NORTHERN CALIFORNIA — The Yuba Community College District Board appears to be getting closer to selecting a new chancellor, with the trustees set to discuss the appointment at a meeting this week.
The board will meet in closed session at 3 p.m. Thursday, April 13, with the regular session to begin at 5 p.m. at Yuba College, 2088 N. Beale Road, Building 300-Flavors, Marysville.
Members of the public can attend the meeting virtually through this Zoom link.
The Zoom Meeting ID is 852 1986 0695; the call-in number is 1-669-900-6833.
The district — which includes Woodland Community College and its Lake County campus in Clearlake — has been without a permanent chancellor since 2021, when Dr. Douglas Houston left.
Since July, 2021, Dr. James L.J. Houpis has served as interim chancellor.
Earlier this month, the district held public forums in Marysville and Woodland to introduce the four chancellor finalists: Dr. Beatriz Espinoza, Dr. Eugene Giovannini, Dr. Shouan Pan and Dr. Wei Zhou.
During the closed session on Thursday, the board is due to discuss the chancellor’s appointment.
On the agenda for the public portion of the meeting is the consideration of an employment agreement with a new chancellor.
The report for that employment agreement explains that before taking a final action on such an appointment, Government Code requires that an oral report must be given in open session regarding the compensation to be paid to the superintendent candidate.
The agenda packet doesn’t include a proposed employment contract, which appears to hinge on the outcome of the closed session.
“If negotiations of a Chancellor employment agreement are unsuccessful, this agenda item will be considered at a subsequent Board Meeting,” the report said.
Email Elizabeth Larson at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. Follow her on Twitter, @ERLarson, or Lake County News, @LakeCoNews.
Submit comments and questions in writing for commission consideration by sending them to Administrative Services Director/City Clerk Melissa Swanson at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. Identify the subject you wish to comment on in your email’s subject line.
The meeting also can be watched on the city’s YouTube account.
To give the planning commission adequate time to review your questions and comments, please submit written comments before 4 p.m. Tuesday, April 11.
On the agenda is the swearing-in of new commissioners Christopher Inglis and Jack Smalley.
The Clearlake City Council selected Inglis and Smalley on March 2 to succeed Lisa Wilson and Erin McCarrick.
Inglis and Smalley join a five-member commission that includes Robert Coker, Terry Stewart and Fawn Williams.
During Tuesday’s meeting, the commission will appoint its chair and vice chair for the year, and will hold a review of Planning Commission norms and procedures.
Email Elizabeth Larson at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. Follow her on Twitter, @ERLarson, or Lake County News, @LakeCoNews.
UPPER LAKE, Calif. — The Lake County Outdoor Passion Play is preparing for its next performances in May.
The play will be presented on Saturday, May 20, and Sunday May 21, from 4 to 6 p.m.
The event is free but donations are gratefully accepted.
The Passion Play invites everyone to join them as they share the story of the passion, death, resurrection and ascension of Jesus Christ.
Lake County’s Passion Play has been rated by many spectators as among the best in the world.
The play is a prayerful expression of the faith of the people involved.
Men, women, and children from many denominations have come together to make what organizers call “a truly ecumenical experience, touched by the Holy Spirit.”
For the performances, bring your own chair. There are facilities for the handicapped. Water will be available.
There is no smoking, food, drink or pets allowed on the grounds.
The Lake County Outdoor Passion Play grounds are located at 7010 Westlake Road in Upper Lake, about four miles north of Lakeport, off Highway 29.
For more information, visit the Passion Play Facebook page or website, or call 707-263-0349.
LAKE COUNTY, Calif. — Highland Springs Recreation Area was recently closed for over a month due to significant winter storm-related damage.
While the recreation area has since reopened, there is a considerable amount of brush that still needs to be cleared to allow fuller use of the park and trails.
On Saturday, April 15, Lake County Water Resources will host a Highland Springs Vegetation Cleanup Day from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m.
Participants will meet at the Highland Springs disc golf course.
Residents are encouraged to bring hand tools (no use of power tools will be permitted), gloves, sunscreen water and lunch, and join this event.
Volunteers will work together to drag brush into piles, cut brush into smaller pieces and clear pathways.
The Highland Springs Recreation area is located at 3600 E. Highland Springs Road in Lakeport. Continue on Highland Springs Road through the open gate, and the disc golf course will be on the right-hand side of the road. Some parking is available near the course.
Highland Springs Recreation Area is owned by the Lake County Watershed Protection District and managed by the Lake County Water Resources Department.
For more information, contact Water Resources at 707-263-2344 or This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..
Paul Shafer, Boston University and Kristefer Stojanovski, Tulane University
Section 2713 of the ACA requires insurers to offer full coverage of preventive services endorsed by one of three federal groups: the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force, the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices or the Health Resources and Services Administration. If one of those groups recommends a preventive care service as essential to good health outcomes, then you shouldn’t have to pay anything out of pocket. For example, the CARES Act, which allocated emergency funding in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, used this provision to ensure COVID-19 vaccines would be free for many Americans.
The lead plaintiff in the ACA case, Braidwood Management, is a Christian for-profit corporation owned by Steven Hotze, a physician and conservative activist who has previously filed multiple lawsuits against the Affordable Care Act. Braidwood and its co-plaintiffs, a group of conservative Christian employers, objected to being forced to provide their 70 employees free access to pre-exposure prophylaxis, or PrEP, a medicine that is nearly 100% effective in preventing HIV infection. Hotze claimed that PrEP “facilitates and encourages homosexual behavior, intravenous drug use and sexual activity outside of marriage between one man and one woman,” despite a lack of evidence to support this. He also claimed that his religious beliefs prevent him from providing insurance that covers PrEP.
PrEP received an A rating from the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force in June 2019, paving the way for it to be covered at no cost for millions of people.
Over 150 million Americans are enrolled in private health insurance, allowing them to benefit from free preventive care, with about 60% using at least one free preventive service each year. Raising the cost barrier again for PrEP, for example, would disproportionately harm younger patients, people of color and those with lower incomes.
The ruling in Braidwood rests in large part on the appointments clause of the U.S. Constitution, which specifies that certain governmental positions require presidential appointment and Senate confirmation, while other positions have a lower bar.
Texas federal District Judge Reed O'Connor ruled that because the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force is an independent volunteer panel and not made up of officers of the U.S. government, they do not have the appropriate authority to make decisions about which preventive care should be free, unlike the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices or Health Resources and Services Administration. O'Connor also ruled that being forced to cover PrEP violated the religious freedom of the plaintiffs.
Following his initial ruling in September, both sides submitted briefs that tried to inform the “remedy,” or solution, the judge would ultimately recommend. He could have chosen, as the federal government advocated, to grant only the plaintiffs an exemption from covering PrEP under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. But O'Connor instead chose to make his “remedy” apply nationally and cover more services.
He invalidated all of the task force’s recommendations since the Affordable Care Act was passed in March 2010, returning the power to insurers and employers to decide which, if any, preventive care would remain free to patients in their plans. A few of the recommendations covered by his ruling include PrEP; blood pressure, diabetes, lung and skin cancer screenings; and medications to lower cholesterol and reduce breast cancer risk. As of 2022, 15 states have laws with ACA-like requirements for plans in the insurance marketplace, but not for large employer plans generally exempt from state oversight.
Insurance contracts are typically defined by calendar year, so most people will see these changes starting only in 2024. Importantly, these services will likely still need to be covered by health insurance plans as essential health benefits through a separate provision of the ACA – they just won’t be free anymore.
Other U.S. Preventive Services Task Force recommendations and those made by the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices or Health Resources and Services Administration – namely, immunizations and contraception, respectively – will remain free to patients for now.
What’s next?
The federal government appealed the ruling to the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on March 31, 2023, buoyed by a coordinated response from 23 patient advocacy groups. They have asked for a stay while the case continues, which pauses the effects of the ruling. If either O'Connor or a higher court grants their request, it will leave the status quo of free preventive care in place.
But there are also concerns that either the 5th Circuit orthe Supreme Court could take the ruling even further, endangering the free coverage of contraception and other preventive care that remains in place.
LAKE COUNTY, Calif. — Lake County Animal Care and Control has lots of dogs waiting to go to their homes this Easter.
Dogs available for adoption this week include mixes of Akita, Anatolian shepherd, Australian cattle dog, blue heeler, border collie, boxer, Chihuahua, German shepherd, Great Pyrenees, Labrador retriever, pit bull and terrier.
Dogs that are adopted from Lake County Animal Care and Control are either neutered or spayed, microchipped and, if old enough, given a rabies shot and county license before being released to their new owner. License fees do not apply to residents of the cities of Lakeport or Clearlake.
The following dogs at the Lake County Animal Care and Control shelter have been cleared for adoption.
Call Lake County Animal Care and Control at 707-263-0278 or visit the shelter online for information on visiting or adopting.
‘Ivy’
“Ivy” is a 2-month-old Akita-Anatolian shepherd mix with a short brown and black coat.
She is in foster, ID No. LCAC-A-5031.
‘LilDan’
“LilDan” is a 7-month-old short coat Chihuahua-terrier mix.
He is in kennel No. 2, ID No. LCAC-A-4719.
Male American blue heeler
This 1.5-year-old male American blue heeler has a blue and tan coat.
He is in kennel No. 3, ID No. LCAC-A-4961.
Female pit bull terrier puppy
This 3-month-old female American pit bull terrier puppy has a short black and white coat.
She is in kennel No. 4, ID No. LCAC-A-4788.
‘Shasta’
“Shasta” is a 1-year-old female pit bull terrier with a short black and white coat.
She is in kennel No. 5, ID No. LCAC-A-4873.
Male border collie-shepherd mix
This 2-year-old male border collie-shepherd mix has a long black coat.
He is in kennel No. 9, ID No. LCAC-A-5012.
Male Chihuahua-terrier mix
This 3-year-old male Chihuahua-terrier mix has a short buff coat.
He is in kennel No. 10, ID No. LCAC-A-5008.
Female border collie
This 1-year-old female border collie has a black and white coat, and one brown eye and one blue eye.
She is in kennel No. 11, ID No. LCAC-A-4903.
Female pit bull terrier
This 1-year-old female pit bull terrier has a brindle and white coat.
She is in kennel No. 16, ID No. LCAC-A-5000.
Female Great Pyrenees puppy
This 3-month-old female Great Pyrenees puppy has a short tan coat with black markings.
She is in kennel No. 18, ID No. LCAC-A-5026.
Male pit bull terrier
This one and a half year old male pit bull terrier has a black coat with white markings.
He is in kennel No. 19, ID No. LCAC-A-4843.
Female pit bull terrier puppy
This 3-month-old female American pit bull terrier puppy has a short brindle coat.
She is in kennel No. 22, ID No. LCAC-A-4787.
Male pit bull
This 2-year-old male pit bull has a short brindle coat with white markings.
He is in kennel No. 23, ID No. LCAC-A-5029.
Male mixed breed
This 2-year-old male mixed breed dog has a short tan coat.
He is in kennel No. 24, ID No. LCAC-A-5024.
Male boxer-pit bull mix
This 8-year-old male boxer-pit bull mix has a short brown brindle coat.
He is in kennel No. 26, ID No. LCAC-A-4678.
Male Great Pyrenees
This 2-year-old male Great Pyrenees has a long white coat.
He is in kennel No. 28, ID No. LCAC-A-4821.
Male shepherd
This 2-year-old male shepherd has a black and tan coat.
He is in kennel No. 30, ID No. LCAC-A-5023.
Female German shepherd
This 1-year-old female German shepherd has a black and tan coat.
She is in kennel No. 34, ID No. LCAC-A-5015.
Email Elizabeth Larson at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. Follow her on Twitter, @ERLarson, or Lake County News, @LakeCoNews.
More than a quarter of the U.S. population in 2021 (26.4%) had lost both parents.
Among those who had ever lost a parent, 50.7% had lost their mother and 69.2% their father by age 50, according to an analysis of recent estimates from the 2021 Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP).
New data shows at what age we lose our mothers and fathers and how that pattern varies by race and ethnicity.
It shows that approximately 30.8% of people in the United States have lost their biological mother, 39.8% have lost their biological father, and 44.2% have lost at least one parent.
Parent mortality has become even more salient amid the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. As of February 8, 2023, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reported over 1.1 million deaths from COVID-19 in the United States.
The lives lost to COVID-19 often mean the loss of a spouse, parent, child or caregiver. As of February 3, 2023, the Imperial College London estimates that over 222,500 children have lost one or both parents due to COVID-19 associated deaths in the United States alone.
Disparities in a wide variety of health outcomes, including mortality, have long been associated with race and ethnicity differences. Mortality rates from the COVID-19 pandemic also vary by race and ethnicity, with age-adjusted mortality rates higher for American Indian or Alaska Native, Black, Hispanic, and Native Hawaiian or other Pacific Islander individuals relative to Asian or White individuals.
This data provides recent estimates of parent mortality and changes between 2019 and 2021. Importantly, these years reflect data prior to (2019) and during (2021) the COVID-19 pandemic, allowing for comparisons. It uses data from the public-use files of the SIPP, which asks respondents whether their parents are alive and, for those who have lost a parent, their age when their parent(s) passed away.
Key highlights
Age:
• As people age, they are more likely to have lost a parent. For example, data from 2021 show that 4.3% of children ages 0-17 have lost at least one parent, compared to 11.5% of 18- to 29-year-olds and 23.4% of 30- to 39-year-olds. • Overall, the percentage of people with a deceased father is greater than the percentage of people with a deceased mother. This difference is statistically significant at every age group tested (0-17, 18-29, 30-39, 40-49, 50-59, 60-69, 70+).
Race and Ethnicity:
• Based on data from 2021, about 19.6% of Black 18- to 29-year-olds have lost at least one parent. This is significantly higher than White alone (10.1%); White alone, non-Hispanic (9.5%); Asian alone (9.5%); Hispanic (11.5%); and all other non-Hispanic (11.9%) 18- to 29-year-olds. The same pattern holds true for 30- to 39-year-olds.
Comparisons between 2019 and 2021:
• For the population as a whole, there was no statistically significant difference in the percentage of people who had at least one parent deceased in 2019 compared to 2021. However, there was a significant increase in the percentage of people who had both parents deceased (25.7% to 26.4%), their father deceased (39.3% to 39.8%), and their mother deceased (30.3% to 30.8%). • For the total population of Black alone and Hispanic individuals, the percentage with at least one parent deceased increased from 43.4% to 46.4% and 32.3% to 33.9%, respectively. • The percentage of people with a deceased father increased for the Black alone and Hispanic populations. The percentage of people with a deceased mother increased for the Black alone population.
At what age did people lose their parents?
For those individuals who lost a parent, the SIPP asks how old they were when their parent passed away.
This information can be used to estimate the percentage of people who lost their parent in a given age range (e.g., 0-4, 5-9) and the percentage of people who lost their parent up to, and including, a given age. Some key findings from these data in 2021 include:
• The most common age ranges in which people lost their mother were 50-54 (13.6%), 55-59 (13.0%), and 60-64 (11.7%). Additionally, 5.7% lost their mother by age 15, 17.2% lost them by age 30, and 50.7% lost them by age 50. • The most common age ranges in which people lost their father were 50-54 (11.5%), 45-49 (11.2%), and 40-44 (10.8%). Additionally, 10.3% lost their father by age 15, 29.0% lost them by age 30, and 69.2% lost them by age 50.
About the SIPP
SIPP is a nationally representative, longitudinal survey administered by the Census Bureau that provides comprehensive information on the dynamics of income, employment, household composition, and government program participation.
SIPP is also a leading source of data on economic well-being, family dynamics, education, wealth, health insurance, child care, and food security. SIPP interviews individuals for several years and provides monthly data about changes in household and family composition and economic circumstances over time. More information is available on the SIPP webpage.
George M. Hayward is a survey statistician in the Census Bureau’s Fertility and Family Statistics Branch.
LAKE COUNTY, Calif. — Lake County Animal Care and Control has four cats ready to be adopted this week.
Call Lake County Animal Care and Control at 707-263-0278 or visit the shelter online for information on visiting or adopting.
The following cats at the shelter have been cleared for adoption.
Female domestic shorthair
This 1-year-old female domestic shorthair cat has a yellow tabby coat.
She is in cat room kennel No. 70, ID No. LCAC-A-4988.
Female domestic shorthair
This 1.5-year-old female domestic shorthair cat has a gray tabby coat.
She is in cat room kennel No. 74, ID No. LCAC-A-4930.
‘Wednesday’
“Wednesday” is a 3-year-old domestic shorthair cat with a short gray coat.
She is in kennel No. 127, ID No. LCAC-A-4463.
‘Flynn’
“Flynn” is a 9-year-old male Siamese cat with a medium-length white coat and blue eyes.
He is in kennel No. 13, ID No. LCAC-A-3460.
Email Elizabeth Larson at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. Follow her on Twitter, @ERLarson, or Lake County News, @LakeCoNews.
What’s Easter about? In some ways, the answer is pretty simple: Jesus Christ, and Christians’ belief that he rose from the dead.
In other ways, though, the springtime holiday is far from straightforward. How did rabbits get involved? Where did the name “Easter” come from – and why is the English word different from the way many other cultures refer to the holy day? Even theologically, exactly what the Resurrection means is not universally agreed upon.
Here are four articles that delve into Easter’s history, its significance – and what a rock ‘n’ roll Broadway show has to do with it.
1. Picking the date
First things first: Easter is what’s called a “movable feast,” a holiday whose exact date changes year to year. In the Northern Hemisphere it falls soon after the spring equinox, as the world comes back into bloom – a fitting time to celebrate rebirth.
But Easter’s dating “goes back to the complicated origins of this holiday and how it has evolved over the centuries,” wrote Brent Landau, a religious studies scholar at the University of Texas at Austin. Similar to Christmas and Halloween celebrations today, Easter blends together elements from Christian and non-Christian traditions.
The name “Easter” itself seems linked to a pre-Christian goddess named Eostre in what is now England; she was celebrated in springtime. And in fact, in most languages, the word for the holiday is related to Passover, since the Gospels say Jesus traveled to Jerusalem to celebrate the Jewish festival in the days leading up to his crucifixion.
But “celebrating” Easter, per se, wasn’t always in fashion with Christians. For the Puritans, Landau explained, these holidays were regarded as too tainted by merrymaking and un-Christian influences. As 19th-century American culture embraced the idea of childhood as a special time in life, though – not just preparation for adulthood – both Christmas and Easter became popular occasions to spend time with family.
2. Holy hares
The Easter bunny’s bio starts long before the 1800s, though. Rabbits’ and hares’ famous fertility has made them symbols of rebirth for thousands of years. Some were ritually buried alongside people during the Neolithic age, for example.
Of course, that fecundity also makes them symbols of sex, as anyone who’s seen the Playboy logo is aware. “In the Classical Greek tradition, hares were sacred to Aphrodite, the goddess of love,” explained folklorist Tok Thompson, a professor at USC Dornsife. The goddess’s son Eros was also depicted carrying a hare “as a symbol of unquenchable desire,” and even the Virgin Mary is often painted with a rabbit, to symbolize how she overcame desire.
Modern-day Easter bunny traditions stem from folk traditions in Germany and England, and there is evidence that the goddess Eostre’s symbol was the hare as well.
3. Victory over death
Holy Week, the series of events in Christian churches that lead up to Easter, traces Jesus’ final days before death and resurrection, including Palm Sunday and the Last Supper. Easter Sunday itself is the climax of the story: his triumph over death.
“As a Baptist minister and theologian myself, I believe it is important to understand how Christians more generally, and Baptists in particular, hold differing views on the meaning of the resurrection,” wrote Jason Oliver Evans, a doctoral candidate at the University of Virginia.
Over the centuries, Evans wrote, Christians have had “passionate debates over this central doctrine of Christian faith” and what it means for Jesus’ followers – such as whether his body was literally raised from the dead.
4. Superstar
There are many ways to share the story of Holy Week – and one of the most controversial ones debuted on Broadway in 1971.
“Jesus Christ Superstar,” the rock musical by Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice, struck some Christians as blasphemous with its modern-day telling of the Passion and “Jesus is cool” ethos. Then there’s the show’s ending, which cuts off after the crucifixion – cutting out the Resurrection, and its theological message, entirely.
Half a century later, though, “Superstar” raises fewer eyebrows – a reflection of changes in U.S. culture and Christianity, wrote Henry Bial, a theater professor at the University of Kansas. Maybe that shouldn’t be such a shock: As he pointed out, theater and drama have always been entwined with Bible stories.
Editor’s note: This story is a roundup of articles from The Conversation’s archives.
LAKE COUNTY, Calif. — The Board of Supervisors on Tuesday is expected to accept a resolution to create a new town hall to replace the Lucerne Area Town Hall.
The board will meet beginning at 9 a.m. Tuesday, April 11, in the board chambers on the first floor of the Lake County Courthouse, 255 N. Forbes St., Lakeport.
The meeting ID is 962 0634 5867, pass code 866990. The meeting also can be accessed via one tap mobile at +16699006833,,96206345867#,,,,*866990#.
All interested members of the public that do not have internet access or a Mediacom cable subscription are encouraged to call 669-900-6833, and enter the Zoom meeting ID and pass code information above.
At 11:15 a.m., the board is scheduled to consider a resolution rescinding the 2017 formation of the Middle Region Town Hall and the 2018 amendment to change it to the Lucerne Area Town Hall in order to fulfill Supervisor EJ Crandell’s plan of establishing the Central Region Town Hall.
The proposed resolution would include all of the 95458 zip code — not just the Lucerne community growth boundaries.
It also would allow nonresident property owners to be seated on the new board, a proposal which the Lucerne Area Town Hall’s members had specifically rejected in bylaws accepted last year both by that group and by the Board of Supervisors.
What’s changed since then is Crandell’s claims that he’s been contacted by community members who want to be included but haven’t been because of the limits.
In that time the Lucerne Area Town Hall also passed a resolution condemning a plan to put a homeless youth housing facility in the Lucerne Hotel, a plan for which Crandell’s wife has publicly advocated.
The full agenda follows.
CONSENT AGENDA
5.1: Adopt proclamation designating the month of April 2023 as Sexual Assault Awareness Month in Lake County.
5.2: Adopt proclamation designating the month of April 2023 and every April thereafter as Arts, Culture and Creativity Month in Lake County.
5.3: Approve late mileage claim in the amount of $20.67 for administration staff person.
5.4: Adopt resolution amending Resolution No. 2022-119 establishing position allocations for FY 2022-2023, Budget Unit 2702 (Planning), deleting one deputy Community Development director, and adding one deputy Community Development administrator position.
TIMED ITEMS
6.2, 9:07 a.m.: Pet of the Week.
6.3, 9:08 a.m.: National Poetry Month — Poem of the Week.
6.4, 9:09 a.m.: Presentation of proclamation designating the month of april 2023 as Sexual Assault Awareness Month in Lake County.
6.5, 9:10 a.m.: Presentation of proclamation designating the month of April 2023 and every April thereafter as Arts, Culture and Creativity Month in Lake County.
6.6, 9:15 a.m.: a) Consideration of resolution amending Resolutions 2022-15 and 2022-45 for the purpose of extending the end date for changes made to cannabis cultivation taxes in regards to suspension of CPI increases, using canopy area only, and a decrease of the tax by 50%; and b) discussion on permanent changes to cannabis cultivation taxes.
6.7, 9:45 a.m.: Public hearing for the consideration of the vacation of a portion of a roadway known as Robert's Road in the town of Middletown (A) resolution of Vacation; and (B) irrevocable offer of dedication.
6.8, 10:30 a.m.: Discussion and possible direction to extend the temporary emergency warming shelter in north Lakeport and to develop an interim shelter crisis plan.
6.9, 11:15 a.m.: Consideration of resolution rescinding Resolutions No. 2017-05 formation of the Middle Region Town Hall (MRTH) and 2018 – 334 amendment from MRTH to the Lucerne Area Town Hall (LATH) and Establishing the Central Region Town Hall (CeRTH) as the Municipal Advisory Committee for the Central Region in District 3.
UNTIMED ITEMS
7.2: Sitting as the Lake County Air Quality Management District Board of Directors, consideration of resolution establishing an operating reserve and transferring funds into Fund #299 Budget #8799 Reserves.
7.3: Consideration of the following Advisory Board Appointment: Mental Health Board.
7.4: Consideration of increase in county match amount for Area Agency on Aging due to population change and recommendation by governing board to increase staffing.
CLOSED SESSION
8.1: Public employee evaluation: Public Works Director Scott De Leon.
8.2: Public employee evaluation: Special Districts Administrator Scott Harter.
Email Elizabeth Larson at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. Follow her on Twitter, @ERLarson, or Lake County News, @LakeCoNews.
MIDDLETOWN, Calif. — After a hiatus of several years, Earth Day in Middletown will return this month.
The celebration will take place on Saturday, April 22, from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. at the Calpine Geothermal Visitor Center, 15500 Central Park Road.
“We are thrilled to be hosting Earth Day again,” said Danielle Matthews Seperas, director of community affairs at Calpine. “After spending time in isolation our collaboration with Middletown Art Center promises to make this year’s event the best one yet. We can’t wait to celebrate Earth Day this year with friends both old and new.”
With a theme of sustainability, this year’s Earth Day will host many exciting vendors, live music, pony rides, and activities for families and children.
The Goddess of the Mountain will be serving a beautiful, healthy lunch based on the Three Sisters, which the Iroquois and the Cherokee called corn, bean, and squash, because they nurture each other like family when planted together.
The Middletown Community Garden will offer tours and workshops to further their mission of educating the community about sustainable food production and healthy eating. A tree planting ceremony will be featured at 1 pm.
The Lake County Master Gardeners will be on hand to answer your gardening questions and to hand out useful information and seeds.
Local vendors include a solar installation company, plant nursery, makers from around Lake County and more.
The Children's Museum of Art and Science in Clearlake will offer fun activities for kids. A veritable petting zoo with a donkey, miniature horse and a goat also will be there.
Jesus Christ Fellowship, next door to the Calpine Geothermal Visitor Center and the garden, will open its doors for the community to enjoy billiards and other games inside the church, as well as the Lions Club-sponsored Bocce ball out back.
Beaver Creek, a local biodynamic and organic winery will pour. Biodynamic farming is holistic land stewardship at its best. It is the highest paradigm of sustainable farming, offering one of the smallest carbon footprints of any agricultural method. They forgo the use of inorganic fertilizers, pesticides or herbicides and instead rely on practices such as composting to increase the activity of microorganisms in the soil and planting cover crops that control erosion and provide habitat and food for beneficial insects as well as green manure for the vines.
And since all great parties start with great music, Brandon Eardley will provide music for the first half of the day’s events with Carlos Garay providing the tunes for the second half.
The day will close with our local poet laureate, Georgina Marie Guardado reading poetry she composed specifically for this event.
For more information or to become a vendor please email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..
The explosion of a star is a dramatic event, but the remains the star leaves behind can be even more dramatic.
A new mid-infrared image from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope provides one stunning example. It shows the supernova remnant Cassiopeia A (Cas A), created by a stellar explosion 340 years ago from Earth’s perspective.
Cas A is the youngest known remnant from an exploding, massive star in our galaxy, which makes it a unique opportunity to learn more about how such supernovae occur.
“Cas A represents our best opportunity to look at the debris field of an exploded star and run a kind of stellar autopsy to understand what type of star was there beforehand and how that star exploded,” said Danny Milisavljevic of Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana, principal investigator of the Webb program that captured these observations.
“Compared to previous infrared images, we see incredible detail that we haven't been able to access before,” added Tea Temim of Princeton University in Princeton, New Jersey, a co-investigator on the program.
Cassiopeia A is a prototypical supernova remnant that has been widely studied by a number of ground-based and space-based observatories, including NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory. The multi-wavelength observations can be combined to provide scientists with a more comprehensive understanding of the remnant.
Dissecting the image
The striking colors of the new Cas A image, in which infrared light is translated into visible-light wavelengths, hold a wealth of scientific information the team is just beginning to tease out.
On the bubble’s exterior, particularly at the top and left, lie curtains of material appearing orange and red due to emission from warm dust. This marks where ejected material from the exploded star is ramming into surrounding circumstellar gas and dust.
Interior to this outer shell lie mottled filaments of bright pink studded with clumps and knots. This represents material from the star itself, which is shining due to a mix of various heavy elements, such as oxygen, argon, and neon, as well as dust emission.
“We’re still trying to disentangle all these sources of emission,” said Ilse De Looze of Ghent University in Belgium, another co-investigator on the program.
The stellar material can also be seen as fainter wisps near the cavity’s interior.
Perhaps most prominently, a loop represented in green extends across the right side of the central cavity. “We’ve nicknamed it the Green Monster in honor of Fenway Park in Boston. If you look closely, you’ll notice that it’s pockmarked with what look like mini-bubbles,” said Milisavljevic. “The shape and complexity are unexpected and challenging to understand.”
Origins of cosmic dust – and us
Among the science questions that Cas A may help answer is: Where does cosmic dust come from?
Observations have found that even very young galaxies in the early universe are suffused with massive quantities of dust. It’s difficult to explain the origins of this dust without invoking supernovae, which spew large quantities of heavy elements (the building blocks of dust) across space.
However, existing observations of supernovae have been unable to conclusively explain the amount of dust we see in those early galaxies.
By studying Cas A with Webb, astronomers hope to gain a better understanding of its dust content, which can help inform our understanding of where the building blocks of planets and ourselves are created.
“In Cas A, we can spatially resolve regions that have different gas compositions and look at what types of dust were formed in those regions,” explained Temim.
Supernovae like the one that formed Cas A are crucial for life as we know it. They spread elements like the calcium we find in our bones and the iron in our blood across interstellar space, seeding new generations of stars and planets.
“By understanding the process of exploding stars, we’re reading our own origin story,” said Milisavljevic. “I’m going to spend the rest of my career trying to understand what’s in this data set.”
The Cas A remnant spans about 10 light-years and is located 11,000 light-years away in the constellation Cassiopeia.
The James Webb Space Telescope is the world’s premier space science observatory. Webb will solve mysteries in our solar system, look beyond to distant worlds around other stars, and probe the mysterious structures and origins of our universe and our place in it. Webb is an international program led by NASA with its partners, ESA (European Space Agency) and the Canadian Space Agency.