WILLITS, Calif. – On Friday Caltrans issued a statement regarding “misconceptions and misinformation” it said is being circulated about the Willits Bypass project, which is at the heart of a lawsuit filed earlier this week.

Caltrans said the $210 million dollar highway improvement project will relieve congestion, reduce delays and improve safety for traffic currently passing through Willits.

On Tuesday, the Center for Biological Diversity, Willits Environmental Center, Redwood Chapter of the Sierra Club and Environmental Protection Information Center filed a lawsuit in federal court against Caltrans, the Federal Highway Administration and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, alleging that the National Environmental Policy Act and Clean Water Act were violated in approving the project, as Lake County News has reported.

The groups alleged that the four-lane freeway would hurt wetlands, salmon-bearing streams and endangered plants.

Caltrans said in a Friday statement that the federal lawsuit has not put the project on hold, and the agency plans to keep the project on schedule.

The bypass project is anticipated to go out to bid on May 14 and a mandatory pre-bid meeting will be held June 13 for all contractors who wish to submit bids or participate as subcontractors, Caltrans reported.

Current traffic counts in Willits show that a four-lane bypass will meet traffic needs, and that a two-lane bypass will not be sufficient, Caltrans reported.

Caltrans said it thoroughly investigated two-lane alternatives prior to selecting the four-lane bypass. The selection process involved rigorous involvement and analysis by traffic engineers and other traffic specialists with extensive experience in planning roadways and projecting traffic needs.

The data showed – and continues to show, even with current fluctuations in traffic counts – that a two-lane bypass would provide insufficient traffic service in terms of congestion and delays, which also affect traffic safety, Caltrans said. A four-lane bypass, in contrast, will relieve congestion and delays for decades to come

The 2006 environmental document has been revalidated and supplemented to keep it compliant with State and Federal environmental protection laws. Caltrans' 2006 Environmental Impact Report/Environmental Impact Statement (EIR/EIS) substantiates the need to provide a four-lane bypass around the city of Willits.

In order to ensure the viability of its conclusions as time has passed, and as several project and funding changes have occurred, Caltrans conducted several revalidations of its 2006 environmental analyses. On all but one occasion, Caltrans' analysis revealed that the 2006 EIR/EIS remained valid and did not require supplementation.

When a state-listed threatened plant species, North Coast semaphore grass, was discovered in the bypass area during field studies, Caltrans prepared and circulated a supplemental EIR in 2010 to assess potential impacts and protective measures for the plant. Caltrans firmly stands behind our 2006 environmental documents, our revalidations, and Supplemental EIR as fully compliant with state and federal environmental protection laws.

Caltrans works with local transit authorities when developing highway projects. The agency said it examines public transit options when considering alternatives to freeway projects. Although Caltrans facilitates public transportation systems by administering public funds to local transit authorities, the actual building of transit facilities is not within its legal limitations.

The majority of local and regional community members do not support the continued reliance on existing roadways where congestion results in daily delays, according to Caltrans.

The project's mitigation measures will increase the overall quality of fisheries habitat in the area, the agency said. These headwaters of the Eel River will not only be preserved by a detailed plan to minimize impacts during construction; the mitigation being funded due to this project will greatly increase the overall quality of fisheries habitat in this area.

Culverts on Haehl and Upp Creeks are being removed and two culverts on Ryan Creek will be replaced with natural bottom culverts. Removal of the culverts at Haehl and Upp Creeks will open the headwater sections of those creeks to spawning fish, Caltrans said.

Installing natural bottom culverts on Ryan Creek will allow summering juvenile Southern Oregon-Northern California Coasts Coho salmon, a species designated as threatened, to seek summer rearing habitat and greatly increase the species long-term survival outlook, according to Caltrans.

Along all creeks within the mitigation properties, invasive non-native plants will be removed and replaced with native plants. Caltrans said fencing also will be installed along all of the creeks within the mitigation properties keep cattle out of the creeks and riparian zones increasing water quality and fisheries habitat.

Agencies which reviewed and approved the project mitigation measures are California Department of Fish and Game, National Marine Fisheries Service, North Coast Regional Water Quality Control Board, U. S. Environmental Protection Agency. U. S Army Corps of Engineers and the U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – University of California, Berkeley, scientists are drilling into ancient sediments at the bottom of Northern California’s Clear Lake for clues that could help them better predict how today’s plants and animals will adapt to climate change and increasing population.

In the video above, produced by Roxanne Makasdjian, UC Berkeley Professor Cindy Looy and graduate student Liam Reidy explain how drilling into Clear Lake can reveal the consequences of past climate change, and help us predict the future consequences of global warming.

The lake sediments are among the world’s oldest, containing records of biological change stretching back as far as 500,000 years.

The core drilling is part of a unique, multifaceted effort at UC Berkeley to determine how Earth’s flora and fauna responded to past changes in climate in order to improve models that project how life on Earth will adapt to today’s environmental pressures.

What the researchers learn from their look-back in time will be crucial for state or local planners clamoring for better predictive tools to guide policies crucial to saving ecosystems threatened by climate change.

“We are reconstructing the past to better forecast the future, because we need to know what’s coming in order to adequately prepare for it,” said Looy, the project leader and an assistant professor of integrative biology.

Looy and 16 other UC Berkeley faculty members – including paleontologists, pollen experts, botanists, ecologists and climate modeling experts – will examine the lake cores for pollen grains, charcoal and fresh-water organisms going back at least 130,000 years, long before humans arrived in the area.

Using isotope and chemical analysis as well as carbon dating, the researchers will obtain a long series of detailed snapshots – ideally, every 10 years – of the plant and animal communities in the Clear Lake area and how the communities changed in response to “natural” global warming events.

The analysis will also provide a measure of the temperature, oxygen content and nutrient levels of the lake, which reflect rainfall and water level.

“One way to check our predictions is to go back in time to a state very similar to today, with the same plants and animals and about the same temperature. The fossilized plant and animal remains from Clear Lake will give us a baseline for what this region of California looked like under similar climatic conditions, and when it was colder or warmer. We use that information to fine-tune predictive models being developed today,” Looy said. “Rates of global warming almost as fast as what we see today last happened during the shift from the last glacial to the current interglacial roughly 12,000 years ago, so that is one time interval we will focus on.”

Focusing on two glacial-to-interglacial transitions

Looy and her team also will look at an even earlier transition from a glaciated Earth 130,000 years ago to a time 113,000 years ago when it may have been locally warmer than today.

Learning what the area looked like during that time will help Northern Californians anticipate how conditions will change as global temperature continues to rise over the coming decades.

“There are indications from ice cores and ocean drilling cores that the beginning of the previous interglacial may have been warmer than it is now, which is where it becomes interesting,” said Looy. “We know what the Earth is like at today’s temperature, but a lot of people are trying to predict what will happen if the earth warms 1 or 2 degrees Celsius (2-4 degrees Fahrenheit), or even more.”

Charcoal in the lake sediments will also tell the researchers how Native Americans altered the environment through deliberate fires designed, for example, to increase acorn production by oaks.

One member of the team, Anthony Barnosky, UC Berkeley professor of integrative biology, will correlate this information with mammalian fossils collected from cave deposits in the area and that have been stored for decades in the Museum of Paleontology.

“You can view the core as a time machine by which we can define a continuous record of change, both climatic and vegetational, though the past 130,000 years, and then we have all these floating snapshots of the ecosystem – the mammal communities – from cave deposits around here,” Barnosky said. “We can put names on these fossils and radiocarbon-date them and begin to build a 3-D picture of change through time from the late Pleistocene, some 130,000 years ago, through the last glacial/interglacial transition 13,000 to 11,000 years ago, all the way up to the present.”

The study will help to evaluate and refine current models that predict how plants and animals will adapt to a changing world by testing predictions of the models against what actually happened during past times of climate change.

Such models are important for state and local planning agencies that must deal with future consequences of climate change, including sea level rise, water shortages and increasing fire incidence that can threaten ecosystems.

“Based on this type of research at UC Berkeley, we want to make the case that adaptation to a changing climate is an issue we have to take more seriously, we have to bring it more into the mainstream of Bay Area planning,” said Bruce Riordan, director of the Bay Area Joint Policy Committee, which coordinates regional planning agencies in responding to climate adaptation. “By starting planning now and understanding the problems, the strategies we need to implement and the costs involved, we may find less costly solutions today rather than later. The research can really help inform about both the problems and about the solutions.”

Half million years of sediment

Clear Lake is unusual in having survived the advance and retreat of glaciers that scoured and obliterated most lakes outside the tropics, including the large lakes in California’s Sierra Nevada.

Previous coring in Clear Lake by the U.S. Geological Survey in 1973 and 1980 revealed lake sediments half a million years old, with only three breaks in continuity.

At the site where UC Berkeley plans to obtain cores, in the upper arm of the lake about one to three miles west southwest of the town of Lucerne, the USGS obtained a continuous core in 1973 going back 130,000 years.

Looy and her team hired Utah-based DOSECC (Drilling, Observation and Sampling of the Earths Continental Crust), a non-profit scientific drilling company, to obtain two 120 meter-long (400-foot) cores, each about 8 centimeters (3 inches) in diameter.

The cores are obtained in 3-meter (10-foot) chunks that are capped and labeled at the site and will be shipped to a cold-storage facility in Minnesota operated by LacCore (National Lacustrine Core Facility), a nonprofit organization funded by the National Science Foundation and the University of Minnesota.

In the facility’s cold lab, the team will split each chunk longitudinally, photograph the halves, and then bring one half of each chunk back to UC Berkeley for analysis.

While the USGS sampled its cores once every meter, Looy and her team will sample parts of their cores every centimeter, the equivalent of about 10 years of sediment.

“We will get 100 times better time resolution, and can follow what happens when you rapidly warm the Earth up,” Looy said.

“The detail we can get from Clear Lake is really impressive,” she added. “The material is well preserved, and the USGS did a great job in describing the whole time interval so that now we know what the interesting areas are to focus on. We know this is not a shot in the dark.”

The Clear Lake drilling project is one of seven research projects involving global change forecasting funded by a $2.5 million grant from the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation to UC Berkeley’s Berkeley Initiative in Global Change Biology, or BiGCB.

Each project focuses on a particular California environment and leverages UC Berkeley’s unique museum collections of vertebrates, insects, plants and fossils to provide details about past changes in plant and animal populations.

Robert Sanders writes for the UC Berkeley News Center.

SACRAMENTO – The California Office of Traffic Safety (OTS) on Thursday released results of the first-ever survey of California motorists and motorcycle riders on the subject of “lane splitting,” where motorcycles travel between two lanes with other vehicles traveling the same direction.  

At the same time, OTS and the California Highway Patrol announced that they are joining with other federal, state and local traffic safety, law enforcement, and motorcycle organizations in proclaiming May as “Motorcycle Safety Awareness Month.”  

After more than a decade of steady increases, motorcycle fatalities in California began a decline in 2009.

Lane splitting has been a subject for controversy and confusion for years.  

The OTS survey showed that only 53 percent of vehicle drivers knew that lane splitting is legal in California.  

Eighty-seven percent of motorcycle riders say they lane split, while seven percent of vehicle drivers admit to having attempted to prevent it.

The key to legal lane splitting for motorcycle riders is doing so in a safe and prudent manner, being cognizant of overall traffic speeds, speed differences, spacing and lane changing patterns of surrounding traffic.  

Riding too fast is one of the most common things that motorcyclists do to make lane splitting unsafe.

Motorists and other road users are reminded to safely “share the road” with motorcycles during May, and throughout the year, and to be extra alert to help keep motorcyclists safe.  

Changing the driving habits of motorists and motorcyclists alike will help decrease the numbers of motorcyclists killed and injured in crashes.

Motorcyclists are reminded to make sure that they are visible to motorists, and that they follow the rules of the road.  

All road users are reminded to never drive, ride, walk or bicycle while distracted or under the influence of alcohol or drugs.

 “As the weather improves, more and more motorcyclists are enjoying California’s roads,” said Christopher J. Murphy, Director of the Office of Traffic Safety (OTS). “And with that in mind, pedestrians, bicyclists and drivers of all vehicles, including SUVs, passenger cars and trucks, need to be extra attentive and make sure they ‘share the road.’  A motorcycle is one of the smallest vehicles on our roads, often hidden in a car or truck’s blind spot. Every driver needs to aggressively look for them before changing lanes or merging with traffic.”

Those traveling the state’s highways will notice the electronic Caltrans signs with the “SHARE THE ROAD.  LOOK TWICE FOR MOTORCYCLISTS” message.  

Motorists and bicyclists should perform visual checks for motorcyclists by checking mirrors and blind spots before they enter or exit a lane of traffic, and at intersections.  

Pedestrians should also get into the habit of scanning for motorcyclists who might be hidden by other traffic.  

Motorcycle riders should select lane position to better see the road ahead and to be more visible to other vehicles.

The latest survey results will be incorporated into the California Strategic Highway Safety Plan to help develop additional strategies to reduce motorcycle fatalities and injuries. A motorcyclist is more vulnerable than a passenger vehicle occupant in the event of a crash.  

Research from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration shows that per vehicle mile traveled, motorcyclists are about 39 times more likely than passenger car occupants to die in traffic crashes.

Remember, a motorcycle is a vehicle with all of the rights and privileges of any other motor vehicle.

OTS and CHP offer the following tips for drivers to help keep motorcyclists safe on our roadways.

• Perform a visual check for motorcycles by checking mirrors and blind spots before entering or exiting a lane of traffic, and at intersections.
• Always signal your intentions before changing lanes or merging with traffic.
• Don’t be fooled by a flashing turn signal on a motorcycle – motorcycle signals are often not self-canceling and riders sometimes forget to turn them off. Wait to be sure the motorcycle is going to turn before you proceed.
• Allow more following distance – three or four seconds – when behind a motorcycle so the motorcyclist has enough time to maneuver or stop in an emergency.
• Never tailgate. In dry conditions, motorcycles can stop more quickly than cars.
• Never drive while distracted or under the influence of drugs or alcohol.

Motorcyclists can increase their safety by:

• Avoiding riding in poor weather conditions;
• Wearing brightly colored protective gear and a DOT-compliant helmet;
• Using turn signals for every turn or lane change, even if the rider thinks no one will see it;
• Combining hand signals and turn signals to draw more attention to themselves;
• Using reflective tape and stickers to increase conspicuity;
• Positioning themselves in the lane where they will be most visible to other drivers; and
• Never driving while impaired.

The message to all drivers and motorcyclists is: share in the responsibility of keeping all road users safe, and do your part by safely “sharing the road.”

MENDOCINO COUNTY, Calif. – A Mendocino County jury on Tuesday found a Fort Bragg resident guilty of two felony and four misdemeanor counts of reckless driving, stemming from a three-car accident that happened nearly a year ago.

Jurors deliberated slightly more than two hours before rejecting defendant Randall Douglas Jennings’ defense that he was suffering from something akin to sleepwalking in the time leading up to the May 27, 2011, accident on Highway 1 on the Mendocino Coast, according to the Mendocino County District Attorney's Office.

Prosecutors called a dozen witnesses – including five witnesses to Jennings’ driving that day – three victims, three CHP officers, and one medical expert.  

The witnesses testified that they observed Jennings driving north of Cleone on Highway 1 at high speeds, passing several cars across double yellow lines and around blind corners.  

At the intersection of Little Valley Road and Highway 1, Jennings’ vehicle narrowly missed a southbound vehicle, before losing control and colliding head-on with two other southbound vehicles, injuring a total of six victims.  

The defense called three witnesses, including the 43-year-old defendant and Dr. Richard Miller, in support of the defendant’s attempted defense of “sleep driving.” Jennings testified that he remembered driving north on Highway 1, but did not remember reckless driving or the accident.

The two felony convictions entered were for reckless driving causing specific injury to two passengers in the first car hit by Jennings.

The four misdemeanor reckless driving convictions entered were for injuries to passengers in the two additional cars struck by Jennings’ vehicle. All six victims were visiting from out of county on the day of the accident.

“I would like to thank the jurors for their careful consideration of the evidence and for reaching a just verdict,” said prosecutor Jared Kelly.
 
District Attorney David Eyster said the verdict “is evidence of how the California Highway Patrol, concerned citizens and the DA’s Office continue to work together towards the common goals of seeking justice for victims of crimes and safeguarding our roads.”

Judge Clayton Brennan referred the defendant’s matter to the Probation Office for a sentencing report and recommendation.

The sentencing hearing was then calendared for 9 a.m. June 18 at the Fort Bragg courthouse.

LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – Due to the lack of bidders for the tax delinquent properties in the February online auction, the Lake County Treasurer-Tax Collector has scheduled a re-offer of the unsold properties.

This reoffer auction starts Saturday, May 12, and ends Tuesday, May15, online at www.bid4assets.com .

In hopes that a lower deposit may spur interest, the treasurer-tax collector’s office has reduced the deposit to $2,500 from the previous $5,000. Some minimum bids have also been reduced.

The deposit for bidding is due no later than Tuesday, May 8. Full details on where and how to send the deposit to the auction company – plus their $35 processing charge – may be found on www.bid4assets.com . The county tax sales link is on the home page.  

February’s online auction started with 138 properties, but after many were redeemed or postponed, 83 went on the auction block.

The local paper listed the parcels over several weeks in January. By the close of auction, only 23 properties had been sold, some for just the minimum bid of a few thousand dollars, according to the Lake County Treasurer-Tax Collector's Office.

Staff at the treasurer-tax collector's office said the small number of properties sold was due to the economy.

Past auctions often resulted in excess proceeds, coming in over the amount needed to pay taxes and fees.

According to the rules of county tax sales, available the Bid4Assets Web site, excess proceeds can be claimed by the previous owner after a waiting period.

In recent Lake County auctions there have been very little excess proceeds, the county reported.

Property owners of delinquent parcels that still wish to redeem their properties before the auction should contact the Lake County Treasurer-Tax Collector’s Office.

Although it is now common for most counties to sell their tax delinquent properties through this Web site, many only list the parcel numbers.

Lake County has listed both the parcel number and the address of each property. This makes it easier to map the property online and appeals to a wider range of bidders, especially those out of the area.

The Bid4Assets auction company discourages “sniping” – that last-minute bidding that foils your bid – by adding the “overtime” feature. Any bid entered within the last five minutes of the auction will automatically go into overtime, extending the auction until no bids are entered for a five-minute period.

This allows the property to fetch as high an amount as possible, with overtime periods sometimes running for several hours.  

Since not all parcels in the auction will close their bidding at the same time, it is important to make a note of what time the bidding ends for a particular parcel.

On the auction Web site, auction times are generally posted in Eastern Standard Time, which isn’t always the local time zone of all bidders.

The Web site can email an alert to bidders when their parcel is open for bidding and also allows placing a maximum bid amount ahead of the auction. This amount is not visible to the public, but usually can’t be reduced until bidding ends for that parcel.    

UKIAH, Calif. – Mendocino College has a new interim college president/superintendent.

On Wednesday, May 2, the Mendocino-Lake Community College District Board of Trustees officially approved a contract for Dr. Roe Darnell to become interim superintendent/president.

Darnell succeeds Superintendent/President Kathy Lehner, who is leaving to take over the leadership of the College of the Redwoods in Eureka. Lehner was the sixth president at the college.

Darnell will serve in his interim position at Mendocino College until February 2013.

The board also approved a process for hiring a permanent superintendent/president at the May 2 meeting.

Before approving Darnell, the board recognized Lehner’s accomplishments during her six years as superintendent/president with a resolution highlighting her accomplishments.

The resolution mentions, among other achievements, her leadership in passing Measure W, which is allowing the college to build permanent facilities in Lakeport and Willits as well as a Library/Learning Center on the Ukiah Campus; her “outreach to the community and community relations”; her talent at “developing a unified team as well as building trust”; and her focus on student success during difficult budget times.  Lehner was also praised for making the college a statewide leader in the accreditation process and positioning the institution as well-respected at the state level.

Dr. Darnell earned an Ed.D. from the University of La Verne, a master's degree in history from Pepperdine University and a bachelor's degree in history from Oklahoma Christian College.

He also has completed additional graduate courses at the University of Southern California in Higher Education Curriculum and Administration.

Most recently, Dr. Darnell was employed by the Yosemite Community College District. He retired in 2010 after serving as chancellor for three years.

Previously he was the superintendent/president for West Kern Community College District (2001-07) and President at Cerro Coso Community College (four years) where he also served as vice-president of instruction (14 years) and associate dean of instruction (four years).

After cooling the eastern tropical Pacific for the second winter in a row – and teaming with other large-scale weather patterns to wreak havoc on North American winter – La Niña ended in April 2012.

Researchers from the Climate Prediction Center of the U.S. National Weather Service reported on May 3 that the Pacific has transitioned to “neutral conditions, which are expected to continue through northern summer 2012.”

La Niña and El Niño are alternating patterns of ocean and atmospheric circulation that have a distinct impact on weather around the Pacific basin.

La Niña brings cooler waters and stronger trade winds to the tropical Pacific, boosting precipitation in western Pacific nations like Australia and Indonesia and drying out southern North America.

The pattern can alter the path of the jet stream and other atmospheric phenomena.

The images above depict sea surface height (SSH) anomalies for the Pacific Ocean in January and April 2012, as observed by the radar altimeter on the OSTM/Jason-2 satellite.

Shades of blue show regions where the sea surface height is lower than the average, while reds show heights that are above average.

The animation linked below the image shows the see-saw pattern of sea surface heights over the past four years.

Over yearly scales, the height of the ocean surface is driven by the temperature of the water – warmer water expands to a greater volume than cooler water – and by winds.

“Sea surface temperatures (SST) show the surface manifestation of La Niña and El Niño; this is what the atmosphere ‘feels,’” said Bill Patzert of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. “Sea surface height shows how much heat has been redistributed in the equatorial Pacific. These are very complementary. SST shows what the atmosphere is responding to, while SSH shows how intense the event is.”

LAKEPORT, Calif. – Nothing brings as much as energy to a home as a kitten.

Now just imagine three of them.

The three kittens featured in the video above – two females and a male – are available for adoption at Lake County Animal Care and Control.

The youngest of the kittens is a 10-week-old female. She is not yet spayed.

The other two kittens are both 11 weeks old, one male and one female. Both have been altered.

All are friendly and socialized, and all would much rather bring their energy to a new family.

To fill out an adoption application online visit http://www.co.lake.ca.us/Government/Directory/Animal_Care_And_Control/Adopt/Dog___Cat_Adoption_Application.htm .

Lake County Animal Care and Control is located at 4949 Helbush in Lakeport, next to the Hill Road Correctional Facility.

Office hours are Monday through Friday, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., and 1 p.m. to 3 p.m., Saturday. The shelter is open from 10:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Monday through Friday and on Saturday from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m.

Visit the shelter online at http://www.co.lake.ca.us/Government/Directory/Animal_Care_And_Control.htm .

For more information call Lake County Animal Care and Control at 707-263-0278.

Email Elizabeth Larson at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. .

LAKEPORT, Calif. – Congressman Mike Thompson hosted local veterans leaders and Department of Veterans Affairs officials at a Monday roundtable in an effort to find out how the agency can be improved to better serve its veteran clients, including the thousands of veterans who reside in Lake County.

The meeting took place on the same day that Thompson’s office announced that he had secured commitments from the VA that it will make improvements at the VA Oakland Regional Office, one of the slowest regional offices in the nation for claims processing.

The Monday afternoon roundtable at the Lake County Courthouse in Lakeport featured representatives from veterans’ organizations around the lake – Vietnam Veterans of America, Veterans of Foreign Wars, American Legion, United Veterans Council and the Military Funeral Honors Team – as well as Lake County Veterans Service Office staff, county Supervisor Jim Comstock, staff from the VA Clinic in Clearlake and the Employment Development Department.

Making the trip to meet with the vets and local leaders were Lawrence Carroll, director of the San Francisco Veterans Affairs Medical Center, and VA Oakland Regional Office Director Douglas Bragg.

“I can't tell you how important this is to the community,” said Thompson, who along with the VA officials had held a similar roundtable with veterans in Sonoma County earlier in the day.

Approximately 11 percent of Lake County’s total population – or 7,293 people – are veterans, according to Thompson’s office.

“Generally a veteran doesn't call my office until they're at their wits' end,” said Thompson.

The VA has a large number of claims pending nationwide, “and the numbers reflect even worse in our area,” Thompson said.

However, at a meeting he and Congressman Wally Herger had with VA officials last month, he said the VA came forward with what he believed was a good proposal – including training for staff – to address that claims backlog.

“They’re making some very substantial efforts to clean that backlog up,” he said.

Carroll, who like Bragg is a veteran, told the vets they would try to get them answers to their issues.

He said they work for a big bureaucracy. While that’s not an excuse, it helps to understand their challenges.

Carroll said they were going through some transformational changes, and as a result sometimes it looks like things are getting worse.

He also shared with the group that a family member of his, a three-tour Vietnam veteran, had fought for years to get health services through the VA, which did not believe the man had served in Vietnam.

Bragg, a 36-year federal employee, arrived in Oakland six months ago, and said he is there to fix the problems.

Thompson told the vets Monday that the training that VA staff is scheduled to be given is meant to make the Oakland Regional Office more responsive and help them catch up on claims processing.

“I want everyone to know we're here as allies, not adversaries,” Thompson said.

Bragg said the VA is going to train more people in more skills, which will give them flexibility.

“We are going to get better,” he said.

Addressing a larger problem

Thompson, a Vietnam veteran, said he and Congressman Wally Herger met in Washington, DC last month with VA Under Secretary for Benefits Brigadier General Allison A. Hickey to discuss the VA’s claims processing issues, which the agency said has resulted from workload and performance issues.

Hickey oversees all nonmedical benefits and services provided to veterans and their families, including all operations at the VA Oakland Regional Office.

Oakland has 30,765 pending disability claims, according to the VA. On average, the wait time on these claims is more than 263 days, 50 days longer than the national average. Of those disability claims, more than 9,200 have been pending for more than a year.

On Monday Thompson shared a copy of a letter from Hickey, who outlined the elements of a plan to improve services delivery that began at the Oakland Regional Office on March 27.

“Our goal is to achieve significant improvements in the quality and timeliness of claims processing,” Hickey wrote. “We have also made it a priority to enhance our communications with congressional stakeholders.”

The performance improvement plan will include “Challenge” training for the entire regional office in June to improve employee skill levels and decision quality, as well as technical, team, supervisory and communications training. It’s the first effort to retrain an entire regional office, according to Hickey.

The VA also is shifting 27 employees to the Rating Veterans Service Representative position and four employees to the Decision Review Officer position to increase the number of employees assigned to its congressional liaison staff in order to improve service and responsiveness to congressional inquiries, Hickey reported.

A new Simplified Notification Letter process (SNL) is being recently implemented at the Oakland Regional Office as part of the Veterans Benefits Administration’s Transformation plan, and the office also is establishing a Quality Review Team to eliminate errors at the earliest possible stage of the claims process, according to Hickey.

In order to reduce its pending claims inventory, Hickey said the Oakland Regional Office is receiving brokering assistance from other VA regional offices in Lincoln, Nebraska, and Muskogee, Oklahoma, an effort that began in March.

Hickey said Bragg, the new Oakland Regional Office director, also will engage in face-to-face discussions with each of the 21 Northern California congressional district offices over the coming months.

Email Elizabeth Larson at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. .

COBB, Calif. – A woman was reportedly shot to death on Cobb Friday evening.

The shooting was reported before 7 p.m. on Cobb.

Radio reports indicated the woman was shot to death near the Adams Springs Golf Course in the area of Hogan Hill Lane.

The possible suspect was a male, the woman's boyfriend or ex-boyfriend, said to be in his 40s. No further descriptions of the suspect were immediately available.

Sheriff's deputies and Kelseyville Fire responded to the scene of the shooting, radio reports indicated.

A REACH air ambulance also responded and landed at the Boggs Mountain helitack just before 7:15 p.m. However, once on the ground dispatch informed REACH that it could return to quarters as the patient had died.

Shortly after 9 p.m. deputies were called from the scene on the report of a man in the Middletown area threatening to shoot his girlfriend, according to radio traffic.

Additional details will be posted as they become available.

The full Moon has a reputation for trouble. It raises high tides, it makes dogs howl, it wakes you up in the middle of the night with beams of moonlight stealing through drapes.

If a moonbeam wakes you up on the night of Saturday, May 5, you might want to get out of bed and take a look.

This May’s full Moon is a “super Moon,” as much as 14 percent bigger and 30 percent brighter than other full Moons of 2012.

The scientific term for the phenomenon is “perigee moon.” Full Moons vary in size because of the oval shape of the Moon's orbit.

The Moon follows an elliptical path around Earth with one side ("perigee") about 50,000 kilometers closer than the other ("apogee").  Full Moons that occur on the perigee side of the Moon's orbit seem extra big and bright.

Such is the case on May 5 at 11:34 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time when the Moon reaches perigee.

Only one minute later, the Moon will line up with Earth and the sun to become brilliantly full. The timing is almost perfect.

Okay, the Moon is 14 percent bigger than usual, but can you really tell the difference?

It's tricky. There are no rulers floating in the sky to measure lunar diameters. Hanging high overhead with no reference points to provide a sense of scale, one full Moon can seem much like any other. The best time to look is when the Moon is near the horizon.

For reasons not fully understood by astronomers or psychologists, low-hanging Moons look unnaturally large when they beam through trees, buildings and other foreground objects.

On May 5, this Moon illusion will amplify a full Moon that's extra-big to begin with. The swollen orb rising in the east at sunset should seem super indeed.

Folklore holds that all kinds of wacky things happen under the light of a full Moon.

Supposedly, hospital admissions increase, the crime rate ticks upward, and people behave strangely. The idea that the full Moon causes mental disorders was widespread in the Middle Ages. Even the word "lunacy," meaning "insanity," comes from the Latin word for "Moon."

The majority of modern studies, however, show no correlation between the phase of the Moon and the incidence of crime, sickness or human behavior.  The truth is, the Moon is less influential than folklore would have us believe.

It's true that a perigee full Moon brings with it extra-high "perigean tides," but according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration this is nothing to worry about.

In most places, lunar gravity at perigee pulls tide waters only a few centimeters (an inch or so) higher than usual. Local geography can amplify the effect to about 15 centimeters (six inches) – not exactly a great flood.

Super perigee Moons are actually fairly common. The Moon becomes full within a few hours of its closest approach to Earth about once a year on average.

The last such coincidence occurred on March 19, 2011, producing a full Moon that was almost 400 kilometers closer than this one. As usual, no trouble was reported – unless you count a midnight awakening as trouble.

If so, close the drapes on May 5. Otherwise, enjoy the super-moonlight.

Dr. Tony Phillips works for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.

LAKEPORT, Calif. – Need a fun friend for your home or office?

If so, meet “Chloe,” a 9-month-old gray tabby.

She is playful – she especially likes to play with pens and pencils, and other office supplies – and also likes to hang out.

Chloe has green eyes and a short coat, and she has been spayed.

If you would like to meet her, you can find her in cat room kennel No. 63, ID No. 32327.

To fill out an adoption application online visit http://www.co.lake.ca.us/Government/Directory/Animal_Care_And_Control/Adopt/Dog___Cat_Adoption_Application.htm .

Lake County Animal Care and Control is located at 4949 Helbush in Lakeport, next to the Hill Road Correctional Facility.

Office hours are Monday through Friday, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., and 1 p.m. to 3 p.m., Saturday. The shelter is open from 10:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Monday through Friday and on Saturday from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m.

Visit the shelter online at http://www.co.lake.ca.us/Government/Directory/Animal_Care_And_Control.htm .

For more information call Lake County Animal Care and Control at 707-263-0278.

Email Elizabeth Larson at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. .