Editorial

Recent revelations about past financial mistakes inside Healdsburg District Hospital should not be taken as any reason for patients, doctors and community partners to withhold support or question its medical excellence. A business turnaround looks to be in place and elected leaders of the North Sonoma County Healthcare District last week expressed their vote of confidence in a new management team, now completing its first full year on the job.

Instead of our usual Winter Lite we have been experiencing record cold. A cold snap, they call it. Nothing as punishing as in other parts of the country. A Kansan might poo-poo how we fret over our lemon tree, tucked in like a dowager on a cruise ship. A New Englander might not share my delight in how my neighbor’s frosted roof glimmers in the dawn.

In 1972 my wife Bonnie and I came to Healdsburg from Calistoga, where I had been the Vicar of St. Luke’s Church. Many churches now have a fairly extensive series of profiles and interviews prior to calling a priest. In 1972, the move was made based on two phone calls from the Bishop, one to me and the other to the Senior Warden of St. Paul’s. When I met the leaders of St Paul’s for the first time it was an accomplished fact that I was their new priest. Neither Bonnie nor I was yet 30 years old and we had a McGovern for President sticker on the bumper of our old Chevy sedan.

In Healdsburg and throughout Sonoma County, issues related to housing have been in the spotlight for many months. The city is keenly aware of our community’s housing needs and has been working hard, alongside our residents, to address these serious housing problems. Providing affordable housing to working families and building government subsidized, affordable housing units continue to be top City Council priorities. Much has been accomplished and a great deal remains to be done.

Editor: We wish to publicly recognize and congratulate HUSD

Van Jones at SSU