LAKE COUNTY, Calif. — Lake County Animal Care and Control has adult cats and kittens needing new homes.
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.
‘Chowder’
“Chowder” is a 4-year-old female domestic shorthair cat with a calico coat.
She is in cat room kennel No. 15, ID No. LCAC-A-982.
‘Blackette’
“Blackette” is a young male domestic shorthair with a black and white coat.
He is in kennel No. 53b, ID No. LCAC-A-2385.
‘Blackie’
“Blackie” is a young male domestic shorthair with a black and white coat.
He is in cat room kennel No. 53c, ID No. LCAC-A-2386.
Male domestic shorthair
This young male domestic shorthair has a unique striped gray tabby coat.
He is in cat room kennel No. 53d, ID No. LCAC-A-2383.
Male domestic shorthair kitten
This male domestic shorthair kitten has an orange tabby coat.
He is in cat room kennel No. 96a, ID No. LCAC-A-1871.
Male domestic shorthair kitten
This male domestic shorthair kitten has an orange tabby coat.
He is in cat room kennel No. 96c, ID No. LCAC-A-1873.
Female domestic shorthair kitten
This female domestic shorthair kitten has an orange tabby coat.
She is in cat room kennel No. 96d, ID No. LCAC-A-1874.
Female domestic shorthair kitten
This female domestic shorthair kitten has a gray tabby coat.
She is in cat room kennel No. 101a, ID No. LCAC-A-1945.
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.
LAKE COUNTY, Calif. — During the Lakeport City Council’s meeting this week there will be an update from a youth council and a discussion of contracts for the police and utilities departments.
The council will meet at 6 p.m. Tuesday, Jan. 18, in the council chambers at Lakeport City Hall, 225 Park St.
The council chambers will be open to the public for the meeting. In accordance with updated guidelines from the state of California and revised Cal OSHA Emergency Temporary Standards, persons who are not fully vaccinated for COVID-19 are required to wear a face covering at this meeting.
If you cannot attend in person, and would like to speak on an agenda item, you can access the Zoom meeting remotely at this link or join by phone by calling toll-free 669-900-9128 or 346-248-7799.
The webinar ID is 973 6820 1787, access code is 477973; the audio pin will be shown after joining the webinar. Those phoning in without using the web link will be in “listen mode” only and will not be able to participate or comment.
Comments can be submitted by email to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. To give the city clerk adequate time to print out comments for consideration at the meeting, please submit written comments before 3:30 p.m. on Tuesday, Jan. 18.
On Tuesday, the council will present a proclamation designating January 2022 as Human Trafficking Awareness Month in the City of Lakeport and will get an update on the All Children Thrive Youth Governance Council.
Under council business, Police Chief Brad Rasmussen will seek the council’s approval of the purchase of a 2022 Dodge Charger patrol vehicle at a cost of up to $65,000.
Rasmussen also will ask the council to authorize him to implement an automated license plate recognition program and approve funds for up to a year of operation, estimated at $22,000.
Public Works Superintendent Ron Ladd will ask for the council to authorize professional services agreements with Dokken Engineering for the Forbes Creek Headwall Repair Project and the Hartley Street Culvert Repair Project.
City Manager Kevin Ingram will give the council traffic safety reports and Utilities Superintendent Paul Harris will present a resolution to submit an application to the Small Community Drought Relief Program for the modification of the city’s intake structure.
On the consent agenda — items usually accepted as a slate on one vote — are ordinances; minutes of the council’s regular meeting on Jan. 4 and special joint meeting with the Board of Supervisors on Jan. 11; approval of amendment No. 2 to the agreement for the lease of acreage devoted to spray irrigation disposal of wastewater; introduction of an ordinance adding chapter 12.30 and amending chapters 9.08 and 10.08 of the Lakeport Municipal Code related to skating and skateboarding in any skate park, parklands, and the downtown district and setting a public hearing for the consideration of the ordinance for Feb. 15; receive and file the midyear Community Development Activity Report.
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.
Six months ago, it was easy for many Americans to think COVID-19 was on the defensive. Vaccinations were ticking up as case numbers ticked down. Summer sunshine made hanging out outside actually enjoyable, after a cooped-up winter of socializing with just our pods. Maybe, just maybe, Zoom fatigue would soon be a thing of the past.
Today, that optimism seems miles away. Hospitalizations are hitting new highs. Concerns about school safety amid climbing case counts have working parents and teachers on edge.
If you’re not exactly feeling hopeful about the year ahead, you’re not alone. Here are five of our favorite stories spotlighting resilience, healing, and yes, hope, to help you face 2022.
But if you think that makes our society unique, think again. For as long as humans have been writing, they’ve been facing crises, learning to adapt – more than we give our species credit for – and keeping hope afloat. And readers today can draw strength from yesterday’s literature.
Whether it’s Homer’s Greek epic “The Iliad” or American poet Emily Dickinson, writing about resilience often shares key themes, Hadas says: learning to balance the present and the future, the big-picture horizon and the joy of small things along the way. Quoting the modern Greek poet George Seferis, she writes of the need to “put to sea again with our broken oars.”
2. Before healing, remembering
The pandemic has robbed people not only of joy, but also of ways to process grief. As many people grasp “every opportunity to reconnect” and find new normals, others are still mourning lost loved ones, especially if COVID-19 restrictions prevented the kinds of healing and commemoration families once took for granted.
Eventually, as the pandemic ebbs, both groups can find happiness, but in different ways, writes David Sloane, who studies commemoration and mourning practices.
With normal healing interrupted, “everyday memorials” from flags and photographs to tattoos can help people “transition from the depths of the pandemic to the reopened society by offering ways for them to mourn and remember.”
As we recover, joy and grief are often mixed together, he says, but don’t let “survivor’s guilt” keep you from finding comfort.
3. Lean in to rituals
Across cultures, rituals can mark life milestones, strengthen social ties and even promote hygiene – such as Wudu, ritual cleansing before prayers in Islam. Yet the pandemic has interrupted everyday rites like handshakes and hugs, not to mention once-in-a-lifetime events like weddings or bar mitzvahs.
But that presents an opportunity to adapt, writes psychologist Cristine Legare. People often rely on rituals to manage stress and exert control, which helps them deal with uncertainty – part of what’s so overwhelming about the pandemic.
“There are good reasons people spend time, money and energy engaging in rituals in the face of COVID-19 restrictions,” she writes. “They are essential to meeting our physical, social and psychological needs in the face of adversity.”
4. Hope vs. optimism
Hope isn’t expecting good things, psychologist Jacqueline Mattis clarifies: It’s believing they’re possible, and then creating paths to achieve them. In other words, having a plan.
She offers five strategies to actively cultivate hope: having goals, harnessing uncertainty, managing attention, seeking community and looking at evidence. Challenges like a global pandemic call for adapting, not giving up, and “uncertainty is not reason for paralysis – it is a reason to hope,” Mattis writes.
“Hopeful people do not wish – they imagine and act,” she writes, emphasizing the importance of acting in community. Research on anti-poverty activists, for example, underscores that their relationships ignited their hope and conviction, giving them “a sense of accountability, to recognize that their work mattered and that they were part of something bigger than themselves.”
5. Get in the flow
For people still crafting their 2022 resolutions, cognitive scientist Richard Huskey has a suggestion: Add some flow.
It’s on his own list, too. “Flow,” a term coined in the 1970s by psychologist Mihály Csíkszentmihályi, is that feeling of complete absorption, or intense concentration, when someone’s thoughts “are focused on an experience rather than on themselves,” Huskey explains.
Intrinsically rewarding experiences, like those that put us “in the zone,” support mental health, well-being and resilience. In fact, a study from China shows that people with more “flow” in their lives “had better well-being during the COVID-19 quarantine.”
Editor’s note: This story is a roundup of articles from The Conversation’s archives.
LAKE COUNTY, Calif. — The Board of Supervisors has appointed a new agricultural commissioner, a Lake County native who also will be the first woman to hold the position.
The board emerged from closed session at 3:15 p.m. on Tuesday, Jan. 11, to announce the appointment of Katherine Vanderwall as agricultural Commissioner/Sealer of Weights and Measures.
Her appointment is effective Feb. 12.
She will succeed Steve Hajik, Lake County’s longest-serving agricultural commissioner. Hajik retires in February after 20 years of service in the job.
Born and raised in Lake County, Vanderwall brings experience, insight and lived-in local perspective. She is also a highly connected and respected statewide authority. This combination carries great promise for a critical local industry, the county reported.
“Agriculture is a key facet of Lake County’s economy, and it is important to have a Commissioner in place that understands the unique opportunities and challenges our local farmers experience,” said Board Chair Eddie Crandell. “No one could be better positioned to step into this role than Katherine, and we are very excited she has stepped up to serve Lake County communities in this new and expanded way.”
For the past five years, Vanderwall has served as deputy agricultural commissioner and sealer of weights and measures, supporting the work of the department she will soon lead.
In total, she has been in service with the county of Lake for 14 years, starting as an entry-level biologist. Over that time, she has worked hard to expand her qualifications and contributions to her department and County residents.
Now, Vanderwall is fully licensed by the California Department of Food and Agriculture as both an Agricultural Commissioner and Sealer of Weights and Measures.
She is a past president of the California Association of Standards and Agricultural Professionals and received the association’s Distinguished Service Award in 2021. Vanderwall also holds a Bachelor of Science degree from UC Davis, and earned a Senior Executive Credential from the California State Association of Counties’ CSAC Institute, also in 2021.
Many county residents and leaders know Vanderwall from her service on the Executive Board for Lake County’s 4H program and her annual Ag Venture presentations.
“It was a great privilege for me to make the Motion to appoint Katherine to this critical County leadership role,” enthuses Tina Scott, vice chair and District 4 supervisor. “She brings a strong theoretical understanding and lived-in, local experience. Our board is truly looking forward to seeing how the relationships and knowledge Katherine has developed will benefit all Lake County residents in the years to come.”
As commissioner and sealer, Vanderwall will build on effective partnerships with local farmers, gas station and grocery store owners and staff and other stakeholders to promote sustainable success.
Vanderwall said she will be able to hit the ground running because of her experience and familiarity with the programs the department administers and the relationships that have been built.
She said her previous work has given her the opportunity to promote agriculture, as well as protect consumers by building equity in the marketplace.
Serving her home County in such a vital role is truly a logical next step for Vanderwall.
“I sincerely care for the well-being of the communities we serve and staff in the department,” Vanderwall said.
LAKE COUNTY, Calif. — Lake County Animal Care and Control added more dogs this week to its list of adoptable pets.
Dogs available for adoption this week include mixes of Akita, border collie, Chihuahua, German shepherd, Labrador retriever, pit bull and Rhodesian ridgeback.
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 (additional dogs on the animal control website not listed are still “on hold”).
Call Lake County Animal Care and Control at 707-263-0278 or visit the shelter online for information on visiting or adopting.
Male German shepherd
This 1-year-old male German shepherd has a black and tan coat.
He is in kennel No. 12, ID No. LCAC-A-1892.
‘Cinnamon’
“Cinnamon” is a 5-year-old female chocolate Labrador retriever-pit bull mix with a short chocolate-colored coat.
She is in kennel No. 13, ID No. LCAC-A-1769.
‘Bruce’
“Bruce” is a 2-year-old male pit bull terrier with a short brown coat.
He is in kennel No. 14, ID No. LCAC-A-2351.
Male pit bull
This 6-year-old male pit bull mix has a short tan coat.
He is in kennel No. 17, ID No. LCAC-A-2445.
‘Chapo’
“Chapo” is a 7-year-old male pit bull with a tan coat.
He is in kennel No. 19, ID No. LCAC-A-2458.
‘Nioki’
“Nioki” is a 1-year-old female shepherd with a black coat.
She is in kennel No. 21, ID No. LCAC-A-2442.
Female border collie mix
This 2-year-old female border collie mix has a black and white coat.
She is in kennel No. 23, ID No. LCAC-A-2207.
‘Nugget’
“Nugget” is a male Chihuahua mix puppy with a short tan coat.
He is in kennel No. 25b, ID No. LCAC-A-2413.
Male German shepherd
This 2-year-old male German shepherd has a black and tan coat.
He is in kennel No. 26, ID No. LCAC-A-1903.
Male German shepherd
This 2-year-old male German shepherd has a black and tan coat.
He is in kennel No. 29, ID No. LCAC-A-2400.
‘Duke’
“Duke is a 1-year-old male Rhodesian ridgeback with a short brown coat.
He is in kennel No. 30, ID No. LCAC-A-2219.
Female Akita-shepherd mix
This 1-year-old female Akita-shepherd mix has a black and tan coat.
She is in kennel No. 33, ID No. LCAC-A-2438.
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.
Tom Jacobs of Bellevue, Washington, loves treasure hunts.
Since 2010, the former U.S. naval officer has participated in online volunteer projects that allow anyone who is interested — “citizen scientists” — to look through NASA telescope data for signs of exoplanets, planets beyond our solar system.
Now, Jacobs has helped discover a giant gaseous planet about 379 light-years from Earth, orbiting a star with the same mass as the Sun.
The Jupiter-size planet is special for astronomers because its 261-day year is long compared to many known gas giants outside our solar system. The result also suggests the planet is just a bit farther from its star than Venus is from the Sun.
The finding was published in the Astronomical Journal and presented at an American Astronomical Society virtual press event on Jan. 13.
Uncovering this planet and pinning down its size and mass required a large collaboration between professional astronomers and citizen scientists like Jacobs.
To track the planet, they engaged in “a global uniting effort, because we all need to go after it together to keep eyes on this particular planet,” said Paul Dalba, astronomer at the University of California, Riverside, and lead author of the study.
“Discovering and publishing TOI-2180 b was a great group effort demonstrating that professional astronomers and seasoned citizen scientists can successfully work together,” Jacobs said. “It is synergy at its best.”
How the discovery happened
The signature for the newly discovered planet was hiding in data from NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite, or TESS. Using TESS data, scientists look for changes in brightness of nearby stars, which could indicate the presence of orbiting planets.
Jacobs is part of a group of citizen scientists who look at plots of TESS data, showing the change in a star’s brightness over time, in search of new planets.
While professional astronomers use algorithms to scan tens of thousands of data points from stars automatically, these citizen scientists use a program called LcTools, created by Alan R. Schmitt, to inspect telescope data by eye.
That’s why Jacobs’ group, which includes several citizen scientists and two veteran astronomers, calls themselves the Visual Survey Group. Many of them met while working on Planet Hunters, a NASA-funded citizen science project through Zooniverse that focused on data from NASA’s Kepler spacecraft.
On Feb. 1, 2020, Jacobs happened to notice a plot showing starlight from TOI-2180 dim by less than half a percent and then return to its previous brightness level over a 24-hour period, which may be explained by an orbiting planet that is said to “transit” as it passes in front of the star from our point of view.
By measuring the amount of light that dims as the planet passes, scientists can estimate how big the planet is and, in combination with other measurements, its density. But a transit can only be seen if a star and its planet line up with telescopes looking for them.
A graph showing starlight over time is called a “light curve.” The Visual Survey Group alerted two professional scientist collaborators — Paul Dalba at the University of California, Riverside, and Diana Dragomir, assistant professor at the University of New Mexico, that this light curve was potentially interesting.
“With this new discovery, we are also pushing the limits of the kinds of planets we can extract from TESS observations,” Dragomir said. “TESS was not specifically designed to find such long-orbit exoplanets, but our team, with the help of citizen scientists, are digging out these rare gems nonetheless.”
Computer algorithms used by professional astronomers are designed to search for planets by identifying multiple transit events from a single star. That’s why citizen scientists’ visual inspection is so useful when there is only one transit available. Since this is the only instance of the TOI-2180 b star dimming in this dataset, it is called a “single transit event.”
“The manual effort that they put in is really important and really impressive, because it's actually hard to write code that can go through a million light curves and identify single transit events reliably,” Dalba said. “This is one area where humans are still beating code.”
But how could the team rule out other explanations for the brief dip in starlight? Could they be sure they had found a planet? They would need follow-up observations.
Fortunately, Dalba was able to recruit the Automated Planet Finder Telescope at Lick Observatory in California. “I use that telescope to measure the wobble of the star to then determine how massive this planet is, if it is a planet at all,” he said.
The research team also used the Keck I telescope at the W. M. Keck Observatory in Hawaii to perform some of these measurements when Lick Observatory was threatened by wildfires.
With 27 hours of observations spread over more than 500 days, Dalba and colleagues observed the planet’s gravitational tug on the star, which allowed them to calculate the planet’s mass and estimate a range of possibilities for its orbit.
Still, they wanted to observe the planet’s transit when it came back around to confirm the orbit. Unfortunately, finding a second transit event was going to be difficult because there was so much uncertainty about when the planet would cross the face of its star again.
Dalba pressed on, and organized an observing campaign including both professional astronomers and citizen scientists using telescopes at 14 sites across three continents in August 2020. To support the campaign, Dalba camped for five nights in California’s Joshua Tree National Park and looked for the transit with two portable amateur telescopes. The collaborative effort yielded 55 datasets over 11 days.
Ultimately, none of these telescopes detected the planet with confidence. Still, the lack of a clear detection in this time period put a boundary on how long the orbit could be, indicating a period of about 261 days. Using that estimate, they predict TESS will see the planet transit its star again in February 2022.
About the planet
TOI-2180 b is almost three times more massive than Jupiter but has the same diameter, meaning it is more dense than Jupiter. This made scientists wonder whether it formed in a different way than Jupiter.
Another clue about the planet’s formation could be what’s inside it. Through computer models they determined that the new planet may have as much as 105 Earth masses worth of elements heavier than hydrogen and helium. “That’s a lot,” says Dalba. “That’s more than what we suspect is inside Jupiter.”
Astronomers still have much to learn about the range of planets that are out there. About 4,800 exoplanets have been confirmed, but there are thought to be billions of planets in our galaxy. The new finding indicates that among giant planets, some have many more heavy elements than others.
In our solar system, gigantic Jupiter orbits the Sun every 12 years; for Saturn, a “year” is 29 years. We don’t have giant planets like TOI-2180 b between the Earth and Sun.
But outside the solar system, astronomers have found dozens of exoplanets that are even bigger than Jupiter and orbit much closer to their stars, even closer than the orbit of Mercury.
With an average temperature of about 170 degrees Fahrenheit, TOI-2180 b is warmer than room temperature on Earth, and warmer than the outer planets of our solar system including Jupiter and Saturn. But compared to the array of transiting giant exoplanets that astronomers have found orbiting other stars, TOI-2180 b is abnormally chilly.
“It's a nice stepping stone in between most giant exoplanets we’ve found, and then really cold Jupiter and Saturn,” Dalba said.
What’s next
When TESS observes the star again in February, Dalba and the citizen scientists are eager to get the data and dive back in. If they find the planet’s signature, confirming the 261-day period, that would give more meaning to the data from their global campaign to find it in 2020.
NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope, which launched on Dec. 25, could potentially observe this planet and its atmosphere. But there’s another reason Dalba is excited about Webb’s capabilities. Given that in our own solar system, Jupiter has rings and moons, Webb could be used to look for the presence of small objects orbiting TOI-2180 b.
So far, no rings or moons have been found outside of our solar system with certainty, but one reason could be that many exoplanets are found very close to their star, whose gravity might strip such objects away.
TOI-2180 b, located at a farther distance from its host star, might present an interesting opportunity for such a search. “I think this is a fun system for that later on in the future,” Dalba said.
When he’s not pursuing his planet-hunting hobby, Jacobs, the citizen scientist, works with nonprofits that help people with disabilities find employment in their communities.
The Visual Survey Group members “devote many hours each day surveying the data out of pure joy and interest in furthering science,” said Jacobs. Collectively, the team has co-authored more than 68 peer-reviewed science papers, including the discovery of transiting “exocomets” or comets outside the solar system crossing the face of a star.
“We love contributing to science,” Jacobs said. “And I love this type of surveying, knowing that one is in new undiscovered territory not seen by any humans before.”
NASA has a wide variety of citizen science collaborations across topics ranging from Earth science to the Sun to the wider universe. Anyone in the world can participate. Check out the latest opportunities at www.science.nasa.gov/citizenscience.
TESS is a NASA Astrophysics Explorer mission led and operated by MIT in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and managed by NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center. Additional partners include Northrop Grumman, based in Falls Church, Virginia; NASA’s Ames Research Center in California’s Silicon Valley; the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian in Cambridge, Massachusetts; MIT’s Lincoln Laboratory; and the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore. More than a dozen universities, research institutes, and observatories worldwide are participants in the mission.
The National Science Foundation Astronomy and Astrophysics Postdoctoral Fellowship Program contributed support to this study.
On July 2, 1964, Martin Luther King Jr. stood behind President Lyndon Baines Johnson as the Texan signed into law the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Although not the first civil rights bill passed by Congress, it was the most comprehensive.
King called the law’s passage “a great moment … something like the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation by Abraham Lincoln.” Johnson recognized King’s contributions to the law by gifting him a pen used to sign the historic legislation.
King was foremost a minister who pastored to a local church throughout his career, even while he was doing national civil rights work. And he became concerned that his political ally Johnson was making a grave moral mistake in Vietnam. Johnson quickly escalated American troop presence in Vietnam from 75,000 to 125,000 in 1965. And by 1968, more than a half a million troops were stationed in the Southeast Asian nation.
King called on the United States to “be born again” and undergo a “radical revolution of values.” King believed that Jim Crow segregation and the war in Vietnam were rooted in the same unjust ethic of race-based domination, and he called on the nation to change its ways.
Speaking against the Vietnam War
King preached nonviolent direct action for years, and his team organized massive protest movements in the cities of Albany, Georgia, and Selma and Birmingham in Alabama. But by 1967, King’s religious vision for nonviolence went beyond nonviolent street protest to include abolishing what he called the “triple evils” crippling American society. King defined the triple evils as racism, poverty and militarism, and he believed these forces were contrary to God’s will for all people.
He came to believe, as he said in 1967, that racism, economic exploitation and war were crippling America’s ability to create a “beloved community” defined by love and nonviolence. And on April 4, 1967, he publicly rebuked the president’s war policy in Vietnam at Riverside Presbyterian Church in New York City in a speech titled “Beyond Vietnam.”
“I speak as a child of God and brother to the suffering poor of Vietnam,” he told those gathered in the majestic cathedral. “I speak for the poor of America who are paying the double price of smashed hopes at home, and death and corruption in Vietnam.”
King was initially optimistic that Johnson’s Great Society program, which aimed to make historic investments in job growth, job training and economic development, would tackle domestic poverty. But by 1967 the Great Society appeared to be a casualty of the mounting costs of the war in Vietnam. “I was increasingly compelled to see the war as an enemy of the poor and to attack it as such,” King said in his speech.
King saw the grinding poverty facing Black people at home as inseparable from the war overseas. As he noted, “If our nation can spend 35 billion dollars a year to fight an unjust, evil war in Vietnam, and 20 billion dollars to put a man on the moon, it can spend billions of dollars to put God’s children on their own two feet right here on earth.”
King could no longer ignore that military force ran contrary to the nonviolence he espoused. As urban revolts in Watts and Newark in the late 1960s rocked the nation, he pleaded with people to remain nonviolent.
“But they ask – and rightly so – what about Vietnam?” King said in the same 1967 speech. “They ask if our own nation wasn’t using massive doses of violence to solve its problems, to bring about the changes it wanted. Their questions hit home, and I knew that I could never again raise my voice against the violence of the oppressed in the ghettos without having first spoken clearly to the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today – my own government.”
King’s vision
By 1967, King’s vision of justice was one of flourishing for all people, not only civil rights for African Americans. King was criticized for expanding his vision beyond civil rights for Black Americans. Some worried that aligning with the peace movement would weaken the civil rights movement. The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People even issued a statement clearly opposing what it saw as a merging of the civil rights and peace movements.
But in his 1967 “Beyond Vietnam” speech, King called “for a worldwide fellowship that lifts neighborly concern beyond one’s tribe, race, class, and nation … an all-embracing and unconditional love for all mankind.” Such unconditional love is “the key that unlocks the door which leads to ultimate reality,” and he noted that this unifying principle was present in Hinduism, Islam, Christianity, Judaism and Buddhism.
King was always first a religious leader. He never sought nor gained elected office, because he wanted to maintain a moral voice and be free to challenge policies he believed to be unjust.
He was not a morally perfect man. Declassified files show how the FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover tried to target King over his extramarital affairs. Hoover used a wiretap to tape King having sex with other women and sent those to his wife, Coretta Scott King, with a letter indicating King should kill himself because of his moral transgressions.
Honoring King
For those seeking to honor King’s legacy today, his religious nonviolence is demanding. It asks that people go beyond acts of service and charity – as important as those are – to both speak and act against violence and racism as well as to organize to end those pernicious forces.
It is a radical concept of love that demands we embrace those we know and those we don’t, to acknowledge, as King said, “that all life is interrelated, that somehow we’re caught in an inescapable network of mutuality tied in a single garment of destiny.”
On Martin Luther King Jr. Day, the challenge may be to decipher the meaning of this idea in action for our own lives. The future of what King called the beloved community depends on it – a world at peace because justice is present.
Editor’s Note: This article has been updated with the correct location of Albany.
How are the Clear Lake Hitch doing? I saw that they did not get Federal Endangered Species Act (ESA) Protection? What does that mean for the future of the fish? Thanks for your column.
— Hans asking how are the Hitch —
Hi Hans!
I have been holding on to your question for a while, sorry it took so long to get to you. But this is a great time to talk about the Clear Lake hitch. The scientific name of the Clear Lake hitch is Lavinia exilicauda chi, and the native indegenous peoples of Clear Lake (the Hinthil, Gowk Xabatin, or the Pomo) refer to the fish as “chi” (pronounced CH-eye). In this article I will use hitch and chi interchangeably, as they are commonly recognized under both names.
The chi is a very culturally important fish to the Pomo, serving as a main food staple, providing a vital source of protein and nutrients, and easy to catch as the hitch prefers shallow, warm, and slow-moving water, ideal to the shores and sloughs along the edges of Clear Lake. Chi love to inhabitat shallow waters full of submergent and emergent aquatic plants, in areas with sandy or gravel bottoms. Here is where they feed on aquatic insects and terrestrial insects that rest on the surface of the water, as well as crustaceans.
Chi don’t live that long, about five to six years, and become reproductively active in their second year for females and first year for males. The maximum size for the minnow has been recorded at 350 mm (or about 13 inches). The juvenile chi are small, and easy food prey for larger game fish in Clear Lake. Juveniles mostly stay within the shallow shorelines of the lake and sloughs, in areas hard to access by their predators yet where their food is plentiful. Luckily, chi can withstand rather warm temperatures, up to 30oC (86 degrees Fahrenheit) and more, which is an advantage when they are trying to avoid predatory fish who prefer cooler waters.
Chi will spawn in the shallow yet flowing tributaries that flow into Clear Lake, usually in the springtime, but they have been observed spawning anywhere between February and July, if the weather conditions are right and there is plentiful, warm, yet well-oxygenated water in the streams. Chi will swim against currents and flows, and jump small barriers to get up stream to preferred spawning grounds. However, chi are no salmon, they are small-bodied and have limits to the heights and velocities they can overcome when swimming in a high-flowing stream.
Clear Lake chi populations and abundances have declined in recent years, with declines being noted by local residents, tribes, and the California Department of Fish and Wildlife in 2014. Since then population estimates and catch counts, conducted by several state and federal agencies, have fluctuated, but in the last four years, sharp declines and little to no recruitment of juvenile chi has raised some high concerns for this endemic, special minnow fish.
This chi is currently threatened under the California Endangered Species Act, or CESA, but failed to make the U.S. Endangered Species Act list in 2020 when it was petitioned.
Listing of the species adds extra protections that go into effect when the species population or habitat could be harmed or jeopardized. For example, when getting a permit to build something on the lakeshore, like a structure that goes out into the water and might disturb the shallow habitat of the lake, there are seasonal limitations of the year when that building is prohibited; this is a state CESA protection to prevent habitat loss or injury to the Hitch or direct loss of the Hitch themselves.
The story of the chi is complicated, and the chapters to recovery are even more so. There is still so much unknown information about the chi, particularly that time in the streams after they spawn when the eggs hatch and the fingerlings, then juveniles, make their way downstream to the Lake. Fish biologists and water resource managers don’t know what happens to the chi during this time and we don’t know factors are causing the chi numbers to be so low. Drought and surface / and subsurface water use are most certainly having impacts, but the specific mechanisms of how are currently unknown.
Spawning observations in the creeks is high; we can see them spawning and we can count high numbers. After that, something is happening to the eggs or baby chi that is causing them not to become adults in the lake, or hindering their ability to make more baby chi.
Some of this important research is being led by research fish biologists from the United States Geological Survey, or USGS, California Water Science Center in Sacramento, California. Research conducted in the lake from the last five years has demonstrated drastic declines in young Hitch in Clear Lake. Those biologists are going to investigate post-spawning activities, and sample streams during and after spawn, to identify what exactly is happening to hitch in the streams and what management actions would be best suited to aid in recovery of the species.
However, before significant and expensive actions and restoration projects can take place, fish biologists and agency scientists need to have a clear plan. Over the last couple years, there has been a huge, collaborative effort to establish a plan for recovery, called The Hitch Conservation Strategy.
The strategy plan is being coordinated by the US Fish and Wildlife Service, or USFWS, but includes many local partners such as those from regional tribes like Big Valley Rancheria, Middletown Rancheria, and Robinson Rancheria, County of Lake, the Lake County Land Trust, private citizens, CDFW, and more. This plan is hefty, and again, relies on information that is yet unknown.
How can you help?
There are several ways you can help.
First, educate yourself about the Hitch and about lake and stream ecology and biology. Luckily, by reading the Lady of the Lake columns and asking important questions, like you did Hans, you are already accomplishing this step. If everyone understands the ecology and biology of this important species, and it’s habitat, the community as a whole will appreciate and value this species, and be aware of the kinds of activities that have negative impacts on the fish and their habitat.
An easy way to learn a great deal about the Clear Lake kitch is to check out the video below, from a public forum called Water Quality Wednesday that was held on Jan. 12 and hosted by Lake County Water Resources.
This video is about an hour long, but broken up into two 20-minute presentations. Moderated by myself, the Lady of the Lake, the first presentation is by a research biologist from USGS, Dr. Fred Feyrer, and he discusses his recent observations and data on Hitch from Clear Lake.
The second presentation is by Amber Aguilera, a scientist of the US Fish and Wildlife Service, and she goes through the current outline of the draft conservation strategy, and the actions and management being proposed to help in the recovery of the hitch and its habitat.
The second way you can help is to volunteer a few hours during the spring (March, April or May) to help do hitch observations and counts.
It’s really very easy. This is a great activity for extra credit for a science or environmental class, a great activity for girl or boy scouts, or just a great way to get outdoors and spend some time with family or friends. All while giving back to a special species that really needs all our help!
There are several ways you can participate in this important effort:
You can download volunteer directions and datasheets from the Chi Council website from the tab on the left. Basically, it includes driving around to bridges and public access points of spawning creeks (like Clover, Middle, Scotts, Adobe/Highlands, Manning and Kelsey) and wait till you spot a hitch. If you go during the right time of year, you won’t have to wait long! Take a few moments and see how many you see and can count. Note any spawning behavior. Review the full protocols provided by the Chi Council before starting any Hitch counts.
You can record locations on the map online provided by the Clear Lake Environmental Research Center, or CLERC, in their Hitch Observation Program. CLERC also has lots of videos of hitch to show you what you are looking for and how to identify the hitch (don’t get them confused with carp!). CLERC also has forms and directions you can view, download, or print to help you.
Lastly, you can call the County of Lake Water Resources Department at 707-263-2344 to get paper forms and directions for doing Hitch observations, and recommendations on busy spots.
For teachers and troop leaders: If your classroom, study group, girl/boy scout troop wants to learn how to observe and track hitch, and you want a Water Resources staff to lead, guide, or assist you, call Water Resources or email them, and might be able to help you or connect you with someone who can guide your group.
Thanks for your questions Hans, and thanks for caring about the Clear Lake hitch. The recovery of this unique species will be slow, but together, with dedicated and caring community-members like you, the Clear Lake hitch has a bright future.
If you have more questions about the Clear Lake hitch, I suggest you watch this informative video all about the hitch. If you still have questions or comments, you can direct them to the Lake County Water Resources Department, 707-263-2344, or through email at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. and they can help answer your questions or get you in touch with someone who can.
Sincerely,
Lady of the Lake
Angela De Palma-Dow is a limnologist (limnology = study of fresh inland waters) who lives and works in Lake County. Born in Northern California, she has a Master of Science from Michigan State University. She is a Certified Lake Manager from the North American Lake Management Society, or NALMS, and she is the current president/chair of the California chapter of the Society for Freshwater Science. She can be reached at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..
LAKE COUNTY, Calif. — Authorities have arrested a man who they say is a person of interest in the August disappearance of a Lucerne resident.
The Lake County Sheriff’s Office said Nova Maye Deperno, 26, a Lake County resident, was arrested in Occidental in Sonoma County on Thursday evening.
He’s believed to be connected to the disappearance of Ronald James Meluso.
Meluso, 63, was reported as missing to the sheriff’s office on Aug. 22, four days after he was last heard from, authorities said.
Meluso is believed to be a victim of foul play, the sheriff’s office said.
Authorities were seeking Deperno for assault with a deadly weapon, vandalism and brandishing a firearm, and he was considered armed and dangerous.
At 5 p.m. Thursday the Lake County Sheriff’s Major Crimes Unit Detectives developed information that led to the location of Nova Deperno at a residence in the 14000 block of Occidental Road.
The Sonoma County Sheriff's Office SWAT team assisted the Lake County Sheriff's Office with taking Deperno into custody.
Deperno fled from the residence, and after a two-hour search, he was found by the Sonoma County Sheriff's Office helicopter, Henry-1, hiding under a tree canopy, officials said.
Deperno was booked into the Sonoma County Jail where he’s being held on $635,000 bail.
Jail records said he is due to appear in court in Sonoma County on Tuesday afternoon.
The investigation is ongoing. Anyone who has information regarding Meluso’s whereabouts to contact Det. Jeff Mora of the Lake County Sheriff’s Office at 707-262-4224 or by email at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. .
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.
LAKE COUNTY, Calif. — With in-person instruction in the district suspended until Jan. 24 due to a staffing shortage arising from a COVID-19 exposure, the Kelseyville Unified School District Board this week will consider a resolution opposing the governor’s COVID vaccine mandates for students and staff.
The board will meet at 7 p.m. Tuesday, Jan. 18, in the Tom Aiken Student Center at Kelseyville High School, 5480 Main St.
Those participating in the meeting are asked to wear facial coverings based on state guidelines.
The resolution is listed as an action item on the board’s agenda.
It uses similar language to resolutions accepted last month by the Lakeport Unified, Lucerne Elementary and Konocti Unified school district boards, as Lake County News has reported.
However, the Kelseyville document has introduced some changes, in particular, noting that the district “will continue to partner with public health agencies to provide education material and offer vaccination opportunities for school-age children and employees; however, the governing board respectfully asks that the California Legislature not mandate the COVID-19 vaccine for students and staff of TK-12 grade Local Education Agencies.”
The resolution also resolves that the district governing board will petition the state that the COVID-19 vaccine not be a condition of enrollment for students or employment for staff.
Middletown Unified first considered its own version of the resolution last month but postponed a vote. It is due to consider that resolution again on Tuesday night, after having to delay its meeting for nearly a week due to a board member being in COVID quarantine.
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.
LAKE COUNTY, Calif. — Seven-year-old Lily Pedro, a first-grade student at Lower Lake Elementary School, just published her first book, “My Hunt for the Perfect Pet.”
Pedro was only 6 years old when the COVID-19 online schooling mandate forced students to learn from home.
During this time, Pedro asked her grandmother, Tammara Cappellano, for help with a story she was writing to share with her class.
When Cappellano read her granddaughter’s story, she believed it had the potential to do more than just engage Pedro’s classmates.
Cappellano thought it was worth publishing — and that a published work by one so young could inspire children everywhere “to do anything or become whatever they choose if they try.”
Cappellano helped her granddaughter with some of the technical elements of writing a book, such as spelling, typesetting, and illustration, and sent the draft off to a publisher for her review. The publisher liked the story and encouraged Cappellano to self-publish, so she did.
When Pedro’s school learned of her accomplishment, Lower Lake Elementary Principal Tara Bianchi put Pedro’s name on the list of students to be recognized at the school’s upcoming monthly awards ceremony this February.
“My Hunt for the Perfect Pet” has been on the market since November via Google, Amazon, EBay, and Kindle, as well as in bookstores such as Barnes & Noble, making Pedro the youngest published female author in the world since Dorothy Straight in 1958, according to Cappellano.
Konocti Unified Superintendent Becky Salato said, “I’m so proud of Lily. When families and schools work together to support our students, it’s amazing what students can achieve.”
Cappellano praised Lower Lake Elementary School and credited Pedro’s teacher with encouraging her to write. “It says a lot about our educational quality, dedicated staff, and administrators who really work hard to educate and enhance our children’s abilities,” she said.
She continued, “I believe that when a parent sets their child up for success, the child will believe in themselves, and this can lead to a great future.”
LAKEPORT, Calif. — First 5 Lake County reported that Samantha Bond is its new executive director.
Bond comes to Lake County after working at First 5 Mendocino County for nearly five years as the public relations manager.
“I truly believe that the work First 5’s across the state do has immense positive impact for families with young children and am humbled to be able to continue this great work here in Lake County. If we as a community can set our families up for success, then we are truly succeeding as a community,” said Bond.
“While I am not new to the First 5 world and work, I am new to the work being done here in Lake County,” Bond said. “I am excited to see the progress that has already been made and look forward to collaborating with partners and our community in the days ahead for the good of young children and families.”
Bond holds a bachelor’s degree in psychology from the University of California, Davis, and has previous experience working in group homes for children with severe mental and behavioral health disabilities. She also has worked as an education supervisor for Six Flags Discovery Kingdom.
“My experience at the group home showed a light on the negative impacts of adverse childhood experiences, while my work at Six Flags highlighted the other side of the spectrum where positive, enriching experiences abounded,” Bond said. “We need to remember and consider that children and families come from all walks of life, and it is our responsibility to provide them with the resources necessary and to meet them where they are at. First 5’s upstream work helps prevent or at least provide a path of hope in the face of adversity, and is critical to this balance.”
More information about First 5 Lake, its investments and priorities can be found at www.firstfivelake.org.
Using funds derived from California Proposition 10’s voter-mandated tax on tobacco products, the First 5 Lake County Commission funds programs and services that benefit the health and development of young children and educate parents, grandparents, caregivers and teachers about the critical role they play during a child’s first five years.
Since its inception in 2000, First 5 Lake has supported thousands of families with programs and services designed to help Lake County children grow up healthy and ready to succeed in school and life.
The First 5 Lake commissioners are:
• Chair: Tina Scott, Lake County District 4 supervisor. • Vice Chair: Carly Swatosh-Sherman, Lake County Office of Education, education specialist. • Lake County Superintendent of Schools Brock Falkenberg. • Lake County Social Services Director Crystal Markytan. • Lake County Health Services Director Jonathan Portney. • Allison Panella, mother of children under age 5. • Fawn Rave, education director, Robinson Rancheria. • Tarin Benson, coordinator of Student Services for Konocti Unified School District. • Justin Gaddy, father of a child under age 5.