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Opinion
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- Written by: William MacDougall
It was wet and we all certainly needed to drive carefully, but it never occurred to me that we would close our schools. After all, if we closed the schools while parents were expected to be at work that would really cause problems throughout our community.
Then it occurred to me: “When did daily attendance, rain or shine, happy or sad, stop being a common expectation?”
Now I fully understand that we have just gone through a difficult, worrisome flu pandemic. The Konocti Unified School District has recently spent a great deal of time, energy and money advising parents and students about healthy behaviors. This information and the change in healthy habits have been beneficial.
I’m not addressing contagious disease here; I’m addressing a mindset. It is the mindset that getting up every day and getting to work on time is simply what you are supposed to do. There is no, “Do I feel like going to school or work?” You go to school or work unless you are physically unable to do so. After all, “the early bird catches the worm” and “you must be present to win.”
We live in a world in which those with the greatest skills, knowledge and those who try hardest have the greatest success and have the greatest chance of employment. When you get to the professional level in sports, all of the athletes have a tremendous amount of natural physical ability. But they have reached the professional level only because they also worked very hard and put in huge amount of time to perfect their skills.
Our students are required to learn more, at an earlier age, than they have in the past. It just makes sense when you consider the advance in science, math, and that history books now include Clinton, Bush and 9/11. The third grade math standards now include elementary algebra, geometry and probability theory. Algebra is a requirement in the eighth grade. Our children need to put in the time and effort required to be successful and that requires daily attendance.
We are coming to the most important academic months of the school year. Every grade level and course in California has academic standards that students are required to master to be eligible to move on to the next grade or to pass the course. The majority of these standards, and certainly the most complex ones, are taught from November through mid-May.
Missing even one day during this time places a student behind. In fact, every day missed costs a student two days of learning. Not only is the missed day lost, but the student spends the return day catching up.
Studies have shown that if a student attends school less than 95 percent of the time, then his/her ability to learn the necessary standards is significantly reduced. Ninety-five percent attendance requires missing no more than one day per month.
The success of our children and our schools depends on excellent attendance. Students who fall behind cannot score as well on the standardized tests. When parents are looking at moving into an area, one of their main concerns is the quality of the schools. One of the ways that parents determine the quality of schools is test scores. Low test scores mean our community will have fewer residents coming into our area and businesses will suffer. Attendance directly affects our community’s economic well-being.
Our school also receives funding based upon Average Daily Attendance (ADA). Each 1 percent of ADA received brings over $150,000 to the Konocti Unified School District. This is the money that we use to pay teachers and other staff, keep class sizes low, buy materials, and provide athletics, music, drama, art and other enrichment. The less money we have, the less we can do for our students.
Student attendance affects our kids’ achievement, our schools and our community. We must make a strong effort over the next few months to have all of our children attend school daily. Any incentives that we can give our kids to encourage them to master this important life skill must be provided.
One of the first things we must teach them is that you must be present to win. In this case, it is a win-win because our schools and community benefit as well.
Dr. William MacDougall, Ed.D., is superintendent of the Konocti Unified School District.
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- Written by: Clay Shannon
Human nature is to protect one’s own or one’s own beliefs, which is what led me to my red-faced experience while reading a Monday article written and posted on the front page of the Press Democrat.
I ponder the following: The media is a powerful driver that influences readers and viewers alike. One eye-catching headline peaks the curiosity … drawing in even the strongest willed. Each line can lead you to wanting more, and can even lead you to changing your stance on certain subjects.
Being careful to state facts precisely, the journalist is generally considerate of all sides in an effort to relate to their target audience, creating interest in which the reader fully engages in the dialogue.
However, my experience when reading the Press Democrat had me angry, emotional and, above all, ready to defend the county in which I live.
The day before Lake County vintners were hyped in an article in the San Francisco Chronicle, two weeks ago Shannon Ridge was named one of the “hot” California wine brands in 2009 at the Unified Wine & Grape Symposium. As far as the wine business goes, there are a lot of good things going on in Lake County. Our fruit is favorably modeled to be a sustainable North Coast ultra premium wine region.
Yes, it’s tough out there, it’s tough everywhere! And, in general, as I ponder, let’s focus on the bright things in life and in our county, not just on one person's experience in The Dollar Store. Let me remind you all that there is a Dollar Store in shi shi Healdsburg (which is where I am from) and I know some pretty shi shi people that shop there!
But back to business, the bright things. As vintners we have affordable land, affordable sites for tasting rooms, incredible soils, perfect climate to grow high end grapes, and WATER! We also have a progressive and supportive population with a county seat that actually knows how to and can successfully balance our budget within the county.
As a citizen who resides in Lake County I can proudly say we have the following: water, water, water, clean air, clean air, no pollution, no traffic, great hospitals, and affordable land, homes and home sites.
I question comments about unemployment. It is the change in unemployment that is a concern to me. Because it is affordable to reside in Lake County and we have many retired folks it may appear as a 9 percent increase, but this is the same rate as the balance of the USA.
It’s tough everywhere, but the way I was mentored growing up is, don’t throw rocks, don’t sucker punch, always give and be positive. What we should not be doing is bad-mouthing, this is no help for anybody. “Say something nice or don’t say anything at all.”
Sure, people are struggling, people are out of jobs everywhere in the US. We don’t have a lot of industry in Lake County, but people travel to work everywhere. The effect of Konocti Harbor Resort & Spa closing is bad and good; it needed to be remodeled, out-of-county people stayed there and, in time, it will come back.
Bottom line, I am sick and tired of people bad-mouthing my home and the place I live. They talk about the lake, have you ever been out there? It’s beautiful and healthy, and yes sometimes it smells, have you ever smelled the ocean?
Talk about the mercury. I had my first bass barbecued last summer and it was fabulous. They talk about the trailers. Folks, there are trailer parks in St. Helena and all over Napa Valley and Sonoma County. They talk about unemployment. For me I don’t see a difference here in comparison to any other place.
They talk about foreclosures. That is sad, nothing to tease about, people are losing their homes. People are starving in this country and others, let’s help them. They talk about Colusa County being bad, too. Have you ever been there, it is a thriving agricultural community; not sure where the numbers are coming from there.
Business being down 30 to 50 percent is normal through the country. There are always bright spots … our January tasting room business is up 30 percent from last year.
Tourism will get better. Where else can you go water skiing, wakeboarding and fishing, and breathe some affordable, clean air? The US is in a bad cycle, times will change. Lake County wines are being accepted and recognized in the US marketplace as high value, quality wines that people can enjoy and afford in these tough times.
For now I am staying up here in Lake County, so I can watch our bald eagles fish from our creeks, our bears feed on the manzanita berries and a few grapes, our elk graze on the grassy range, our beavers try to build dams in Clear Lake, our bobcats chase gophers and jack rabbits.
Lake County is where I can drive 30 miles to anywhere and never be stuck in traffic, where new resorts are being built on the Northshore and our neighbors from the south are vacationing and enjoying our lakes and purchasing weekend retreats, where I can watch our valuable and abundant water go down our creeks to feed Yolo and other counties and our valued red rocks travel over the hill to the south to landscape yards and build roads, a much needed infrastructure for an ever crowding landscape.
Here we have a beautiful lake that can be seen filling and flooding our wetlands so the otters and beavers, ducks and geese can reproduce.
I am staying here where I can watch my sprinklers operate during frost protection season because we have water. I am staying here where when you look up into the evening sky you can truly appreciate the brightest shining stars you have ever seen.
Where else can I breathe fresh, clean air and think to myself, “God, life is great!”
Clay Shannon and his family live and farm in Clearlake Oaks.
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- Written by: Maurice Taylor
Recent restrictive actions by the TV8 Board, primarily by Jeff Smith, Joyce Overton and Ed Robey, began in earnest when the TV8 Board met at their Dec. 9 meeting where an apparent attempt to restrict nonlocal programming with a new policy was created.
The objection to these videos by the board was apparently voiced as too “far out” (related to “conspiracy theory“), and that county supervisors would not support this kind of programming.
In addition, they claimed some few unknown persons (as opposed to the many TV8 viewers who enjoyed being informed by such videos) objected to this kind of programming using this excuse as a further basis to impose the new “provisional” policy (while publicly claiming at a later meeting the need for more local input as the reason for forcing a change in TV8 programming).
However, the TV8 board was created as advisory board, and not to act as a policy implementing board. By creating and dictating a programming policy it changed its functional nature, which is why Shawn Swatosh (from Mediacom), a TV8 Board member, resigned due to potential legal issues against Mediacom that can result from such a board dictating programming to a PEG station.
This action by the TV8 Board also makes the county and city (Jeff Smith is a Lake County supervisor, and Joyce Overton, an elected Clearlake City official) potentially liable for such restrictions of free speech, regarding the operation of a PEG station.
Apparently, subsequent actions by the then-acting voluntary TV8 PEG station manger Allen Markowski were deemed inappropriate and contrary to TV8 Board and city powers of control (the city is the franchise owner of the PEG station), and City Administrator Dale Neiman locked out all public access to the station. The city, in some unmentioned conjunction with the TV8 Board members, apparently accomplished this lockout action without regard or discussion with the TV8 Advisory Committee and without civil due process.
Following the closure of the TV8 station to community public access, the TV8 Board, at Clearlake City Hall, held public meetings on Jan. 13 and Jan. 20. Various objections to the board’s action and their rationalizations aired but at the Jan. 20 meeting, it was clear the TV8 Board was to assume complete control, which basically includes a dictatorship of programming over the “public” part of the Public, Education, and Government aspects of operation of a PEG station.
Coming from a fuzzy advisory position, the TV8 Board now assumed more complete control by essentially firing the voluntary provisional TV8 operation’s manager, Markowski, the most successful manger to lift TV8 out of its previous obscure and retarded position against substantial political and financial obstacles, and dissolved the TV8 Advisory Committee and all TV8 PEG station operational personnel.
It becomes obvious that a PEG station should not have politically minded county or city officials in control of its programming operations (in spite of franchise considerations), as that control is in conflict with the public access to free speech which represents the nature of a PEG station.
Political dogma and bias tend to infest and pervert the meaning of free speech when political power assumes such authority over the principles for which PEG stations exist.
The operation of the TV8 broadcast station, once created (regardless of city franchise ownership) is by and for the people of Lake County, not for the personal biases of public officials pretending to represent the People through a PEG station, and where such “government” control is legally prohibited in terms of programming.
Indeed, under “Powers and Limitations of a City” the “Limitation on Personal Activities”: “No city council member may occupy two different public offices at the same time, if the offices are incompatible one with the other.” In my opinion, Jeff Smith and Joyce Overton, as TV8 Board members, establishing and dictating programming policy, represent political positions in conflict with the TV8 PEG station operations as proscribed by both Federal, and by state law in this case.
To challenge an establishment’s identity of control becomes a threat to that establishment. Such a threat tends to translate into actions against organizations and individuals, politically (and often underhandedly). Free speech and truth suffer under these conditions, and history shows a long struggle to preserve this freedom.
The very existence of TV8 as a PEG station is one of those entities created in the attempt to preserve the value of truth and freedom against intrusion by political and corporate influence. Programming is a major concern because of this potential influence, which often results in such deterioration, but which is protected under the Constitution of this Republic, for obvious reason.
Such actions as the Clear Lake TV8 Board has recently demonstrated, in terms of policy and control, have demonstrated an attempt to subvert these constitutional guarantees with political intrusion and distortion. The recent, hastily imposed, ill formed provisional policy (a weakly disguised programming control over content), and subsequent action of locking out public access to the TV8 station, represents that malignant interference and conflict of interest, in my opinion.
Having said the above, the TV8 PEG Board at the Jan. 20 meeting apparently adopted a new station manager, Terri Larsen, who outlined at this meeting a new and comprehensive TV8 operational structure called “transition television” as a replacement of the former operational staff. This promises to implement more local programming and a revised structure for the good of the PEG station.
More power to them, but in my opinion as a former TV8 PEG Advisory Committee Member volunteer, beware of imposed political dictatorial powers acting under the guise of a TV8 PEG Board composed of elected politicians, and others who subvert free speech in covert ways.
Maurice Taylor lives in Clearlake.
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- Written by: Gale Tompkins-Bischel
Someone actually told me this yesterday after a brief conversation about religion and spirituality.
Sadly, I have to admit that the comment did not come as a surprise. If you are Christian and you are surprised, I invite you to think deeply about the stark underlying reason for this person's ignorance: The Body of Christ is preaching a lot of things, but Love is not overwhelmingly one of them.
The fact is that for far too long, the defining voice of Christianity has been left to divisive, hurtful individuals whose witness leaves a lot to be desired. Rev. Pat Robertson comes to mind currently as a perfect example of this.
The unfortunate result of the prevailing misguided evangelism is that a lot of Christians won't even mention Jesus' name outside of church, not wanting to risk the "fanatic" label. Instead, they quietly live their lives, being perfectly nice people, but never linking their compassionate actions or humanistic values to Jesus.
Others opt out of church altogether, thinking it has simply become a place of hatred and discrimination, and in many cases they are right. Though the song says so, society today does not “know we are Christians by our love.”
I doubt Jesus himself would be welcomed in many churches today. He'd be pegged, rightly, as a radical religious socio-political subversive. “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly" Jesus said (John 10.10).
Why do so many of today's Christians find that acceptable 2,000 years ago, but not now? Would Jesus even recognize his church, where Jesus-type behavior or attitudes result in heretics, censures, and excommunications? It's as if the Pharisees have been reincarnated into the present-day Christian Church Establishment.
What a mess.
The time has come to take back Christianity, get unified, and both live-out and boldly proclaim the Gospel. The health of humankind and this planet depends on it.
To do this, we need a radical new reformation of the church itself, that can then make possible a similar reformation among those outside the church; people who simply don’t know that the Way of Jesus is one of equality, justice, love, and service.
Since Christians are called to be “light to the world” (Matthew 5.14), the change must begin with those inside the faith. The sole purpose of our discipleship must be to help bring about a better world – not necessarily a biblical world.
Bringing forth the Kingdom of love and abundant wholeness envisioned by Jesus, even if it goes against our comfort levels or our wallets, is surely an essential goal that can not be met unless every Christian rethinks his role as a follower of the one we call the Prince of Peace. A mighty reformation is in order; one in which the Church and by extension the world, can emerge better, stronger, and more unified.
Will you accept the invitation? If so, let's explore and try to embrace some basic principles that might serve as a bridge to Christian unity and discipleship.
I commit myself to the following concepts, and I hope you will too:
1. Understanding that the one to whom we look for guidance in living in and building the Kingdom is Jesus Christ. We are not called to worship or idolize any political party, any flag, or any book – and certainly not one that has been so greatly tampered with and modified by flawed humans throughout the centuries.
Christ was the living answer to the frustrated author of Psalm 119 who struggled to make sense of Scripture. If just reading the Bible and following the laws were all that was required, then, as Paul says, “Christ died unnecessarily.” (Galatians 2.21)
Certainly, conflicting sayings of Christ must be compared in light of his overall Message and interpreted in reference to the particular history and agenda of the author or community for which it was written. To neglect to recognize these things is to dishonor both the Bible and God Himself.
2. Setting aside once and for all the notion that everyone in the faith can or should agree about everything. This is not the way it was in the earliest days of Christianity or throughout the last 20 centuries, and it certainly isn’t this way now.
The Bible itself is rife with contradictions and evidence of disagreements between even the Apostles themselves. Even within Judaism, from which the sect of Christianity grew, arguing about interpretations of scripture was a commonplace activity.
So, instead of Christians seeing differences of interpretation as something to fear, pride in this diversity should be celebrated. Today when disagreements arise, the overwhelming love and wholeness of Christ interacting with the voice of the Holy Spirit must naturally prevail.
Extraneous details should be left alone if they don’t violate the command to love; i.e., no one is hurt by someone else’s belief that the Red Sea either parted or didn’t part, and no one is hurt thinking that Jesus either did or did not turn actual water into wine.
Similarly, no one’s dignity is stripped away if someone is allowed to believe or not believe in the virgin birth (after all, Apostle Paul, the earliest Christian theologian, did not appear to know anything about it anyway).
On the contrary, the dignity and even safety of others is surely at risk from convictions that God sanctions and demands allegiance to any government authority or that gay people should be put to death. (Romans 13 and Leviticus 20.13) Such things do not pass the test of living up to Christ’s overall Message of Love in action.
3. Being guided into a deeper sense of the Holy as a way to reach the internal, fear-free peace that is available within and that connects us to all others. Knowing about God by reading human biblical writings is nowhere close to the same thing as being in mystical or spiritual relationship with God. (It's really no wonder so many are looking to the East for their "New Age" spirituality; the Church has very effectively quashed its treasure trove of ancient mystics, so almost no one thinks to look right here in our own backyard.)
Never did Jesus proclaim that his disciples would be known by how well they could memorize and force their literal interpretation of scriptures (especially ones that were as yet unwritten!) upon the world.
The defining characteristic he gave them, modeled for them, and subsequently died for, was love. Love and fear are simply incompatible, and since the Spirit is present within every person, we can feel extra secure giving our love selflessly to friend and stranger alike. A hungry person is Jesus in disguise, and he needs a meal, not judgment and a Bible lecture.
4. Becoming bold and courageous in our walk with God. We must lose the negative association with words such as liberal or rebel. Jesus Christ was the greatest rebel the world has ever seen. Not only that, but he rebelled precisely to bring us liberty (note the root of that word).
Christians should not create enemies out of liberal people. It’s all-too-common in some faith communities for people to be afraid to let others know that they voted for a Democrat, afraid to admit they believe in evolution, afraid to admit that they don’t accept the scripture-based age of the earth, afraid to admit that they really have no problem with gay people – or are gay themselves, and afraid to admit that they have serious doubts about God’s dislike of birth control or His supposed preference for women‘s subordination to men.
These Believers remain silent, fearful that their liberal views will be seen as rebelling against God and result in being either shunned or kicked out of their faith community. The silence speaks volumes to thinking people outside of Christianity; it gives them the false impression that all Christians are mindless Bible thumpers who are either incapable of or unwilling to be partners in effecting real change in the world.
5. Discerning the voice of the Spirit – whether from science or any other source – and proclaiming this to all. God is still speaking! Our faith is unfolding, changing, and growing just like any living organism.
It is unrealistic and not expected by God for Christians to carry around and live life with the mindset, fears, superstitions, assumptions and knowledge-base of the first century. When critical knowledge that enhances biblical understanding, human dignity, and planetary stewardship enters our world, it should be embraced by Christians as being the voice of the Spirit, not feared as being ungodly or somehow sinful. Using such knowledge to bring healing to the world is the modern-day equivalent of driving out demons.
6. Realizing that to build the kind of Kingdom that Jesus envisioned, all must reach out in love and respect to peoples of other faiths (and denominations). God is not Christian, Jesus was not Christian, none of the attendees at the Last Supper were Christians.
Intolerance only begets intolerance, and such behavior is contrary to the nature and will of God as revealed through Jesus Christ. He is the logos; the underlying fabric of all of life, and therefore his nature can be found everywhere we look – if we have the eyes to see.
If you are one of those who believes that the skies will soon open and Jesus will arrive to judge humanity, you may not be able to embrace most or any of what you’ve just read. Why worry about such things, since any time now we’ll have the satisfaction of seeing, among others, Hitler sentenced to Hell.
Well, if fear is keeping you among the crowd who is “so heavenly minded that they’re no earthly good,” as Oliver Wendell Holmes put it, you may want to ponder for a while what your own day of judgment will look like when Jesus asks why you didn’t love, serve or heal during your time on the earth. I doubt he’ll care about how hard anyone worked to discredit Charles Darwin, and I’m certain he’ll find it disgusting that his followers supported political structures that prey on the weakest and neediest in society.
I am an optimist. I think that as faith communities develop the courage to embrace even mere fragments of crucial reformation concepts, the rest will start to naturally fall into place and worldwide liberty and charity will soon follow.
I am personally convinced that when the church as a whole begins to awaken from its slumber, loudly proclaiming and acting not on misunderstood or archaic scripture or the words of fear-mongering preachers, but rather on the Love of Jesus that is the foundation of our faith, the rest of the secular and religious world will relax its defenses and take another look at our Message.
While the Bible will always be respected as a source of wisdom, history and an essential map of our understanding of God, idolatry of the scriptures and turning a blind eye to injustice will be abandoned and replaced by actively following Jesus’ Way. His Way is the one in which no division, destruction or inaction is possible. It is the Way in which Love wins out every time.
"Someday, after mastering the winds, the waves, the tides and gravity, we shall harness for God the energies of love, and then, for a second time in the history of the world, man will have discovered fire."
– Pierre Teilhard de Chardin
Gale Tompkins-Bischel attends United Christian Parish in Lakeport.