Clearlake Planning Commission to consider Lakeshore Drive design guidelines

CLEARLAKE, Calif. – This week the Clearlake Planning Commission will discuss design standards and permitting music venues on Lakeshore Drive.

The meeting will begin at 6 p.m. Tuesday, Aug. 6, in the council chamber at Clearlake City Hall, 14050 Olympic Drive.

On the agenda is a review of the Lakeshore Drive design guidelines released in 2007 as part of the Clearlake Vision Task Force.

The Clearlake City Council last month approved a three-month moratorium on construction or major remodel projects on a portion of Lakeshore Drive, between Olympic Drive and Old Highway 53, as Lake County News has reported.

The council took the action at the recommendation of City Manager Joan Phillipe, who said that city staff has been challenged by a lack of cohesive standards in the city's design districts, particularly the Lakeshore Drive area.

During the three-month moratorium the goal is for city staff to bring back proposed design standards, with the planning commission to be involved in that process.

On Tuesday the commission will be asked to consider the proposals made by the Clearlake Vision Task Force with a view to either amending the language or recommending the current guidelines be adopted by the city council.

Also on the agenda, staff will ask the commission if it is interested in having a zoning ordinance drafted to permit music venues on Lakeshore Drive, where the zoning is mostly commercial and doesn’t allow for such uses.

City staff reported that a temporary use permit has been given to The Spot for outdoor music in the afternoons and early evenings, which was deemed appropriate because the business is permitted for outdoor dining.

The city also has been approached by business owner Andre Williams who is interested in setting up a venue for outdoor music events.

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.

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Written by: Elizabeth Larson

Published: 05 August 2013

Lakeport gears up for ‘National Night Out’ event Aug. 6; children’s activities added

LAKEPORT, Calif. – New activities are being added to the offerings for community members at this week’s “National Night Out” event in Lakeport.

The event will take place from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. Tuesday, Aug. 6, on the grounds of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, located at 600 16th St. in Lakeport.

The event is free and all interested community members are encouraged to attend.

National Night Out is focused on efforts to promote involvement in crime prevention activities, police-community partnerships and neighborhood camaraderie.

It’s also meant to send a message to criminals, letting them know that neighborhoods are organized and fighting back.

The Lakeport City Council has canceled its Tuesday night meeting and will be available to meet with community members.

Also on hand will be Lakeport Police officers and volunteers, Lakeport Fire Protection District personnel, and city management and staff.

They will provide information and materials about community policing programs, Neighborhood Watch, community safety, fire safety and prevention, and other health and welfare issues within the community.

Added to the event is a kids’ corner where there will be games for kids to play and win prizes.

Be sure to bring your kids by the police booth and receive information on drug awareness. Each person who reviews the brochures will receive a raffle ticket and chance to win one of two new bicycles. Two bicycles will be raffled off at the end of the event.

Also featured at the event are "McGruff the crime fighting dog" and "Chipper" from the California Highway Patrol.

The city will be providing free hot dogs and drinks and the Lakeport Kiwanis Club will be on hand to barbecue and serve attending citizens.

For updates on the event follow the Lakeport Police Department at https://www.facebook.com/pages/Lakeport-Police-Department/176101292414821 and the city of Lakeport at https://www.facebook.com/pages/City-of-Lakeport/110619388983178 .

For further information on NNO, please go to http://www.natw.org/about-nno/  .

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Written by: Lake County News reports

Published: 05 August 2013

City of Lakeport begins community outreach on new marijuana cultivation ordinance

LAKEPORT, Calif. – Lakeport officials have begun an outreach effort to educate community members about the requirements of the city's new marijuana cultivation ordinance.

The Lakeport City Council unanimously approved the ordinance at its final reading on June 18, as Lake County News has reported.

The ordinance – which went into effect on July 18, 30 days after its passage – was drafted by a committee composed of city staff and community members.

The committee, created at the council's direction, sought to balance concerns about marijuana grows from community members with the rights of patients with medical recommendations to cultivate their own medicine.

City officials said the rules were designed to allow for medical marijuana cultivation in residential areas in a way that avoids nuisance odors and public safety threats related to theft, burglary, home invasions and fires.

The full text of the ordinance can be found at http://www.cityoflakeport.com/docs/Ordinance-No--889-Marijuana-Cultivation--718201331815PM.pdf .

While the Lakeport Police Department reported that it already is responding to complaints of out-of-compliance marijuana grows and conducting some enforcement, the primary focus now is education about the city's new limits and requirements in an effort to gain voluntary compliance.

Lakeport Police Chief Brad Rasmussen told the council at a special meeting last week, “We're going to be in the education period for a little while.”

He added, “There's going to come a point where it's strictly enforced,” but the goal now that the ordinance is in effect is to work with the community.

“We want to do it right,” Rasmussen said.

Among the ordinance's key provisions, it prohibits marijuana cultivation in residences or attached garages, and requires that grows take place in secured, detached structures that have effective odor filtration systems.

Those accessory structures must be provided with setbacks from other structures and property lines, with the city also requiring perimeter fencing.

Grows are not permitted within 300 hundred feet of any school, child care center, park or playground.

The ordinance doesn't place a limit on the number of cannabis plants grown, but limits maximum canopy area to 80 square feet.

For additional information about the ordinance and suggested greenhouse structures, visit http://www.cityoflakeport.com/departments/docs.aspx?deptID=39&;catID=224 .

The city intends to handle violations of the ordinance through its administrative citation process. Information about that process can be found at http://www.codepublishing.com/CA/lakeport/html/Lakeport08/Lakeport0830.html#8.30 .

Community members are asked to review the ordinance and contact Community Development Department staff at City Hall, 225 Park St. or telephone 707-263-5615, to answer questions about the new rules.

The Community Development Department can provide information about a secure structure specifically designed for medical marijuana cultivation, including the necessary odor filtration system.

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.

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Written by: Elizabeth Larson

Published: 29 July 2013

A new chapter for the old Middletown Library: Group works to create Gibson Museum and Cultural Center

MIDDLETOWN, Calif. – Although nearly all of the books from the Chauncey W. Gibson building, which for 83 years was the Middletown Public Library, were moved to the community's new and modern library, the book on the structure itself has not been closed.

Far from it. Thanks to the resourcefulness of a small but growing cadre of the south Lake County citizens, a plan to dedicate the Gibson building to a new purpose is moving ahead.

Indeed, its future as a place where the south county's past will be on display is virtually assured.

“Consideration is being given to making the old library the genealogical center of south Lake County,” said Voris Brumfield, who heads up the group.

As a link with the past, the dedication of the Gibson Museum and Cultural Center is tentatively set for the first weekend of May of next year to coincide with the initial opening in 1930.

The dedication was celebrated with a grand ball, a concert and a ceremony in the Middletown pavilion. Sonoma County sent a Salvation Army band to commemorate the occasion.

The planners for the 2014 reopening are seeking to replicate that event as much as possible, even to the extent of encouraging contemporary Middletown residents to turn out in the Hollywood- and French-influenced long and sleek look for women and straw-hatted, hound's-tooth attire for men of the 1930s.

The concept for reinventing the Gibson building grew from a meeting of 11 south county citizens who, since March, have met bimonthly.

“Our first meeting concerned how we were going to use this building. There were no thoughts of tearing it down,” said Brumfield, the pastor at Middletown's Methodist Community Church and a former Lake County Supervisor for District 1 who has been active in community affairs since moving to the county in 1975.

Making the building a museum and genealogical center was an idea that took hold partly because an earlier attempt to create a Middletown genealogical society, lacking a place to meet, has languished.

“The idea had been around a long time,” said Brumfield.

“We've pretty much determined that we're going to jump right into this,” asserted committee member and author Nina Bouska. “It's a very small building and we don't have room for a lot of artifacts, but the way museums are going now – with digital displays, such as Calpine, I think we can do that as well or better.”

To Bouska fell the task of locating artifacts, while John Parker is organizing and cataloging materials.

“We're still pretty much in the dark about what will go into the museum,” Bouska said. “Mostly I have promises.”

Said Brumfield: “We have people who have collected oral history, others who have collected photographs. Lillie Langtry wrote a letter to someone saying 'join me in paradise.' She had a house built for Freddie Gebhard, a paramour.”

Other illustrious early south county residents included Adolph Sutro, creator of the Sutro baths on the San Francisco shore at the turn of the 19th century; Judge S.C. Hastings, founder of Hastings Law College; Lawrence Gamble of Procter & Gamble; L.J. And Mary Skaggs, pioneers in the pharmaceutical industry; and Ralph Davies, benefactor of the San Francisco Symphony.

That Gibson Library has only 1,300 square feet of floor space versus the enormity of the new library – almost four times as large at 5,000 square feet.

But neither Bouska nor Brumfield see that as an obstacle. Like other modern museums, screens and computers, they say, the Gibson Museum and Cultural Center will provide accessibility to Middletown's past.

“I think we're going to try to get the high school kids to do the animated displays for us. So it's a great project for them,” said Bouska.

In the process of restoring south Lake County landmarks, this is not the first rodeo for either Brumfield or Bouska.

Brumfield played a major part in the restoration of the Lower Lake Schoolhouse Museum.

“That was a miracle. It was a god awful place, filled with bats and pigeons and all kinds of clutter,” she recalled. “I was the district representative on the Board of Supervisors at the time. The California Conservation Corps came in and cleaned it out. Other government organizations donated paint and other materials.”

Bouska is a member of the Stone House Historical Society and wrote a book about the history of this quaint structure, the oldest building in Lake County.

“Four years ago we were talking about fundraising for the house,” she said. “I started researching and found so much that was interesting that all of a sudden I put together a 150-page book.”

The next step for the conversion project is getting approval by the Lake County Historical Society and the Board of Supervisors for a memorandum of understanding. The MOU has been given to Lake County Public Services and the County Counsel's Office, and a go-ahead approval by the supervisors is all but assured.

“Once that memo is approved by the Board of Supervisors we'll be able to make the plan for the building,” said Brumfield. “That's what were waiting for right now.

“We have no idea of what (the conversion of the Gibson building) will cost, but we've had an architect come in and look at it,” she added. “We have no funds for the building, so we have to think what are the minimum things we can do to make it usable and available to the public.”

Work toward the May 2014 rededication of the Gibson building is scheduled to begin in August.

“That will allow us time to do fundraising for whatever we determine needs to be done,” said Brumfield.

An estimated $5,000 to $10,000 will be needed to open the center and $500 to $1,000 a month will be required to cover operational costs.

Bouska spoke of how the addition of how the Gibson Museum and Cultural Center will serve young people.

“I found just in working with the Stone House book that once you get the kids' attention they learn that history is not just space ... there are some stories there,” she said. “They can return to a time when things were so much different. When the Stone House was built (1853-4) the closest store was in Napa. You ran out of baking powder you had to make a five-day trip by oxcart. With the series of mountains they (early residents) were practically hemmed in.”

Although quicksilver mining was ratcheting up in south county by the mid 19th century, homesteading in the Middletown area was late getting started because probate for the area was not opened until 1870.

“So while Lower Lake, Lakeport, Kelseyville, Upper Lake – even Clearlake Oaks – were growing and growing nobody could buy property here,” said Bouska. “This has been an undeveloped area and started out that way.”

One advantage that will benefit the proponents for conversion of the Gibson building, Brumfield points out, is that they will not be required to go through a 501(c)3 process.

“A lot is in place,” she said. “We have successfully piggybacked on what is already done. We have the Courthouse Museum, the Schoolhouse Museum, the Ely Stage Stop and Agricultural Museum, and now we'll have the South County Gibson Museum.”

Turn the page.

Email John Lindblom at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. .

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Published: 28 July 2013