Sebastopol Saves! Energy Audits for Residents

Sebastopol Saves!

City’s Energy Committee and local realtors group walking for clean energy

The City of Sebastopol Energy Committee, along with members of the Sebastopol Chapter of the North Bay Association of REALTORS® (NorBAR) and other local organizations, want to help Sebastopol residents save money by making their homes water and energy efficient. Sebastopol REALTORS® will be going door-to-door in March to give residents and businesses the information they need to do just that!

Businesses and residents might be paying much more than they need to if their home or place of business is not energy efficient. Inadequate insulation, cracks and leaks, single pane windows, low efficiency showerheads and toilets result in high utility bills and don't help the environment.

Walkers will be providing information to encourage residents to spend a little to save a lot by performing an energy audit on their buildings. The audits will itemize the improvements needed to reduce water and energy bills by making buildings water and energy efficient. This will enable residents to do their part to help the environment by reducing greenhouse gas emissions and reducing our dependence on diminishing fossil fuel supplies.

“We have installed a new green furnace and double pane windows which made our house much warmer, reduced our heating bill and gave us rebates from PGE and a federal tax credit,” said Councilmember Kathleen Shaffer.

The Sonoma County Energy Independence Program (SCEIP) will offer help with financing the improvements. SCEIP may also finance the energy audit to help determine what is needed. All of the information necessary will be in a reusable bag delivered to every address in Sebastopol. Coupons for FREE low flow showerheads and toilet replacements will also be in the bag.

“This is a wonderful contribution to our community by NorBAR and our other partners. Once again, Sebastopol is at the forefront of smart energy action,” said Councilman Larry Robinson, co-chair of the City’s Energy Committee.

Other partners in this community effort include PG&E and Solar Sonoma County. Sebastopol residents and businesses should expect a knock at their door during the second or third weekend of March. Packets of information and coupons will be left at each home and business.

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Abuse Laws in Trial - the Aaron Vargas Case

Abuse Laws on Trial
By Vesta Copestakes

Abuse of every kind…physical, mental, emotional is wrong. That’s an easy judgment to make…a simple right vs. wrong. Most people think of abuse in physical terms – he beats her, etc. That’s the kind that gets in the news. But it’s often more subtle than that – hidden behind curtains of shame so we don’t even recognize the symptoms, often until it’s too late.

On March 22 Aaron Vargas goes to trial for killing his abuser. He took an antique weapon and shot the man who abused him since he was 11, then waited until he died. Aaron wasn’t the only person Darrell McNeill abused over the years. One victim committed suicide, others have come forward to tell their tale. In a small community, it’s easy to see why people kept their shame to themselves. But not all did, and that’s where the case crosses a line into a matter of law and justice.

Right now three Sonoma County officials are asking us to vote for them using domestic violence as their calling card. It’s a good one because much needs to be done to change the way our system works. In the Aaaron Vargas case numerous people went to the police over the years to ask for help. Each time nothing changed. The abuser was a Boy Scout leader, a Big Brother, a well-respected leader in the community. Mabe if he had been the town drunk law enforcement would have listened…maybe not.

The police will tell you that they get calls every day asking for help when a husband beats his wife, when a child comes to school with cuts and bruises, when the neighbor’s fight gets out of hand. Law enforcement will tell you that they can only take action when there has been an incident that results in injury they can document. Child Protective Services will open a case, interview the parents, etc. but they can only intervene when the child suffers enough to warrant removing him/her from the home. For many, that’s too late.

In California we have laws that will take an abuser away even if the abused doesn’t press charges. It’s a good law. Victims have a lot of fear around pressing charges. Fear of retaliation. Fear of losing the good times when he’s fun. Fear of losing their child’s father – the man who provides when he’s not under the influence. Fear of being judged by others. Fear.

So what can we do to change the laws so that reporting suspected abuse stops the perpetrator before the victim suffers permanent damage – or takes the law into his/her own hands?

Government budget cuts are rampant so there are less and less law enforcement personnel to tackle these “little” cases where no one gets robbed or killed. We prioritize the big crime and let the quiet crimes take care of themselves…because we’re broke…because there’s so much crime…because we don’t really know what to do about it.

With the Aaron Vargas trial we have chance to get law enforcement’s attention because his case is so unusual and his family, friends, neighbors, community…even the wife of his victim are asking us to examine what makes a kind person kill. What went wrong that law enforcement didn’t stop this abuser before he was killed.

In the Aaron Vargas case we have a chance to raise our voices along with his supporters and bring attention to how law enforcement does, and does not, respond to abuse. We also have a chance to ask questions of the people running for office in this coming election. Abuse is a subject that needs more attention – let’s talk about it out in the open where our voices can be heard – and maybe – we can do something about it.

www.saveaaronvargas.com for information on the Aaron Vargas trial March 22nd. Pay attention to the politicians running for office from now until the election. Previous posts on this story can be found here on GazExtra!

Below is a letter written by Aaron's aunt - the family side of the story many people will recognize as reflecting their own lives and experiences:

On February 8, 2009, I received a phone call telling me my nephew, Aaron Vargas, had been arrested for killing Darrell McNeill. Of course my first response was disbelief followed by shock and more disbelief. Not possible, not Aaron. Aaron is kind, gentle, and caring. Then of course came the “why”? If what I’m being told is true, then why? What could possibly make this kind, gentle, caring person kill?

It is now February 10, 2010 and that is one of the questions I’ve been thinking about for 367 days. As the story has unfolded the answers to some questions have been immensely devastating. I learned that Darrell was a pedophile. Pedophile is the wrong word, let me rephrase, Darrell raped children. Darrell pretended to be a good father to Aaron’s friend, Michael. Darrell pretended to be a nice neighbor. Darrell pretended to be an upstanding citizen, a “Big Brother,” a Boy Scout leader. Darrell pretended to care for children in order to prey upon them. Darrell, who cared so much for his “little brother,” was the cause of that “little brother’s” eventual suicide. Darrell began molesting – no, molesting is the wrong word - Darrell began raping Aaron when Aaron was eleven years old. Eleven. Take a moment to remember yourself at eleven. What were you like? What did you think? How did you feel? At eleven did you have much life experience? Aaron was eleven, Darrell was in his forties. Aaron was not Darrell’s first victim, nor was he his last.

Darrell was good at what he did.

After Aaron’s arrest many boys came forward in support of Aaron, telling of the abuse they’d endured by Darrell. In some instances it was the first time they’d ‘told’. In others it was not, they had told before, some had reported it to the police. These boys, I call them boys but they are now men in their thirties and forties, were brave enough to disclose and nothing was done. No investigation - Darrell wasn’t even approached let alone questioned. Nothing.

The days and weeks following Aaron’s arrest were days and weeks of our family continually asking ourselves, “how did we not know?” How was it possible that we had failed Aaron so miserably? The continual conversations with each of us saying, “I should have known”. Why didn’t we? Why didn’t we see it? Why didn’t we know? Seeing the pain and sadness in Aaron’s parents, in my parents, and knowing the heartbreak and despair we all felt at not doing our job, not protecting our loved one. These haunting questions led me to research child abuse and the things I learned broke my heart yet again. I learned that the abuser is most likely to be a trusted family friend or a family member. I learned one in four girls and one in six boys are sexually abused before the age of 18. That 70% of child abusers have between one and nine victims. That 20% have 10 to 40 victims. That an average serial abuser can have as many as 400 victims. That over 30% of victims never disclose the experience to ANYONE, and of those who do disclose, 75% do it accidentally. Is there comfort in knowing that our family is not alone in not knowing? No. None at all.

Learning these things and realizing the “stranger danger” that I taught my children would be of little use in most situations led to my panicked phone call to my son, who is away at Graduate school. Asking him point blank, “have you ever been sexually abused?” A sigh of relief when he responded that he hadn’t, the surprise when he asked me the same question. Thinking yes, he is right, according to the statistics it needs to be a conversation that everyone has no matter parent or child. Then remembering that 30% never disclose leads me to ask again and again to ensure that his response was truthful.

Later it hit me, what if he had said yes? What if my daughter had said yes? What if the answer had been yes, and a friend or family member that I loved and trusted was named, what would I do? In that moment I knew. In that moment I realized that I could kill. Me, a person who has never intentionally killed anything, not even bugs. Me, the person who catches and releases any insects I find in my home. Me, the law-abiding, rational person I thought myself to be, realized that I could kill.
I don’t know exactly what happened the night of February 8, 2009. From what I do know Aaron didn’t go to Darrell’s with the intent of killing him. But if he had I now understand. I understand it is possible for a good person to kill.

In these last 367 days some questions have been answered, but many others have arisen. Why didn’t the police investigate? How is it possible that we as a society allow one in four girls and one in six boys to be sexually abused? How could the Deputy DA on Aaron’s case even utter the words describing the abuse testimony as “self-serving” and “irrelevant”? Why are there so many abusers in our society? How does a person become so messed up that they can rape children? Why does our justice system not work? Why is the DA so intent on sending Aaron to prison for 50-years-to-life, knowing Darrell’s family is supporting him? How do we stop all forms of child abuse? How do we protect every child?

During these 367 days Aaron’s sister, Mindy, has been tirelessly working on his behalf. She started a website called SaveAaron.com, which provides information on Aaron’s case and on recognizing and preventing child abuse. She’s contacted numerous media organizations trying to get the word out, and she has organized several fundraisers. She’s told me of the many, many people who’ve contacted her and shared their own stories of abuse and who write to Aaron. Tirelessly she is working to bring her brother home, to raise awareness, to protect every child. She is working hard to end the silence of child abuse, and I wonder, why aren’t we all?
Rhonda Wilson
Fort Bragg

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Sonoma Mountain gets a Trail

North Slope Sonoma Mountain Ridge Trail Project Kicks-Off
District acquisitions totaling $12 million to connect to Jack London State Historic Park

The Sonoma County Board of Supervisors, acting as the District’s Board of Directors, approved five contracts totaling $391,360 to prepare for the construction of the North Slope Ridge trail on Sonoma Mountain, and to assist the District with other trail development projects at the Montini and Healdsburg Ridge Open Space Preserves.

“Sonoma Mountain now joins the ring of Bay Area summits that provide public access,” said Valerie Brown, First District Supervisor. “State, County and District-protected properties will be linked together by a multi-use trail that allows the community to enjoy 5,500 acres of contiguous open space.”

The agreements include services from Sonoma County Regional Parks Department for construction management of park improvements, the Bay Area Ridge Trail Council (BARTC) for trail planning and construction oversight, and the Conservation Corps North Bay for trail construction and stewardship tasks such as invasive plant control and fire abatement. Additional contracted services include engineering, surveying, and permitting work that must occur prior to construction. Construction is expected to begin early this summer and be substantially completed by late fall.

“This project will help provide local youth with meaningful work and new perspectives,” said Gary Miltimore, Sonoma County Program Director of the Conservation Corps North Bay. “They will be working alongside people that are passionate about providing safe, yet exhilarating, public access to Sonoma County’s richest natural resources.”

The proposed multi-use trail will traverse four District-protected properties, totaling approximately 454 acres and a public investment of more than $12 million, the 84-acre Sonoma Mountain Woodlands parcel owned by Regional Parks, and the approximately 1,400-acre Jack London State Historic Park. The $1.4 million construction project encompasses access road improvements, a parking area, and a 4.25-mile trail that will total approximately nine miles of trail from the proposed trailhead at Jacobs Ranch on Sonoma Mountain to the Hayfields trailhead at Jack London State Historic Park and add to the larger Bay Area Ridge Trail.

“The North Slope Sonoma Mountain Ridge Trail will be a treasured link in the visionary 550-mile Bay Area Ridge Trail,” said Janet McBride, BARTC Executive Director. “We are thrilled that trail construction is poised to begin—this is the happy result of many years of passionate, persistent efforts among many partners.”

The California Coastal Conservancy has supported the preservation of, and access to, Sonoma Mountain by providing a total of $2,385,000 in grant funding for planning, land acquisition, and public access improvements. The Coastal Conservancy was able to release $341,666 of a $575,000 grant frozen by the State to begin the construction.

“There is no better place to experience the spectacular beauty of Sonoma County than its namesake mountain,” said Maxene Spellman, project manager for the State Coastal Conservancy. “The new trail will lead hikers into the quiet intimacy of nature and offer majestic views that take in much of the North Bay’s awe-inspiring landscape.”

“This project once again demonstrates the significance of partnerships in our land conservation efforts,” said Bill Keene, General Manager of the District. “Our combined teamwork in funding, planning, and implementing this project will provide needed jobs, public access, and protection of diverse wildlife habitats and sensitive natural resources.”

About the Sonoma County Agricultural Preservation and Open Space District
The Sonoma County Agricultural Preservation and Open Space District permanently protects the diverse agricultural, natural resource and scenic open space lands of Sonoma County for future generations. Since 1990, the District has protected more than 83,000 acres. Agricultural and open space lands have been protected through a 1/4-cent sales tax approved by voters in 1990 and reauthorized in 2006. For more information, please visit www.sonomaopenspace.org

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Santa Rosa's Roseland Community Park gets Funded

District Awards Matching Funds for City of Santa Rosa Park
Board approves $2.42 million for Roseland Creek Community Park and Trail Project

Today (February 23, 2010), the Board approved a $2.42 million grant to the City of Santa Rosa for the acquisition of 7 acres located at 1370 and 1400 Burbank Avenue for an eventual park and trail project located in southwest Santa Rosa. The Sonoma County Agricultural Preservation and Open Space District recommended the project for funding in 2008 as part of its Matching Grant Program.

“This park is a needed asset for the community and will directly benefit the children in the Roseland School District,” said Efren Carrillo, Fifth District Supervisor. “Through the Matching Grant Program we are able to bolster local programs to make more parks and recreational opportunities available, as well as create quality environmental, educational and economic resources for the neighborhoods of our cities.”

This acquisition represents a portion of the larger 18 acres identified for park and trail development located between Burbank and McMinn Avenues, and is the first of a multi-phased project. The City is currently negotiating additional acquisitions totaling approximately 11 acres located at 1027 McMinn and 1360 Burbank Avenues and has applied for funding from the District as part of its 2009 grant program.

The site was identified as a potential park in the City’s general plan and comprises a reach of Roseland Creek, grasslands, and oak savanna. The proposed park is within a one-mile radius of four elementary schools, two middle schools, and two high schools of the Roseland School District, and is expected to support a variety of community activities, including environmental education and after-school programs.

“The acquisition of this property will bring us closer to realizing our general plan goal of increasing parkland and recreational amenities for our residents,” said Marc Richardson, Assistant City Manager and Director of Recreation, Parks and Community Services. “By partnering with the District, the City of Santa Rosa is able to leverage its resources to create an 18-acre park envisioned by the community.”

As its matching contribution, the City will provide nearly $2.8 million of city funding, grants, and professional in-kind services toward ongoing park maintenance, restoration and enhancement of the creek. The Matching Grant Program guidelines require a 1:1 contribution match from applicants, which can include direct contributions and in-kind services and materials, with no more than 50 percent of the match identified for operations and maintenance.

Both Measures C and F, approved by the voters in 1990 and 2006, respectively, provide for the Matching Grant Program. Since 1994, the District has administered and based funding for this program on available sales tax revenues. To date, nearly $28 million in matching grants have been selected for funding of land acquisition, development of recreational amenities, and restoration of open space within or near urban areas. Projects include the Town Green in Windsor, the Prince Memorial Greenway in Santa Rosa, and the 250-acre expansion of land along the Petaluma River for public access and habitat enhancement adjacent to Schollenberger Park. As the District anticipates an approximate 10 percent decline in its revenue for FY09-10, the program is budgeted at $2 million or nearly 13% of its total revenues for the year.

“Now, more than ever, this program is especially important as it leverages the resources of our city, local agency, and non-profit partners to develop parks and restore open space for our urban communities,” said District General Manager Bill Keene. “Our success relies on the ability to offer a program that responds to the changing needs of our applicants.”

About the Sonoma County Agricultural Preservation and Open Space District
The Sonoma County Agricultural Preservation and Open Space District permanently protects the diverse agricultural, natural resource and scenic open space lands of Sonoma County for future generations. Since 1990, the District has protected more than 83,000 acres. Agricultural and open space lands have been protected through a 1/4-cent sales tax approved by voters in 1990 and reauthorized in 2006. For more information, please visit www.sonomaopenspace.org

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Protecting Sonoma Coumty Land for the Future

Agreement Protects Natural Area along Highway 12
Conservation easement keeps 165-acre Danielli property “forever wild” and preserves historic agricultural use.

In an area surrounded by existing or planned residential development and vineyards, the Sonoma County Agricultural Preservation and Open Space District will purchase an easement over the 165-acre Danielli property which will keep approximately 148 acres natural and provide for 17 acres of agricultural use.

The Sonoma County Board of Supervisors, acting as the District’s Board of Directors, approved the $1.48 million agreement between the District and Lola Danielli. The purchase price represents a 10% or $164,500 reduction of the appraised value, and the agreement eliminates the potential for development of six parcels and provides for continued agricultural and existing residential uses on the property.

“We thank Lola Danielli and applaud her family’s efforts to voluntarily preserve their land,” said Valerie Brown, First District Supervisor. “Together we’re maintaining our county’s quality of life and ensuring wildlife habitat.”

The property has been in the Danielli family since the 1940s and will adjoin two existing open space easements that will create 420 acres of contiguous wildlife habitat. Forever protected are the oak woodland, conifer forest, meadows, chaparral, and seasonal creeks that characterize the property.

“It was always the wish of my parents to keep this land open and undeveloped,” said property owner Lola Danielli. “Working with the District has allowed us to keep this land natural and protect these vital resources for future generations.”

The expanse of the property runs from the northeast side of Sonoma Highway across from the Oakmont subdivision, halfway between downtown Santa Rosa and Kenwood, to nearly a mile into the hills on the northeast side of Sonoma Valley. Elevations range from 400 to 850 feet along the property’s two ridges. Additionally, it is located within a major groundwater basin that recharges the water supply to Santa Rosa Creek.

“More than half of the nearly 83,000 acres we’ve conserved protects the County’s natural areas and critical habitats.” said Bill Keene, General Manager of the District. “By setting aside these protected areas, we are able to preserve our native plants and animals, promote clean air and water, and provide educational opportunities for the community.”

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About the Sonoma County Agricultural Preservation and Open Space District
The Sonoma County Agricultural Preservation and Open Space District permanently protects the diverse agricultural, natural resource and scenic open space lands of Sonoma County for future generations. Since 1990, the District has protected more than 83,000 acres. Agricultural and open space lands have been protected through a 1/4-cent sales tax approved by voters in 1990 and reauthorized in 2006. For more information, please visit www.sonomaopenspace.org

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Best Family Winery Public Hearing March 2nd

Attend the Public Hearing on March 2, 2010 @ 2:10 p.m. Sonoma County Board of Supervisors, 575 Administration Drive Santa Rosa.
http://supervisors.sonoma-county.org/
for the time, agenda and contact information for comments.

To the people of Sonoma County,
The Best Family Investment Group LLC would like to become my new neighbor. They want to move in across the narrow country lane from my home of the past 20 years and build a winery complex that would include a building that is nearly a football field long, 1/2 football field wide, and 4 1/2 stories tall. Further ingratiating themselves to me they intend to host parties with up to 150 guests, 17 times a year and serve 100 guests daily in a separate 5,000 square foot wine tasting room. If that's not enough to have me quivering in anticipation of their arrival, they are even going to truck in enough grapes to crank out 26,500 cases of wine AND they'll have operations going 24/7 for several months of the year. What more can I possible hope for? I can't wait till they're in so we can have each other over for tea, borrow a cup of sugar, you know, just do the kinds of things that good neighbors do for each other. I hope my tears of joy don't get the welcome cake soggy when my new neighbors rip out the apple orchard that has been growing here in the scenic corridor since 1925. Good riddance to those pesky old apple trees. Welcome to my new neighbors, the kind that most people only get to dream about.

Just think of it, a wine bottling plant right next door operating all night along. How lucky can one get?

What must I do to become the recipient of all this good fortune?

I must hope and pray that on March 2nd the Sonoma County Board of Supervisors will vote to amend the General Plan twice, rezone 2 parcels and throw in some special policy voodoo so my special neighbors can build a winery complex on an undersized lot outside my bedroom window. Oh, I almost forgot, I also need the Board of Supervisors to accept the MND instead of requiring an Environmental Impact Report. I certainly wouldn't want to delay move-in day just to do a silly study to see if this project could in some remote way have a potentially significant impact on the environment and surrounding area. If this precedent is set any resident of Sonoma County can look forward to the day when they too can have a neighbor like this.

Seriously folks, this project does not belong here. This project does not fit here. This project is not wanted here. Creating an island of Diverse Agriculture land-use with no buffer to the surrounding residential properties would create an area of conflicting land use which is the exact opposite of the goal of our General Plan and zoning laws.

Can you say: Square Peg, Round Hole!

Contact your Board of Supervisors. Tell them to VOTE NO. Attend the Public Hearing on March 2, 2010 @ 2:10 p.m. 575 Administration Drive Santa Rosa.

Sincerely,
Thomas Morabito
Sebastopol

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Sonoma County Board goes LIVE on the Internet

Sonoma County Board Meetings to Begin Live Streaming on Internet

Beginning on January 26th, Sonoma County residents will be able to watch Board of Supervisors meetings live on the internet.

Viewers with internet access will be able to watch live meetings, view the Board’s agenda, and access relevant support documents such as staff reports and board resolutions. The internet streaming will include live captioning for the hearing impaired. In addition, meetings will be archived and available for replay at the viewer’s convenience. This project is a continuation of the County’s commitment to making government transparent and accessible to its residents.
“This will enhance the public’s access to their county government,” said Board Chair and 1st District Supervisor Valerie Brown. “This is a smart use of technology that moves the county closer to being paperless, and also complements our sustainability efforts.”

Residents interested in using this new service may visit the Board of Supervisors website at http://supervisors.sonoma-county.org/meetings/. The meetings will be listed by date. The meeting archive will begin with the January 26th meeting, and will grow over time as future Board meetings occur.

The new online service is provided through a contract with Granicus, Inc., a San Francisco company and a leading provider of government webcasting and public meeting management solutions throughout the U.S.

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Russian River Flooding - Sandbag Availability

Then worst may be over ...or yet to come. Sonoma County Transportation and Public Works has sanbbags for those who need them.

The Sonoma County Transportation and Public Works Department (TPW) has begun placing sand at locations in the Russian River area so that area residents may make and place sand bags on their property if they desire to guard against the possibility of flooding.

The Forestville Fire Department has bags for local residents. Sand has already been placed at the Forestville Youth Park on Mirabel for public use. TPW will be placing sand tomorrow (1/20) near the Guerneville Library on Armstrong Woods Road, also for public use.

Friedman’s Home Improvement stores are also providing a limited number of bags for free at their Sonoma County locations.

TPW - Tom O’kane ∙ (707) 565-3585

Forestville Fire Department 6554 Mirabel Road, Forestville, CA‎ - (707) 887-2212‎

Forestville Youth Park

Friedman’s Home Improvement 4055 Santa Rosa Ave, Santa Rosa - 707-588-7625

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Fight for Air - Sonoma County Healthy Home Website

IS YOUR HOME MAKING YOU OR YOUR FAMILY SICK?

WHAT DO YOU DO IF YOU HAVE AN UNHEALTHY HOME?

New “Healthy Homes” Webpage Launched
on Sonoma County Environmental Health Division Website

The County of Sonoma Department of Health Services, Environmental Health Division has launched a new webpage resource with information about how to identify health and safety problems in homes, and how to keep our homes healthy.

“Poor housing conditions can definitely affect the public’s health, which is why we’re so pleased to launch this webpage”, said Walt Kruse, Director of Environmental Health.

The webpage was created in cooperation with the Sonoma County Asthma Coalition through a grant from California Breathing of the California Department of Public Health. The webpage includes the following resource information:

· Aspects that define healthy homes
· What constitutes a substandard housing violation
· Indoor air quality asthma triggers
· A quick reference table and map of code enforcement jurisdictions that include the public contact numbers for submitting substandard housing complaints/tips
· Frequently asked questions regarding mold
· Tenant/Landlord resources
· Many helpful and informational links to external resources for Healthy Homes related topics

The new webpage is located at the following link: http://www.sonoma-county.org/health/eh/healthy_home.htm

For any questions regarding the webpage, please contact the Environmental Health Division at (707) 565-6565

Shan Magnuson
Associate Director
Sonoma County Asthma Coalition
American Lung Association in California
115 Talbot Ave.
Santa Rosa, CA 95404
707-527-5864
smagnuson@alac.org
www.sonomaasthma.org

I am committed to bringing forth an environmentally sustainable, spiritually fulfilling and socially just human presence on this planet as the guiding principle of our times.

Saturday, March 27, 2010
www.fightforairclimb.org

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Bohemian Grove Forest Management Protest

As many now know, the plan to log valuable stands of timber at the Bohemian Grove property in Monte Rio, California was signed off for approval by CALFIRE on December 29, 2009. This development, characterized by Judge Bill Newsom as a "thinly disquised plan..." to log "one of the last two great stands of old-growth" has disappointed more than a few, both Russian River residents and many of the environmentally conscious community.

So what's next? With such approvals, there's a thirty day window to file appeal via legal means. Who better to tell the story than John Hooper, organic farmer and past member of the Bohemian Club. John knows the Bohemian Club property and its trees far better than many, and as an owner of forestry stands himself, he has a strong sense of how forests can best be managed.

A wealth of information, including professional testimonials, forestry reports, and forestry management statistics relevant to the Bohemian Grove NTMP is available for review at

http://www.savebohemiangrove.org

John has taken time to discuss the situation's latest developments in an interview with David Kenly and Harvey Mendelson, and that interview is now online as a podcast.

To listen to the interview, podcast player software is required. We recommend iTunes for either MAC or PC. It's free and downloadable from the Apple site at http://www.apple.com/itunes/

Once iTunes (or a similar podcast player) is installed, subscribe to the ArrowFlight Green Parallel podcast to hear the interview with John Hooper. All you have to do is click on

itpc://www.arrowflight.com/podcasts/green.xml

or, in the event your computer doesn't accept this address, enter the following directly into the podcast subscription area of iTunes, usually found in the "Subscribe to Podcast" menu item in the "Advanced" menu.

http://www.arrowflight.com/podcasts/green.xml

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Sebastopol Raw Sewage Spill into Laguna de Santa Rosa

UPDATE January 21 - repair is complete - see below

This is an EMERGENCY message
from the City of Sebastopol.

Wednesday, January 20, 2010 - The City of Sebastopol has experienced a rupture of our main wastewater transmission pipe requiring us to shut down pumping to the treatment facility. City crews will be pumping and hauling wastewater generated in the City by truck to the treatment plant in Santa Rosa, until the wastewater main repairs are completed.

During the next 24-48 hours, residents are requested to limit indoor water use to a minimum, to minimize the amount of wastewater flow which must be trucked to the plant. In particular, use of dishwashers, clothes washers and showers should be curtailed during this period. If you have questions, call the Public Works Department at 823-5331 during normal business hours.
If you live in the City of Sebastopol, PLEASE immediately adopt strict conservation measures for all water use which might flow to the Laguna through the sewer system.

Thank you for your cooperation.

All residents that are downstream of the spill, from the city limits to the Russian River, 500 feet on both sides of the Laguna. (about 70 residents).

There has been an accidental release of wastewater into the Laguna De Santa Rosa surface waterway. If your water wellhead is under water, where contaminants can enter your well, do not use your water for the next 48 hours. Please avoid contact with the Laguna surface water as it may carry contaminants. If you have questions, call the Sebastopol Public Works Department at 823-5331, during normal business hours. Thank you for your cooperation.

UPDATE January 21 - repair is complete

January 21, 2010
At 11:37 a.m. on Wednesday, January 20, 2010, the City or Sebastopol received a report of a broken sewer main in the Meadowlark Field east of the Laguna de Santa Rosa, north of Highway 12. Public Works and Engineering staff responded to the scene and confirmed a break in the sewer transmission main which carries wastewater from the City of Sebastopol to the Subregional sewer treatment plant on Llano Road. At the time it was discovered, water was flowing from the broken main across the field to the drainage way leading to the Laguna de Santa Rosa.

The City immediately made the required reports to State regulatory authorities and proceeded to arrange for containment of the spill and repairs to the main. City residents were notified to conserve water as much as possible until repairs could be made, to limit the amount of wastewater flowing to the system.

At the time of the incident, the Laguna was flooding out of its banks into the field, due to heavy rains earlier in the morning. On the recommendation of the North Coast Regional Board, all residents downstream of Sebastopol with water wells within 500 feet of the Laguna de Santa Rosa were also notified of the wastewater spill.

The City had a contractor on scene by 12:50 p.m. to excavate the broken main and make repairs. Pump trucks were also deployed at the site of the main break to contain the leaking wastewater to the extent possible, and near the City’s sewer pumping station on Morris Street. The pump station was shut down and wastewater flowing in the system was pumped into tanker trucks and hauled to the treatment plant during the afternoon and evening, to divert wastewater flow from the area of the main break. The contractor completed repairs to the transmission main by 9:54 p.m. and the pumping system was put back in service.

The City continues to investigate the cause of this rupture, and will be assembling additional reports from our engineers and field personnel.

Susan Kelly, Public Information Officer
City of Sebastopol
(707) 823-2151
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The Laguna de Santa is an important tributary to the Russian River. What happens in the Laguna gets carried downstream to the Russian River then out to sea. Accidents happen and the City of Sebastopol is responding quickly to this problem. What's important is that people need to realize that this is not just a Sebastopol problem - it impacts the entire waterway from the spill put to the sea and beyond.

The GOOD NEWS is that it is being taken care of as diligently as possible by Public Works. Residents who rely upon the Sebastopol Wastewater System need to realize how much they play a part in the success of this defense and clean-up. Life does not go on as usual during the time it takes to haul wastewater away and fix the problem. Flushing the least amount of water down the drain makes the job easier - and quicker - for Public Works.

In these heavy rains the Laguna will flush itself out as well - and take a lot of cow manure from the dairies that line the Laguna along with the human waste. Agricultural lands that line our waterways also dump many products into the water as rains wash across surface soil and soak through layers of soil, leaching nutrients of all kinds in the process. All of this material ends up in the Laguina, the Russian River and the Pacific Ocean.

More than likely the 70 homes that line the Laguna down stream from the spill have septic systems along with their water wells and these systems get flush with rainwater at this time of year as well. Are all of these systems up to code and as efficient as a sewage treatment plant? Are all of the septic systems that are used in homes along the Russian River up to code nand keeping their effluent from entering our waterways?


The wastewater/sewage spill in Sebastopol has a short-term solution/fix that will bring their wastewater back into compliance within a few days. The Laguna, Russian River and Pacific Ocean are vulnerable 365 days a year.

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REVIEW: Monte Rio Wastewater Task Force meeting Jan 11

Review of Monte Rio Wastewater Task Group Meeting, January 11, 2010
Personal perspective by Lloyd Guccione, Guerneville

Follow-up letters below

The Monte Rio Wastewater Task Group (MRWWTG) met at the Monte Rio Community Center on Monday evening; January 11th. The Task Group is a group of citizens, property owners (both resident and outside of the area), contractors, and investment – speculator property owners. Its members include Ken Wikle, Dan Fein, Preston Smith, Leo Torr IV, Rene de Monchy, Gary Getchell, Chuck Berger, Doreen Atkinson, Jim Quigley, Steve Mack Richard “Rick” Holmer, Susie Baxman, and Fifth District Supervisor Efren Carrillo. This was the group’s fourth meeting and was important in that it brought together in a panel discussion the lead spokesmen for all the significant agencies that have relevance to the Task Group’s self-defined mission. Panelists included spokespersons from North Coast Regional Water Quality Control Board, Sonoma County Water Agency, Environmental Health and Safety, and Permit and Resources Management Department. Also in attendance was Kathleen Kane (Executive Director Community Development Commission) and twenty-five or so members of the public during the course of the meeting.

Background: The Task Group

The current Task Group was appointed by Kathleen Kane and followed upon two main events. The first was Mr. Mike Reilly’s ‘Amending Resolution’[1] which stripped the Oversight Committee of its ability to have subcommittees (among other impacts) and assigned to the CDC Executive Director the authority to both establish “Task Groups”, make the appointments to the groups, and oversee meetings. The second event was the collapse of the CSWS (Citizens for Sensible Wastewater Solutions), an ad-hoc group, when the Monte Rio Parks and Recreation District Board disbanded them as a subcommittee of that Board. The short-lived CSWS held only a few “formal” meetings and at least two of those had to on the picnic tables outside the Community Center because they could not pay for the facility, and because they were locked out (did not have keys).

The demise of the CSWS was due primarily to some glaring organizational and procedural problems, lack of a legitimate funding source to underwrite their efforts, and a legitimacy conferred by county government (e.g. CDC/Redevelopment). All of these shortcomings and difficulties have now apparently been overcome or addressed. The members of the ad-hoc CSWS (now almost all members of the MRWWTG) have learned from their past procedural and organizational errors and miss-steps. Dan Fein deserves much credit in helping the group in this respect as well as in guiding the group toward obtaining the legitimacy the Task Group now has. The funding (underwriting) was addressed by Mr. Reilly’s ‘Amending Resolution’ and the authority it ceded from the RRROC to the Executive Director of the CDC.[2] And the bureaucratic/institutional legitimacy was obtained through the appointment power of CDC and the sitting on the Task Force of Efren Carrillo; Fifth District Supervisor. Also deserving credit for this group’s rebirth and its massively reinvigorated possibilities are Ken Wikle (RRROC Chairman, Monte Rio Volunteer Firefighter), Victoria Wikle (Sweetwater Springs Water District Board Member). Steve Mack (Sweetwater General Manager) and Jim Quigley (Sweetwater Board Member and Windsor Water employee) have also added to the “weight” credibility of the group; Mr. Mack for his wastewater experience and the two of them together as important components in Sweetwater policy, operations, and/or governance. [Sweetwater Springs Water District is one of several “potential” lead agencies or administrative districts (entities) that may be essential to certain “solution” approaches being broached and discussed.]

Prior to the formation of the CSWS the key players in the CSWS (and now the MRWWTG) had largely been advocates/boosters of the Sheridan Ranch regionalized sewer approach and advocates/boosters of a rebuilding and development of the core (downtown) area of Monte Rio. The group also included individuals with interests and concerns surrounding building on undeveloped (vacant) parcels, renovation, remodeling, and expansion of current structures (residential and commercial). The members of the group, irregardless of their individual motivations and expectations, are all committed, intelligent, and community-minded (albeit each has his or her own important view of what ‘community-minded’ includes or excludes). In general they are all to be thanked for their work, their persistence, and their willingness to learn and accommodate.

On the current MRWWTG there are some notable questioning and constructive divergent perspectives; Doreen Atkinson and Gary Getchell.

The Meeting of Monday January 11, 2020

Dan Fein outlined the intent of the meeting, introduced the panelists, and explained the format for the meeting. Rene de Monchy provided some of the important background issues (AB 885, septic particulars, slopes, and explained a large map he and Preston Smith had created). Dan Fein, Rene de Monchy, and Preston Smith sat at the table in conjunction with the panelists and gave the appearance of being an executive group of the task force (at least for this meeting). The presentations by the three were well delivered, coherent, and avoided unnecessary repetitions. The attention of the public and the other Task Group members was retained and the question-comment/answer-commentary segment also went quite well. This is notable in that the concerns and discussion covered a rather large territory.

Some of the larger points/concerns addressed were; water body impairment and Section 303 (d) designation, AB 885 and its current legislative further working out including a conceptionalized ‘three-tier’ approach modification, Guerneville Treatment Plant status and capacity or lack of capacity issues, UC Davis and other monitoring undertakings, revised PRMD policies, and cost implications of certain approaches. All of these, however, were dealt with only in rather general and perhaps cursory detail. Some of this was due to time limitations, but also due to the outline provided to the panelists in anticipation of the meeting. Several of the panelists cited that they were not prepared to provide requested detail or greater specificity since the outline material they were provided did not provide the advance notice or expectation. This was particularly applicable to the NCWQCB’s spokesman.

The lack of more current detail and specificity can be understood by taking into account the “intent” of the meeting as a general informational outline. In other words the meeting was not structured to allow in-depth review of aspects, questions, or concerns. A further meeting is anticipated for Spring were there may be opportunity to reach for greater substance instead of a review. At least two members of the Monte Rio community; familiar with past efforts and meetings felt the meeting lacked sufficient ‘new’ data or perspectives to sustain their interest. They left the meeting early; slightly disappointed, if not disenchanted. Other members of the public seemed to appreciate the re-opening of the perennial issue and getting a review with some important (although general) updates.

The issue of water body impairment and the Section 303 (d) designation for the Russian River (e.g. Healdsburg at the bridge and that stretch between Fife and Dutch Bill creeks) was addressed. In connection with it Gary Getchell asked about the impact of the low flow regime and its attendant low flow-rates on data results for coliform bacteria and the other criteria of impairment including temperature and turbidity. Mr. Getchell made the point, through his question, that one action to address an issue (low flow to accommodate fishery issues) can and has had a subsequent deleterious effect upon the river. In example, lower river flows have resulted (allowed) in higher temperatures in the summer and the concentration of biologicals and other components that would have been sufficiently diluted (possibly) with what had been ‘normal’ flows before the regime was instituted. It is a clear example of how addressing one problem can lead to a set of new ones that are more intractable, expensive in solution, and politically and socially sensitive that expected. None of the panelists were able to give a sufficient answer either to Mr. Getchell’s question or to the equally important issue it implied.

When the question was raised about how a body or segment receives the 303 (d) designation: ‘How long does a single indicator (temperature, turbidity, coliform count) need to persist to trigger the designation?’ there was no clear responsive reply. There was also no enlightening response to questions regarding such impact specifics as motoring locations, flow-rates corollaries, eddies, water depth, daily or seasonal variations, and time specific events (such as children in a shallow ‘kiddie beach’). Another point that was not clearly or adequately addressed is how the 303 (d) designation can be rescinded. In other words (putting both aspects together) it was not made clear how long a monitoring result must be in effect before 303 (d) is triggered, or how long it must be absent for it to be rescinded. The best the panelists could offer is that it is easier to make the designation that it is to remove it. Perhaps they meant that it is hard to prove a negative and therefore rescinding a designation is exceedingly problematic. Even more simply; they didn’t know.

One of the troubling implications of the lack of a clear response is that a monitoring result, perhaps a single event, could trigger a designation that could take years to address and study and bushels of money and time. Not an encouraging or confidence building scenario. The current regimen has the propensity to initiate miss-leading positives and to act like a blinking light – now on, now off; the regulatory agencies will gladly acknowledge the “on” but have not quite figured out to how to address the “off”. After all, an “off” might well imply a diminishing of their (at any particular moment) purview; something bureaucracies eschew.

The concerns and review of AB 885, the legislature’s bill addressing septic systems state-wide, held little new concrete information. The review of the concerns, as raised by the overflow crowd at the Wells Fargo (Luther Burbank) meeting last February (2009), was good for that (a review) but did not carry things forward. The caveat to that is that the public was informed that it appears the legislature is moving toward a “three-tier” approach to implementation instead of the “one size fits all” approach. However, the changes will not offer any appreciable relief to Monte Rio over the initial AB 885 implications. This is due to Monte Rio’s location on the river, its slopes, and its predominate small (insufficient) lot sizes. While there was some soft comment that something may come out of the legislative/lobbying process this year it was implied that any active implementation of a worked out AB 885 was still many years off.

One limiting factor to the implementation of any worked out AB 885 is funding, and in connection with that the current state of the State’s finances is quite relevant. In addition to the costs to state and local government to implement any plan there is also the potentially prohibitive costs to property owners, the intrusiveness of the inspection requirements, and the inability of government (federal, state, or local) to underwrite or mitigate the costs. AB 885 looks like a well-intended idea; a good theory! But it also is seemingly absolutely impractical to implement. This impracticality; for cost and political reasons (the rural public does not appear to be ready, or willing, to accept it) does not seem to be going away soon.

Although analogies are always imperfect by their very nature they can be helpful. In a fashion AB 885 is like the regulations and changes that occurred in automobiles in pursuit of cleaning up the air. Everyone is for clean air; everyone is for clean water. The problems start when you try to figure out how to get from A to B. With cars we went the route of imposing exhaust emission limits on new cars and greater efficiencies. This lead to a host of innovations and results. The route, however, was not to require everyone to buy a new car and junk their old one. The theory in the car ‘model’ was that given time the newer models would replace the older ones by a kind of natural process.

With AB 885 the implication is otherwise. Still following the car analogy; an AB 885 type of law would have required everyone to have their car inspected yearly, pay $125-130 yearly (to start), and if it failed make the necessary repairs. Start thinking in multiples of 10’s of thousands of dollars. So far in essence not much different. But AB 885 would apply no matter how old your car was. It would be like taking your Model A, or your Bel-Air into inspection and told you didn’t pass and now you need to bring your classic up to current standards; even though yours is running just fine and dandy. Yes-siree-bob… you gotta’ add a catalytic converter, an O2 sensor, an air bag (make that two), a five mile per hour bumper, and you just read down the list yourself. The point is AB 885 is currently impractical and is being used as a “boogey-man” by way too many. And in addition to the annual inspections god help you if you wanted to restore or update your old jalopy or classic (house). If you want to replace more than one rusted fender and one bent bumper you’d get a real wake-up call in the pocket book and in the process (permit) line.

I know that the analogy is weak, but somehow it still gets me in the right kind of mood. Like… I like my old car; I take care of it:… I like my old house, I take care of it. I don’t ask anyone to take my crap away; I take care of it myself. Its my old heap… its my crap (so to speak) and I prefer to keep it that way. Now mind your own business and go and find some other ‘problem’ to fix somewhere else. Don’t need the likes of you round these here parts. We do care for our river, our neighbors, our septics, and our pocketbooks… thank you very much.

Conclusion:
The dialog and discussion on MRWTG and the attendant issues has taken off in the past few days and hopefully will reach a point of increased public exposure and responsiveness. It is clear that the Task Group members need to now individually put down in written form; actual pen to paper, what their individual perceptions of the issues and problems. These written presentations should (must) be in the context of the mission statement and the parameters of the Task Group. That means not all their individual problems or concerns, but those relevant to the (their) task at hand. Without these individual written perspectives no effective (firm) understanding will be forthcoming that is not subject to the critique (disparagement) of personal, personal business, bureaucratic, and growth self-service. Truly, the group needs to come to grips with what is self-evident to so many others; the group is refusing to distinguish itself from its previous incarnation; the CSWS, with its more obvious intentions and needs and its equally obvious shortcomings.

There is no need for the individual members of the group to eschew such a task; writing down their views of the issues and problems. Once done let these be made available and (I believe; if done with candor) the result will provide a must needed understanding of the various terrains each brings to the table. Once done this will allow (accommodate) discussion on a level playing field (show your cards!) instead of this money consuming effort being turned into a political game-play.

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[1] The formal (legal) title of the resolution is: Revised Procedures for the Composition, Election and Continuing Role of the Citizens’ Oversight Committee for the Russian River Redevelopment Project.

[2] Note: It must be stated that the rationale given for the elimination of the RRROC’s subcommittees was that CDC could not support their activities due to staffing and budgetary restraints. Following the passing of the ‘Amending Resolution’ these constraints somehow evaporated and staffing, staff time, and discretionary budgetary funds became available. [The RRROC previously had declined to form a specific subcommittee to address the Monte Rio Wastewater (Sewer) matter finding that no project existed or was being put forward. Also its Infrastructure Subcommittee declined to focus on the issue and was additionally specifically barred from developing liaisons with relevant governmental (county and state) departments, agencies, and/or individuals.

ADDENDUM:

Mr. Richard Holmer has written to Mr. Todd Thompson of the State Water Resources Control Board a well conceived letter on AB 885. Assembly Bill 885 which concerns septic systems is relevant to those of us hooked up to the Grenville Treatment Plant in that the Plant is being
considered (viewed) as an option (again) by the proponents of a Monte Rio Wastewater Solutions program. Such a prospect could have significant impacts on sewer cost (future assessment increases) as well as other considerations.

I encourage you to share this with your other neighbors.

Please keep yourself informed on the activities and participants in the Monte Rio Wastewater Solutions Task Force of the Community Development Commission/Russian River Redevelopment Project. Get informed about local issues. Participate and have confidence in your own abilities to have an important and relevant impact. Voting is not enough; participation is local issues and goverance is vital.

Text of Mr. Holmer's letter is below:

January 15, 2010

Mr. Todd Thompson, P.E.
Division of Water Quality
State Water Resources Control Board
1001 I Street
P.O. Box 2231
Sacramento, CA 95812

Dear Todd:

Subject: Comments on “Proposed Regulations and Waiver for Onsite Wastewater Treatment Systems (Septic Systems) and the Associated Draft Impact Report (EIR)” currently being developed pursuant to AB885

As you know, I was involved with the Sonoma County septic system program for 32 years (until my retirement from public service) and I was in charge of the program from 1995 to 2004. I attended the initial hearings on AB885 as a representative of the County of Sonoma. At that
time, I raised the issue of existing dwellings that would not be able to comply with the proposed regulations due to substandard lot size or other issues. I was assured that this would be dealt with during the process of developing the regulations. My review of the current draft
finds that the language about existing dwellings on septic systems is ambiguous and appears potentially confiscatory. I have detailed my comments on this subject below as well as my comments on other aspects of the regulations.

At this time, I feel that the regulations have significant fatal flaws and should not be adopted due to the unintended consequences which may result. I also feel that the EIR is not adequate particularly in the economic analysis.

My comments follow:

EXISTING DWELLINGS ON SEPTIC SYSTEMS

History: Many areas in California that are served by septic systems were developed primarily for recreational purposes; often when local land use regulations were limited or nonexistent. I will use Sonoma County as an example but this applies to other counties as well.

In Sonoma County there are thousands of lots that were subdivided prior to any septic system regulations or land use planning. Some of these subdivisions date back to the early 1900's. Many of these lots are extremely substandard in size for a septic system based on current
standards. At the time that they were subdivided, the lots were intended for seasonal use and often had only a cesspool or pit privy for sewage disposal. Over the course of time, the residences have become converted to full time occupancy and are often the best source of
affordable housing for low income families.

When conventional septic system standards are applied to these situations, it is simply impossible to meet standards for sizing of absorption fields, setbacks to water ways, depth of soil requirements and many other issues. In response, Sonoma County has developed an
extensive program of alternative wastewater systems that includes the provision for waiver to septic system standards where in can be demonstrated that the system being proposed as a replacement system provides a clear and positive improvement over the existing system and
represents the best available technology for the specific site constraints.

Without this type of approach, the septic systems could not be repaired or replaced and the house would not be able to be occupied. It should be noted that all on-site sewage disposal systems have a finite lifetime and will become subject to repair or replacement at some point. In
order to prevent the widespread condemnation of older housing, the proposed septic system regulations must provide for flexibility in application of the standards to existing houses.

Proposed regulations: The sections of the proposed regulations that mention repair or replacement of septic systems are ambiguous and subject to interpretation. There is no provision for waivers or exemptions to the regulations.

In Section 30000 (definitions), “New OWTS” is defined as “an OWTS permitted after the effective date of this chapter”. Does this mean that the issuance of a permit to repair a system, issued after the effective date of the regulations, triggers meeting the requirements for a new system?

“Existing OWTS” is defined as “an OWTS that was either permitted by the applicable local agency or legally installed before the effective date of this chapter”. This appears to imply that the replacement of a system has to meet all of the requirements.

Section 30001 (b) states that this chapter applies to all new OWTS and only to existing OWTS where specifically indicated. This section speaks only to the OWTS and not to the dwelling. There is no recognition of the need to differentiate between existing houses served by septic systems versus new construction of houses.

In section 30002, there appears to be an attempt to differentiate between new and replaced OWTS. Section 30002 (b) refers to “new and replaced OWTS” having to be designed to maximize treatment of wastewater. Section 30002 (c) states that “new OWTS” “shall be
designed, operated and maintained in accordance with the requirements of this chapter”. Does this mean that replacement OWTS do not have to meet the design requirements? If this is the intent, then it should be clearly stated as such and the standards for a replacement OWTS should
be clarified. This is especially confusing given the requirements under the definitions section described above.

EIR: If the regulations are not flexible in their application to existing dwellings, then there are huge economic impacts that have not been addressed in the economic analysis. This analysis should quantify the number of existing dwellings that would be unable to meet the new standards and would be subject to condemnation. This is a critical aspect of the new regulations that has been completely overlooked. This impact, in my opinion, is potentially the most significant impact of the proposed regulations unless there are changes made to allow existing
houses on septic systems to repair or replace their systems even if they cannot meet the proscriptive standards contained in the regulations.

WELL WATER SAMPLING

Section 30002 (t) requires routine testing of the drinking water well on the property where the OWTS is situated. The specified testing includes a variety of mineral tests for constituents that are not of public health significance. Specifically the required testing includes calcium, magnesium, sodium, potassium, iron, manganese, zinc, sulfate, chloride, total alkalinity, carbonate, bicarbonate, MBAS and pH. Although these tests may be of interest to a property owner in determining whether or not they need a water softener or other mineral removal devices, they are not indicative of any kind of threat to the property owner’s health. It is excessive to require these kinds of tests and is an unnecessary expense. Routine testing for coliform organisms and nitrate could be justified.

GROUNDWATER LEVEL MONITORING

Section 30012 sets requirements for monitoring groundwater levels prior to installation of a new OWTS. These requirements stipulate continuous monitoring of groundwater for a period of five months during the winter months. This will be very expensive and is much more restrictive than
what is typically currently required in California. It could also lead to inaccuracies from heavy storms or due to damage to the testing equipment when it is subjected to conditions in the field for five months. Most jurisdictions now require one test during the wettest part of the year. For the purposes of installing a household septic system, this has proven to be adequate. There is inadequate substantiation of problems with the existing testing methods to justify this onerous
requirement.

LEACHFIELD DESIGN

Section 30014 (b) requires that “dispersal systems” (leachfields) be designed using only the square footage of bottom area of the trench for infiltration. This is an extremely poor design requirement. It has been repeatedly shown that the bottom area of a leachfield will clog
very quickly during operation due to formation of biofilm and physical clogging with suspended particles in the wastewater. Most jurisdictions in California have required that systems be designed based upon sidewall area of the leach trench because this is the effective absorption area during most of the life of the leachfield. The use of bottom area for sizing will result in wider trenches with less sidewall per linear foot of trench. This will hasten premature failure of the leachfield system when the bottom of the trench becomes clogged. There is no scientific
evidence to support use of bottom area for leachfield sizing.

IMPAIRED WATER BODIES

Section 30040 stipulates that no new system shall be constructed within 600 feet of the “edge of the river bank” of an impaired river. This is extremely vague. Many rivers do not have clearly defined banks. They are often characterized by a series of flood plateaus that can extend great distances from the typical course of water flow. This section would be subject to interpretation that would result in discrepancies between jurisdictions. There are ways to define this
more accurately such as: edge of summer water flow, edge of 10 year flood plane, or edge of floodway.

It is also unclear whether the impaired water body is meant to be simply the area described in the 303(d) listing or also including the tributaries to the listed water body. The maps shown as an attachment to the regulations show all of the tributary streams to the listed water
bodies. For example, a stretch of the lower Russian River from Fife Creek to Dutch Bill Creek is listed as an impaired water body, a relatively small portion of the lower river. Map 20 of the attachment, however, shows every tributary to that stretch of the river as an impaired water body. This is a huge expansion of the 303 (d) listing. If the intent is to include these tributaries, then the regulations become extremely burdensome to property owners.

EIR: The EIR significantly understates the costs to homeowners adjacent to 303 (d) listed water bodies particularly in relation to the attached maps which expand the boundaries of the impaired water bodies. There is no attempt to provide a statewide tally of costs to property owners. There are only estimated costs for a few areas in the state. This does not provide adequate information for the decision makers to make an informed decision on the true economic impacts of adopting these regulations.

SETBACKS

Oddly enough, the regulations do not include any requirements for the distance that an OWTS must be located from water wells, rivers, streams, lakes, etc. This is a fundamental provision of any regulation relating to OWTS. The executive summary makes a vague reference to these
setbacks being contained within “existing regulations”. Which existing regulations? The California Plumbing Code, Regional Water Quality Control Board Basin Plans, and individual County Codes all set standards for setback requirements. Often these are contradictory. Having individual jurisdictions adopt their own setback requirements would be in conflict with the goal of having uniform statewide OWTS standards. The proposed regulations should either contain setback standards or should adopt them by reference to another code.

Richard L. Holmer
Registered Environmental Health Specialist #3145

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

Dear Mr. Guccione,

The draft regulations circulated on Nov. 7, 2008 were retracted on Nov.
6, 2009.

The State Water Resources Control Board staff is fully reconsidering ways to fulfill the requirements set forth in Water Code Section 12291 (as added by AB 885 in 2000). We do not currently have a schedule for this process.

Thank You,

Todd Thompson, P.E.
Program Manager
DoD/Site Cleanup Program
Division of Water Quality
State Water Resources Control Board
1001 I Street
Sacramento, CA 95814
tthompson@waterboards.ca.gov
916 341 5518

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Meet the Candidates Sonoma County!

Political races are heating up so expect to see many opportunities to Meet the Candidates. Here are two that I know of so far - more to come - so if you know of any more - please let me know at vesta@sonic.net. Face-to-Face is the best way to find out who this person is in order to form your opinions. Educate yourself and you will feel confident that your vote is correct for you.

MEET Healdsburg Councilmember MIKE MCGUIRE
Candidate for Sonoma County 4th District Supervisor

Thursday, January 21st

Mary Ann Brigham, Cloverdale Councilmember is co-hosting an evening of live music, great food and ales at Ruth McGowan's Brewpub - www.ruthmcgowansbrewpub.com in Cloverdale. Mikewants to share his vision and perspective on important issues facing Sonoma County. He'd like to answer your questions.

Attendance is free for everyone.
For more information about Mike, visit www.MikeforSupervisor.com
R.S.V.P. to events@mikeforsupervisor.com

“Mike has had a decade of elected experience in this county. He served on the Healdsburg school board first and on the Healdsburg City Council (Mayor two times) after that. He's accomplished more in his 30 years than many of us get done in a lifetime.” - Maddy Hirschfield

-----------------------------------------------------
MEET Assemblywoman
NOREEN EVANS
Candidate for California State Senate

Saturday, January 23rd

11 - 12:30 LaFondita Mexican Restaurant, 816 Sebastopol Rd., Roseland

2 – 3:30 Sebastopol Senior Center, 167 N. High Street, Sebastopol

5 - 6:30 Russian River Senior Center, 16010 Armstrong Woods Rd, Guerneville

PLEASE RSVP: info@noreenevans.com
No Charge – Light Refreshments – Donations Accepted
FPPC #1320905
Visit Noreen’s Website at www.noreenevans.com

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Our County: Efren Carrillo Jan 2010

While we face the New Year with a mixture of enthusiasm and trepidation, there is much to look back on in this final month of 2009 that is worth celebrating. 2009 has been a year of economic turmoil, which brought unprecedented demand for services to the disadvantaged and disenfranchised delivered with increasingly limited resources. Still, some remarkable accomplishments by our Sonoma County community this month give cause for hope and appreciation.

On December 17th, the Sonoma Land Trust celebrated its acquisition of Jenner Headlands! Not your average accomplishment, Jenner Headlands is the single largest North Coast conservation acquisition in history with over 5630 acres of critical wildlife habitat being preserved forever. This was a truly once in a lifetime opportunity which required the perseverance, grit, and dedication of the Land Trust over a five year period.

The epic struggle to acquire Jenner Headlands culminated in success through creativity, collaboration of public (local, state, and federal government supported the acquisition financially) and private partners, and purposeful dedication by Ralph Benson, Amy Chesnut, and the Land Trust family. Their fortuitiveness will benefit Sonoma County for generations to come.

2009 was a wild ride for Ralph, Amy, and their partners, with the $36 million deal requiring that every part of a complex financial puzzle aligned and came together with no mishaps…all during this incredibly tough year. That coupled with the patience and dedication of the landholders to the outcome yields a remarkable achievement. I am proud to have played a role in supporting their efforts along with Assemblyman Wes Chesbro, former Supervisor Mike Reilly, and former Congressman (current Chair of the Coastal Commission) Doug Bosco. Congratulations to them, to us, and to all future residents and visitors to our beautiful County!

Steps both large and small have been made this year toward greater sustainability for the County. The vision of policy makers in adopting and pursuing the innovative Sonoma County Energy Independence Program (SCEIP) continues into its next phase. The early part of 2010 will see us move forward toward a regional approach to retrofitting homes and commercial properties, using the financing mechanism of SCEIP along with developing a “one stop shop” with all the tools needed for retrofits: energy audits (maximizing the return on retrofit investment), financing, maximizing education, incentives, and implementation.

We expect to see results from leveraging American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funds which will continue the job creation begun by SCEIP, and result in a much needed, concerted effort at retrofitting existing properties. Retrofitting has been identified as the number one priority for meeting our green house gas (GHG) community targets. Retrofitting benefits individuals through reduced energy costs and our entire planet through lowered GHG emissions. More information can be found at the Regional Climate Protection Authority’s (RCPA) website (www.sctainfo.org/rcpa.htm) or by contacting Dave Brennan of RCPA (dbrennan@sctainfo.org) or Chris Cone at the Climate Protection Campaign (ccone@climateprotectioncampaign.org)

It is expected that the new program will launch in April 2010, with the initial focus on single family residential units, and moving forward with multi-family and commercial properties within the year.

While we’re on the topic of resources and conservation, there will be a continuing focus on reducing our use of water in 2010. Recent changes in state law regarding greywater are propelling our County to look at alternatives to the use of drinking quality water for landscaping and other high use water needs. Public health is a valid concern, but the time to move forward in dramatically reducing our water use is now.

The past few years of drought and the declining health of our river and salmon populations have brought urgency to the topic. While 2009 showed that community concern is high, and urban users can and will reduce their water consumption when needed, much remains to be done to accomplish a permanent behavioral shift. We will continue to move forward, taking a hard look at water reuse and other methods of water reduction.

I’m looking forward to a very wet (but not too wet) winter to give us a necessary buffer while we work on policy, alternatives, and solutions.

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Recycle Holiday Trees - Three Options for Sonoma County

COUNTY REMINDS RESIDENTS TO RECYCLE HOLIDAY TREES

~ Unincorporated County residents benefit from new
Christmas tree disposal options ~

Keep Sonoma Clean, a multi-agency Sonoma County program designed to reduce illegal dumping, reminds Sonoma County residents to recycle their Christmas trees.

Three convenient options are available for tree recycling:
- cut the tree into pieces and place it in your green waste container
- call a nonprofit to collect the tree
- or drop the tree off for free at one of many locations throughout the County.
Complete details can be found at www.recyclenow.org/r_christmastree.html, the Sonoma County Waste Management Agency Web site.

This year, residents in the Unincorporated County have an additional option for Christmas tree disposal. As a result of a new contract with North Bay Corporation, residents in the Unincorporated County may place a whole Christmas tree at the curb for pickup.

This service also is available in Healdsburg, Rohnert Park, Santa Rosa and Windsor. Residents may visit www.recyclenow.org/r_christmastree.html for curbside pickup dates and details, or contact their local recycling and garbage disposal provider.

In order for trees to be recycled through any of the collection programs, they must be free of decorations, tinsel and stand (metal or wood). Flocked trees will not be accepted.

“Sometimes people think that it’s okay to dump Christmas trees, because over time they decompose,” noted Patrick Carter, Waste Management Specialist for the Sonoma County Waste Management Agency. “But just because a waste product degrades doesn’t make it legal to throw it by the side of the road or in a creek. Roadside dumping is unsightly, trees discarded in a ditch or creek can cause flooding, and dead trees can create a fire hazard.

“Keep Sonoma Clean has now installed approximately a dozen surveillance cameras at common illegal dump sites throughout the County,” Carter added. “Regardless of how difficult times are, it’s always important to dispose properly of your waste to keep our families and neighbors healthy and safe. We offer so many options for recycling your Christmas tree; there is no excuse for dumping it illegally.”

For complete information about proper disposal or recycling of unwanted goods other than Christmas trees, consult the Keep Sonoma Clean Web site at www.KeepSonomaClean.org. To report an illegal dump site, visit the Web site or call 877-565-DUMP (3867).

Keep Sonoma Clean is a cooperative effort between the Sonoma County Department of Health Services, Environmental Health Division; the Sonoma County Department of Transportation and Public Works, and the Sonoma County Sheriff, and is funded by a grant from the California Integrated Waste Management Board.

Zero Waste – You Make It Happen!

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Project Censored: Inside the Media Complex

Inside the Military Media Industrial Complex:
Impacts on Movements for Peace and Social Justice

By Peter Phillips and Mickey Huff

Among the most important corporate media censored news stories of the past decade, one must be that over one million people have died because of the United States military invasion and occupation of Iraq. This, of course, does not include the number of deaths from the first Gulf War nor the ensuing sanctions placed upon the country of Iraq that, combined, caused close to an additional one million Iraqi deaths. In the Iraq War, which began in March of 2003, over a million people have died violently primarily from US bombings and neighborhood patrols. These were deaths in excess of the normal civilian death rate under the prior government. Among US military leaders and policy elites, the issue of counting the dead was dismissed before the Iraqi invasion even began. In an interview with reporters in late March of 2002 US General Tommy Franks stated, “You know we don’t do body counts.”[i] Fortunately, for those concerned about humanitarian costs of war and empire, others do.

In a January 2008 report, the British polling group Opinion Research Business (ORB) reported that, “survey work confirms our earlier estimate that over 1,000,000 Iraqi citizens have died as a result of the conflict which started in 2003. We now estimate that the death toll between March 2003 and August 2007 is likely to have been of the order of 1,033,000. If one takes into account the margin of error associated with survey data of this nature then the estimated range is between 946,000 and 1,120,000.”[ii]

The ORB report came on the heels of two earlier studies conducted by Dr. Les Roberts and colleagues at Johns Hopkins University and published in the Lancet medical journal. The first study done from January 1, 2002 to March 18, 2003 confirmed civilian deaths at that time at over 100,000. The second study published in October 2006 documented over 650,000 civilian deaths in Iraq since the start of the US invasion and confirmed that US aerial bombing in civilian neighborhoods caused over a third of these deaths. Over half the deaths were directly attributable to US forces.

The now estimated 1.2 million dead six years into the war/occupation, included children, parents, grandparents, cab drivers, clerics and schoolteachers. All manner of ordinary Iraqis have died because the United States decided to invade their country under false pretences of undiscovered weapons of mass destruction and in violation of international law. An additional four to five million Iraqi refugees have fled their homes

The magnitude of these million-plus deaths and creation of such a vast refugee crisis is undeniable. The continuing occupation by US forces has guaranteed a monthly mass death rate of thousands of people a carnage that ranks among the most heinous mass killings in world history. More tons of bombs have been dropped in Iraq than in all of World War II.[iii] Six years later the casualties continue but the story, barely reported from the start, has vanished.

The American people face a serious moral dilemma. Murder and war crimes have been conducted in their name. Yet most Americans have no idea of the magnitude of deaths and tend to believe that they number in the thousands and are primarily Iraqis killing Iraqis. Corporate mainstream media are in large part to blame. The question then becomes how can this mass ignorance and corporate media deception exist in the United States and what impact does this have on peace and social justice movements in the country?[iv]

Truth Emergency and Media Reform

In the United States today, the rift between reality and reporting has peaked. There is no longer a mere credibility gap, but rather a literal Truth Emergency in which the most important information affecting people is concealed from view. Many Americans, relying on the mainstream corporate media, have serious difficulty accessing the truth while still believing that the information they receive is the reality.

A Truth Emergency reflects cumulative failures of the fourth estate to act as a truly free press. This truth emergency is seen in inadequate coverage of fraudulent elections, pseudo 9/11 investigations, illegal preemptive wars, torture camps, doctored intelligence, and domestic surveillance. Reliable information on these issues is systematically missing in corporate media outlets, where the vast majority of the American people continue to turn for news and information.

Consider these items of noteworthy conditions. US workers have been faced with a thirty-five year decline in real wages while the top few percent enjoy unparalleled wealth with strikingly low tax burdens. US schools, particularly in the west, are more segregated now than half a century ago. The US has the highest infant mortality rate among industrialized nations, is falling behind in scientific research and education, leads the world as a debtor nation, and is seriously lacking in healthcare quality and coverage, which results in the deaths of 18,000 people a year. America has entered another Gilded Age. Someone should alert the media.[v]

The Free Press or Media Reform Movement is a national effort to address mainstream media failures and the government policies that sanction them. During the 2008 National Conference for Media Reform (NCMR) in Minneapolis, Project Censored interns and faculty conducted a survey, completed by 376 randomly selected NCMR attendees out of the 3,500 people registered for the conference. This survey was designed to gauge participants’ views on the state of the corporate news media and the effectiveness of the media reform movement.

The survey also sought to determine the level of belief in a truth emergency, a systematic hiding of critical information in the US. Not surprisingly, for a sample of independent media reform activists, majorities in the 90% plus range agreed on most criticisms of mainstream media, that corporate media failed to keep the American people informed on important issues facing the nation and that a truth emergency does indeed exist in the US.

Regarding the reasons, 87% of the participants believed that a military-industrial-media complex exists in the US for the promotion of the US military domination of the world and most agreed with research conclusions by Project Censored, and others, that a continuing powerful global dominance group inside the US government, the US media, and the national policy structure is responsible.

What was clear from our survey is that media democracy activists strongly support not only aggressive reform efforts and policy changes but also the continuing development of independent, grassroots media as part of an overall media democracy movement.

While most progressive media activists do not believe in some omnipotent conspiracy, an overwhelming portion of NCMR participants do believe the leadership class in the US is dominated by a neo-conservative group of some several hundred people who share a goal of asserting US military power worldwide. This Global Dominance Group (GDM) continues under both Republican and Democratic rule. In cooperation with major military contractors, the corporate media, and conservative foundations, the GDM has become a powerful long-term force in military unilateralism and US political processes.

The Global Dominance Group and Information Control

A long thread of sociological research documents the existence of a dominant ruling class in the US, which sets policy and determines national political priorities. C. Wright Mills, in his 1956 book The Power Elite, documented how World War II solidified a trinity of power in the US that comprised corporate, military and government elites in a centralized power structure working in unison through “higher circles” of contact and agreement.[vi] This power has grown through the Cold War and, after 9/11, the Global War on Terror.

At present, the global dominance agenda includes penetration into the boardrooms of the corporate media in the US. Only 118 people comprise the membership on the boards of director of the ten big media giants. These 118 individuals in turn sit on the corporate boards of 288 national and international corporations. Four of the top 10 media corporations share board director positions with the major defense contractors including:

William Kennard: New York Times, Carlyle Group

Douglas Warner III, GE (NBC), Bechtel

John Bryson: Disney (ABC), Boeing

Alwyn Lewis: Disney (ABC), Halliburton

Douglas McCorkindale: Gannett, Lockheed-Martin.

Given an interlocked media network of connections with defense and other economic sectors, big media in the United States effectively represent the interests of corporate America. Media critic and historian Norman Solomon described the close financial and social links between the boards of large media-related corporations and Washington’s foreign-policy establishment: “One way or another, a military-industrial complex now extends to much of corporate media.”[vii]

The Homeland Security Act Title II Section 201(d)(5) provides an example of the interlocked military-industrial-media complex. This Act specifically asks the directorate to “develop a comprehensive plan for securing the key resources and critical infrastructure of the United States including information technology and telecommunications systems (including satellites) emergency preparedness communications systems.”

The media elite, a key component of the Higher Circle Policy Elite in the US, are the watchdogs of acceptable ideological messages, the controllers of news and information content, and the decision makers regarding media resources. Their goal is to create symbiotic global news distribution in a deliberate attempt to control the news and information available to society. The two most prominent methods used to accomplish this task are censorship and propaganda.

Sometimes the sensationalist and narrow media coverage of news is blamed upon the need to meet a low level of public taste and thereby capture the eyes of a sufficient market to lure advertisers and to make a profit. But another goal of cornering the marketplace on what news and views will be aired is also prominent.

Billionaire Rupert Murdoch loses $50 million a year on the NY Post, billionaire Richard Mellon Scaife loses $2 to $3 million a year on the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, billionaire Philip Anschutz loses around $5 million a year on The Weekly Standard, and billionaire Sun Myung Moon has lost $2 to $3 billion on The Washington Times. The losses in supporting conservative media are part of a strategy of ideological control. They also buy bulk quantities of ultra-conservative books bringing them to the top of the NY Times bestseller list and then give away copies to “subscribers” to their websites and publications. They fund conservative “think tanks” like Heritage and Cato with hundreds of millions of dollars a year. All this buys them respectability and a megaphone.

Even though William Kristol’s publication, the Standard, is a money-loser, his association with it has often gotten him on TV talk shows and a column with The New York Times. Sponsorships of groups like Grover Norquist’s anti-tax “Americans for Tax Reform” regularly get people like him front-and-center in any debate on taxation in the United States. This has contributed to extensive tax cuts for the wealthy and the most unfair tax laws of any industrialized country – all found acceptable by a public relying upon sound-bites about the dangers of ‘big government.’ Hence media corporation officials and others in the health care, energy and weapons industries remain wealthier than ordinary people can imagine. Their expenditures for molding opinion are better understood as investments in a conservative public ideology[viii]

Modern Media Censorship and Propaganda

A broader definition of contemporary censorship needs to include any interference, deliberate or not, with the free flow of vital news information to the public. Modern censorship can be seen as the subtle yet constant and sophisticated manipulation of reality in our mass media outlets. On a daily basis, censorship refers to the intentional non-inclusion of a news story – or piece of a news story – based on anything other than a desire to tell the truth. Such manipulation can take the form of political pressure (from government officials and powerful individuals), economic pressure (from advertisers and funders), and legal pressure (the threat of lawsuits from deep-pocket individuals, corporations, and institutions). or threats to reduce future access to governmental and corporate sources of news.

Following are a few examples of censorship and propaganda.

1. Omitted or Undercovered Stories - The failure of the corporate media to cover human consequences, like one million , mostly civilian deaths of Iraqis, reduces public response to the wars being conducted by the US. Even when activists do mobilize, the media coverage of anti-war demonstrations has been negligible and denigrating from the start. When journalists of the so-called free press ignore the anti-war movement, they serve the interests of their masters in the military media industrial complex.[ix]

Further, the corporate mainstream press continues to ignore the human cost of the US war in Iraq with America’s own veterans. Veteran care, wounded rates, mental disabilities, VA claims, first hand accounts of soldier experiences, and pictures of dead or limbless soldiers are rare. One of the most important stories missed by the corporate press concerned the Winter Soldier Congressional hearings in Washington, D.C. The hearings, with eyewitness testimony of US soldiers relating their experiences on the battlefield and beyond, were only covered by a scant number of major media, and then only in passing. In contrast to the virtual corporate media blackout concerning American soldiers’ views of the war, the independent, listener sponsored, community Pacifica Radio network covered the hearings at length.[x]

A common theme among the most censored stories over the past few years has been the systemic erosion of human rights and civil liberties in both the US and the world at large. The corporate media has ignored the fact that habeas corpus can now be suspended for anyone by order of the President. With the approval of Congress, the Military Commissions Act (MCA) of 2006, signed by Bush on October 17, 2006, allows for the suspension of habeas corpus for US citizens and non-citizens alike. While media, including a lead editorial in The New York Times October 19, 2006, have offered false comfort that American citizens will not be the victims, the Act is quite clear that ‘any person’ can be targeted.[xi]

Additionally, under the code-name Operation FALCON (Federal and Local Cops Organized Nationally), federally coordinated mass arrests have been occurring since April 2005 and netted over 54,000 arrests, a majority of whom were not violent criminals as was initially suggested. This unprecedented move of arresting tens of thousands of “fugitives” is the largest dragnet style operation in the nation’s history. The raids, coordinated by the Justice Department and Homeland Security, directly involved over 960 agencies (state, local and federal) and mark the first time in US history that all domestic police agencies have been put under the direct control of the federal government.[xii]

All these events are significant in a democratic society that claims to cherish individual rights and due process of law. To have them occur is a tragedy. To have a “free” press not report them or pretend these issues do not matter to the populace is the foundation of censorship today.

2. Repetition of Slogans and Sound Bites - The corporate media in the US present themselves as unbiased and accurate. The New York Times motto of “all the news that’s fit to print” is a clear example, as is CNN’s authoritative “most trusted name in news” and Fox’s mantra of “fair and balanced.” The slogans are examples of what linguist George Lakoff has referred to as framing. Through constant repetition, the metaphors and symbols that pervade our media turn into unquestioned beliefs. Terms like “liberal media,” “welfare cheaters,” “war on terror,” illegal aliens,” “tax burden,” “support our troops,” are all distorted images serving to conceal a transfer of wealth from people needing a safety net to corporations seeking profitable markets and military expansion.

3. Embedded Journalism - The media are increasingly dependent on governmental and corporate sources of news. Maintenance of continuous news shows requires a constant feed and an ever-entertaining supply of stimulating events and breaking news bites. The 24-hour news shows on MSNBC, Fox and CNN maintain constant contact with the White House, Pentagon, and public relations companies representing both government and private corporations.

By the time of the Gulf War in 1991, retired colonels, generals and admirals had become mainstays in network TV studios during wartime. Language such as “collateral damage” and “smart bombs” flowed effortlessly between journalists and military men, who shared perspectives on the occasionally mentioned but more rarely seen civilians killed by U.S. firepower. This clearly foreshadowed the structure of “embedded” reporting in the second Iraq War, where mainstream corporate journalists literally lived with the troops and had to submit all reports for military review.[xiii]

A related militarization of news studies by Diane Farsetta at the Center for Media Democracy documented a related introduction of bias. These investigations showed Pentagon propaganda penetration on mainstream corporate news in the guise of retired Generals as “experts” or pundits who turned out to be nothing more than paid shills for government war policy.[xiv]

The problem then becomes more complex. What happens to a society that begins to believe such lies as truth?

The run up to the 2003 war in Iraq concerning weapons of mass destruction (WMDs) is a case in point. It illustrates the power of propaganda in creating not only public support for an ill-begotten war, but also reduces the possibility of a peace movement, even when fueled by the truth, to stop a war based on falsehoods. The current war in Iraq was the most globally protested war in recorded history. This did nothing to stop it and has done little to end it even under a Democratic president who promised such on the campaign trail. The candidate of “hope and change,” with peace groups in tow, has proven to be dependent upon the same interests in foreign policy that got the US into war in the first place.[xv]

The Progressive Press

Where the left progressive press may have covered some of the Winter Soldier issues, most did not cover the major story of Iraqi deaths. In Manufacturing Consent, Wharton School of Business Professor of Political Economy Edward Herman and MIT Institute Professor of Linguistics Noam Chomsky claim that because media are firmly embedded in the market system, they reflect the class values and concerns of their owners and advertisers.

The corporate media maintain a class bias through five systemic filters: concentrated private ownership; a strict bottom-line profit orientation; over-reliance on governmental and corporate sources for news; a primary tendency to avoid offending the powerful; and an almost religious worship of the market economy. These filters limit what will become news in society and set parameters on acceptable coverage of daily events.[xvi]

The danger of these filters is that they make subtle and indirect censorship more difficult to combat. Owners and managers share class identity with the powerful and are motivated economically to please advertisers and viewers. Social backgrounds influence their conceptions of what is “newsworthy,” and their views and values seem only “common sense.” Journalists and editors are not immune to the influence of owners and managers. Reporters want to see their stories approved for print or broadcast, and editors come to know the limits of their freedom to diverge from the “common sense” worldview of owners and managers. The self-discipline that this structure induces in journalists and editors comes to seem only “common sense” to them as well. Self-discipline becomes self-censorship—independence is restricted, the filtering process hidden, denied, or rationalized away.

Project Censored’s analysis on the top ten progressive left publications and websites coverage of key post-9/11 issues found considerable limitations on reporting of specific stories. The evidence supports the Chomsky and Herman understanding that the media barrage may in fact contribute to the news story selection process inside the left liberal media as well.[xvii] Even the left progressive media showed limited coverage of the human costs of the 9/11 wars.

The figure reported in summer, 2007 documenting a million dead did appear in progressive websites and radio including After Downing Street, Huffington Post, Counter Punch, Alternet, Democracy Now! and the Nation, but several took months to get to it. This lack of timely reporting on such a critical story on the humanitarian crisis of the US occupation by the alternative press in America does not bode well for a strong, public, peace movement. The US is in dire need of a media democracy movement to address truth emergency concerns.

In response, the Truth Emergency Movement, held its first national strategy summit in Santa Cruz, California Jan. 25-27, 2008. Organizers gathered key media constituencies to devise coherent decentralized models for distribution of suppressed news, synergistic truth-telling, and collaborative strategies to disclose, legitimize and popularize deeper historical narratives on power and inequality in the US. In sum, this truth movement is seeking to discover in this moment of Constitutional crisis, ecological peril, and widening war, ways in which top investigative journalists, whistleblowers, and independent media activists can transform how Americans perceive and defend their world.

We learn from grassroots actions in the US but also from experiences of other countries. This requires us to transcend the stereotypes of other countries hammered by the corporate media. It is not by chance that two Latin American nations, both targets of US efforts to remove their popular leaders by force, have been vilified by mainstream media. Both Cuba and Venezuela, however, have been experiments in local democratic participation in which voices of communities weigh heavily upon social policy.

International Models of Media Democracy in Action: Venezuela

Democracy from the bottom is evolving as a ten-year social revolution in Venezuela. Led by President Hugo Chavez, the United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV) gained over 11⁄2 million voters in the November, 2008 elections. “It was a wonderful victory,” said Professor Carmen Carrero with the communications studies department of the Bolivarian University in Caracas. “We won 81 percent of the city mayor positions and seventeen of twenty-three of the state governors,” Carrero reported.

The Bolivarian University is housed in the former oil ministry building and now serves 8,000 students throughout Venezuela. The University (Universidad Bolivariana de Venezuela) is symbolic of the democratic socialist changes occurring throughout the country. Before the election of Hugo Chavez as president in 1998, college attendance was primarily for the rich in Venezuela. Today over one million, eight hundred thousand students attend college, three times the rate ten years ago. “Our university was established to resist domination and imperialism,” reported Principal (president) Marlene Yadira Cordova in an interview November 10, 2008, “We are a university where we have a vision of life that the oppressed people have a place on this planet.”

The enthusiasm for learning and serious-thoughtful questions asked by students was certainly representative of a belief in the potential of positive social change for human betterment. The University offers a fully staffed free healthcare clinic, zero tuition, and basic no-cost food for students in the cafeteria, all paid for by the oil revenues now being democratically shared by the people.


Bottom up democracy in Venezuela starts with the 25,000 community councils elected in every neighborhood in the country. “We establish the priority needs of our area,” reported community council spokesperson Carmon Aponte, with the neighborhood council in the barrio Bombilla area of western Caracas. Aponte works with Patare Community TV and radio station and is one of thirty-four locally controlled community television stations and four hundred radio stations now in the barrios throughout Venezuela. Community radio, TV and newspapers are the voice of the people, where they describe the viewers/listeners as the “users” of media instead of the passive audiences.[xviii]

Democratic socialism has meant healthcare, jobs, food, and security, in neighborhoods where in many cases nothing but poverty existed ten years ago. With unemployment down to a US level, sharing the wealth has taken real meaning in Venezuela. Despite a 50 percent increase in the price of food last year, local Mercals offer government subsidized cooking oil, corn meal, meat, and powdered milk at 30-50 percent off market price. Additionally, there are now 3,500 local communal banks with a $1.6 billion dollar budget offering neighborhood-based micro-financing loans for home improvements, small businesses, and personal emergencies.

“We have moved from a time of disdain [pre-revolution—when the upper classes saw working people as less than human] to a time of adjustment,” proclaimed Ecuador’s minister of Culture, Gallo Mora Witt at the opening ceremonies of the Fourth International Book Fair in Caracas, November, 2007. Venezuela’s Minister of Culture, Hector Soto added, “We try not to leave anyone out. . . before the revolution the elites published only 60-80 books a year, we will publish 1,200 Venezuelan authors this year…the book will never stop being the important tool for cultural feelings.” In fact, some twenty-five million books—classics by Victor Hugo and Miguel de Cervantes along with Cindy Sheehan’s Letter to George Bush—were published in 2008 and are being distributed to the community councils nationwide. The theme of the International Book Fair was books as cultural support to the construction of the Bolivarian revolution and building socialism for the 21st century.

In Venezuela the corporate media are still owned by the elites. The five major TV networks, and nine of ten of the major newspapers maintain a continuing media effort to undermine Chavez and the socialist revolution. But despite the corporate media and $20 million annual support to the anti-Chavez opposition institutions from USAID and National Endowment for Democracy, two-thirds of the people in Venezuela continue to support President Hugo Chavez and the United Socialist Party of Venezuela. The democracies of South America are realizing that the neo-liberal formulas for capitalism are not working and that new forms of resource allocation are necessary for human betterment. It is a learning process for all involved and certainly a democratic effort from the bottom up.

International Models of Media Democracy in Action: Cuba

“You cannot kill truth by murdering journalists,” said Tubal Páez, president of the Journalist Union of Cuba. In May of 2008, One hundred and fifty Cuban and South American journalists, ambassadors, politicians, and foreign guests gathered at the Jose Marti International Journalist Institute to honor the 50th anniversary of the death of Carlos Bastidas Arguello —the last journalist killed in Cuba. Carlos Bastidas was 23 years old when he was assassinated by Fulgencia Batista’s secret police after having visited Fidel Castro’s forces in the Sierra Maestra Mountains. Edmundo Bastidas, Carlos’ brother, told about how a river of change flowed from the Maestra (teacher) mountains, symbolized by his brother’s efforts to help secure a new future for Cuba.

The celebration in Havana was held in honor of World Press Freedom Day, which is observed every year in May. The UN first declared this day in 1993 to honor journalists who lost their lives reporting the news and to defend media freedom worldwide.

Cuban journalists share a common sense of a continuing counter-revolutionary threat by US financed Cuban-Americans living in Miami. This is not an entirely unwarranted feeling in that many hundreds of terrorist actions against Cuba have occurred with US backing over the past fifty years. In addition to the 1961 Bay of Pigs invasion, these attacks include the blowing up of a Cuban airlines plane in 1976 killing seventy-three people, the starting in 1981 of an epidemic of dengue fever that killed 158 people, and several hotel bombings in the 1990s, one of which resulted in the death of an Italian tourist.

In the context of this external threat, Cuban journalists quietly acknowledge that some self-censorship will undoubtedly occur regarding news stories that could be used by the “enemy” against the Cuban people. Nonetheless, Cuban journalists strongly value freedom of the press and there was no evidence of overt government control. Ricardo Alarcon, President of the National Assembly Cuba allows CNN, AP and Chicago Tribune to maintain offices in Cuba, noted that the US refuses to allow Cuban journalists to work in the United States.[xix]

Cuban journalists complain that the US corporate media is biased and refuses to cover the positive aspects of socialism in Cuba. Unknown to most Americans are the facts that Cuba is the number one country in percentage of organic foods produced in the world, has an impressive health care system with a lower infant mortality rate than the US, trains doctor from all over the world, and has enjoyed a 43% increase in GDP between 2005 and 2008.

Neither Cuba nor Venezuela are utopian societies. Developing countries subject to continuing pressure by the US may be cautious and suspicious of provocateurs that would incite violence or provoke US military intervention. But in these countries, the ability of local media expressing voices of local communities is something from which media reformers can learn.

Grassroots Antidotes to Corporate Media Propaganda

Tens of thousands of Americans engaged in various social justice issues constantly witness how corporate media marginalize, denigrate, or simply ignore their concerns. Activist groups working on issues like 9/11 Truth, election fraud, impeachment in the Bush era, war propaganda, civil liberties abridgements, torture, the Wall Street meltdown, and corporate-caused environmental crises have been systematically excluded from mainstream news and the national conversation leading to a genuine Truth Emergency in the country as a whole.

Now, however, a growing number of activists are finally saying “enough!” and joining forces to address this truth emergency by developing new journalistic systems and practices of their own. They are working to reveal the common corporate denominators behind the diverse crises we face and to develop networks of trustworthy news sources that tell people what is really going on. These activists know we need a journalism that moves beyond inquiries into particular crimes and atrocities, and exposes wider patterns of corruption, propaganda and illicit political control by a military and corporate elite.

Recent efforts at national media reform through micro-power community radio– similar to the 400 people’s radio stations in Venezuela– and campaign finance changes, that would mandate access for all candidates on national media, have been strongly resisted by the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB). NAB, considered one of the most powerful corporate lobby groups in Washington, works hard to protect over $200 billion dollars of annual advertising and the several hundred million dollars political candidates spend in each election cycle.

The Truth Emergency movement now recognizes that corporate media’s political power and failure to meet its First Amendment obligation to keep the public informed leaves a huge task. Citizens must mobilize resources to redevelop news and information systems from the bottom up. Citizen journalists can expand distribution of news via small independent newspapers, local magazines, independent radio, and cable access TV. Using the internet, the public can interconnect with like-minded grassroots news organizations to share important stories. These changes are already in progress.

Becoming the Media: Media Freedom International and Project Censored

In response to Truth Emergency conference, the Media Freedom Foundation and Project Censored launched an effort to both become a repository of independent news and information as well as a producer of content in what are called Validated Independent News stories vetted by college and university professors and students around the world. As corporate media continue their entertainment agenda and the PR industry—working for governments and corporations—increasingly dominates news content, there exists a socio-cultural opening to transform how the public receives and actually participates in the validation and creation of their own news.

Corporate media are increasingly irrelevant to working people and to democracy. People need to tell their own news stories from real experiences and perspectives, as an alternative to the hierarchically imposed and “official” top-down narrative. What better project in support of media democracy than for universities and colleges worldwide to support truth telling and validate news stories and independent news sources.

Only 5% of college students under 30 read a daily newspaper. Most get their news from corporate television and increasingly on the internet. One of the biggest problems with independent media sources on the internet is a perception of inconsistent reliability. The public is often suspicious of the truthfulness and accuracy of news postings from non-corporate media sources. Over the past ten years, in hundreds of presentations all over the US, Project Censored staff has frequently been asked, “what are the best sources for news and whom can we trust?”

The goal of this effort is to encourage young people to use independent media as their primary sources of news and information and to learn about trustworthy news sources through the Media Freedom International News Research Affiliate Program.

By the end of 2008, there were over thirty affiliate colleges and universities with plans to expand that participation several fold this next year. Through these institutions, validated independent news stories can be researched by students and scholars, then written, produced and disseminated via the web. In addition, on any given day at the Media Freedom Foundation website, one can view enough independent news stories from RSS feeds to fill nearly fifty written pages, more than even the largest US newspapers.

An informed electorate cannot remain passive consumers of corporate news. As aforementioned activist David Mathison suggested in his how-to manual, Be the Media, where he argues and instructs not only about how to build community media but how to build community through media.[xx]

Part of building community is in developing awareness about the type of world we want to participate in creating, and developing strategies for achieving change. New forms of media that promote widespread responsibility for both creating and disseminating information do not remove the need for people to protest, to demonstrate, to march, to boycott and to demand entry into corporate board rooms. Rather it assures that voices can be heard and, as shown in Howard Rheingold’s Smartmobbing Democracy,[xxi] the power of new Internet communication technologies can be harnessed to mobilize more effectively.

Contrasted with previous more limited technologies, Rheingold points out that now, “[m]obile and deskbound media such as blogs, listserves and social networking sites allow for many-to-many communication.” Technology has helped level the playing field by creating a virtual sphere where people can exchange ideas and instigate activism. Grassroots, bottom-up, peer-to-peer efforts have increased in influence and effectiveness due to the speed and breadth of new communication technologies. We are currently experiencing a potential for collective activism on a scale never before seen.

The continued expansion of independent internet news sources allows for the mass political awareness of key issues and truth emergencies in the world. The involvement of university and college professors and their students in validating news stories will be an important component of reliability verification of these sources. As we learn who we can trust in the independent news world, we will be in a stronger position for the continued development and expansion of democratic social movement/anti-war efforts in the future.

It is up to the people to unite and oppose the common oppressors manifested in a militarist and unresponsive government along with their corporate media courtiers and PR propagandists. Only then, when the public forms and controls its own information resources, will it be armed with the power that knowledge gives to move beyond the media induced mindsets that limit change to modest reform. Grassroots media providing voice to those who would challenge elite domination are our best hope to create a truly vibrant democratic society that promises as well as delivers liberty, peace, and economic justice to all.

Peter Phillips is a Professor of Sociology at Sonoma State University and President of the Media Freedom Foundation and recent past director of Project Censored.

Mickey Huff is an Associate Professor of History and Social Science at Diablo Valley College and serves on the executive committeeof the Media Freedom Foundation and is recent past associate director of Project Censored.

Media Freedom website include:

Daily News at: http://mediafreedom.pnn.com/5174-independent-news-sources

Validated News & Research at: http://www.mediafreedominternational.org/

Daily Censored Blog at: http://dailycensored.com/

Project Censored: http://www.projectcensored.org/


[i] US General Tommy Franks, quoted in The San Francisco Chronicle, March 23, 2002, online http://www.globalsecurity.org/org/news/2002/020323-attack01.htm.

[ii] Peter Phillips and Andrew Roth, Censored 2009, (New York: Seven Stories, Press, 2008), 19-25. This story is the number one censored story of the year at Project Censored for this year, archived online http://www.projectcensored.org/top-stories/articles/1-over-one-million-iraqi-deaths-caused-by-us-occupation/ and for the earlier casualty numbers see http://www.countercurrents.org/iraq-polya070207.htm.

[iii] Ibid.

[iv] Various theories exist on the problem of the subject, from historian Rick Shenkman’s Just How Stupid Are We to historian and cultural critic Thomas Frank’s What’s the Matter with Kansas, but few examine its affects on the peace community. For more on the issue of American historical amnesia, see Gore Vidal on Democracy Now! at http://www.democracynow.org/2004/5/21/gore_vidal_on_the_united_states , also, In These Times online at http://www.inthesetimes.com/article/3099/the_united_states_of_amnesia/ and for a broader academic look at the issue of how Americans have become arguably the least informed, most entertained people in the modern world, see the now classic work from the late New York University media scholar Neil Postman, Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business, (New York: Viking Adult, 1985). This article hopes to shine more light on the impact of all of the aforementioned on the peace movement in general and what can be done about it. For another view of this written earlier, at the outset of the US invasion of Iraq in 2003, see Felix Kolb and Alicia Swords, “Do Peace Movements Matter?” Commondreams.org, May 12, 2003, online at http://www.commondreams.org/views03/0512-08.htm.

[vi] C. Wright Mills. The Power Elite, (New York: Oxford University Press, 2000, reissue). Also, continuing with this theme in terms of democratic communications theory/policy and the ideas of an open society, see the work of Jurgen Habermas, The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere: An Inquiry into a category of Bourgeois Society, published in1962, and The Theory of Communicative Action, from 1981, as well as Karl Popper’s The Open Society and Its Enemies, first published in 1945.

[vii] Norman Soloman, “The Military-Industrial-Media Complex

Why war is covered from the warriors’ perspective,” Extra! July/August 2005, published by Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR), on the FAIR website at http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=2627.

[viii] Cenk Uygur, “Conservative Media vs Progressive Media” Posted on The Daily Kos blog, July 1, 2009.<http://www.dailykos.com/story/2009/7/1/748854/-Conservative-Media-vs.-Progressive-Media> )

[ix] Linda Milazzo, “Corporate Media Turned Out for Jena, but Not for Anti-War. Here’s Why.” Atlantic Free Press, September 23, 2007, online at http://www.atlanticfreepress.com/news/1/2473-corporate-media-turned-out-for-jena-but-not-for-anti-war-heres-why.html.

[x] For more on the Winter Soldiers, see Censored 2009, chapter 1, story 9, pp. 58-62 and online http://www.projectcensored.org/top-stories/articles/9-iraq-and-afghanistan-vets-testify/ and chapter 12, pp.297-319. See the KPFA radio and Corp Watch website for the coverage at http://www.warcomeshome.org/wintersoldier2008.

[xi] Peter Phillips, Censored 2008, (New York: Seven Stories Press, 2007), 35-44. Online http://www.projectcensored.org/top-stories/articles/1-no-habeas-corpus-for-any-person/ and http://www.projectcensored.org/top-stories/articles/2-bush-moves-toward-martial-law/.

[xii] See Censored 2008, chapter 1, story 6, 55-59. Also online at http://www.projectcensored.org/top-stories/articles/6-operation-falcon-raids/.

[xiii] Ibid.

[xiv] Diane Farsetta, Center for Media Democracy, studies on Pentagon propaganda online at http://www.prwatch.org/pentagonpundits and http://www.prwatch.org/node/8180.

[xiv] Norman Soloman, “The Military-Industrial-Media Complex
Why war is covered from the warriors’ perspective,” Extra! July/August 2005, published by Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR), on the FAIR website at http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=2627.

[xv] For several excellent studies of US Iraq War propaganda, see PR Watch’s John Stauber and Sheldon Rampton, Weapons of Mass Deception: The Uses of Propaganda in Bush’s War on Iraq, (New York: Tarcher Penguin, 2003), and their follow up Best War Ever: Lies, Damned Lies, and the Mess in Iraq, (New York: Penguin, 2006), and the exhaustive work by Anthony R. DiMaggio, Mass Media, Mass Propaganda: Examining American News in the “War on Terror,” (UK: Lexington Books, 2008). Additionally, forthcoming in fall 2009, just reviewed by the authors, is Robert P. Abele, The Anatomy of a Deception: A Reconstruction and Analysis of the Decision to Invade Iraq, (Baltimore: University Press of America, 2009).

For reports on the continuation of war policy under President Barack Obama, see Center for Media Democracy’s John Stauber, “How Obama Took Over the Peace Movement” online http://www.prwatch.org/node/8297, and Peter Phillips, “Barack Obama Administration Continues US Military Dominance” online http://www.projectcensored.org/articles/story/http-wwwprojectcensoredorg-articles-story-barack-obama-administration-c/.

[xvi] Edward Herman and Noam Chomsky, Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media, (New York: Pantheon Books, 1988, 2002). For an introduction of the Propaganda Model, see chapter 1, or see a retrospective by Edward Herman online http://www.chomsky.info/onchomsky/20031209.htm.

[xvii] Peter Phillips, Censored 2008, see chapter 7, “Left Progressive Media Inside the Propaganda Model,” 233-251. Online at http://www.projectcensored.org/articles/story/left-progressive-media-inside-the-propaganda-model/.

[xviii] Co-author Peter Phillips interviewed Carmon Aponte while visiting the Patare Community TV and radio station in a trip to Venezuela for a book fair in 2008. The station was one of thirty-four locally controlled community television stations and four hundred radio stations now in the barrios throughout Venezuela.

[xix] Co-author Peter Phillips attended the major journalism conference in Cuba in 2008. About his experiences there, Phillips remarked, “During my five days in Havana, I met with dozens of journalists, communication studies faculty and students, union representatives and politicians. The underlying theme of my visit was to determine the state of media freedom in Cuba and to build a better understanding between media democracy activists in the US and those in Cuba.”

Phillips continued, “I toured the two main radio stations in Havana, Radio Rebelde and Radio Havana. Both have Internet access to multiple global news sources including CNN, Reuters, Associated Press and BBC with several newscasters pulling stories for public broadcast. Over 90 municipalities in Cuba have their own locally run radio stations, and journalists report local news from every province.”

“During the course of several hours in each station I (Phillips) was interviewed on the air about media consolidation and censorship in the US and was able to ask journalists about censorship in Cuba as well. Of the dozens I interviewed all said that they have complete freedom to write or broadcast any stories they choose. This was a far cry from the Stalinist media system so often depicted by US interests.”

[xx] For more details see the Project Censored website at http://projectcensored.org/, for independent media feeds see Media Freedom Foundation at http://mediafreedom.pnn.com/5174-independent-news-sources, and for more on the Project Censored International Affiliates Program, see http://projectcensored.org/project-censored-international-affilates-program and http://mediafreedominternational.org. For more on how to become the media, see David Mathison’s work online http://bethemedia.com. For more on Smart Mobs, see Howard Rheingold’s work online http://www.smartmobs.com/book/.

[xxi] Howard Rheingold, “Smartmobbing Democracy,” in Rebooting America: Ideas for Redesigning American Democracy for the Internet Age,” ed. Allison Fine, Micah L. Sifry, Andrew Rasiej and Josh Levy. Retrieved from The Personal Democracy Press Website: http://rebooting.personaldemocracy.com/node/5484.

*The co-authors would like to express sincere appreciation for editing assistance provided by Rebecca Norlander and Ellen Gaddy.

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