NICE, Calif. – The US Army Corps of Engineers said it's negotiating with Robinson Rancheria regarding the agency's finding that the tribe violated the federal Clean Water Act in building its new gas station project on Highway 20.
Following a site visit earlier this year, Army Corps Regulatory Branch Manager Peck Ha said he made the final determination on the property, situated across the highway from the tribe's casino, which is located at 1545 E. Highway 20 in Nice.
The Army Corps notified the tribe in a letter, dated Feb. 9, that it found the tribe had discharged dredged or fill material into wetlands – which are “waters of the United States” – without a Department of the Army permit.
The Army Corps' letter to Robinson instructed the tribe to provide more information on the project, and also asked for comments from appropriate state, local and federal agencies, which were copied on the letter. Those agencies include the US Environmental Protection Agency, US Fish and Wildlife, California Department of Fish and Game and the California Regional Water Quality Control Board.
In 1999 the tribe had received Army Corps authorization for another, similar project in the area, which Ha said will be taken into consideration as it looks at the current case.
Lester Marston, Robinson Rancheria's Ukiah-based attorney, said the tribe doesn't agree with the determination.
“The tribe disputes the Army Corps' finding that there was a violation,” he said.
Army Corps spokesman John Prettyman said the tribe has verified receipt of the letter, noting that the tribe's formal response includes a denial that they've violated the Clean Water Act's Section 404, which has to do with wetlands, and that they will provide documentation.
“All the tribe did was put rock over an existing dirt road that is a public easement or right-of-way that was dedicated to the county to prevent soil erosion and siltation into the ditch,” said Marston, noting that rock isn't a pollutant under federal regulations, although sand and gravel are.
Marston said it's the tribe's intention to make sure the area where the rock was put down was restored to its original condition.
According to Ha, however, the riprap or placement of fill across the roadway is just one part of the violation.
His finding also included grading for the gas station platform closest to the detention basin where runoff is contained. Ha said both the riprap and the grading of the gas station platform activities resulted in impacts to approximately 0.23 acre of waters of the U.S. including wetlands.
Marston didn't respond to followup questions about those additional findings in the determination.
Prettyman said in the response the tribe's attorney stated that if there was a violation, the tribe would mitigate for the wetlands loss.
“Right now we are waiting on that documentation,” Prettyman said this week.
He said Army Corps officials spoke with Marston in the middle of March.
“They seem to be open to working with us,” Prettyman said, noting the Army Corps is working to find the best solution.
Federal officials aren't seeking punitive measures, but are instead are wanting to work with the tribe. Because there are “minor impacts” to the wetlands, Ha said the Army Corps is recommending that the tribe seek an after-the-fact permit.
“The tribe has no problem applying for a permit if a permit is needed,” said Marston.
Ha said the Army Corps also will ask the tribe to mitigate the damage to the wetlands, which can be done in a variety of ways, or the tribe can propose to conduct a mitigation on its own property to make up for the impacts.
Marston said the tribe had studied the area more than a decade ago when applying for the 1999 permit.
“The tribe went out and did a wetlands study for the specific purpose of delineating the wetlands,” he said.
That earlier project would have included construction in the wetlands area. “This project was designed so there would be no construction in the wetlands,” Marston said.
That original map was provided to the Army Corps, said Marston, who noted that he's also personally walked every inch of the property. Since the 1999 permit, the wetlands haven't changed or expanded, he said.
Regarding when the matter could be resolved, Prettyman noted, “As to right now there is no specific time line.”
KELSEYVILLE, Calif. – Two county residents were injured Wednesday as the result of a head-on collision outside of Kelseyville.
The crash occurred just after noon on Highway 29 south of Cruickshank Road, according to the California Highway Patrol.
A 73-year-old Clearlake Oaks man was driving his 2001 Chevrolet Corvette northbound on Highway 20 south of Cruickshank at approximately 55 miles per hour, and a 50-year-old Lower Lake woman was driving her 1997 Mercury Mountaineer southbound, also at 55 miles per hour, the CHP said.
For a yet-to-be-determined reason, the Corvette traveled across the double-yellow lines and hit the Mountaineer head-on, according to the CHP report.
The CHP said the Corvette's driver was flown via REACH air ambulance to Santa Rosa Memorial Hospital with major injuries, while the woman in the Mountaineer was taken via Kelseyville Fire ambulance to Sutter Lakeside Hospital in Lakeport, where she was treated for minor injuries.
Both drivers were wearing their seat belts, the CHP said.
Reports from the scene indicated the crash blocked both lanes of traffic, with the highway completely cleared just before 2 p.m.
CHP Officer Randy Forslund is investigating the incident.
WASHINGTON, D.C. – The North Coast's congressman said he won't support a budget plan put forth by the House Budget Committee because the deep $6 billion in spending cuts it proposes would come at the expense of American families.
Congressman Mike Thompson (D-St. Helena), a senior member of the House Committee on Ways & Means and the Blue Dog Coalition, said the country's debt crisis is a serious problem, and concrete action to decrease spending, increase saving, and balance the budget is needed to keep the national solvent.
But, “it’s important that we accomplish these goals in the right way,” he said.
“Unfortunately, the majority’s budget would hurt working families, seniors, children, and our middle class. This isn’t a workable approach if we’re going to achieve the broad bipartisan agreement necessary to enact a responsible budget.”
In a March 18 statement, House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan criticized President Barack Obama's budget, saying it spent too much, taxed too much and borrowed too much.
“In the weeks ahead, the House Budget Committee will lead where the president has failed. In sharp contrast to the empty promises and diminished future offered by the president’s budget, we will chart a path to real security and a prosperous future,” Ryan said. “The American people demand – and deserve – honest leadership on our greatest fiscal and economic challenges.”
But that budget isn't going over well with members of Congress like Thompson, who said it slashes some of the most important investments and programs relied on by American families.
“The proposed budget would privatize Medicare, forcing seniors into the private health insurance market to shop for coverage with a government voucher,” Thompson said.
He explained that it also would mandate a block grant of federal Medicaid spending, severely undercutting California and other states’ ability to provide health care to our most vulnerable citizens. \
Additionally, the budget would establish an unprecedented fast track process to force Congress to cut Social Security benefits, jeopardizing the program for future generations, he said.
“In any budget discussion, all options should be on the table to start,” Thompson said. “But if the final plan hurts more Americans than it helps, then it’s time to reassess these options.”
Thompson said he he's not afraid to cut spending where it’s deserved, “but I won’t support a budget that decreases smart investments, increases bad ones and threatens our country’s fragile economic recovery.”
He added, “Moving forward, I hope the majority is willing to take a step back, reassess its priorities, and work across the political aisle to develop a viable alternative that puts America and the American people on a path toward long-term fiscal success.”
Thompson held a budget town hall in Lakeport in February in which he pointed to the need for serious budget reforms, including corporate tax structure, but worried that deep cuts in some programs might push the country's recovery backward, as Lake County News has reported.
SACRAMENTO, Calif. – Every year hundreds of California motorists lose their lives in a collision caused by an impaired driver.
Although the numbers have improved from the previous year, in 2009, more than 700 people in the state were killed in a crash where the primary collision factor was driving under the influence (DUI); another 19,805 people were injured under similar circumstances.
“These are more than statistics, they are real people killed in collisions that were entirely preventable,” said California Highway Patrol (CHP) Commissioner Joe Farrow. “Impaired driving is an issue that crosses all segments of society.”
Driving with a measurable blood alcohol content of .08 percent or more for motorists 21 years old or older is illegal in California.
In 2009, law enforcement throughout the state made more than 210,000 arrests for driving under the influence. The CHP accounted for 44 percent of those arrests.
Enforcement alone will not halt this overwhelming problem in California, the CHP.
That's why, during the next several months, the CHP will conduct a grant-funded public education and awareness program with a focus on educating drivers about the dangers of DUI and the devastation it
causes.
The “Designated Driver Education Program” grant will fund the production of public service announcements; educational materials will be also produced and distributed statewide.
“Nobody ever thinks it’s going to happen to them,” said Farrow. “They think it happens to other people. Anytime an impaired motorist is on the road, not only do they put themselves at risk, they’re putting the lives of everyone else around them in danger.”
Funding for this program was provided by a grant from the California Office of Traffic Safety, through the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
Christine Duggan and her son Mathew Gardiner were arrested on Tuesday, March 29, 2011, with investigators alleging that they were involved in a series of Clearlake Oaks burglaries. Lake County Jail photos.
CLEARLAKE OAKS, Calif. – A Clearlake Oaks woman and her adult son were arrested last week in connection with a series of residential burglaries in the Clearlake Oaks area.
Christine Annette Duggan, 47, and her 22-year-old son, Mathew Martin Gardiner, were arrested on Tuesday, March 29, according to a Wednesday report from Capt. James Bauman of the Lake County Sheriff's Office.
Bauman said the arrests resulted from ongoing investigations the Sheriff's Major Crime Unit was conducting into the burglaries. The arrests also resulted in recovery of stolen property.
He said that, over the past several months, the sheriff’s office has responded to multiple reports of burglaries or thefts in the community of Clearlake Oaks.
Sheriff’s detectives and patrol deputies have been coordinating their investigations to develop leads on the cases, and Bauman said last week their efforts led them to a home where stolen property was being stored.
On March 24, sheriff’s detectives received information from one of the burglary victims that Duggan and Gardiner may have been involved in the thefts. Bauman said detectives were told that Duggan and Gardiner had been seen taking items of property in and out of a vacant residence on Oak Grove Avenue at night.
He said further investigation revealed that the Oak Grove Avenue home was owned by an Oakley man, who later confirmed the home was supposed to be vacant and no one had permission to be there. Detectives informed the owner of the situation and obtained permission to search the home for stolen property.
On March 28, detectives searched the Oak Grove Avenue home and found evidence that it had been recently occupied. Bauman said their search revealed several items of property, some of which were confirmed stolen in at least two of the prior burglary cases.
Detectives subsequently contacted other burglary victims and confirmed other items of property found in the search were stolen in two other burglaries, he said.
On March 29, sheriff’s deputies working the Clearlake Oaks area located and detained Duggan and Gardiner near the Oak Grove Avenue home, Bauman said. Detectives responded to assist and both suspects were subsequently arrested.
Duggan’s Chevy pickup truck was impounded as it was also believed to contain stolen property. A search warrant for the truck was secured and detectives located two iPods in Duggan’s purse, inside of the truck. The iPods were seized as suspected stolen property, Bauman said.
Duggan and Gardiner, both of whom were listed as caregivers on their booking sheets, were booked at the Lake County Hill Road Correctional Facility, according to jail records.
Duggan was charged with receiving stolen property, with bail set at $10,000, and Gardiner was charged with first-degree burglary, with bail at $25,000. Both have since posted bail and been released.
As a result of the arrests, Bauman said four burglary cases have been closed, however the investigation continues.
The Sheriff’s Major Crimes Unit is seeking the public’s assistance in identifying other recovered property that has yet to be tied to any of the burglaries. Bauman said property items recovered that have yet to be identified include appliances, kitchen ware, computer equipment, power tools, jewelry and numerous DVDs.
The sheriff’s office also reminds the public to always record serial numbers and descriptive information for valuable items and keep such information in an inconspicuous place in the home.
Bauman said the information is essential for investigators to recover, identify and return stolen property to victims, and to apprehend and prosecute suspects.
Anyone who may be a burglary or theft victim, or who may have information relating to these burglaries, is encouraged to call Detective Sgt. John Gregore at 707-262-4200.
Clear Lake Hitch hover near the surface during a brief calm moment in their spawning migration on Saturday, April 2, 2011. Photo by Ed Oswalt.
KELSEYVILLE, Calif. – There are many signs of spring's arrival in Lake County, and one of them – the spring spawning migration of the Clear Lake Hitch – is making a gradual comeback after many years when it appeared the fish was about to disappear into memory.
The hitch – known as the “chi” to the local Pomo peoples – is a Clear Lake native, has strong links to the Pomo cultural past and is well remembered by many people who have called the county home for the last several decades.
Sometime within the last 40 years the hitch started to decline, but more recently the fish has become a comeback kid of sorts, as it's the focus of tribal monitoring projects and a community group, the Chi Council for the Clear Lake Hitch, that's dedicated to the fish's preservation.
On Saturday, April 2, the Chi Council hosted a field trip for community members who wanted to watch the fish make their way up local streams for spawning.
Peter Windrem, a Chi Council member who led the tour, said he remembered the hitch in abundance in local creeks when he was a boy.
His childhood friend, Keith Petterson, who joined in the Saturday morning field trip, said the fish would sometimes be backed up into the little streams that ran through pear orchards.
A Chi Council map shows that most of Clear Lake's major tributaries at one time were home to hitch spawning runs.
But over the last several decades the hitch population has taken a precipitous decline, according to those who study the fish. Now, the hitch are mostly to be found in Kelsey, Adobe and Thompson creeks, although a small population is believed to live in Middle Creek near Upper Lake.
Windrem said the hitch is one of four fishes native to Clear Lake, the largest natural freshwater lake completely within California boundaries.
In addition to the hitch, those native species included the Clear Lake Splittail, now believed extinct – biologist Rick Macedo said the last sighting of one was in 1975 – the pikeminnow and Sacramento sucker.
Windrem said the sucker isn't seen much, but when it is he said it's a treat, because it's such a beautiful fish – golden in color, with black markings.
Where once the streams ran thick with hitch, today its numbers are far fewer, with little columns of them now making their way upstream to spawn.
Unlike salmon, however, the trip upstream isn't a long goodbye. Rather, once they spawn, it's back to Clear Lake for the hitch, with the possibility that they can return for several more years to come to repeat the process.
The reasons for the hitch's decline are many, according to Chi Council members and biologists.
On the first stop of the Saturday field trip, Windrem led the group to the bridge over Kelsey Creek at the west end of Kelseyville.
Looking down from the bridge, he showed a historical picture from 1899 of hitch crammed together in Kelsey Creek, taken from a vantage point about 100 yards down the creek from the bridge. At the time of that picture, the creek was more shallow, like an omelet pan, said Windrem.
“Historically, these streams have a very gradual grading,” he explained.
However, today the creek runs much deeper, with more defined banks.
In the 1960s and 1970s, gravel extraction operations on local creeks caused the level of Kelsey Creek to drop by about 30 feet, Windrem said.
At one point, there were concerns that the footing of the Kelseyville bridge over Kelsey Creek was being exposed so much that it might fall over, so Windrem said reinforcements were installed along its base to stabilize it.
But the changes to the creek's essential topography had more far-reaching consequences for the hitch, he said.
Whereas once the hitch could move easily along, with no serious changes in creek elevation, Windrem and Macedo, who took part in the Saturday tour, said the fish began to confront barriers they couldn't overcome during their multistage migration.
A fish ladder was added to an area of Kelsey Creek on the north side of the bridge, but the ladder's design favors salmonids, and, as Windrem pointed out, “Hitch don't jump.”
Macedo, considered a hitch expert, said that because they're not strong jumpers, hitch struggled to navigate both the ladders and the streams when the elevations become more steep.
He suggested the crossing under the Kelseyville bridge could be vastly improved for hitch if a trench was dug between the bridge's footings.
Other changes to streams and water resources play a part. Retired state Fish and Game biologist Jim Steele said, “The game is over when you get a reservoir.”
When asked if he remembered a point when the hitch population began to drop off, Petterson said, “I think it's just been a gradual change.”
On the field trip's second stop, at the Bell Hill low water crossing on Adobe Creek, Macedo said needed repairs at the crossing – particularly lowered culvert openings – benefited the fish, allowing them to pass easily pass through to a small area of rapids.
Good-sized clusters of the fish could be seen pooling in various areas around the crossing, and Macedo and Steele waded into the stream to catch a few hitch to show to the group traveling along on the trip.
Wearing a backpack device that some of the tour members said reminded them of equipment in “Ghostbusters,” Macedo used a long pole with a mesh square at one end that was attached to the backpack to mildly stun the fish in order to catch a few to put in a bucket of water.
Macedo called the fish – about a foot in length – “exceptionally large.”
The field trip goers gathered around to take a closer look at the silver-colored fish which, as they started to come out of their brief stupor, slapped disapproving tails on the insides of the buckets.
After just a few minutes in the bucket, Macedo carried them around the rapids and deposited them in a still pool so they could resume their trip upstream.
Biologist Erik Ringelberg tags a Clear Lake Hitch on Saturday, April 2, 2011. Photo by Ed Oswalt.
Research filled with new discoveries
For all of science's power to collect data and expand understanding, the hitch is still a fish largely surrounded by mystery.
“Everything that we learn about this fish is completely new,” said Paula Britton, environmental director for the Habematolel Pomo of Upper Lake.
Britton has been part of a study of the fish that's now in its third year.
For the county's tribes, the hitch historically was an important food source, with its spring spawning runs providing tribes with a critical harvest.
Today, the tribes aren't engaged in catching the fish for food, but rather for research, with a view to preserving it.
The US Fish and Wildlife Service granted Habematolel, Big Valley and Robinson Rancheria grants to study and tag the fish, now a “species of special concern,” Britton said.
Britton said the hitch project is the only one that doesn't involve an endangered species, and competition for funding is intense.
On Saturday, Britton was part of a team tagging the fish on a narrow portion of Thompson Creek off of Highland Springs Road, between Lakeport and Kelseyville.
The previous day they tagged 76 hitch in four hours, she said.
In about 45 minutes Saturday morning, they tagged 14 more, and Britton said they were planning to continue their work throughout this week and, possibly, into the coming weekend.
The fish – which must be 1 pound before they'll be tagged – were caught, put into a large cooler with water and a mild sedative to calm them. The fish were then handed to biologist Erik Ringelberg, who measured them and looked for anomalies like parasites, bird strikes and other injuries.
Ringelberg then handed them over to Britton – who was keeping the statistics – who then weighed them before putting them into another cooler filled with water with added oxygen to help the fish recover from the anesthetic.
“They're pretty amazing little fish,” said Britton.
Part of Habematolel's effort includes restoration on Middle Creek, including improving weirs there, she said.
The equipment being used to track the hitch allows researchers to follow the hitch's movement in the creeks, mostly on Adobe Creek, said Ringelberg.
However, they can't currently track what the fish do when they ultimately return to Clear Lake. Ringelberg said another proposed project would pursue tracking them in their lake home.
All of this carefully pursued research is adding to knowledge of the fish, but raising yet more questions that still haven't been answered, such as if the fish return to their natal streams, much like salmon do, he explained.
One of the surprising findings of the research, said Ringelberg, is that the fish, if they meet obstructions while passing through streams, will attempt to burrow through the streambed to get around the barriers.
Ringelberg said a requirement of Habematolel's grant is that the information be reported. Among the entities they report to are the California Natural Diversity Database.
Exploring the causes of the decline
The hitch is known to scientists as Lavinia exilicauda chi. The fish is the only species reported to be within the genus Lavinia.
University of California, Davis biologist Dr. Peter Moyle's seminal work, “Inland Fishes of California” discusses the fish in detail. It's an important book that Macedo keeps with him, pulling it out on Saturday to show to those on the tour interested in the hitch.
Moyle is a much respected scientist who is considered an expert on anadromous fish – those that migrate from salt water to fresh water for spawning – and whose knowledge and opinion have been called upon in studies on the Bay-Delta and the state's larger water issues.
In a 2009 e-mail exchange with Lake County News, Moyle said that he believed there was no question the hitch's numbers have declined, although the evidence is largely anecdotal.
The hitch and splittail were historically the lake's main plankton-eating fish, and had an enormous food supply, in addition to also eating the Clear Lake gnat, he said.
Moyle, who worked in Lake County in the 1970s, recalled seeing hundreds of spawning fish at “virtually any stream with water in it,” including drainage ditches of fields near Seigler Creek which he estimated was as many as 15 miles from Clear Lake.
Moyle attributed the fish's population decline to three main causes.
They included loss of spawning habitat, with streams being “increasingly channelized, dewatered, altered with barriers, and otherwise made inhospitable to hitch, including making them more vulnerable to predation, human and non-human.” He added that the hitch “have survived mainly because they spawn so early, the eggs hatch quickly, and the larvae wash into the lake.”
The second cause Moyle identified was loss of rearing habitat, particularly tules and marshes. He said that the larval hitch appear to benefit from being reared among tule stems, which protects them from predators like silversides and provides them with abundant microscopic food sources like rotifers, a tiny aquatic animal.
Moyle said the third – and probably most important – cause is the introduction of alien species into Clear Lake, including silversides and threadfin shad that compete with hitch for important food sources like zooplankton and which he believed also prey on the larvae and small juveniles.
The Florida largemouth bass for which the lake has become known are what Moyle called “a voracious predator” on larger hitch, which also are preyed upon by three species each of catfish and sunfish, and mosquitofish.
He estimated that huge fluctuations in shad numbers should have an impact on hitch populations both by periodically depleting food supplies and by allowing predator populations such as grebes to build up before the crash.
Moyle concluded, “It is evident that the Clear Lake hitch get hammered throughout their life cycle. It is a bit of miracle that they have persisted despite all this. Their decline makes the work of the Chi Council extremely important. Without active protection and management, the hitch will disappear.”
To learn more about the hitch, visit the Chi Council's Web site, http://lakelive.info/chicouncil/ . The group next meets at 3:30 p.m. Wednesday, April 27, at the Lake County Agriculture Center, 883 Lakeport Blvd., Lakeport. The public is invited to attend.
GUALALA, Calif. – Mendocino County officials are investigating the theft of an estimated 1,000 gallons of gas at a coastal gas station on April 2.
The theft occurred at the Gualala Chevron on South Highway One, according to Capt. Kurt Smallcomb of the Mendocino County Sheriff's Office.
At 2 p.m. on Saturday, April 2, Mendocino County Sheriff's deputies were dispatched to the station regarding the theft, Smallcomb said.
On arrival deputies learned that at 4:30 a.m. that day a U-Haul truck and an unknown type of two-door sedan arrived at the Chevron Station, Smallcomb said.
It's believed that through some type of electronic manipulation the pumps were unlocked, which allowed the gas to be taken, according to Smallcomb.
He said the estimated value of the theft is $5,500.
Anyone with information investigating Mendocino County Sheriff's Deputy Mike Gander at 707-463- 4086.
State and federal leaders are asking President Barack Obama for a major disaster declaration for California following the damage the state suffered last month that was triggered by a 9.0 magnitude earthquake and tsunami off the coast of Japan.
Gov. Jerry Brown and North Coast Congressman Mike Thompson (D-St. Helena) penned separate letters sent to Obama on Wednesday asking for the assistance for the state, which suffered $48 million in damage to ports, harbors, boats, businesses and infrastructure due to a water surge triggered by Japan's March 11 quake and tsunami.
That $48 million damage estimate, Brown said, exceeds California’s state threshold of $44 million as established by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, and is adding to California's current economic crisis.
Thompson's letter to Obama supports Brown's requests.
“Last month’s tsunami caused significant damage to infrastructure up and down California’s coast,” Thompson said in a statement issued by his office. “Without assistance, I am extremely concerned that recovery efforts in affected communities, including those I represent, will languish. That’s why my colleagues and I are strongly urging the president to support Governor Brown’s request for a federal disaster declaration to help get local communities back on their feet.”
Brown's letter asks for additional federal resources to supplement state and local repair and recovery efforts.
It follows emergency proclamations Brown issued for Del Norte, Humboldt, Mendocino, San Luis Obispo, San Mateo and Santa Cruz counties, which his letter said were “significantly impacted,” with Del Norte and Santa Cruz reportedly hit hardest.
Brown's letter said the Crescent City Harbor, which last year generated crab and fish revenues of $12.5 million, sustained an estimated $19.9 million in eligible damage, and the Santa Cruz Port sustained an estimated $26.4 million in eligible damage.
The Santa Cruz Port District, whose businesses employ approximately 800 people, operates as a government-owned business, funded entirely by user fees and generates approximately $16.8 million annually for Santa Cruz County, Brown reported. The port district has reported that businesses in the harbor, and those dependent upon harbor operations, are experiencing a loss of almost $59,000 per day.
Brown also had issued an executive order issued to waive the waiting period for victims to apply for unemployment insurance, expedite the hiring of emergency and cleanup personnel and request state tax officials to accommodate those affected by the water surge.
He also reported that, since January 2010, California has received four major federal disaster declarations, had six fires declared under FEMA's Fire Management Assistance Grant Program, endured 20 events for which funds under the California Disaster Assistance Act were issued, and received four disaster designations from the U.S. Department of Agriculture and seven U.S. Small Business Administration designations.
Thompson's letter, signed by 22 fellow members of the California Congressional Delegation, also asks Obama to provide California with federal disaster assistance. He said the funding would be used to repair and rebuild harbors and other damaged infrastructure, and to safeguard coastal communities from future losses.
The letter notes that more than 150 vessels have been damaged, and over 30 vessels have sunk. “Additionally, oil sheens have been reported, and the sunken vessels continue to pose the threat of substantial hazardous releases, as well as navigational dangers, that would exacerbate the economic devastation.”
The letter added, “California state authorities are working with local governments and the United States Coast Guard and have taken a proactive and timely response. Efforts to secure loose vessels, remove debris and sunken vessels, assess damages, and monitor coastal areas for oil sheens are fully underway. However, additional federal assistance is necessary to repair and rebuild harbors and other damaged infrastructure, as well as to safeguard our communities from future losses.”
The Heron Festival is a celebration of birds, wildlife and springtime on beautiful Clear Lake. Festival keynote speaker and photographer, Lyle Madeson captured this shot of a Great Blue Heron.
KELSEYVILLE, Calif. – The upcoming Heron Festival and Wildflower Brunch, on April 30 and May 1, sponsored by the Redbud Audubon Society and the Clear Lake State Park Interpretive Association (CLSPIA), promises an array of fun and interesting nature-oriented activities, ranging from pontoon boat tours on Clear Lake to a live birds presentation.
Heron Festival is in its 17th year and since its founding by the Redbud Audubon Society, the event has grown to become one of Northern California’s most popular nature festivals.
The festival is held at the Clear Lake State Park at 5300 Soda Bay Road in Kelseyville.
Pontoon boat birding tours on Clear Lake are a popular feature of the festival, but a great variety of other activities and programs are offered.
Boat tours are held on both days beginning at 8 a.m. and last for approximately 90 minutes. Advanced reservations are strongly suggested for the boat tours. This may be accomplished by going to the Heron Festival website at www.heronfestival.org. Price for a boat ride is just $15 per person.
Other activities on Saturday include an Audubon Bird Walk with Brad Barnwell starting at 8:30 a.m., the popular Wildflower Brunch from 9 a.m. until noon, a Nature Fair, which features exhibit booths highlighting education displays and information from nature-related government agencies, local environmental nonprofit groups, and nature-related artists and craftsmen.
Keynote speaker on Saturday is highly acclaimed Lake County nature photographer, Lyle Madeson. Don’t miss his spectacular photos of the nesting cycle of herons and egrets, with special emphasis on mating behaviors, nest building, and fledging. His presentation will be given at the Visitor Center Auditorium at 10 a.m. In the visitor center there are interpretive displays of Lake County’s natural and cultural resources to enjoy.
Children’s activities will include a wide range of fun educational programs for children to learn about nature, including owl masks, peanut butter birdseed feeders to take home, and making a personalized bird journal. A family nature walk is available on Saturday at 12 p.m. and Sunday at 10 a.m.
Pontoon boat tours continue on Sunday along with more walks, the nature fair, and a 10 a.m. presentation by Dr. Harry Lyons on “Myths and Music of Clear Lake.”
At 11:30 a.m. children of all ages will enjoy a nature-inspired Sing-along Puppet Show and at 1 p.m. a live birds presentation, “Raptor Speak,” by Native Bird Connections will give visitors the opportunity to see raptor behavior up close. The “Raptor Speak” program will repeat at 2 p.m. and the puppet show at 3:15 p.m.
All events except the pontoon boat tours and the Wildflower Brunch are free and open to the public. Registration for both the boat tours and the brunch are required and can be made by going to the festival website or by calling 707-263-8030.
The Web site, www.heronfestival.org, also features the full schedule of events for the two day Heron Festival at Clear Lake State Park.
After a three-year effort by the departments of Defense and Veterans Affairs to improve the process, ill and injured military members still endure a long, complex and often contentious evaluation system when seeking disability ratings and compensation for service-related health conditions.
The process has been made more convenient and even shortened by an average six to eight months under a pilot program jointly run by the two departments and which continues to be expanded to more military bases.
Yet the Defense Department’s personnel chief and the Army’s surgeon general both have concluded, and said publicly, that the “integrated” disability evaluation system, or IDES, remains a disappointment.
More dramatic changes, they suggest, have to occur or else wounded warriors and other disabled service members still will be saddled with a process not befitting their sacrifices to serve the country.
Clifford L. Stanley, under secretary of defense for personnel and readiness, first revealed the depth of his concern to the annual Military Health System conference in January.
Stanley said he had been “raising Cain” over the time that injured and ill members still spent in “limbo” awaiting medical appointments and medical review board decisions.
Lt. Gen. Eric B. Schoomaker, Army’s top medical officer, told the House military personnel subcommittee in March that the pilot run by the two departments since late 2007, called IDES or the Integrated Disability Evaluation System, “remains complex and adversarial.”
Soldiers, he said, “still undergo dual adjudication where the military rates only unfitting conditions and the VA rates all service-connected conditions.”
That produces separate ratings “confusing to soldiers and leaves a serious misperception about Army’s appreciation of wounded and injured soldiers [and their] medical and emotional situation.”
Interviewed in his Pentagon office late last month, Stanley said he agrees with that criticism of IDES, though the pilot continues to be improved as it replaces, base by base, the far more flawed legacy DES.
The legacy system, still used for 40 percent of members seeking disability ratings, requires each service to conduct its own medical evaluation to identify only “unfitting” conditions and award them a rating.
If the rating is 30 percent or higher, the member is retired and draws a lifetime annuity and other retiree benefits including access to military medical care.
If the rating is below 30 percent, the member is separated, usually with a lump sum severance payment. Veterans then go to VA where a new evaluation process begins, this time of every service-related condition found. VA ratings and compensation usually are higher than the service allowed.
Back in 2007, it took an average of 540 days to clear both DES processes. The pilot program to integrate them uses one set of medical examinations done by VA doctors to VA standards. It has honed the total process time down to an average of just over 300 days.
Members leave service with both their military and VA ratings set and with their compensation, usually based on the VA, starting immediately.
Stanley and Schoomaker agree that IDES, where it operates, has been an improvement. Yet both leaders say it doesn’t go far enough to simplify and accelerate the process for the 26,000 members moving through it at any given time.
Stanley has had a working group studying its weaknesses. Recommendations to improve it will be presented to Defense Secretary Robert Gates and VA Secretary Eric Shinseki at the end of April.
The ideal system, Stanley said, would produce “a single evaluation based upon one medical record,” and over which Defense and VA officials “have joined hands and made a decision: ‘Here’s the disability rating. Period.’ That’s what we’re looking for … That’s nirvana.”
But such a change, presuming the one and only rating were set by VA, would make many more military members eligible to be disabled “retirees” thus driving up DoD retirement and medical costs.
Neither Stanley nor Schoomaker have addressed, at least publicly, the possible cost consequences of their vision.
What both appear to be embracing is a key recommendation of the 2007 Dole-Shalala Commission, which Congress and the Department of Defense choose to ignore because of the costs involved.
Dole-Shalala, formerly called the President’s Commission on Care for America’s Returning Wounded Warriors, was formed after the scandal involving neglected wounded warriors on the campus at Walter Reed Army Medical Center.
It recommended getting “DoD completely out of the disability business” by giving VA sole responsibility for setting disability ratings and awarding compensation.
It urged replacing “confusing parallel systems” of DoD and VA ratings with a single simple and more generous system.
Congress instead passed more modest reforms to partially integrate the two processes. In the pilot, DoD and VA use the same set of exams. Both rating occur while members remain on active duty. But IDES still allows the military to rate only “unfitting conditions” for determining retirement eligibility and the VA to rate all conditions.
Stanley, in our interview, said this dual adjudication process keeps the system too long and complex, and shakes the bond of trust members should have with their service branch as they leave for civilian life.
Disability evaluation shouldn’t be something that the private first class, or even the general has to briefed on for hours “to understand,” Stanley said. It should just be there to serve them well and fairly.
Stanley isn’t persuaded, as some DES experts are, that the law would have to be changed to allow the services to use more than just “unfitting conditions” to set disability ratings for determining retirement eligibility.
While that debate continues internally, Stanley is pressing IDES officials to take more steps to cut down wait times for members, and at the same time ensure that their rights to due process are protected.
“At no time in this process are we talking about going faster than they want to go,” Stanley said. “We’re not trying to rush people out. We’re talking about respecting them [and] giving them an opportunity to go through a process that is not dehumanizing.”
To comment, send e-mail to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or write to Military Update, P.O. Box 231111, Centreville, VA, 20120-1111.
MIDDLETOWN, Calif. – Alcohol is believed to be a factor in a weekend crash in the south county that injured three people.
The crash in question occurred Saturday, April 2, at 6:20 p.m. on the Dry Creek Cutoff near Middletown, according to the California Highway Patrol.
A Monday report from CHP Officer Steve Tanguay explained that the single-vehicle collison involved a 1981 Toyota pickup driven by 23-year-old Middletown resident Justin McCarty.
Tanguay said McCarty was driving the pickup eastbound on the Dry Creek Cutoff toward Highway 29, with 24-year-old Shane Sims of Middletown riding in the front passenger seat and Sina Radley, 21, of Clearlake riding in the truck's bed.
According to the report, McCarty lost control of the truck, which veered to the left and went off of the roadway, colliding with a tree and rolling over onto its left side.
Radley was thrown from the bed of the truck, which came to rest in a ditch, Tanguay said.
Sims was able to get out of the truck while McCarty was trapped in the driver’s seat. Tanguay said neither McCarty nor Sims were wearing their seatbelts at the time of the collision.
When McCarty was removed from the vehicle, he was flown to Santa Rosa Memorial Hospital for major injuries sustained in the collision, Tanguay said. Sims and Radley were transported by South County Fire Ambulance to Saint Helena Hospital, Clearlake for treatment of their injuries.
CHP Officer Erica Coddington is the investigating officer, Tanguay said.
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