In stressful times, we are often faced with difficult decisions. Sometimes the choices are not good, but we still try to make the wisest decisions possible.

I have found that often the best solutions are those that solve multiple issues or concerns at the same time.

Being an avid bird-watcher, whose stone throwing prowess was never fully developed, I prefer to call this “feeding two birds with one hand.”

The financial crisis in which our state and country finds itself has adversely affected our community and our children. These are the times in which one of the most endearing characteristics of Lake County shines through – we have an unbelievable capacity and willingness to help out one another.

When one organization suffers from the effects of financial distress, another organization or group of individuals comes to the rescue to continue programs that are essential to the health well-being of our citizens. We must work together and “feed as many birds as possible” with an open hand.

It is incumbent upon our school system to provide a safe environment that promotes academic success and physical health. Like many other state-funded entities, schools will be faced with severe budget cuts again next year. Nonetheless, our plan is to continue to provide the wide variety of programs our children deserve.

We will continue to offer music, performing arts, and athletics in the Konocti Unified School District.

We will continue to provide healthy, warm meals served by a caring staff who know our students’ nutritional needs.

We will continue to provide a full spectrum of vocational training programs at our high schools.

We will continue to offer advanced placement classes, the Academic Decathlon, and foreign language classes.

As we begin to hear the depressing news from other school districts around the state, Lake County’s schools will survive and thrive because we know that the best decisions require us to support one another.

In the Konocti Unified School District for example, we have determined that an excellent way to help balance our budget combines decreasing operating costs while concurrently reducing our impact on the environment and teaching students a more environmentally friendly way to live.

In the short term, we will do this by instituting intensive, systemized efforts to recycle and reduce waste. This new program will require greater participation by students, staff, and the community to maintain high standards for cleanliness and respect for our campuses.

We will shut down our heating and air units and water heaters when facilities are not in use. We will make a concerted effort to reduce electrical use in every classroom. In the long term, we are intensifying our efforts to explore solar options and other methods to reduce fuel costs.

Another important component of our budget-balancing plan is to ask the cooperation of parents, guardians and other caregivers to do whatever possible to send their children to school every day.

Research has shown that a student who misses 10 days of school per year or more will be behind the rest of the year and will have difficulty making up the gaps in knowledge. Sixth graders who miss more than 20 percent of their school year are nearly guaranteed to drop out of high school. So, sending your children to school every day ensures that they will be able to maintain their academic growth.

In addition, our programs are funded through attendance. The more the students attend, the more the schools can provide. Now that’s a classic example of feeding “two birds with one hand!”

Obviously these are only a few of the methods that we plan to utilize to balance our budget and cover the hundreds of thousands of dollars of cuts needed in the Konocti Unified School District alone. But, they do show how we are connected and how we can work together to reduce costs, increase revenue, and provide the programs for our kids that other communities have lost many budget cuts ago.

So please support your schools’ efforts to balance the budget, send your children to school, and attend our fundraising events. Your schools, in turn, will support a healthy community of children.

Dr. William R. MacDougall, Ed.D., is superintendent of the Konocti Unified School District, based in Lower Lake, Calif.

Supervisor Anthony Farrington doesn't think Pacific Gas & Electric's plan for SmartMeters is all that smart. Courtesy photo.

On Tuesday, March 8, at 11 a.m. the Lake County Board of Supervisors will consider the possibility of taking legal action against Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E) to stop the installation of SmartMeters.

Recently, PG&E representatives came before our board to present the positive aspects of SmartMeters. PG&E representatives stated that with SmartMeters our state will move toward a “Smart Grid,” and that with SmartMeters residents “may” realize a 12- to 20-percent savings in their monthly bill.

The word “may” peaked my attention (pun intended).

PG&E told our board that they have installed over seven million SmartMeters.

During PG&E’s presentation, I asked PG&E to provide my office statistical data that substantiated their claim of a 12- to 20-percent monthly savings.

So far, I have not received any information. In fact, I have had conversations with elected officials in other counties and I have received feedback from residents who have had a SmartMeter installed, and the overwhelming consensus is that their monthly bill has actually increased!

With SmartMeters, PG&E is able to use wireless technology that sends real-time information on a daily basis. With SmartMeters, PG&E is able to bill each customer or peak day usage versus total monthly usage with standard meters. This means an exponential increase in rates to our local residents, businesses and farmers.

On July 26, 2006, the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) approved SmartMeters for the customers of PG&E, and authorized PG&E to spend $1.7 billion to deploy SmartMeters.

On Feb. 25, 2010, the CPUC adopted the new rate structures for residential, commercial and agricultural customers that will allow PG&E to bill its customers a higher rate for use during the peak hours. The SmartMeter is necessary to implement this new billing structure.

CPUC members are appointed, and not elected. They are removed from local residents and, in my opinion, beholden to utility companies and special interest groups.

As decision makers, the CPUC can take only one of two sides: either the members stand “for people,” or they stand “for profit.” Unfortunately, time and time again, the CPUC continues to stand “for profit.”

When this discussion came before our board, a number of local residents voiced their concerns about SmartMeters. At that time, I did not understand what all the fuss was about.

Many citizens voiced concerns about rate increases; health risks associated with SmartMeters due to the exposure of electromagnetic field (EMF) emissions; concerns about the loss of privacy due to the sharing and storage of real time information and data; and they voiced concerns about the firing of meter readers throughout the state.

In my research, I have found it true that there are positive aspects of SmartMeters, and the development of a Smart Grid.

With SmartMeters and a Smart Grid users will have to be more frugal with their use of electricity which will result in a decrease in the use of energy, which means a decrease in greenhouse gases.

In addition, people with Internet access will be able to go online and monitor their bill. While this may be a strong selling point, I do not believe that this is PG&E’s motive.

I have also found the concerns about health risks and exposure to EMFs to be a valid concern.

Even though the CPUC looked at studies and concluded that the emissions from an individual SmartMeter “should” not pose a health risk, there are no studies that have looked at the “cumulative” health risks where SmartMeters are installed in dense neighborhoods.

Yes, it may be true that with SmartMeters customers will be able to go online and monitor their usage and attempt to decrease their demand in order to reduce their bills.

Unfortunately, a lot of my constituents do not have Internet access and they are not in a position to decrease their demand.

My constituents are business owners who need power to run their businesses; my constituents are farmers who need power during all hours to water, harvest and package their crops; and my constituents are seniors, and disabled people that have to stay cool in the summer and warm in the winter.

Unlike the CPUC, the choice for me is simple. I will continue to stand “for people.”

Email me your input at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

Anthony Farrington represents District 4 on the Lake County Board of Supervisors. He lives in Lakeport, Calif.

One argument used to resist genetically modified organism/genetically engineered (GMO/GE) labeling sounds an awful lot like nanny-state thinking: “We must not allow labeling of GMOs because, given a choice, people would make the wrong choice.”

Poor silly foolish misguided consumers!

How lucky we are to have giant corporations and the government making the right choices for us, since we are incapable of deciding for ourselves.

Sorry, but I just don't have that much faith in corporations or the government.

I would rather make my own choices. So would 87 percent of Americans polled.

On Feb. 15 the New York Times published a column calling for GMO labeling, citing the above poll.

A week later, Forbes published a column insisting that we must not have GMO labeling. Why? Because then people would avoid such products.

Take a moment to absorb that interesting proposition, from a magazine which is supposed to be about business and economics. Not merely economics, but free market economics.

Can there be a “free market” when consumers are denied the right to make their own choices?

Can there be a “free market” when taxpayer subsidies are used to shore up a product which consumers don't want to buy?

GMO crops would have no place in an agriculture economy based on sound, free-market principles. As in, cost of production should not exceed market-value of end-product.

Fact: GMO crops cost more to grow than they are worth in the market.

American taxpayers make up the difference, through farm subsidies, most of which are issued to recipients beloved by corporate ag. (Only a tiny percentage of subsidies are paid to organic farmers, one reason why organic costs more.)

Currently, the commodity-crop system is rigged to push the more expensive (more profitable) GMO seeds. And since many GMO crops are designed to encourage increased use of herbicide, GMOs also generate more profit for herbicide sellers (often the same company that sells the seeds).

And that, ladies and gents, is the reason GMOs are being pushed down our unwilling throats.

Everything else (“feeding the world,” “higher yields,” etc) is just smoke and mirrors, created via bazillion-dollar PR campaigns that harken back to the days when Big Tobacco spent umpteen millions to poo-poo the possibility of any link between smoking and cancer.

The rigged commodity-crop system has existed for generations, originally created to channel agriculture profits away from farmers and into the pockets of middle-men and Wall Street.

Today, with the system pushing GMOs, biotech and petrochemical industries are the big winners. Farmers, consumers and the whole concept of free enterprise continue to be the losers.

It's not just here in America that GMO crops cost more to grow than they are worth.

In much of the developed-world, they are worth nothing. Many developed nations bar growing or import of GMO crops. (Farmers in California's Imperial Valley are so afraid of losing their overseas market that they have begged Monsanto to keep GE alfalfa out of their region.)

So, how-what-when-where-why would anyone grow GMO crops, if they really cost more to produce than they are worth?

Remember: Taxpayers make up the difference.

In short, GMO crops are welfare crops.

In a true free market, we'd be growing crops that have higher value, higher consumer demand. That means non-GMO and organic. Don't take my word for it. Search the internet on keywords non-GMO premiums and see for yourself.

High premiums (10 to 20 percent above Chicago Board of Trade) are paid for non-GMOs (even when they are non-organic). And prices paid for organic soy and corn are often twice (or more) what is paid for GMO soy and corn. Why? Because these are products that consumers value the most.

If corporate agriculture were not rigged to be so anti-free-market, no one would plant GMOs.

Eighty-seven percent of consumers polled reject the Nanny-State approach.

Eighty-seven percent want GMOs to be labeled.

Eighty-seven percent want the right to choose.

If that leads to the collapse of the artificially-shored-up, taxpayer-subsidy-reliant GMO industry, so be it.

The free market will have spoken.

Deb Baumann is a health care industry professional who grows GMO-free fruits, nuts and vegetables and raises heritage livestock near Upper Lake, Calif. She is a contributor to Lake County’s community-driven Rural Values Web site, www.ruralvalues.org. Anyone wishing links and citations verifying the information she writes about is welcome to send email to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. .