & Economy

A reader checks in with tongue-in-cheek comments on the current financial crisis in our country. Sometimes it helps to look disaster in the face with a smile. - V

Dear American:

I need to ask you to support an urgent secret business relationship with
a transfer of funds of great magnitude.

I am Ministry of the Treasury of the Republic of America. My country has had crisis that has caused the need for large transfer of funds of 800 billion dollars US. If you would assist me in this transfer, it would be most profitable to you.

I am working with Mr. Phil Gram, lobbyist for UBS, who will be my replacement as Ministry of the Treasury in January. As a Senator, you may know him as the leader of the American banking deregulation movement in the 1990s. This transactin is 100% safe.

This is a matter of great urgency. We need a blank check. We need the funds as quickly as possible. We cannot directly transfer these funds in the names of our close friends because we are constantly under surveillance. My family lawyer advised me that I should look for a reliable and trustworthy person who will act as a next of kin so the funds can be transferred.

Please reply with all of your bank account, IRA and college fund account numbers and those of your children and grandchildren to wallstreetbailout@treasury.gov so that we may transfer your commission for this transaction. After I receive that information, I will respond with detailed information about safeguards that will be used to protect the funds.

Yours Faithfully Minister of Treasury Paulson

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Volunteer at Tolay Pumpkin Fest for FREE Park Pass

This is a great opportunity to volunteer and have fun - meet wonderful people - and get a FREE Regional Parks Pass - all at the same time!


The Regional Parks Department needs volunteers to help out at this year's Tolay Fall Festival.

http://www.sonoma-county.org/parks/pk_tolay_fallfest.htm

Everyone who signs up and works a five-hour shift will receive a volunteer parking pass. This pass works exactly like our Park Pass, waiving the parking fees in all 44 Regional Parks.

The Fall Festival itself is a really fun event that truly benefits from volunteer involvement. The Festival highlights Sonoma County's Agricultural and Native American heritage through interactive, hands on crafts, exhibits and games. Volunteers assist staff with a number of different booths and activities. The Festival runs from October 9-12 and 16-19. Volunteers are asked to attend an orientation at our main office in Santa Rosa located at 2300 County Center Dr. Suite 120A. Orientations are being held on:


Thursday, 9/25: 6pm – 8pm
Saturday, 9/27: 10am – noon
Sunday, 9/28: 2pm – 4pm
Tuesday, 9/30: 10am – noon
Wednesday, 10/1: 5:30pm – 7:30pm
Saturday, 10/4: 3pm – 5pm

Please let me know if you have any questions or would like to sign up for one of the orientations. Due to the nature of the position, working with children, all volunteers will be fingerprinted and background-checked at County expense. All volunteers who go through an orientation and volunteer for a five hour shift receive a Festival T-Shirt, Park Hat, lunch and of course, the volunteer parking pass which waives all parking fees in the County parks for a year.

Thank you so much for your interest in our parks.

Sincerely,
John Ryan
Volunteer/Intern Coordinator
Sonoma County Regional Parks
Ph: 707-565-3356
Fax: 707-579-8247

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ACLU Voter Recommendations for California

The ACLU (American Civil Liberties Union) weighs in on specific propositions and makes recommendations.


The ACLU-NC believes that our priorities in California should be focused on building communities in which every child is safe and free to pursue his or her dreams. We believe that the only way to create safe communities for all Californians is through a balanced approach that includes investment in education and prevention and intervention to end violent crime. That’s why we urge you to vote NO on propositions 6 and 9 and YES on Proposition 5.

NO on PROPOSITION 6
Prop 6 is focused on the wrong priorities. We need real solutions to violent crime. But that’s not what Prop 6 provides. Prop 6 threatens to take funding away from the places we need it the most -- like education -- and to spend billions on the same costly and ineffective methods, such as incarcerating more youth, that have failed to help our communities, at great cost to all Californians. Learn more: http://defeatrunner.org/

NO on PROPOSITION 9
Prop 9 is a well intentioned but poorly written and truly dangerous initiative. It will negatively impact California’s most vulnerable residents -- our children -- by diverting hundreds of millions from schools and education to spending on prisons and jails. It puts huge burdens on local law enforcement and creates more red tape but does not provide new services to victims. Learn more http://www.votenoprop9.com/

YES on PROPOSITION 5
Prop 5, on the other hand, takes a sensible and balanced approach to the problem of non-violent crime. It offers common sense solutions to prison overcrowding by providing drug treatment as an alternative to incarceration for non-violent offenders, saving California taxpayers billions of dollars. Learn more http://www.prop5yes.com/

It’s time to focus on the right priorities. Vote NO on propositions 6 and 9 and YES on Proposition 5.

Our Mission:
The ACLU of Northern California works to preserve and guarantee the Bill of Rights for all, through litigation, public education, organizing, lobbying and legislation. Protecting freedom of expression, the right to privacy, and the right to be free of discrimination are fundamental goals of the ACLU.

ACLU of Northern California | 39 Drumm Street, San Francisco, CA 94111
T (main): 415.621.2493 | T (civil liberties counselor): 415.621.2488 | F: 415.255.1478
http://www.aclunc.org/

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McCain: A flustered rookie

I've read Geogre F. Will's columns for many years and have admired his rational thinking in the face of what I consider irrational Conservatives. In Will's McCain: A flustered rookie 9-23-08 column, he pointed out the volatile nature of McCain. It's what scares me about him. Even at the mature age of 72, he has yet to show evidence of thinking before he acts. If there is one characteristic with which I tie him to Bush, it is the shoot-from-the-hip decision making process. He doesn't seem to take the time to examine a situation in depth before he makes a statement of opinion. This can also be evidenced in his choice of a running mate. How little he seems to have known about Sarah Palin before choosing her as his successor to the presidency. McCain's health and age will surely put Palin in the White House and McCain's impulsive decision to seek a dynamic woman who can win him the highest office of our nation, puts us at risk for his political ambitions. As quickly as McCain smeared Chris Cox, he attacks opponents. Do we really want a president who doesn't stop to think before he speaks…and acts? - Vesta

The full text of Will's column is below. I am passing this on to readers because George F. Will is an intelligent Conservative whom I admire.


McCain: A flustered rookie

By GEORGE F. WILL
WASHINGTON POST

Published: Tuesday, September 23, 2008 at 7:21 a.m.
Last Modified: Tuesday, September 23, 2008 at 9:09 a.m.
"The queen had only one way of settling all difficulties, great or small. 'Off with his head!' she said without even looking around." -- "Alice's Adventures in wonderland"

Under the pressure of the financial crisis, one presidential candidate is behaving like a flustered rookie playing in a league too high. It is not Barack Obama.

Channeling his inner Queen of Hearts, John McCain furiously, and apparently without even looking around at facts, said Chris Cox, chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, should be decapitated. This childish reflex provoked the Wall Street Journal to editorialize that "McCain untethered" -- disconnected from knowledge and principle -- had made a "false and deeply unfair" attack on Cox that was "unpresidential" and demonstrated that McCain "doesn't understand what's happening on Wall Street any better than Barack Obama does."

To read the Journal's details about the depths of McCain's shallowness on the subject of Cox's chairmanship, see "McCain's Scapegoat" (Friday, Page A22). Then consider McCain's characteristic accusation that Cox "has betrayed the public's trust."

Perhaps an old antagonism is involved in McCain's fact-free slander. His most conspicuous economic adviser is Douglas Holtz-Eakin, who previously headed the Congressional Budget Office.

There he was an impediment to conservatives, including then-Congressman Cox, who as chairman of the Republican Policy Committee persistently tried and generally failed to enlist CBO support for "dynamic scoring" that would estimate the economic growth effects of proposed tax cuts.

In any case, McCain's smear -- that Cox "betrayed the public's trust" -- is a harbinger of a McCain presidency. For McCain, politics is always operatic, pitting people who agree with him against those who are "corrupt" or "betray the public's trust," two categories that seem to be exhaustive -- there are no other people. McCain's Manichaean worldview drove him to his signature legislative achievement, the McCain-Feingold law's restrictions on campaigning. Today, his campaign is creatively finding interstices in laws intended to restrict campaign giving and spending. (For details, see the Wednesday Washington Post, Page A4; and the Saturday New York Times, Page One.) By a Gresham's Law of political discourse, McCain's Queen of Hearts intervention in the opaque financial crisis overshadowed a solid conservative complaint from the Republican Study Committee, chaired by Rep. Jeb Hensarling of Texas. In a letter to Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke, the RSC decried the improvised torrent of bailouts as a "dangerous and unmistakable precedent for the federal government both to be looked to and indeed relied upon to save private sector companies from the consequences of their poor economic decisions." This letter, listing just $650 billion of the perhaps more than $1 trillion in new federal exposures to risk, was sent while McCain's campaign, characteristically substituting vehemence for coherence, was airing an ad warning that Obama favors "massive government, billions in spending increases."

The political left always aims to expand the permeation of economic life by politics. Today, the efficient means to that end is government control of capital. So, is not McCain's party now conducting the most leftist administration in American history? The New Deal never acted so precipitously on such a scale. Treasury Secretary Paulson, asked about conservative complaints that his rescue program amounts to socialism, said, essentially: This is not socialism, this is necessary. That non sequitur might be politically necessary, but remember that government control of capital is government control of capitalism.

Does McCain have qualms about this, or only quarrels? On "60 Minutes" Sunday evening, McCain, saying "this may sound a little unusual," said that he would like to replace Cox with Andrew Cuomo, the Democratic attorney general of New York who is the son of former Gov. Mario Cuomo. McCain explained that Cuomo has "respect" and "prestige" and could "lend some bipartisanship." Conservatives have been warned.

Conservatives who insist that electing McCain is crucial usually start, and increasingly end, by saying he would make excellent judicial selections. But the more one sees of his impulsive, intensely personal reactions to people and events, the less confidence one has that he would select judges by calm reflection and clear principles, having neither patience nor aptitude for either.

It is arguable that, because of his inexperience, Obama is not ready for the presidency. It is arguable that McCain, because of his boiling moralism and bottomless reservoir of certitudes, is not suited to the presidency. Unreadiness can be corrected, although perhaps at great cost, by experience. Can a dismaying temperament be fixed?

© George F. Will is a columnist for the Washington Post. E-mail him at georgewill@washpost.com.

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When Freshwater becomes tainted with Wastewater

Ludwigia thrives in wastewater nutrients...choking waterways

When we turn on our faucets to use water, that fresh, clean water instantly becomes wastewater that needs to be treated and disposed of. Rural homes use septic systems where the water leaches into the ground, and over time and distance, is filtered before it re-enters the groundwater system. But in the majority of our populated ares, that water goes down the drain into the sewer system, out to the treatment plant...and then what? Body lotion, laundry detergent, hair conditioners, pharmaceuticals that filter through our bodies - they all end up in the wastewater system - and many of them don't get filtered out during the treatment process. The impacts these products have on our fresh water streams and rivers has changed the way we think about flushing water down the drain.

What's in Our Wastewater?

“Incidental Runoff”

By Brenda Adelman

Wastewater discharged into local streams by sewage treatment plants is subjected to lengthy and complex State permit requirements that can run as much as a 100 pages long. The permits include directions on water quality limits, monitoring, receiving water standards, and protections of beneficial uses, among other things. They describe when and where discharges can occur and penalties to be imposed when compliance fails. As treatment systems age, and pipeline replacement lags, the opportunities for failure (and fines) increase. The Regional Water Quality Control Board is charged with overseeing this very complex process.

Yet, of more than 80,000 chemical pollutants on the market, discharge permits regulate only about 126 of them. Currently, no regulations exist to monitor and limit the discharge of either personal care and cleaning products or pharmaceuticals, especially hormones, steroids, and anti-bacterial products, recently accused of causing bacterial illnesses to become more resistant to treatment.

Recent studies have shown trace amounts of cancer causing and endocrine disrupting chemicals in national rivers and streams and drinking water supplies. Even more alarming are the latest reports indicating that at least 46 million Americans are known to be exposed to drug-contaminated drinking water supplies. The tests have not been done in our area yet, so we don’t know if we are part of that group.

And species are being lost at an unprecedented rate. Currently, the Living Planet Index claims that the bird, fish, mammal, reptile, and amphibian populations worldwide have dropped by almost a third in the last 35 years. Only this month, the United States Geological Survey (USGS) claims in a very new study that nearly 40% of North America’s fish species are in jeopardy, and our area (mid Pacific Coast) has been identified as one of the most threatened.

Yet the State, facing a serious water shortage crisis, is now promoting a program to greatly increase goals for increased irrigation with recycled wastewater from 500,000 acre feet a year to two million acre feet by 2030. To make this policy more palatable, treated sewage is now consistently referred to as recycled water, as though by sanitizing the words, they create a different product. The State is strongly promoting the idea of offsetting water use by greatly expanding recycled wastewater in summer, water short months.

Normally, application of treated wastewater to land is safer than discharging into waterways, although only if done in a manner that prohibits runoff into streams. And that’s the hard part. The State proposed a Recycled Water Policy last year and it met with a great deal of consternation from various environmental, business, and agency groups. Environmental groups objected on the basis that all incidental discharge must be regulated in the same way as intentional winter discharges, since the toxic constituents are the same.

With the State Water Board’s concurrence, a representative group was formed to study, modify, and make recommendations on the policy to which all stakeholders could agree. A draft was presented to the Board in early September and the group agreed on all points, but one, and that was “incidental runoff’. Incidental runoff is not clearly defined; but is intended to mean some runoff that is accidentally spilled, small in amount, and considered to have inconsequential impacts. The committee, not able to agree on this issue, left it to the State Board to define. Our local Regional Board is considering a Basin Plan Amendment to legalize it.

Normally Department of State Health Title 22 regulations apply to the application of wastewater to land. These regulations are meant to protect the public from mostly acute illness, and does not address protection of aquatic life and the environment from these discharges, especially during a time when flows are very low (and getting lower) and unable to assimilate residual toxins in the wastewater.

The State (and the City of Santa Rosa who is planning a large program of urban irrigation) refers to inconsequential runoff in order to justify using it to offset potable water. The problem of defining, successfully and consistently monitoring and regulating these “incidental” events is daunting. No one has addressed the possible impacts if numerous, cumulative impacts occur at the same time.

Extensive carelessness with irrigation water has been regularly observed, and most people really aren’t aware of the difference between potable and treated wastewater. We can easily picture children and pets playing in the water and ingesting it with unknown results. Where irrigation is allowed to occur, it should be on large publicly owned parcels, that are carefully monitored and regulated and discharge permits should be required. Furthermore, irrigation should not be allowed near creeks, especially where pesticide use occurs.

Some of our local streams are filled with Ludwigia and are literally dying in the summer. They cannot assimilate additional toxic loads now, but to make the problem worse, the National Marine Fisheries Service will be demanding lower summer Russian River flows to protect the fish. That combination of circumstances would increase possible harm to people AND fish because of greater potential for exposure to harmful toxins that are not assimilated by flows. Lower flows cause the toxic load to become more concentrated.

We must maintain the summer prohibition of wastewater discharges to protect the health of humans and the environment. RRWPC will keep you posted on future critical actions on this issue. Please contact us at rrwpc-1@comcast.net if you want to be on our mailing list to stay informed about this issue.

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Slow Food Nation comes to San Francisco, CA

“Get Your Hands in the Dirt”

Inspiring people to be conscious of, and there for responsible for, their own nourishment, is part of the mission of Slow Food Nation. With heath problems soaring as people exercise less and eat more fast & convenient food, trying to get people's attention that this issue is extremely personal is vital! The health and economic costs of life-style bad habits impacts the entire planet, from crop priorities to fuel costs transporting food products. The subject is vast.


By Shepherd Bliss

“Get your hands in the dirt,” recommended physicist Vandana Shiva of India. She was speaking at Slow Food Nation over Labor Day Weekend in San Francisco, which attracted around 60,000 people. While in the Bay Area Shiva also gave a presentation in Sonoma County on August 27, partly sponsored by the Occidental Arts and Ecology Center. She wrote the book “Soil Not Oil—Securing Our Food in Times of Climate Change.”

“We have to get back to the stuff that we are made of, which is soil,” Wes Jackson of the Land Institute in Kansas declared, echoing Shiva. The word human, after all, shares a root with humus, the black, organic matter in soil. Perhaps it is also related to humility and humbleness.

Shiva and Jackson were among the Food for Thought speakers at Slow Food Nation (SFN). Most of the SFN’s events, other than the speakers, were free, including a Victory Garden that replaced a lawn in front of City Hall. A soap box was set up in the garden where farmers and others gave lively presentations and engaged people in discussion. A huge marketplace surrounded the garden and offered healthy food. A few miles away at Ft. Mason the SFN Taste Pavilio--the length of two football fields--also offered “good, clean, and fair” food. Free music, films, and other cultural expressions also occurred, because agri-culture is the basis of culture.

The Food for Thought speakers’ series took a systems approach. It related food and agriculture to issues such as climate change, social justice, re-localizing food, and the policy and planning needed to replace our current food system with a more sustainable one. Food security, energy security, and climate security were approached as intimately linked.

21st century agriculture is dependent upon petroleum. As UC Berkeley professor Michael Pollan said, “We eat oil.” Oil is necessary for industrial agriculture. It is needed to make pesticides and fertilizers, for tractors, to transport the average morsel 1500 miles from field to fork, to make plastics for packaging, and in so many other ways. But guess what? The cheap 20th century supply of petroleum is dwindling. We’re running out of oil. This is no longer the Peak Oil theory. It is the fact of diminishing oil supplies meeting growing demand as China, India and other countries rise.

Other prominent speakers at SFN in the growing sustainable agriculture movement included “Fast Food Nation” author Eric Schlosser, Kentucky author and farmer Wendell Berry, chef Alice Waters (Slow Food Nation Founder), and Italian Carlo Petrini, founder of Slow Food movement. He founded Slow Food in 1989 to protest fast food culture. It has spread to 100 countries and has over 80,000 members. Slow Food USA has over 200 chapters, including an active Russian River chapter, and 16,000 members.

Speakers described how our food system is broken, not only in the U.S. but worldwide. Food shortages are occurring around the world, leading to food riots, which are likely to continue as the global food crisis grows.

Farming used to be based on human muscle, then animal power was harnessed. At our family farm in Iowa in the late 40s/early 50s we had no electricity, which had not yet reached the rural mid-west. No TV. We had ice boxes, gas lights, an outhouse, a windmill with a pump on it for the well, and cold cellars. Muscle, mules, and hand tools were the main means of our farming, as well as some draft horses, and eventually tractors. Life was good. When electricity did arrive, life seemed to get somewhat easier, but I am not sure that it was any better.

One of the SFN panels was titled “Help Wanted: 50 Million Farmers.” Most Americans used to farm, which continues in among many traditional peoples on the globe. But in the U.S. less than 2% of the population farms today. If we are to survive, more people must grow their own food and become gardeners and farmers. We are fortunate here in Sonoma County, because we have the climate, soil, and some people who remember how to do such old-fashioned farming.

“Slow Food makes a political statement, though we do not do politics as such,” explained Randi Seidner of the Russian River chapter. The visibly pregnant Seidner was taking a brief break from selling organic fruit. “We are not just about getting together with friends to have dinners. We want to make changes in our food system.”

“Slow Food can help support local farmers,” Seidner added. A month after SFN in San Francisco, on October 5, Seidner and others are organizing the Russian River Convivium’s annual event at the Barndivia Restaurant in Healdsburg, They are joining with a group called Fork and Shovel, which brings together local farmers and chefs.

“The big folks are starting to get it. There are many signs of change. Major publications are realizing that things need to change in our food system. It is a shame that our president and government do not see that we are in a total crisis,” Seidner said.

“I think it is courageous to grow apples,” commented Sebastopol Farmers’ Market manager Paula Downing. “It is courageous to keep working the land when you can sell it for houses, courageous to keep growing Gravenstein apples when they are out of style and don't pay like grapes do, courageous to believe in something that is not necessarily in fashion right now. I feel it is important to honor the apple farmers who have this courage,” she added.

Some of the leading voices in sustainable agriculture have written a draft Declaration for Healthy Food and Agriculture that was released at SFN. “Food Fight” author Dan Imhoff of Healdsburg and Santa Rosa’s Michael Dimock, President of Roots of Change, which init