Page 28 - Sonoma County Gazette 12-18.indd

Both Sides Now
Community Garden Brings Families Together
It’s the week of Thanksgiving and with the smoke from Paradise erasing the blue sky we have entered into a sort of timeless zone. On Sunday I wasn’t even sure what day it was. Perhaps that is due to my advancing age.
Alejandra Cervantes, community organizer, heads
up the Community Garden at Larson Park, a Sonoma County Regional Park. Ms. Cervantes is involved in numerous community improvement programs in the Springs. Thank you, Alejandra.
Paradise is gone. Drone photos show block after block of desolation. Where is this? Hiroshima? The World Trade Center? 27,000 people displaced. Where will they go? Some have been camping out in the Walmart parking lot, Democracy Now reports. Today Walmart has told them they have to go.
Black Friday is coming. Sorry.
They ought to be serving turkey to all these folks, their customers of many years. Walmart can afford it. What’s one store without Black Friday in the massively profitable Walmart empire?
The garden is maintained
by families who come together for planting and maintenance. As winter and cooler months approach many plants are entering a dormant period.
The growers will plant winter crops soon. Wish to participate? Contact Alejandra Cervantes at the addresses in the picture.
I’m reminded of Glen Ellen, where neighbors cooked all those free meals for people who lost their homes.
Those of us who have homes are practicing gratitude. But it’s hard not to feel gloomy in the post-explosion atmosphere. Grateful, and sad.
People are saying it’s the new normal. “Climate change” is suddenly part of the daily idiom. In 13 months, we had our fires, then the Mendocino complex fires, and now the Camp Fires (can you believe that name?), each in turn the biggest and worst fires “in California history.” Today 600 people missing, 79 dead in Butte. Southern California is burning too. The Woolsey fire vaporized uncounted piles of nuclear waste from the Santa Susana Field Laboratory.
With the passage of Measure M in the recent election we look forward to Larson Park and the Community Garden being beneficiaries from improvements.
These fires were not in the forest. People are blaming the forests. Trump,
the great timber man, declared that “poor management of the forests” was to blame. Putting aside the fact that 70 percent of our forests are federal lands, these fires were in the grasslands and chaparral. It’s supposed to burn, says Caitlin Cornwall of the Sonoma Ecology Center and others. Yes, but are there supposed to be 80 mph winds?
Demolition, parking, development, and neighborhood watch are topics presented at Springs Community Alliance Meeting. The mid-November meeting at the Springs Community Hall was informative for those in attendance. Tyra Harrington, Code Enforcement Officer for PRMD, announced that the vacant building between the Hall and Ye Olde Pub will be demolished in the near future. The building has remained unused since the La Salette Restaurant moved into town many years ago.
Let’s be clear.
Meanwhile we’ve been having Big Meetings around Big Issues like equity, disaster resilience, and justice.
Ms. Harrington received a round of applause at this news. However, she was less enthusiastically received when residents asked if her office could take care of community issues such as excessive partying late at night. She referred the speaker to the waiting Sheriff’s officers.
This month the Housing and Community Development released its report on disaster recovery. $124 million will be coming our way for houses. How many houses does that make, I wonder?
Citizens heard Tim Sloat of Mattis Partners outline the progress on
the Noodle Shop and Boyes Food Development. The evening meeting
was concluded by a presentation from Sheriff’s Sergeant Greg Piccinini, Community Services Officer Silvia Floriano, and another officer about services in the Springs. Sgt. Piccinini stated disappointment that the Sheriff’s office had its staff significantly reduced in this region.
I haven’t read the report. It’s 145 pages. But HCD estimates “the total unmet recovery needs are over $922 million.”
Last January, the county said we need 30,000 new homes. If that sounds like a lot, our new governor, Gavin Newsom, has promised to build 3.5 million homes statewide by 2025.
That information came my way at the California Economic Summit held in Santa Rosa November 14 and 15th, a high event, full of promise. There’s money to be made.
The Sheriff’s central message to the Springs residents was to “know your neighbors.” If things don’t appear correct in the neighborhood such as
strange cars parked nearby or people out of character trying doors, call the Sheriff’s office. Above all. look out for each other. When asked about forming
a “neighborhood watch committee” Officer Floriano said that if contacted
she would be pleased to meet with groups of any size to discuss how a watch committee can be formed. (707-996-9495 or Sylvia.floriano@sonoma-county.org)
The really nifty thing is that we can go in and clean up our forests (which, again, haven’t been well managed) and use the timber, even those small
trees that were never been useable before, to make engineered wood. A new treatment makes it possible to create fire retardant wood. And that means jobs!
So folks, there’s a boom coming round.
But I didn’t hear any promise of a livable minimum wage.
I heard a lot of familiar environmental buzzwords, like resiliency and the
Pigeons At Siesta Way and Highway 12 Greet the Daily Commute!
“triple bottom line,” but I did not hear the word “equity.”
To be fair, the Summit did recognize that certain diverse populations have
Look up most mornings or late afternoons at Highway 12 and Siesta Way. You may witness a marvelous scene of pigeons either perched on the lamp post above or swishing about in a circle overhead.
not benefited from the recovery after the recession...and it did acknowledge climate change. So, we can hope.
For years a covey of birds gathers at any time of day, but especially from 4 p.m. til dark at this location. Their presence prompts questions. Are they flying out of an established loft? Or, are they wild? If from a loft, it must be nearby. Who maintains the loft and feeds them? The answer is unknown. This writer spoke with locals at the Fruit Basket, Ye Olde Pub, Beacon Gas, and sidewalk passers-by, but no one had any idea from where the pigeons loft. It would be appreciated if people with information about our wonderful Springs’ pigeons would forward them to “Springs Splash” c/o the SCG.
But these crises just keep on coming, don’t they?
Equity was definitely the word of choice at another meeting, put on by Los Cien, a Guerneville organization of Latino professionals held at the Flamingo Hotel in Santa Rosa.
That lunch meeting was pretty upbeat too, but voices representing community nonprofits like Community Action Partners and North Bay Organizing Project spoke heartfully about struggles in the Latino community, where services are particularly hard to access if you’re undocumented.
Amazing facts about pigeons. They served as communicators in WWI and WW2, religious symbols in India, and they can fly 600-700 miles in a day, and recognize 26 letters in the alphabet, among other facts.
28 - www.sonomacountygazette.com - 12/18
Happy Holidays to and From Resident of the Springs!