NEWS ARTICLE ARCHIVE — in chronological order, with pagination below
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MLPAI: AG ruling is good news
Marine reserves created under the Marine Life Protection Act Initiative (MLPAI) should ban more than fishing, the California Attorney General”s Office said in a memo last week. Locals had questioned why only fishing has been targeted in the current MLPAI process. Major ocean industrialization proposals such as wave energy, oil drilling and fiber optic pipelines…
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MLPAI organizers define 12-month local process
Mendocino Coast ocean lovers were given until January to come up with “external proposals” for the creation of areas off limits to fishing or partially closed to fishing. That was the big change announced Tuesday night by organizers of the Marine Life Protection Act Initiative (MLPAI) at a meeting remotely broadcast to the C.V. Starr…
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Locals asked to create offshore park proposals by January 2010
Melissa Miller-Henson of the Marine Life Protection Act Initiative told a Fort Bragg crowd Tuesday night that the process used in other regions has been changed for the local (Point Arena to Oregon border) region. In all the other regions, the process started with the formation of an official “local stakeholders group.” That group”s recommendations…
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MLPAI organizers define 12-month local process
Mendocino Coast ocean lovers were given until January to come up with “external proposals” for the creation of areas off limits to fishing or partially closed to fishing. That was the big change announced Tuesday night by organizers of the Marine Life Protection Act Initiative (MLPAI) at a meeting remotely broadcast to the C.V. Starr…
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Summers Lane city reservoir proposal worries neighbors
Staff Writer The City of Fort Bragg is planning a 14.7 million-gallon reservoir on city property at the end of Summers Lane in an effort to satisfy part of an ongoing need for city water storage. The reservoir plans worry neighbor Jim Celeri, whose home and rhododendron nursery are located on the downstream side of…
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Summers Lane city reservoir proposal worries neighbors
Staff Writer The City of Fort Bragg is planning a 14.7 million-gallon reservoir on city property at the end of Summers Lane in an effort to satisfy part of an ongoing need for city water storage. The reservoir plans worry neighbor Jim Celeri, whose home and rhododendron nursery are located on the downstream side of…
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Protected areas may help abalone, but confuse people
(This fifth article in the continuing series on the Marine Life Protection Act Initiative will show how our area has protected its abalone in the past from both poachers and big outside interests, and will identify evidence that Marine Life Protected Areas will be good for abalone.) There is solid scientific evidence that the marine…
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Ab poachers may like MLPA”s closed areas
Sharp-eyed Department of Fish and Game wardens used my last article about the Marine Life Protection Act Initiative to catch abalone poachers right where I bumped into them while walking my dogs. The wardens recognized the modus operandi from my description of a lookout and several guys in the water, went back to where I…
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Protected areas may help abalone, but confuse people
(This fifth article in the continuing series on the Marine Life Protection Act Initiative will show how our area has protected its abalone in the past from both poachers and big outside interests, and will identify evidence that Marine Life Protected Areas will be good for abalone.) There is solid scientific evidence that the marine…
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Ab poachers may like MLPA”s closed areas
Sharp-eyed Department of Fish and Game wardens used my last article about the Marine Life Protection Act Initiative to catch abalone poachers right where I bumped into them while walking my dogs. The wardens recognized the modus operandi from my description of a lookout and several guys in the water, went back to where I…
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MLPAI ocean privatization a ground breaker
(In part 4 of this series on the Marine Life Protection Act, we look into how the MLPA Initiative fits into the fast evolving history of environmental privatization and how the successes and failures of that movement might impact the Mendocino Coast) The Marine Life Protection Act Initiative (MLPAI), which arrived in Fort Bragg this…
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City uses grants to restore Otis Johnson Park
The City of Fort Bragg has now lined up three grants to pay for repairs and restoration needed at Otis Johnson Wilderness Park. Caltrans has announced signing of a cooperative agreement that will help the state transportation agency fulfill environmental mitigation required for construction of the new Ten Mile River Bridge. Caltrans will provide $226,059…
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The Marine Life Protection Act: Ocean preservation vs. privatization
As I prepared to write this third installment of the Marine Life Protection Act Initiative series, I decided to take a twilight walk along the ocean for inspiration. Instead I found apparent abalone poachers at Jughandle, two big country boys working with duffel bags at dusk on July 30. My dogs had alerted and pulled…
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Former gang member: Fight gangs with art, not handcuffs
Remember all those gang summits and truces in cities where smiling gang members posed with rivals, cops and community leaders? And whatever became of all those police crackdowns and zero-tolerance policies for red or blue clothes that were supposed to stop gang problems? Noted author and former Los Angeles gang member Luis Rodriguez pointed the…
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Locals demand more from public-private ocean preserve plan
Editor”s Note: In part two of an ongoing series on the Marine Life Protection Act Initiative, this article looks at how the public process works and where the organizers are listening — and where they are not. Next week, the influence and history of the private foundations that are paying for the MLPA, along with…
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Officials explain MLPA process to skeptical locals
Editor”s Note: This is the first of a two-part series on the MLPA process. In part 2 next week, sources of funding, scientific basis and local efforts to create a local plan will be further detailed. Dreading possible impacts from Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA) implementation, local fishermen hope to propose their own option for…
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Officials explain MLPA process to skeptical locals
Editor”s Note: This is the first of a two-part series on the MLPA process. In part 2 next week, sources of funding, scientific basis and local efforts to create a local plan will be further detailed. Dreading possible impacts from Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA) implementation, local fishermen hope to propose their own option for…
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City wins statewide competition for newest member of police force
The Fort Bragg Police Department beat out two dozen other police forces to recruit its newest member, who is leaving Colma despite the tears of separation from her “partner” on the force there. McKeba, a 5-year-old Czech Shepherd, will be the first police dog in Fort Bragg since Attos retired four years ago. The Mendocino…
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Dioxin dirt removal from McGuire Ranch set for September
Tom Lanphar, the new Department of Toxic Substances Control (DTSC) program manager for both the Georgia Pacific Mill Site and the McGuire Ranch, sought to put the amount of dioxin contamination found at the ranch with an analogy based on the federal stimulus plan. “If the bailout is $1 trillion, this [highest reading] of 91.7…
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EcoMotion may move to October
Nicole Kench”s vision of closing downtown for a free hip-hop, reggae, funk and food downtown celebration of sustainability was rejected by the Fort Bragg City Council Monday night. The denial came despite impassioned pleas from a dozen supporters. The council, by a 4-1 vote, upheld staff”s rejection of a permit that would have allowed the…
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