Thanks to toasty temperatures for much of the country last month, March 2020 ranked 10th hottest on record for the contiguous United States.
March also was rather soggy, continuing the nation’s wet streak for 2020, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's National Centers for Environmental Information.
Tragically, the nation has endured two billion-dollar weather and climate disasters this year, so far – in January and March.
Here are more highlights from NOAA’s latest monthly U.S. climate report.
Climate by the numbers March 2020
The average monthly temperature across the contiguous U.S. was 46.1 degrees Fahrenheit – 4.6 degrees above the 20th-century average – making it the 10th-hottest March on record.
Florida saw its warmest March on record, and 17 other states from Texas to New England tallied a top-10 warmest March.
The average precipitation last month across the contiguous U.S. was 2.83 inches – 0.32 of an inch above average – ranking in the wettest third of the 126-year climate record.
Above-average precipitation fell from the Southwest northeastward into the Great Lakes. Both Oklahoma and Texas had a top-10 wettest March.
Year to date and billion-dollar disasters
The average U.S. temperature for the year to date (January through March) was 39.3 degrees F (4.1 degrees above the 20th-century average), which ranked 8th-warmest on record.
The contiguous U.S. kicked off the year on a soggy note as well, with a year-to-date average rainfall of 8.02 inches — 1.06 inches above average.
Moreover, the U.S. saw two billion-dollar disasters since the beginning of the new year:
– From Jan. 10 to 12, widespread storms and flooding swept from the South to the Midwest, including tornadoes, severe flooding and coastal damage along the Great Lakes.
– During March 2 and 3, overnight tornadoes in and around Nashville, Tenn., killed dozens of people and left a long swath of collapsed buildings and destroyed properties.
More notable climate events in March
– The Bering Sea saw a record ice melt: The Bering Sea’s ice cover started the month above average, but southerly winds pushed warmer water and warmer temperatures into the region causing the largest drop in March ice extent on record.
– A snowy month for parts of Alaska: The Headquarters for Denali National Park and Preserve experienced its snowiest four-day period on record for March, with 32.6 inches of snow falling between March 23 and 26.
– U.S. drought conditions intensified: By the end of March, 14.5 percent of the contiguous U.S. was in drought, up from 11.5 percent at the beginning of the month.
This artist’s concept shows the trajectory and configuration of NASA’s OSIRIS-REx spacecraft during Checkpoint rehearsal, which is the first time the mission will practice the initial steps for collecting a sample from asteroid Bennu. Credits: NASA/Goddard/University of Arizona. In August, a robotic spacecraft will make NASA’s first-ever attempt to descend to the surface of an asteroid, collect a sample, and ultimately bring it safely back to Earth.
In order to achieve this challenging feat, the OSIRIS-REx mission team devised new techniques to operate in asteroid Bennu’s microgravity environment – but they still need experience flying the spacecraft in close proximity to the asteroid in order to test them.
So, before touching down at sample site Nightingale this summer, OSIRIS-REx will first rehearse the activities leading up to the event.
On Apr. 14, the mission will pursue its first practice run – officially known as “Checkpoint” rehearsal – which will also place the spacecraft the closest it’s ever been to Bennu.
This rehearsal is a chance for the OSIRIS-REx team and spacecraft to test the first steps of the robotic sample collection event.
During the full touchdown sequence, the spacecraft uses three separate thruster firings to make its way to the asteroid’s surface.
After an orbit departure burn, the spacecraft executes the Checkpoint maneuver at 410 feet above Bennu, which adjusts the spacecraft’s position and speed down toward the point of the third burn.
This third maneuver, called “Matchpoint," occurs at approximately 164 feet from the asteroid’s surface and places the spacecraft on a trajectory that matches the rotation of Bennu as it further descends toward the targeted touchdown spot.
The Checkpoint rehearsal allows the team to practice navigating the spacecraft through both the orbit departure and Checkpoint maneuvers, and ensures that the spacecraft’s imaging, navigation and ranging systems operate as expected during the first part of the descent sequence.
Checkpoint rehearsal also gives the team a chance to confirm that OSIRIS-REx’s Natural Feature Tracking, or NFT, guidance system accurately updates the spacecraft’s position and velocity relative to Bennu as it descends towards the surface.
Checkpoint rehearsal, a four-hour event, begins with the spacecraft leaving its safe-home orbit, 0.6 miles above the asteroid. The spacecraft then extends its robotic sampling arm – the Touch-And-Go Sample Acquisition Mechanism, or TAGSAM – from its folded, parked position out to the sample collection configuration.
Immediately following, the spacecraft slews, or rotates, into position to begin collecting navigation images for NFT guidance.
NFT allows the spacecraft to autonomously guide itself to Bennu’s surface by comparing an onboard image catalog with the real-time navigation images taken during descent.
As the spacecraft descends to the surface, the NFT system updates the spacecraft’s predicted point of contact depending on OSIRIS-REx’s position in relation to Bennu’s landmarks.
Before reaching the 410-ft (125-m) Checkpoint altitude, the spacecraft’s solar arrays move into a “Y-wing” configuration that safely positions them away from the asteroid’s surface.
This configuration also places the spacecraft’s center of gravity directly over the TAGSAM collector head, which is the only part of the spacecraft that will contact Bennu’s surface during the sample collection event.
In the midst of these activities, the spacecraft continues capturing images of Bennu’s surface for the NFT navigation system. The spacecraft will then perform the Checkpoint burn and descend toward Bennu’s surface for another nine minutes, placing the spacecraft around 243 feet from the asteroid – the closest it has ever been.
Upon reaching this targeted point, the spacecraft will execute a back-away burn, then return its solar arrays to their original position and reconfigure the TAGSAM arm back to the parked position.
Once the mission team determines that the spacecraft successfully completed the entire rehearsal sequence, they will command the spacecraft to return to its safe-home orbit around Bennu.
Following the Checkpoint rehearsal, the team will verify the flight system’s performance during the descent, and that the Checkpoint burn accurately adjusted the descent trajectory for the subsequent Matchpoint burn.
The mission team has maximized remote work over the last month of preparations for the checkpoint rehearsal, as part of the COVID-19 response.
On the day of rehearsal, a limited number of personnel will command the spacecraft from Lockheed Martin Space’s facility, taking appropriate safety precautions, while the rest of the team performs their roles remotely.
The mission is scheduled to perform a second rehearsal on Jun. 23, taking the spacecraft through the Matchpoint burn and down to an approximate altitude of 82 feet. OSIRIS-REx’s first sample collection attempt is scheduled for Aug. 25.
NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland provides overall mission management, systems engineering, and the safety and mission assurance for OSIRIS-REx. Dante Lauretta of the University of Arizona, Tucson, is the principal investigator, and the University of Arizona also leads the science team and the mission’s science observation planning and data processing.
Lockheed Martin Space in Denver built the spacecraft and is providing flight operations. Goddard and KinetX Aerospace are responsible for navigating the OSIRIS-REx spacecraft. OSIRIS-REx is the third mission in NASA’s New Frontiers Program, which is managed by NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, for the agency’s Science Mission Directorate in Washington.
For more information on NASA’s OSIRIS-REx mission, visit https://www.nasa.gov/osiris-rex and https://www.asteroidmission.org .
Brittany Enos works for the University of Arizona.
Gov. Gavin Newsom has outlined steps California is taking to protect the residents and employees of the more than 1,224 skilled nursing facilities and 7,461 residential care facilities across the state.
Building on the state’s early action to protect these facilities, California has trained and is deploying 600 nurses to support compliance with COVID-19 guidance, and state staff is calling nursing homes across the state daily to provide support.
"Protecting California’s most vulnerable residents and the employees is a top priority – not only to protect public health but because it’s the right thing to do,” said Gov. Newsom. “Older Californians and those who are medically fragile are at higher risk of becoming seriously ill due to COVID-19, which is why we took early action to restrict visitors to these facilities. Now we are providing even more support for these facilities, their residents, and staff who serve them.”
Recognizing the threat to these medically fragile individuals, the state last month restricted visitors to these facilities except for end-of-life and other rare circumstances.
Before COVID-19 had spread widely in the community in California, the Department of Public Health and the Department of Social Services issued guidance and offered trainings on infection control. And the departments jointly deployed strike teams of infection control specialists to counties, nursing homes and residential care facilities for the elderly to provide one-on-one technical support and expertise.
The governor also announced on Friday that the USNS Mercy will be taking non-COVID-19 patients to help decompress skilled nursing facilities in the Los Angeles area.
To further protect vulnerable Californians, California is:
– Retraining 600 nurses to support facility compliance with COVID-19 guidance and to assist facilities with positive cases; – Working to decompress facilities to help slow the potential spread of COVID-19 in these facilities and create facilities specifically for positive patients; – Reaching out proactively to each skilled nursing facility on a daily basis to assess their specific needs and identify and address any challenges early on; – Prioritizing testing for patients discharged from a hospital to a skilled nursing facility to ensure patients who test positive are transferred to a facility that can safely provide care to the residents and also protect COVID-19 negative residents. California will also prioritize the testing of symptomatic residents and potentially exposed residents to ensure they are immediately isolated; – Prioritizing personal protective equipment to facilities with COVID-19 positive staff or residents and facilities that are at increased risk to COVID-19; – Providing stipends to certified nurse assistants, licensed vocational nurses and other critical staff at nursing homes to make sure their needs are met. A previously announced Facebook donation of up to $25 million available to provide $500 stipends to up to 50,000 nursing home workers; – Offering no-cost or low-cost hotel rooms for workers who have had possible exposure to COVID-19 or test positive for COVID-19 and do not need to be hospitalized; and – Ensuring that families of nursing home residents are informed and educated on COVID-19 safety protections for their loved ones.
Visit www.covid19.ca.gov for critical steps Californians can take to stay healthy, and resources available to those impacted by the outbreak.
A black-tailed jackrabbit. Photo by Kathleen Scavone.
LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – Not your typical bunny, the rabbit that inhabits Lake County is the black-tailed jackrabbit.
But here's the confusing part – jackrabbits are really hares, according to National Geographic.
A hare, which is not a rabbit, is a relative within the mammalian order Lagomorpha.
One of the key differences between a hare and a rabbit is that a hare will freeze in place when threatened, while a rabbit will make a bee-line to its burrow to escape a predator.
The manikin-like pose that the hare assumes lasts until its attacker gets too close for comfort. Then, the hare will make use of its gangly-looking lengthy legs, which are truly lithe and nimble, and will swerve and outmaneuver – if it's lucky – its predator.
Originally jackrabbits were referred to as “jackass rabbits.” In fact, Mark Twain wrote of the subject in his book, “Roughing It.”
After a time, the moniker in the popular lexicon was changed to jackrabbit.
Another term in our lexicon is “harebrained,” meaning silly, juvenile or foolish, which originates from the critters being nervous and agitated when caged.
The saying, “mad as a March hare” came about because of hares' zany antics during their January to August mating season when they jump up, frolic and otherwise become “mad as a March hare.”
A female hare, called a jill, requires that the male, called a jack, chase her for miles to “prove” he is good paternal material. A jill will throw a punch at any male approaching her if she is not yet ready to mate.
Female jackrabbits can birth several litters a year, with between one and six kits, or baby rabbits.
Jackrabbits grow to reach a length of approximately two feet, and weigh in at three to six pounds.
Black-tailed jackrabbits are not the largest of the North American hares, since the antelope jackrabbit, along with the white-tailed jackrabbit hold the distinction of being larger animals.
Our jackrabbits have beige fur, speckled with black along with long, black-edged ears. The elongated ears can track sounds by pivoting like satellite dishes. This fine sense of hearing allows it to tune in more readily on its many predators, like coyote, bobcat and fox.
Jackrabbits work hard to defend themselves against predators by “screaming,” biting and kicking with their powerful hind feet.
They signal danger to other rabbits by thumping their feet, along with flashing the bright, white underside of their tails like a warning light.
Jackrabbits become more active in late afternoon and remain hidden in vegetation during the daylight hours.
Their diet consists mainly of grasses and shrubs. It is in the consumption of all of this plant matter that the jackrabbit obtains enough water to survive, requiring an equivalent water-to-body weight ratio to thrive.
Along with our black-tailed jackrabbits, there are five other species of jackrabbits that thrive in western and central North America.
Be sure to watch for these wild creatures and their Bugs Bunny antics this season.
Kathleen Scavone, M.A., is a retired educator, potter, freelance writer and author of “Anderson Marsh State Historic Park: A Walking History, Prehistory, Flora, and Fauna Tour of a California State Park” and “Native Americans of Lake County.”
Downtown Lakeport, California, is lit up in honor of the men and women working on the frontlines against the COVID-19 pandemic. Courtesy photo. LAKEPORT, Calif. – The city of Lakeport is joining communities across the country to show support and gratitude to first responders, health care and other essential workers on the frontlines of COVID-19.
Blue lights began shining in the downtown area on Friday night and will be on display through the weekend.
The national campaign, “Light It Blue,” originated spontaneously in cities with displays on public buildings, bridges and storefronts, demonstrating appreciation for those who are keeping our communities safe during the global pandemic.
Purple lights will be glowing in California and locally on April 13 and 20, paying tribute to workers in the tourism and hospitality industry. These employers and employees have been hard hit by the ongoing closure of their businesses due to the coronavirus crisis.
The city and the community appreciate all the frontline and behind-the-scenes workers and responders. Residents and businesses are encouraged to display similar lighting and show their support.
New lighting was installed in downtown Lakeport during the revitalization projects and are programmed by a computer system that can be turned on and off by the flip of a switch.
More information is available from the Public Works Department, 707-263-3578.
The crewmembers of the Apollo 13 mission, step aboard the USS Iwo Jima, prime recovery ship for the mission, following splashdown and recovery operations in the South Pacific Ocean. Exiting the helicopter which made the pick-up some four miles from the Iwo Jima are (from left) astronauts Fred W. Haise Jr., lunar module pilot; James A. Lovell Jr., commander; and John L. Swigert Jr., command module pilot. The crippled Apollo 13 spacecraft splashed down at 12:07:44 p.m. (CST), April 17, 1970. Credits: NASA.
As NASA marks the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 13 mission – which has become known as “a successful failure” that saw the safe return of its crew in spite of a catastrophic explosion – the agency is sharing a variety of resources, recognizing the triumph of the mission control team and the astronauts, and looking at how those lessons learned can be applied to its lunar Artemis program.
“Our goal 50 years ago was to save our valiant crew after sending them around the Moon and return them safely to Earth,” said NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine. “Our goal now is to return to the Moon to stay, in a sustainable way. We are working hard to ensure that we don’t need to respond to this kind of emergency in Artemis, but to be ready to respond to any problems we don’t anticipate.”
The crew of Apollo 13 consisted of Commander James (Jim) Lovell Jr., Command Module Pilot John Swigert Jr. and Lunar Module Pilot Fred Haise Jr. Their Saturn V rocket launched at 2:13 p.m. EST on April 11,1970, from Launch Pad 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The command module was named Odyssey, and the lunar module was named Aquarius.
While en route to the Moon on April 13, an oxygen tank in the Apollo service module ruptured.
The lunar landing and moonwalks, which would have been executed by Lovell and Haise, were aborted as a dedicated team of flight controllers and engineering experts in the Apollo Mission Control Center devoted their efforts to developing a plan to shelter the crew in the lunar module as a “lifeboat” and retain sufficient resources to bring the spacecraft and its crew back home safely.
Splashdown occurred in the Pacific Ocean at 1:07 p.m. April 17, after a flight that lasted five days, 22 hours and 54 minutes.
Due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, no NASA in-person activities are planned or sponsored to mark the Apollo 13 anniversary.
However, a wealth of new content and programming, historic documents, still and video imagery are available online, including previously unreleased conversations between the crew of Apollo 13 and the recently restored Apollo Mission Control Center in Houston.
This dialogue includes the now-famous exchange between Lovell and mission control during which Lovell utters the phrase, “Houston, we've had a problem.”
Among the resources NASA is making available are:
Apollo 13 on NASA TV
NASA TV is commemorating the anniversary with multiple videos and interviews, anchored by an original special program, “Apollo 13: Home Safe,” premiering on NASA Television and all of the agency’s streaming and social media platforms.
The 30-minute program features an interview with Lovell, a conversation with Haise and Flight Directors Gene Kranz and Glynn Lunney, and engineer Hank Rotter, in the restored Apollo mission control room mixed with archival footage from the mission.
In addition, NASA TV will air replays of historic mission footage and “pop-up” mission factoids at the exact times the events happened 50 years ago.
Apollo 13 on social media
Social media followers are invited to ask questions about Apollo 13 using the hashtag #AskNASA. Experts will provide answers to as many questions as possible on social media and some will be answered in NASA TV’s upcoming #AskNASA episode about the mission.
The NASA Headquarters Photo Team will share historical images from the photo archives using the @NASAHQPhoto Twitter account, leading up to the splashdown anniversary on Friday, April 17.
The @NASA Instagram account will feature part one and two of an “Apollo 13 by the Numbers” story, a visual recap of the mission as told by the NASA History Office.
On Monday, April 13, the NASA Tumblr page will tell the story about the mission using compelling images and multimedia.
The NASA History Facebook account and @NASAHistory Twitter account also have special content planned during the week of the anniversary.
Apollo 13 Views of the Moon in 4K
This video, from the Scientific Visualization Studio at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, uses data gathered from NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter spacecraft to recreate some of the stunning views of the Moon the Apollo 13 astronauts saw on their perilous journey around the farside of the Moon.
These visualizations, in 4K resolution, depict many different views of the lunar surface, starting with earthset and sunrise and concluding with the time Apollo 13 reestablished radio contact with mission control.
Houston, We Have A Podcast
Listen as Lovell and Haise remember the fateful mission from their perspective 50 years later and reflect on the highlights of their expansive careers and share wisdom gained from their famous mission on its 50th anniversary.
This searchable Apollo 13 website is a NASA-funded project designed by NASA contractor Ben Feist that provides viewers with access to all of the photographs, film, transcripts and audio from the mission. Visitors can replay the mission in real time or scroll through to find highlights.
The site includes more than 17,000 hours of audio recorded from the various positions at mission control. It also includes video from NASA press conferences as they occurred, as well as newly audio-synched, previously silent, mission control footage.
Most of the Apollo 13 flight control team audiotapes were digitized in cooperation with the University of Texas, Dallas. Five additional tapes were found with the help of the National Archives and were digitized earlier this year by NASA.
Apollo 13 in-flight video recordings
These TV transmissions are film recordings of television transmissions, or kinescopes, transferred onto broadcast videotape, then converted to digital files and posted to Johnson’s Internet Archive collection.
Apollo 13 imagery collections
NASA makes imagery available in many formats and resolutions, and NASA’s Image and Video Library contains many items related to Apollo 13. Apollo 13 images also are available on the Apollo Lunar Surface Journal, a volunteer-created site managed by NASA’s History Office.
As NASA marks the anniversary of Apollo 13, the agency is progressing with its Artemis program, which will send the first woman and next man to the Moon by 2024, and establish sustainable exploration with its commercial and international partners by 2028. What we learn during sustained operations on the Moon will prepare us for the next giant leap – sending astronauts to Mars.
LAKEPORT, Calif. – Three women sustained major injuries in a Thursday afternoon crash on Highway 175 near Lakeport.
The California Highway Patrol’s Clear Lake Area office said the two-car wreck occurred at 3:42 p.m. Thursday.
Faith E. Eyler, 20, was driving a 1997 Honda Civic westbound on Highway 175 west of Matthews Road, with Deanna M. Lambert, 20, of Clearlake in the front right passenger seat, the CHP said.
Michelle A. Baldwin, 59, was traveling eastbound on Highway 175, driving a 2006 BMW X5, according to the CHP report.
The CHP said Eyler allowed her vehicle to travel off the north road edge of the highway. She overcorrected her steering and crossed over the solid double yellow lines as she lost control of her vehicle.
Eyler's vehicle traveled into oncoming traffic, with her Honda colliding head-on with Baldwin’s BMW, the CHP said.
Following the collision, the CHP said all three women were transported via ambulance to Sutter Lakeside Hospital in Lakeport for treatment of major injuries.
The CHP said neither drugs nor alcohol were suspected as factors in this collision.
All three women were wearing seat belts, the CHP said.
Email Elizabeth Larson at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. . Follow her on Twitter, @ERLarson, or Lake County News, @LakeCoNews.
Melissa Fulton and Jeff Warrenburg from Lakeport Rotary presented a donation while maintaining an appropriate social distance with Deanna Fernweh, Jordan O’Halloran and Cindy Storrs of NCO’s New Digs in Lakeport, California. Photo courtesy of North Coast Opportunities. LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – The New Digs Rapid Rehousing Program has received a $500 donation from the Rotary Club of Lakeport to support its shelter in place food drive.
The New Digs Rapid Rehousing program follows a Housing First model and aims to help those experiencing homelessness find and secure permanent housing.
The program offers housing stabilization through short-term rental assistance and intensive case management.
It has served more than 300 people since inception in 2017 and currently supports approximately 100 clients.
In 2019, New Digs actively housed over 50 people who were experiencing homelessness at the time they entered the program.
In response to the COVID-19 emergency, the New Digs Shelter in Place Food Drive was created to support New Digs clients experiencing lost wages by delivering personal care packages to those most vulnerable.
Deliveries include fresh fruit, an array of non-perishable food, laundry soap, diapers and baby formula when needed. The project is actively seeking donations.
New Digs is a program of North Coast Opportunities Inc. and is led by director of community projects, Robyn Bera.
“When the shelter in place ordinance hit, we knew we had to act quickly,” said Bera. “Many of our clients are fragile and working toward regaining their independence while maintaining permanent housing. We are prepared to do whatever is necessary to help them avoid slipping back into homelessness.”
It is the combination of financial assistance, intensive case management, landlord partnerships, and long-term planning that lends itself toward long-term client success. “Food security is often a challenge for our clients, and we are working hard to make sure their basic needs for housing, food and hygiene are met,” Bera said.
Within a week of the shelter in place ordinance the New Digs team started fundraising while working with local grocery stores and partners.
“We love this community and the support has been tremendous,” added Housing Navigator Deanna Fernweh. “We are grateful to Lakeport Rotary for donating $500 to our project and to Redwood Credit Union. Lakeport Grocery Outlet and Lakeport Dollar Store have been critical partners in this effort too. ”
In its first week the project provided home delivery to over 20 households using a method that is safe for both staff and clients and adheres to all social distancing recommendations. Household sizes range from one to eight.
Meanwhile, Lead Housing Case Manager Cindy Storrs led a campaign to call all 300 clients in the New Digs database.
“Our case management team immediately pulled together and started surveying our current and past clients to understand their needs and how this emergency was having an impact on them,” said Storrs.
Using vulnerability scoring criteria, Storrs and team identified the most vulnerable clients, often focusing on those with medical needs, limited transportation and lost wages. “We hope to increase the number of households we serve each week and we anticipate client needs will rise each week this continues.”
NCO is also partnering with the Department of Social Services, Catholic Charities, Lake Transit, Lake County Office of Education AmeriCorps, and many other agencies to launch the Community Food Drive Project in mid-April.
This project will also deliver food and resources directly to the homes of residents, with priority given to those experiencing food insecurity as a direct result of COVID-19. While still in development, more information is available at 993-4644.
NCO continues to provide additional support in response to the community effects from COVID-19.
NCO Head Start and Early Head Start Centers have shifted to a modified learning system with at-home activities and regular teacher/family contact. This system will remain in place until May 1 (this date will continue to be reviewed and adjusted as needed).
NCO’s Rural Communities Child Care continues to support providers who are providing child care. Child care remains an essential support service as mandated by the Governor’s Office. If individuals are in need of child care, please email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or call 707-263-4688 Extension 410 with your name, phone number where you can be reached, the days and hours of child care needed, and age of child(ren) needing care.
NCO Volunteer Network is currently recruiting emergency volunteers to help with the COVID-19 response. Please visit www.volunteernco.org for more information or call 707-467-3200, Extension 239. In addition, Tax preparation volunteers are rescheduling tax appointments with VITA clients (US and State tax deadlines have been extended).
NCO’s Redwood Caregiver Resource Center continues to be available to provide remote support for caregivers providing care for adults with brain impairments. For more information, please visit their website www.redwoodcrc.org . Alternatively, those needing assistance, can call 800-834-1636.
NCO’s New Digs is actively seeking donations. Any funds not immediately used by New Digs will be directed to the Community Food Drive Project, in this way, donors can still support the home delivery of food to local people in need. To donate or learn more contact Robyn Bera at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or call 278-8696.
For more information about the New Digs Program or NCO, visit www.ncoinc.org or call 707-467-3200 and leave a message (staff are monitoring and returning calls). Anyone currently experiencing homelessness may call New Digs directly at 707-461-4574 and request to join the waiting list. Due to limitations with COVID-19, New Digs is limited in its ability to accept new clients at this time.
NCO is the Community Action Agency that serves Lake and Mendocino Counties, as well as parts of Humboldt, Sonoma, Del Norte, Napa and Solano Counties. NCO reacts and adjusts to community needs, including disaster response and recovery.
For more information visit www.ncoinc.org or call 707-467-3200.
LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – On Friday the Lake County Public Health Department confirmed a fourth positive case of COVID-19 in Lake County, while neighboring counties announced updated shelter in place orders.
Lake County Public Health Officer Dr. Gary Pace said the fourth case is related to one of the previous three.
“The fourth case is a part of one of the other households, and they have been under isolation,” he said in an email responding to Lake County News’ questions about the case.
Pace did not respond to Lake County News’ request to clarify to which household the fourth case belonged.
The first two cases, confirmed on Sunday and Monday, were reported to involve close family members, one of whom had been in contact with a known case at an out-of-county workplace, as Lake County News has reported.
The third case, confirmed on Tuesday, also involved an initial contact with an infected person out of county, Public Health reported.
In that third case, information released by Pace indicated the person had been out in the community over the previous weeks, before testing positive.
Pace said earlier this week that the third case “illustrates the importance of everyone maintaining ‘shelter in place,’ and wearing a mask when in the public because virus transmission can occur from people with no obvious symptoms.”
Regarding the fourth case, Pace said, “There does not seem to be any further risk of community transmission from this case. It does show how much it can travel through a household.”
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention defines community transmission or spread as “spread of an illness for which the source of infection is unknown.”
Lake County Public Health reported that all four patients are isolating at home. None are reported to have recovered so far.
Pace offered no other details in response to Lake County News’ questions.
He and his department have declined to give further information about the cases, including demographics and locations of patients, citing the need to protect privacy.
Other counties around the state, however, have offered breakdowns of age, gender and community of residence, among other details when reporting their COVID-19 cases.
In addition to the four positive tests, there have been 238 negative tests, according to Lake County Public Health’s case dashboard.
The Public Health dashboard said information on how many total tests of Lake County residents have been conducted is not available.
Lake County residents have been under a shelter in place order implemented by Pace since March 19. He extended it this week to continue until May 3. Under his order, Lake County waterways, including Clear Lake, are closed, an effort that is meant in part to discourage out-of-area visitors.
Pace is advising people to wear facial coverings when out of doors but it is not so far a requirement.
On Friday, Public Health departments across the state were reporting positive case totals topping 20,000, with more than 550 deaths.
Lake’s neighboring counties have so far reported the following positive case counts: Colusa, three; Glenn, three; Mendocino, four; Napa, 32 cases and two deaths; Sonoma, 142 cases and one death; Yolo, 71 cases and three deaths.
In other regional news, Mendocino County Public Health Officer Dr. Noemi Doohan issued a third revised shelter in place order for that county which goes into effect at 10 p.m. Friday and will remain in place until May 10.
Doohan’s updated order says that wearing facial coverings in public is strongly encouraged and made mandatory in certain instances, such as during recreation in parks, and requires essential businesses to create and post social distancing protocols.
During a Wednesday night coronavirus virtual town hall hosted by State Sen. Mike McGuire, Doohan – who was a panelist, as was Pace – indicated she was planning to take the action to require facial coverings in some instances.
Also on Friday, Colusa County Public Health Officer Dr. Gregory Burt issued an order extending and expanding that county’s shelter in place directives through May 8. Burt had first issued an order to shelter in place and maintain social distancing on March 20.
Email Elizabeth Larson at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. Follow her on Twitter, @ERLarson, or Lake County News, @LakeCoNews.
Flour has been in short supply in recent weeks. Gregory Rec/Portland Press Herald via Getty Images)
Retailers are frequently running out of everything from flour and fresh meat to toilet paper and pharmaceuticals as supply chains hammered by the coronavirus struggle to keep up with stockpiling consumers.
Although out-of-stock products are usually replenished within a day or two, the sight of bare shelves typically prompts more hoarding as people fear the supply of the goods they need may be cut off. This vicious cycle is a direct result of shortcomings of modern supply chains, which most companies, regardless of industry, now use.
Toilet paper has seen persistent supply shortages.Michael Siluk/Education Images/Universal Images Group via Getty Images
1. Supply chains have become very complex
Fundamentally, a supply chain links a series of companies that make, transport, refine and deliver the finished product you buy at a retailer, restaurant or anywhere else.
Consider a cup of coffee from Starbucks. Your coffee might begin as a pile of coffee beans grown and picked by a farmer in Guatemala. They’re then shipped to a coffee roaster, say in Seattle, who then sends them on to a distributor near where you live, who sells them to your local Starbucks.
A shutdown anywhere along the supply chain in any of these locations stops this flow and could prevent you from enjoying your morning brew.
While a coffee supply chain may be relatively simple and linear, it can quickly get complicated for products that have many parts, such as an Apple iPhone. Apple actually has suppliers in 43 countries, and tracing the journey of any one component is difficult. For example, one of the chips that run an iPhone is designed in California but made in Taiwan, tested in the Philippines and then added to Apple products in China.
The result is that the vast majority of global companies don’t fully grasp their risk exposure. Few, if any, have complete knowledge of the locations of all the companies that provide parts to their direct suppliers. Even supply chains for foods like bananas are long and complex, as most produce comes from countries across the globe.
Compounding the complexity is the problem of capacity, which is how much of something each company in a supply chain can produce. Rapidly increasing capacity is hard. Just think about the difference in hosting a dinner party for two guests versus 200. That is exactly why there is a shortage of hand sanitizer. Customers are buying huge amounts, but suppliers are not able to increase available amounts of essential ingredients, such as alcohol, glycerol and hydrogen peroxide.
2. A lean machine
What has made these supply chains even more vulnerable are strategies that rely heavily on “just in time” or lean inventory replenishment. That is, companies maintain only enough stock on hand for a short duration and rely on small deliveries made frequently to keeps costs low.
For example, many companies keep just enough inventory to last a few weeks, confident that products will arrive as they are needed. That system works perfectly well provided there are no disruptions.
However, as companies in a wide variety of industries, including food, retail, high-tech and automotive, have increasingly implemented this strategy, they no longer have the extra inventory or excess capacity to make up for production losses caused by a disruption. As a result, these businesses are highly vulnerable to even a short material-flow problem. When an earthquake shook Taiwan on Sept. 21, 1999, it created a huge disruption for the computer-chip industry, delaying shipping times for some products by more than a week.
Similarly, since lean systems removed most excess inventory, many medical supply chains were not able to respond to disruptions during emergence of the avian influenza, or “bird flu,” in 2005.
Yet those were relatively minor, regional disruptions. The coronavirus pandemic has virtually shut down dozens of economies, with movements of over a third of the global population restricted. This means a surge in demand for any product could easily result in shortages for days or weeks.
Having a lean inventory is a strategy with many benefits and is designed to eliminate waste and cut costs. However, many companies may have taken it too far. In an era of global connectivity, a disruption anywhere can trickle down the entire supply chain.
Ground beef is a prime example of a lean supply chain.Erik Isakson/Getty Images
3. Moving manufacturing offshore
Further exacerbating the problem is the strategy of offshoring, in which companies manufacture their products overseas in countries like China, Vietnam and Malaysia in an effort to cut costs.
On the plus side, this has allowed many companies to reduce the number of links in their supply chains – or at least shrink the distance between them – by relying primarily on a smaller number of sources that are concentrated in a specific geographic area.
But in this quest to lower operating costs, including labor and overhead, more companies have put too many of their “eggs” in one basket. Certain industries have favored certain regions, with the auto, tech and agricultural industries favoring China. India, on the other hand, has become the primary source for generic drugs.
As a result, disruptions in a single country become even more severe. In January, well before the U.S. and countries in Europe had coronavirus outbreaks of their own, Western companies and retailers were already bracing for severe supply chain problems after China’s economy went into lockdown. And the impacts are still being felt several months later on all kinds of products, from toys and TV screens to sponges and ink cartridges, and could even extend into Christmas.
Getting ready for the next crisis
Of course, it makes sense that companies would do all they can to reduce costs and make their supply chains as efficient as possible.
That has made them incredibly vulnerable to disruptions, even minor ones. And the coronavirus pandemic is a disruption like no other, and undoubtedly people will continue to see temporary and longer shortages of essential goods as long as it lasts. My biggest concern is that if COVID-19 continues to spread throughout the U.S., devastating the ranks of large meat packing plants and other factories and farms, Americans will begin to experience severe scarcity of foods and other goods.
While it’s probably too late to do much about the current crisis, I hope companies learn these lessons and adopt better strategies to manage their supply chains risks, such as by putting in place more backup suppliers and building up more inventory.
Maybe then more of them will be ready for the next disruption.
LAKEPORT, Calif. – The Easter Bunny is coming to town.
On Easter Sunday, the Lakeport Police Department, the city of Lakeport and the Lakeport Public Works Department will be assisting the Easter Bunny and Lakeport Rotary for a special visit to the city.
From noon to 2 p.m. Sunday, community members can drive by and wave at the Easter Bunny and two of his Rotary helpers – who will be masked and practicing social distancing – at Library Park, located across from City Hall at 225 Park St.
This is drive by only; people must not stop and get out of their vehicles. There can't be any stopping or congregating in the park.
Please enter on First Street and exit on Third Street so that everyone gets a good chance to blow the Easter Bunny a kiss.
LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – An emergency rule accepted by the Judicial Council of California this week is changing a number of court operations, including enacting stays on evictions and foreclosures and establishing a temporary bail schedule, which in Lake County has led to a slight reduction in the jail population.
On Monday, the Judicial Council approved 11 temporary emergency rules for courts statewide that included a $0 statewide bail for misdemeanors and lower-level felonies during the COVID-19 pandemic to “safely reduce jail populations.”
“We are in uncharted territory in many aspects of our everyday lives. The COVID-19 virus has impacted every institution including the courts in how business is conducted in order to enforce social distancing and protect and safe lives,” Lake County District Attorney Susan Krones said in response to the changes.
Lt. Corey Paulich of the Lake County Sheriff’s Office said neither Sheriff Brian Martin nor any county representatives had requested the changes.
“The sheriff is obligated to follow rules and laws set forth by the state, therefore, the sheriff’s office will be working with the Lake County Superior Court and the District Attorney’s Office to comply with this rule,” Paulich said.
At its Monday meeting, the Judicial Council also took action to stay eviction and foreclosure proceedings; allow courts to require judicial proceedings and court operations be conducted remotely, with the defendant’s consent in criminal proceedings; allow defendants to appear via counsel or remote technologies for pretrial criminal hearings; prioritize hearings and orders in juvenile justice proceedings and set a structure for remote hearings and continuances; extend the timeframes for specified temporary restraining orders; extend the statutes of limitations governing civil actions; and allow electronic depositions in civil cases.
Officials said it was the second emergency council meeting of court and branch leaders from around the state to consider further measures to ensure California courts can provide due process and access to justice while following stringent health directions to protect against COVID-19.
Courts remain open as "essential services" under Gov. Gavin Newsom's stay-home executive order.
The Lake County Superior Court had an initial closure that went into effect on March 18, later announcing limited operations through May 1, as Lake County News has reported.
“We are at this point truly with no guidance in history, law or precedent,” said Chief Justice Tani Cantil-Sakauye, chair of the council. “And to say that there is no playbook is a gross understatement of the situation.”
Cantil-Sakauye said that the council listened to suggestions from justice system partners, the public and the courts in developing the rules it enacted this week.
“Working with our court stakeholders, I’m confident we can preserve the rule of law and protect the rights of victims, the accused, litigants, families and children, and all who seek justice. It’s truly a team effort,” she said.
New bail rule being rolled out locally
The emergency rule to reduce jail populations established a mandatory statewide bail schedule effective no later than 5 p.m. Monday, April 13. The application of the revised bail schedule is mandatory for every superior court in the state.
The new bail schedule sets bail at $0 for all misdemeanors and felony offenses, with certain exceptions.
Also exempted from the $0 bail rule include felony and misdemeanor domestic violence, violations of domestic violence protective orders, registerable sex offense violations, possession of a firearm by a felon, felony looting, felony criminal threats and driving under the influence.
That new bail schedule applies to all accused persons held in pretrial custody and will stay in effect until 90 days after the governor declares that the state of emergency is lifted, Krones said.
Krones said the emergency bail schedule doesn’t restrict the ability of the court to deny bail under the California State Constitution Article I, section 12 or 28(f) (3).
Those portions of the State Constitution allow superior court judges to take into consideration the protection of the public, the safety of the victim, the seriousness of the offense, the defendant’s previous criminal record and the probability of the defendant’s appearance at trial or hearing of the case when setting, reducing or denying bail, Krones said.
“Due to this new emergency bail schedule, I expect that a number of pretrial inmates will be released from the Lake County Jail. Any of these released inmates will be given new court dates to appear and if they fail to appear without good cause we will be filing new charges for that failure to appear,” she said.
At the Lake County Jail, where beginning last month they had stopped booking all but felonies and several serious misdemeanor charges, on Thursday the sheriff’s office initially had estimated as many as 24 pretrial inmates could be released as a result of the new rules.
By day’s end, however, Paulich reported that only six inmates were eligible for the $0 bail, three of whom had posted bail already. That left three to be released on Thursday, bringing the jail population to below 190. The jail is licensed for 286 inmates, according to previous reports from Sheriff Martin.
Once the order is lifted, Krones said her office will request bail revert back to the previous amount in appropriate cases.
She assured Lake County residents that, “as your district attorney, I will do everything I can to protect our community in these difficult times.”
Asked if she has seen anything comparable in her career, Krones told Lake County News, “I can honestly say I have never had to deal with anything like this before and I was in the Army.”
Email Elizabeth Larson at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. . Follow her on Twitter, @ERLarson, or Lake County News, @LakeCoNews.
