July 3, 2019
Liz Writes Life
Boy, certainly appreciated the cooler weather this week. I
was able to get more weeding and mulching done, before the higher temps hit.
There is a three-inch-long zucchini that has stopped growing, but is still
firm. I better pick it, because I have found the first few zucchini sometimes
stop growing and go mushy. Hope your gardens and flowers are doing well!
POW
Ray Haupt, Dist. 5 Siskiyou Co. Supervisor, shared positive
info during the Scott Valley Protect Our Water meeting held last Thursday
night. First, The Nature Conservancy has paid Siskiyou Co. $350,000 for
potential lost taxes due to the fact that it sold the Shasta Valley Louie Ranch
to the CA. Dept. of Fish and Wildlife and it will no longer be private
property. Ray said TNC did this as a “good faith effort” during the escrow
process. Ray and Michael Kobseff, Siskiyou Co. Supervisor for Dist. 3, have
been working on protecting agricultural and water on the Louie ranch throughout
TNC’s ownership and its (previous) sale of water rights to CDFW. This $350,000
is a great win for the county!
Budget
The difficult process of getting the county budget to balance
was the major supervisors’ agenda item last month. Nearly all departments found
their budget was the same as last year or declined a bit. The exception is the
sheriff’s dept, which did receive $500,000 more than last year’s budget.
Fuel reduction
Ray explained the county is forging ahead to utilize state
and the federal government programs to help reduce fuel loads and fire hazards.
The first one -- and newest -- is the Governor’s (Newsom) Forest Task Force,
which prioritizes grant-type of money to do hazardous fuels work on private
properties. These grant monies come from the carbon credit initiative tax that
we pay at the pump for our gas. Surprise!
These projects are for fuel breaks and thinning –
specifically to modify fire behavior. Cal-Fire has prioritized these projects
throughout the state and Fire Safe Councils are proposing projects. The county
is competing state-wide for grants from $200 million that has been designated
for fire hazard reduction. One project has been approved in Siskiyou Co. for
the state-identified Shastina area.
To help with this project, our county supervisors asked the
Siskiyou Fire Safe Council to put together a Fire Safe Plan to model and map
potential fire behavior. This information is now filling-in gaps and aiding a
new county-wide task force, which brings government fire agencies, private
timber industry and Fire Safe Councils together to identify projects. This Siskiyou
Task Force held its second meeting last month. Ray is pleased the group is
coordinating its various skills, directions and efforts. “We are well
organized,” he said.
Then, there is the federal program called the Good Neighbor
Authority, which allows the USFS to enter into agreements with state forestry
agencies to do critical forest management work.
Under the Good Neighbor Authority legislation is the Master
Stewardship Agreement program. Its goal is to achieve land management for the
national forest and better interface with private lands and local rural
communities to meet hazardous fuels reduction needs. In other words, the county
can enter into an agreement with the USFS to get work done, which the county
deems high priority. The county must pay 20 percent of the cost of each project
and the USFS pays the remaining 80 percent. Yep, this is a huge savings for the
county.
What Ray likes about this program is that it is prioritized
locally as the county is the lead. As a result, the county is working on
agreements with Klamath National Forest. When the program gets going, it will feed
itself as the positive income funds will go into future projects. KNF is 63
percent of Siskiyou Co. land base, so there is lots of interface with rural
residents and towns.
To avoid pit-falls, Ray asked three-term Tuolumne Co.
Supervisor, Randy Handfield, to come to Siskiyou Co. and explain the good, bad
and ugly of these fire hazard agreements to those involved in the process. Tuolumne
is the only county that has utilized the program and found success. Siskiyou
hopes to be next with a bunch of successes.
Red flag warnings were discussed and Ray said that through
CA. Senate Bill 911, power companies will be required to shut-down power during
high fire threats. There are two places in Siskiyou that have been identified
for the potential need of shutting-off the power and they are the City of Mount
Shasta and the Klamath River corridor between Seiad and Beaver Creek, which
will also cut power to Happy Camp.
Ray also explained that through state legislation, power
companies were mandated to have power mitigation plans and equipment up-grades
by June 1, 2019. Hum, that is a lot of power facilities to address. I wonder if
that happened?
Election
With the election of Dist. 1 Assemblyman Brian Dahle to the
State Senate Dist. 1 seat, in June, there will now be an election to fill his
assembly position. And that election will be here in no time. A primary
election in the counties of Butte, Lassen, Modoc, Nevada, Placer, Plumas,
Shasta, Sierra and Siskiyou will be held on Aug. 27, 2019. Yes, that is an
unusual time for an election.
I believe the primary election will reduce the candidates to
two. Wow, that isn’t much time for candidates to canvas the north state. Then
the special election to select the assembly-person will be held Nov. 5, 2019.
So far three people have declared they are running for the
assembly seat. All are Republicans. They are Patrick Jones, from Redding; Megan
Dahle, of Lassen Co.; and Joseph Turner, also from Lassen Co.
Patrick Jones is a favorite, because of his pro-2nd
Amendment stand, outspoken need for forest health management and pension reform.
He served two terms on the Redding City Council and as mayor. I have met
Patrick and like him.
Megan Dahle is the wife of Brian Dahle. She has served one
term as president on the Big Valley Joint Unified School board and is for
better funding for public safety and emergency personnel.
Joseph Turner recently resigned from his chairmanship with
the Lassen Co. GOP to run for assembly. He is a veteran of the CA. Army
National Guard and will fight against excessive taxes and regulations.
Have a good week and try to stay cool!
Liz Bowen began writing ranch and
farm news, published in newspapers, in 1976. She is a native of Siskiyou County
and lives near Callahan. Columns from the past year can be found at:
lizwriteslife.blogspot.com. Call her at 530-467-3515.
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