Editorial

My Indiana friend sent a photo of her dazzling ruby-colored backyard. For your fall fix, she wrote. A California friend visiting Maine posted golden leaves on Facebook and happily reported it blustery enough for gloves and scarves.

I do not intend the following to be mere nostalgia, but rather a description of a safer world in which a teenaged boy would not likely be shot by a police officer.

On a day dialed up by the Point Arena Chamber of Commerce, the U.S. Secretary of the Interior, Sally Jewell, came, saw and listened. I attended Friday’s environmental love fest on behalf of Sonoma County Supervisor Mike McGuire who is running for the 2nd District Senate seat in which the beautiful 1,664 acre Stornetta Public Lands is being considered for a land inclusion into the California Coastal National Monument.  McGuire’s time is now limited as he is speaking to the Kiwanis, Rotarians and special interest groups times the seven counties in the district.

Last month, Alliance Medical Center was contacted by the Health Resources and Services Administration, the branch of federal government that oversees Federally Qualified Health Centers. HRSA wanted to study how we work with pregnant women. It turns out that Alliance is in the top 1 percent in the nation in prenatal care! More than 90 percent of our patients who are expecting are receiving medical care beginning in their first trimester.

In short, we all need to use reusable carryout bags. It’s good for you and for the environment. Why do we need reusable carryout bags?  

In addition to Breast Cancer Awareness, October is Domestic Violence Awareness Month. Yes, there is less fan-fare or major community activity, still, Men Evolving Non-Violently (M.E.N.) is quietly celebrating the efforts made towards greater awareness about an issue that has been under the radar for far too long.  Laws have been changed and more services are available to women and children who have been abused or are in danger, yet we still have a long way to go.    

One might say that the current dispute about a flight school at the Healdsburg Municipal Airport is simply a NIMBY issue by folks who live near the airport. The rest of you could say,  “It doesn’t affect me”….or does it?

Driving up the Oregon coast we heard a radio interview with a woman, someone who lived in the far-off troubled Arab world, I think she was Lebanese, saying she takes her family to the beach because people don’t usually bomb beaches. That’s something I never thought about. But here I was imagining a mother grabbing sunhats and sand buckets to take time off from war.

The response letters in the Healdsburg Tribune’s “Letters to the Editor” to Dave Henderson and my letters criticizing Gary Plass for not endorsing a ban on assault weapons made me realize that although there are many people who agree with our opinion there are also plenty who don’t. It was interesting to see the various views on the same subject. Most of us here in Sonoma County are liberals - mostly center-left but liberals just the same. Although we are technically part of the Bay Area we are still a rather rural community which is traditionally conservative. The divergent opinions have led to a healthy discourse which is one of the things that make our American way of life, as Vladimir Putin put it, “exceptional.”

Some people with Medicare are asking lately if their Medicare coverage is affected by the new the Health Insurance Marketplace that starts in 2014.