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Ray Holley
4 - www.sonomacountygazette.com - 12/15
Catherine Sagan Graton
LETTERS cont’d from page 3
Full disclosure we’ve known this outstanding young woman for many years- but felt compelled to call out her professionalism and reflect a bit on her development as a human being. Thank you MacKenzie, and thanks to your parents, for serving the community in such a thoughtful and caring way. We’re counting on you to be a kid too- on your way to doing great things for the world.
Mirabel Lodge Expansion
On November 10, 2015, the Board of Supervisors voted 4 out of 5 against a project to expansed a 6 bed Residential Care Facility For the Elderly into a 12 bed residential community. This vote was a big surprise based on the needs of this county. Supervisor Shirley Zane spearheaded the initiative called “Aging Together Sonoma County” where there has been an emphasis on the needs of the elderly in Sonoma County. Sonoma County has 500,000.00 citizens, out of which, today we have 20% ( 100,000.00) 65 and older ( census, ombudsman and AAA ). This number will become 25% (125,000.00) within the next 15 years. Today, we have roughly 4,700.00 beds available in Sonoma County for seniors( a merely 4.5% ), between Skilled Nursing Facility beds ( 1,700 beds in SNF) and Residential Care Facilities for the Elderly beds (3,100 in RCFE). These numbers show the lodging crisis and the lack of options that our elderly population faces.
Peace in Syria
I am in Vienna, Austria, with my German friend, Walter, to celebrate my birthday. We do what many tourists do: attend a Mozart concert; visit museums and art galleries; see the entire panorama of the city from high up the St. Stephan Cathedral, and eat authentic Austrian cuisine. The day before leaving, we go to the state of the art railroad station to purchase our railroad tickets to the Vienna Airport. While there at the station. I go to the women’s restroom, and, coming out of a stall, I see a woman in a burka about to lift her soiled, unshod foot into one of the handwashing sinks. An attendant rushes over and shouts at her in German: “Verboten!” – Prohibited, Forbidden, not allowed!!!” The woman immediately drops her foot, puts on her worn shoe and walks out of the restroom. On the station’s polished marble floors there sits about 40 refugees: men, women, young teens, children and infants – all waiting. The children play on the escalators – a new game – tumbling off at the bottom to climb again the other side. Four little girls run around the shiny glass elevator playing tag, laughing, totally oblivious of their parents’ preoccupation and situation. Walter offers his sandwiches for the train to a man and his family. The man refuses, either from not knowing German or out of caution. At that moment, there is an announcement over the public address system in German and then in English: All trains for Germany have been indefinitely postponed. Angela Merchel, Chancellor of Germany, has spoken out about the humanitarian need for all countries to open their borders, and Germany is one of the few European countries of the European Union doing so. Word spreads quickly; Germany will accept refugees and so they come – by the thousands. Now it is almost winter here in Europe. What to do with all the refugees? They need bathing facilities, warm shelter, food, to learn the German language...a very big problem with so many to care for. And so Germany closes its borders, too, for the time being.
Housing Needed
A little over a year ago I wrote to the Gazette about the trouble I was having finding a place to live. Growing up in Sonoma County, then spending over a year homeless with my father,, sleeping in tents in Bodega Bay and finally packing it in and moving to a scuzzy Ukiah trailer park when nothing opened up for us was a terrible way to say goodbye. My dad died in that trailer, and I hung in for three more years in Ukiah, but my place was dangerous and my landlord even more so. Showing up without calling first is bad; doing so and then grabbing me at every opportunity is worse. I had to leave.
I work and pay taxes but have never made three times the rent in any place I’ve lived; I still pay it in full and on time each month. I need a place to stay, but also a place to LIVE--for the last decade I’ve been digging through boxes and bins, unable to unpack in a cramped trailer or any of these rooms. I would rather be in Ukiah, since citizenship there would get me moving on the waiting list again, and it’s a compact, pedestrian-friendly downtown, which helps a lot when you don’t drive or own a car. However, in the interest of simply clearing out of where I am now, I’m interested in any and all leads you might have. I’m clean, quiet, and need to be a short walk from food shopping at a bare minimum to get by. Everything I own is currently split between a 9 x 12 bedroom, two sets of plastic shelves (1.5 x 3 x 6) and a small hall closet (which is admittedly crammed full), so a larger bedroom could easily hold it all.
This is a crummy time of year to be looking, as it’s likely to be a stormy winter. Please let me know if you have a space or know of a space that might work. Thanks so much for your help.
Denny Rosatti and Kellie Noe Sebastopol, formerly of Camp Meeker
This exapansion project met all the county regulations and codes with height, size, safety, traffic, parking, noise, water and was approved unanimously in June 2015 by the PRMD.
Heather Seggel hlsegg@hotmail.com
At the hearing, 2 supervisors (Rabbitt and Carillo) dozed off during the applicant’s comments and then stated they had a real “dilemma” and “trouble making up their minds” but, had to vote against the expansion, while 2 other Board members (Gorin and Gore) stated “ good planning and great looking building”, but found the proposed project “Incompatible” with the neighborhood. Only Supervisor Zane approved the project and was outraged at her colleagues ‘s votes.
Dear Vesta,
I was really saddened to read such
We need facilities not only in institutions and as Marrianne McBride, president and CEO of the non profit Council on Aging said: “the goal is total cultural changes around the aging and that this change needs to happen in every neighborhood and on every block”
But the problem is not with the Syrian refugees invading the West. If these people had a choice, I would imagine they would prefer to be home in familiar surroundings, hearing their language, War is not the answer for Syria and the Syrian refugees, nor is it for the other countries where war is causing people to flee their homelands.
a negative book review of one of my favorite authors, Elena Ferrante, in the November issue of the Gazette. It is the first time I have felt so strongly about a piece, and have written the follow- ing letter as a response. Thank you for publishing such an important commu- nity magazine that gives every reader a voice!
Please write to your congressperson about this need to find immediate internal peace in Syria. Thanks.
Who is Diane McCurdy?
E. Brennan
As a fan of Elena Ferrante, I read Di- ana McCurdy’s book review Who Is Elena Ferrante? in the November issue of the Gazettte “with gleeful anticipa- tion” (to use her words). Yet nearly half
LETTERS cont’d on page 5