Editorial

Healdsburg¹s historic plaza park is in the midst of a

Editor: The madrases (public schools and universities) of

The good news about the controversy swirling around the county¹s

Tough DA

Inane statute

The physical landscape and human culture of Sonoma County is a multi-layered tapestry of many ethnic paths, heritages and contributions. But if we were to only celebrate one perhaps it should be Latinos and Hispanics, as we now seek to do with National Hispanic Heritage Month from Sept. 15 to Oct. 15.

It’s exciting to see county planning commissioners stepping up to the plate this week to address the county’s booming vacation rental market.

Healdsburg’s rental housing market is in crisis. Evictions, 60 day notices and often 20 percent-plus rental increases are occurring daily, the most recent eviction being the 21-unit rental housing on Prentice Drive, with all tenants being evicted for building repairs, and rents going from a range of $850 to $1,400 to $2,100 – a 65 percent rental increase and more in one year. How many rental units and people are in Healdsburg? According to the 2010 housing element statistics there are 4,378 total housing units in Healdsburg. Forty-two percent of them (1,857) are rental units. With an average of three persons per unit, this could represent 5,571 people in our community of 12,000 residents.

Two decades ago, lots of Sonoma County winemakers and innkeepers were jealous over the attention heaped on their counterparts in Napa Valley, but they swore they’d never actually want to be another Napa or another wine country version of Disneyland. Back then, Sonoma’s wine and hospitality people would chortle, “Sonoma’s for wine, Napa is for auto parts.”