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LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – Lake County Animal Care and Control has another group of mostly big dogs – plus a dachshund – waiting to go to new homes this week.

Dogs available for adoption this week include mixes of Dachshund, German Shepherd, Labrador Retriever, pit bull and shepherd.

Dogs that are adopted from Lake County Animal Care and Control are either neutered or spayed, microchipped and, if old enough, given a rabies shot and county license before being released to their new owner. License fees do not apply to residents of the cities of Lakeport or Clearlake.

If you're looking for a new companion, visit the shelter. There are many great pets hoping you'll choose them.

The following dogs at the Lake County Animal Care and Control shelter have been cleared for adoption (additional dogs on the animal control Web site not listed are still “on hold”).

This young male shepherd is in kennel No. 6, ID No. 11600. Photo courtesy of Lake County Animal Care and Control.

Male shepherd

This young male shepherd has a medium-length tricolor coat.

He’s in kennel No. 6, ID No. 11600.

This female shepherd is in kennel No. 7a, ID No. 11602. Photo courtesy of Lake County Animal Care and Control.

Female shepherd

This female shepherd has a medium-length black and brown coat.

She’s in kennel No. 7a, ID No. 11602.

This female German Shepherd is in kennel No. 7b, ID No. 11604. Photo courtesy of Lake County Animal Care and Control.

Female German Shepherd

This female German Shepherd has a medium-length black and tan coat.

She’s in kennel No. 7b, ID No. 11604.

This male Labrador Retriever is in kennel No. 9a, ID No. 11588. Photo courtesy of Lake County Animal Care and Control.

Male Labrador Retriever

This male Labrador Retriever has a short black coat.

He’s in kennel No. 9a, ID No. 11588.

This male Labrador Retriever is in kennel No. 9b, ID No. 11589. Photo courtesy of Lake County Animal Care and Control.

Male Labrador Retriever

This male Labrador Retriever has a short black coat with white markings.

He’s in kennel No. 9b, ID No. 11589.

“Tank” is a male pit bull terrier in kennel No. 21, ID No. 7002. Photo courtesy of Lake County Animal Care and Control.

‘Tank’

“Tank” is a male pit bull terrier with a short brown brindle coat.

He already has been neutered.

He’s in kennel No. 21, ID No. 7002.

This male dachshund is in kennel No. 27, ID No. 11608. Photo courtesy of Lake County Animal Care and Control.

Male dachshund

This male dachshund has a short black coat.

He’s in kennel No. 27, ID No. 11608.

This male German Shepherd is in kennel No. 33, ID No. 11564. Photo courtesy of Lake County Animal Care and Control.

Male German Shepherd

This male German Shepherd has a medium-length tricolor coat.

He’s in kennel No. 33, ID No. 11564.

This male German Shepherd is in kennel No. 34, ID No. 11605. Photo courtesy of Lake County Animal Care and Control.

Male German Shepherd

This male German Shepherd as a medium-length black and tan coat.

He has been neutered.

He’s in kennel No. 34, ID No. 11605.

Lake County Animal Care and Control is located at 4949 Helbush in Lakeport, next to the Hill Road Correctional Facility.

Office hours are Monday through Friday, 11 a.m. to 5 p.m., and 11 a.m. to 3 p.m., Saturday. The shelter is open from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday through Friday and on Saturday from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.

Visit the shelter online at http://www.co.lake.ca.us/Government/Directory/Animal_Care_And_Control.htm.

For more information call Lake County Animal Care and Control at 707-263-0278.

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.
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A new analysis shows that ocean temperatures are on the rise, and they are going up faster than once thought. Image courtesy of UC Berkeley.

Heat trapped by greenhouse gases is raising ocean temperatures faster than previously thought, concludes an analysis of four recent ocean heating observations.

The results provide further evidence that earlier claims of a slowdown or “hiatus” in global warming over the past 15 years were unfounded.

“If you want to see where global warming is happening, look in our oceans,” said Zeke Hausfather, a graduate student in the Energy and Resources Group at the University of California, Berkeley, and co-author of the paper. “Ocean heating is a very important indicator of climate change, and we have robust evidence that it is warming more rapidly than we thought.”

Ocean heating is critical marker of climate change because an estimated 93 percent of the excess solar energy trapped by greenhouse gases accumulates in the world’s oceans. And, unlike surface temperatures, ocean temperatures are not affected by year-to-year variations caused by climate events like El Nino or volcanic eruptions.

The new analysis, appears online today in Science, shows that trends in ocean heat content match those predicted by leading climate change models, and that overall ocean warming is accelerating.

Assuming a “business-as-usual” scenario in which no effort has been made to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project 5 (CMIP5) models predict that the temperature of the top 2,000 meters of the world’s oceans will rise 0.78 degrees Celsius by the end of the century.

The thermal expansion caused by this bump in temperature would raise sea levels 30 centimeters, or around 12 inches, on top of the already significant sea level rise caused by melting glaciers and ice sheets. Warmer oceans also contribute to stronger storms, hurricanes and extreme precipitation.

“While 2018 will be the fourth warmest year on record on the surface, it will most certainly be the warmest year on record in the oceans, as was 2017 and 2016 before that,” Hausfather said. “The global warming signal is a lot easier to detect if it is changing in the oceans than on the surface.”

The four studies, published between 2014 and 2017, provide better estimates of past trends in ocean heat content by correcting for discrepancies between different types of ocean temperature measurements and by better accounting for gaps in measurements over time or location.

“The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s (IPCC) Fifth Assessment Report, published in 2013, showed that leading climate change models seemed to predict a much faster increase in ocean heat content over the last 30 years than was seen in observations,” Hausfather said. “That was a problem, because of all things, that is one thing we really hope the models will get right.”

“The fact that these corrected records now do agree with climate models is encouraging in that is removes an area of big uncertainty that we previously had,” he said.

Deep divers

A fleet of nearly 4,000 floating robots drift throughout the world’s oceans, every few days diving to a depth of 2000 meters and measuring the ocean’s temperature, pH, salinity and other bits of information as they rise back up. This ocean-monitoring battalion, called Argo, has provided consistent and widespread data on ocean heat content since the mid-2000s.

Prior to Argo, ocean temperature data was sparse at best, relying on devices called expendable bathythermographs that sank to the depths only once, transmitting data on ocean temperature until settling into watery graves.

Three of the new studies included in the Science analysis calculated ocean heat content back to 1970 and before using new methods to correct for calibration errors and biases in the both the Argo and bathythermograph data. The fourth takes a completely different approach, using the fact that a warming ocean releases oxygen to the atmosphere to calculate ocean warming from changes in atmospheric oxygen concentrations, while accounting for other factors, like burning fossil fuels, that also change atmospheric oxygen levels.

“Scientists are continually working to improve how to interpret and analyze what was a fairly imperfect and limited set of data prior to the early 2000s,” Hausfather said. “These four new records that have been published in recent years seem to fix a lot of problems that were plaguing the old records, and now they seem to agree quite well with what the climate models have produced.”

Lijing Cheng of the Chinese Academy of Sciences is the lead author on the paper. Co-authors include John Abraham of the University of St. Thomas and Kevin E. Trenberth of the National Center for Atmospheric Research.

This study was supported by the National Key R&D Program of China (2017YFA0603202). The National Center for Atmospheric Research is sponsored by the National Science Foundation.

Kara Manke writes for the UC Berkeley News Center.
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NORTHERN CALIFORNIA – At the annual organization meeting held on Dec. 20, new officers were elected for the Yuba Community College District Board of Trustees.

At the Jan. 10 regular meeting of the governing board, a newly elected trustee was sworn into office.

“I would like to offer my hearty appreciation to these trustees who have assumed critical governance responsibilities. Our board members are truly dedicated servants of their communities providing countless hours in leadership for our colleges and students. I am humbled to serve with such civic-minded community leaders who have committed to becoming a 'best-in-class' Governing Board," said Chancellor Douglas B. Houston.

Dr. Jesse Ortiz – who represents Trustee Area 5, which includes a portion of Yolo County that includes the city of Woodland and the Woodland Unified School District – was sworn in by his wife of 41 years.

Dr. Ortiz retired in 2018 as the superintendent of Yolo County Office of Education where he had served since 2014.

He has a bachelor’s degree from San Jose State University and a master’s degree from Sacramento State University. His Educational Leadership Doctorate degree is from Brigham Young University. Trustee Ortiz was a Guidance Counselor at Woodland Community College for 20 years.

Trustee Richard Teagarden was re-elected to YCCD Trustee Area 1 and was elected as President of the YCCD Board of Trustees. Trustee Area 1 includes a portion of Yuba County and includes Marysville Joint Unified School District, was elected as the President of the Board.

Teagarden retired in 2010 as the superintendent of Yuba County Office of Education where he had served since 1994. Prior to that appointment, Teagarden was a principal and teacher in the Marysville Joint Unified School District.

He is a graduate of Marysville High School and Yuba College; his undergraduate degree and his master’s degree in public school administration is from North Texas State University.

Trustee David Wheeler was re-elected to YCCD Trustee Area 3 and was elected as vice president of the YCCD Board of Trustees. Trustee Area 3 includes a portion of Sutter County including Nuestro, Franklin, Brittan, Meridian, and Winship Elementary School District, Live Oak Unified School District and Yuba City Unified School District.

First elected to the board in 2010, Wheeler is a graduate of Yuba City High School, has an associate’s degree from Yuba College, and bachelor’s and master’s degrees from San Francisco State University in Theater Arts.

From 1976 until his retirement in 2010, Trustee Wheeler was professor of theatre arts and film studies at Yuba College. During his tenure he directed more than 125 major productions, and received numerous awards including the first Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival Award for Excellence in Theatre Education.

Susan Alves was elected as clerk of the YCCD Board of Trustees. She represents Trustee Area 6, which includes a portion of Yolo County (Woodland Unified School District) and a portion of Colusa County (Colusa, Pierce Joint, and Esparto Unified School District).

She was appointed to the Yuba Community College District Board of Trustees in October. Her current term expires in December 2020.

Alves retired in 2018 from public education where she served in the Woodland Joint Unified School District for 22 years; 13 years as a teacher and nine years as an elementary school principal.

She attended Woodland Community College; her undergraduate degree is from Chico State University and she attended Sacramento State University where she earned a Multiple Subject Teacher Credential and an Administrative Services Credential.

Other members of the YCCD Board of Trustees are Brent Hastey, Michael Pasquale, and V. Richard Savarese.

The Yuba Community College District spans eight counties and nearly 4,192 square miles of territory in rural, north-central California. Yuba College and Woodland Community College, offer degrees, certificates and transfer curricula at college campuses in Marysville and Woodland, educational centers in Clearlake and Yuba City, and through outreach operations in Williams and on Beale Air Force Base.

The two colleges in Yolo County and Yuba County and the campuses in Clearlake, Colusa, and Sutter Counties, serve 13,000 students across the northern Sacramento Valley.

For more information about YCCD, visit http://yccd.edu .
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NORTH COAST, Calif. – The Diocese of Santa Rosa has produced a list of its priests and deacons who have been accused of sexual abuse, with the allegations spanning more than six decades.

Bishop Robert F. Vasa released the list of 39 men on Saturday on the diocese’s Web site and in its newspaper, North Coast Catholic.

The diocese will hold a press conference about the list at 10 a.m. Monday. The event will be livestreamed on the diocese Facebook page at www.facebook.com/dioceseofsantarosa.

The list includes the late Father Ted Oswald, who served in Lake County and was the focus of two lawsuits alleging abuse.

The first suit, filed in 2008, alleged Oswald had sexually abused a young man between 1988 and 1995.

Oswald, who served as priest at St. Mary Immaculate Catholic Church in Lakeport for 20 years, took a leave of absence in June 2008 and didn’t return to ministry.

That suit was settled in March 2009 and Oswald died the following year.

Another suit alleging Oswald abused a teenager was filed in 2013.

It’s unclear, based on the information provided by the diocese, if any of the other priests served at any time in Lake County.

Vasa prefaced the list with a statement in which he expressed “sincere sorrow that so many have been subjected to the evil actions of priests and bishops,” and he apologized for anyone who has been injured by the clergy on the list.

“While the Church has taken some very significant actions over the past 20 years, those actions are significant in terms of the present and future protection of children. However, they do not touch the very real trauma which the evil actions of deacons, priests and bishops have caused in the lives of thousands of young people in our nation,” Bishop Vasa said.

“My primary goal in releasing the names of accused priests and deacons who served in Santa Rosa in this public fashion is to give to all the victims of clerical sexual abuse the assurance that they have been heard and that the Church is very much concerned for their well-being and healing,” Vasa said.

He added, “It is my deepest prayer and hope that this release of names in a consolidated fashion says to any of you who are victims, we have heard you, we believe you, we affirm you in your trauma and we want to help with a healing process. Bringing difficult things to light is painful. It is painful for victims of childhood sexual abuse, for the People of God, for our priests, and for me. I know of no other way to bring light to this distressing moment in the Church.”

Based on the list, abuses were committed from 1957 to 2006.

The list includes 17 who have no known allegations against them during the time of their service or presence in the Diocese of Santa Rosa.

Also listed are seven whose names were released officially by the diocese in January 2004; 14 who “whose names have become a part of a public record, mostly by way of public expressions in the media or on the internet,” in which Oswald was included; four who were prosecuted and convicted; and 22 who are deceased.

The diocese reported in its newspaper, “No priest with a credible accusation of sexual abuse of a minor or vulnerable adult is currently serving in public ministry in the Diocese of Santa Rosa. In keeping with the Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People, when a member of the clergy is found to be guilty of a crime against children or young people, he is permanently removed from ministry.”

Vasa said that, despite the fact that he wants to be entirely open about accusations against diocesan clergy, the names of six additional individuals against whom allegations have been made are not being released.

He said those accusations lack sufficient substantiation to justify a release or the Diocesan Review Board believes they may not be released without a court order authorizing the diocese to do so.

In three cases the proper authorities investigated and found the allegations not substantiated, Vasa said. One of these individuals remains in ministry.

Vasa said that, in two cases, the allegations came to the diocese or religious community to which the accused belonged, and those entities have not yet determined the suitability of releasing the names. In one case the nature of the event described does not indicate that abuse occurred.

The Diocesan Review Board has openly discussed all six, and all but two of the names have been revealed to the Sonoma County district attorney. The two remaining have been reported to police in a timely fashion and investigated, and so Vasa said the presumption of innocence and the right to a presumption of innocence must be fully respected.

“The Diocese does not desire to hide or cover-up anything,” he wrote.

Vasa said the list doesn’t include two other names of individuals who have been the subject of news stories: Bishop G. Patrick Ziemann and Archbishop John Nienstedt.

Ziemann formerly headed the Santa Rosa Diocese until he was sued in 1999 by a young priest who said Ziemann forced him to have sex. Ziemann died in 2009.

Niensted, who came to California in 2015 after serving as archbishop of St. Paul and Minneapolis, has worked at the Napa Institute in Napa County and presided over Mass at the Meritage chapel.

In a statement, Niensted said that in December he became aware that an allegation had been brought to the Ramsey County, Minnesota prosecutor in 2016 by a man in the Diocese of New Ulm. That man said that when he was a minor in 2005 he met Niensted during the 2005 World Youth Day in Cologne, Germany.

The man said he and a friend and Niensted got caught in a rainstorm, and that Niensted invited the two of them to his hotel room, where he changed his clothes in front of them and invited them to remove their clothes so that those articles of clothing could be dry cleaned.

“It’s my understanding the man does not claim any physical touching, hence an allegation of misconduct as opposed to abuse,” Niensted said in his response.

“Having lived through the Dallas charter meeting of the USCCB in 2002 which dealt with the crisis in Boston over the sexual abuse of minors by clergy, I would have known enough never to be alone with minors in a hotel room precisely so that such allegations could not be made. Moreover, my own sense of personal modesty would not permit me to undress in front of others. This allegation was not known to me when I petitioned to minister in the Diocese of Santa Rosa in 2016. I only learned of it on December 13, 2018,” Niensted said.

He said the allegation is false and that he welcomes an impartial look at the facts and the opportunity to defend himself “at the earliest opportunity.”

Vasa said Niensted’s case remains under review by the Holy See.

“The naming of Bishops accused is exclusively under the authority of the Holy See and I am not authorized to make any revelations regarding them,” Vasa said.

Vasa also recognized the Diocesan Review Board, the involvement of which “is one of the strongest measures taken by the Diocese to help assure the fullest degree of transparency permitted by law.”

He said the board has access to everything that he has seen and heard regarding child sexual abuse in the Diocese of Santa Rosa.

“This is not a body of men and women who simply rubber stamp whatever the Bishop wants. They are conscientious, dedicated men and women with areas of expertise which uniquely qualify them as advisors to the Bishop on these most significant matters. I am most grateful to them for their dedicated service and rely greatly upon their expert advice,” Vasa said.

The Diocesan Review Board includes Richard Ortiz, a retired probation officer; George Berg, a police officer; John Storm, a permanent deacon, Catholic Restorative Justice Ministry; psychologist Dr. Alisa Liguori Stratton; psychotherapist Dr. Mary Killeen Lyons, Ph. D.; retired Superior Court Judge Charlotte Walter Woolard; and retired California Court of Appeal Justice Daniel (Mike) Hanlon.

The board’s advisors include Dan Galvin, the diocesan attorney; Monsignor Daniel Whelton, vicar for clergy; and Julie Sparacio, diocesan director of the Office of Child and Youth Protection.

The full list of accused deacons and priests follows.

Joseph Alzugaray

Ordained for the Archdiocese of Los Angeles April 29, 1967
Incardinated in the Diocese of Santa Rosa June 17, 1996
Accused in 1993 for 1967-1972 abuse in Los Angeles
Cleared by LA / Retired 10-31-11
Deceased 1-31-14
No known accusations in the Diocese of Santa Rosa

Carmelo Baltazar

Ordained for the Diocese of Malolos, Philippines June 6, 1960
Chaplain Queen of the Valley Hospital 1981-82
Left the Diocese of Santa Rosa 11-24-82
Arrested and sentenced 1985
Deceased (San Diego Diocese Web site)

Edward F. Beutner

Ordained for the Diocese of Superior 1965
Assigned to Mont LaSalle in Napa in 1987
There are no specific details about allegations against him
Deceased 2008
No known accusations in the Diocese of Santa Rosa

Anthony Bolger

Ordained for the Diocese of Santa Rosa December 19, 1969
Excardinated to Honolulu 6-18-84
Accused in 1994 for abuse of a minor in 1972-1973
In 1994 notified Honolulu of accusation
Deceased 1-7-2015

David Brusky

Religious Priest Ordained June 9, 1952
Served in the Diocese of Santa Rosa 1981-1985
Allegation made in 2002 for abuse in 1980s
Reported to DA in 2002
Deceased 2-1-2014

John Crews

Ordained for the Diocese of Santa Rosa Feb. 14, 1971
Accusation raised by man’s widow 2-1-2013 for 1971-75 actions
Reported to Police February 2013
No assignment / Retired 2013

Kevin Dunne

Religious brother
Accused in 2002 for 1993 abuse elsewhere
Lived at Franciscan Hermitage, Sebastopol 11-19-04 to 7-31-05
Current status unknown
No known accusations in the Diocese of Santa Rosa

Don Eagleson

Ordained for the Diocese of Santa Rosa April 13, 1985
Accused in 2002 of abuse in 1971 prior to ordination
Out of ministry 4-30-02
Deceased 10-22-2004
No known accusations in the Diocese of Santa Rosa

Don D. Flickinger

Ordained for the Diocese of Fresno 1964
Civil suit filed 8-9-11
Chaplain to Christian Brothers Novitiate 1981 to 1983
Retired / No known accusations in the Diocese of Santa Rosa

J. Patrick Foley

Ordained for the Diocese of San Diego 1973
Listed by the San Diego Diocese in 2018
Provided many missions and parish retreats 1998-2006
No known accusations in the Diocese of Santa Rosa

Francis (John) Ford

Incardinated in the Diocese of Santa Rosa January 21, 1971
Belated claim of abuse as a Franciscan prior to 1971
Abuse occurrence in Diocese of Santa Rosa 1974
On leave Jan. 1, 1979
Deceased 10-21-84

Ruben Garcia

Ordained for the Diocese of Boise 1972
Named in a civil suit 2-21-94
Served in Diocese of Santa Rosa beginning 11-1973
No known accusations in the Diocese of Santa Rosa
Deceased

Patrick Gleeson

Ordained for the Diocese of Sacramento June 10, 1947
Incardinated with the Diocese of Santa Rosa when established on 2-21-62
Accused in 2004 of abuse 1968-72
Retired 8-21-89
Deceased 4-15-91

Patrick A. Hannon

Religious priest ordained July 10, 1949
Served in the Diocese of Santa Rosa 1980 to 1981
Accused in 2000 of abuse 1981
Deceased 1993

Austin Peter Keegan

Ordained for the Archdiocese of San Francisco June 9, 1962
Served in the Diocese of Santa Rosa 1976-81
Accused in 2000 of abuse 1976-81
Removed / Moved to Mexico 1981
Stripped of duties by San Francisco 1982

Michael Emmet Kelly

Ordained for the Diocese of Santa Rosa May 15, 1971
Accused in 1999 of abuse 1971-99
Suspended 10-24-99 / Laicized 10-15-04

Don Kimball

Ordained for the Diocese of Santa Rosa May 24, 1969
Accused in 1990 of abuse in the 1980s
On Leave / Removed 1990
Convicted in 2002
Deceased 9-15-2006

Bruce Maxwell

Religious priest ordained 1975
Accused in 2002 and removed from all ministry 2002
Chaplain at USCG Training Center Petaluma 1989 to 1992
In residence at Saint James, Petaluma at that same time
No known accusations in the Diocese of Santa Rosa

Patrick McCabe

Ordained for the Archdiocese of Dublin May 21, 1961
Served in Diocese of Santa Rosa 1983-86
Abuse occurrence in the Diocese of Santa Rosa 1980s
Removed 2-27-1986 / Laicized 3-11-1988

John A. Meenan

Ordained for the Diocese of Santa Rosa June 5, 1965
Accusation 1960s
On Leave 1971 / Laicized 5-23-1975
Deceased 4-21-2009

John Moriarty

Religious brother
Christian Brothers’ Retreat House in St. Helena from 1974-78
The Diocese of Santa Rosa has no record of his presence
No known accusations in the Diocese of Santa Rosa

Francis E. Neville

Ordained for the Diocese of Colombo, Sri Lanka about 1973
Served in the Diocese of Santa Rosa 1983-84
Accused in 1993 of abuse in 1983
Deceased 10-2002

Mark O'Leary

Religious priest ordained May 19, 1985
Accused in 2002 of acts in Southern California from 1974-1977
Chaplain at Santa Rosa Memorial Hospital 1993-2002
Permanently removed from ministry 4-30-2002
No known accusations in the Diocese of Santa Rosa

Vincent O’Neill

Ordained for the Diocese of Santa Rosa May 21, 1971
Accused of abuse in the late 1970s
Dismissed / Retired 1996
Deceased 11-12-1998

Francisco Javier Ochoa

Ordained for the Jesuits July 4, 1969
Incardinated with the Diocese of Santa Rosa 7-11-1991
Abuse occurrence 2006
Laicized 6-29-2009
Deceased 11-30-2009

Ted Oswald

Ordained for the Diocese of Santa Rosa June 6, 1984
Accused in 2008
Permanently removed from ministry 2008
Deceased 7-4-2013

Xavier Pallathuparambil

Ordained for the Diocese of Vijayapuram, India Dec. 22, 1952
Served in the Diocese of Santa Rosa 2-2-84 to 4-13-84
Dismissed from the Diocese of Santa Rosa 4-13-84
Deceased (India) 5-29-2004

Thomas Parker

Ordained for the Diocese of Santa Rosa April 13, 1985
Accused in 2007 of abuse in 1988-89
Police Report 7-10-2007 / Laicized May 2008

Daniel Polizzi

Ordained for the Diocese of Santa Rosa June 7, 1969
Transferred to the Diocese of San Diego 5-30-70
Accused in 1996 / Removed from ministry 1997
Deceased 2003
No known accusations in the Diocese of Santa Rosa

Celestine Quinlan

Religious priest ordained 1957
Named in 2003 civil suit for abuse between 1957-1962
Served in the Diocese of Santa Rosa 1962 to 1968
Deceased 1970
No known accusations in the Diocese of Santa Rosa

John Rogers

Ordained for the Diocese of Santa Rosa May 23, 1976
Served in the Diocese of Santa Rosa to 9-95 / Accused in 1995
Deceased 11-8-1995

Anthony J. Ross

Ordained for the Diocese of Joliet November 11, 1972
Incardinated with the Diocese of Santa Rosa 8-1-97
Accused in 2002 for abuse in Joliet in 1981
Permanently removed April 2002
No known accusations in the Diocese of Santa Rosa

Alfredo Sobalvarro

Ordained for Archdiocese of Washington, DC May 8, 1971
Served in the Diocese of Santa Rosa 1972 to 1976
Out of ministry since 2003

Gary Timmons

Ordained for the Diocese of Santa Rosa May 6, 1967
Served 6-67 to 3-94
Arrested and imprisoned 10-1995 / Laicized 5-15-2001

Francis Verngren

Religious brother
Mont LaSalle 1969-84 and at Justin Siena 1984
Retired 2002
Tutored in math at Saint Apollinaris 1990 - 2002
Deceased 12-2-2003
No known accusations in the Diocese of Santa Rosa

James Walsh

Ordained for Archdiocese of San Francisco March 20, 1943
Incardinated with the Diocese of Santa Rosa when established on 2-21-62
Deceased 12-3-93
Accusation made in 2005 of abuse in 1965

Bernie Ward

Religious priest ordained 1977
Served in the Diocese of Santa Rosa 1978-1979
Accusation made in 2008
Convicted of child pornography related crime 8-2008
Left priesthood 1979 or 80 / Present ecclesial status unknown

Ron Wiecek

Religious priest ordained 1971
Served in the Diocese of Santa Rosa 1970s
Accusation made to his religious community in 2010
Present status unknown

Vincent A. Yzermans

Ordained for the Diocese of St Cloud June 2, 1951
Listed as: On duty at the Diocese of Santa Rosa 1975-1976
File shows correspondence with Bishop Hurley in 1975
No record of any assignment in the Diocese of Santa Rosa
Deceased 5-4-95
No known accusations in the Diocese of Santa Rosa

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.
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NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite, called TESS for short, has found three confirmed exoplanets, or worlds beyond our solar system, in its first three months of observations.

The mission’s sensitive cameras also captured 100 short-lived changes – most of them likely stellar outbursts – in the same region of the sky.

They include six supernova explosions whose brightening light was recorded by TESS even before the outbursts were discovered by ground-based telescopes.

The new discoveries show that TESS is delivering on its goal of discovering planets around nearby bright stars. Using ground-based telescopes, astronomers are now conducting follow-up observations on more than 280 TESS exoplanet candidates.

The first confirmed discovery is a world called Pi Mensae c about twice Earth’s size. Every six days, the new planet orbits the star Pi Mensae, located about 60 light-years away and visible to the unaided eye in the southern constellation Mensa. The bright star Pi Mensae is similar to the Sun in mass and size.

“This star was already known to host a planet, called Pi Mensae b, which is about 10 times the mass of Jupiter and follows a long and very eccentric orbit,” said Chelsea Huang, a Juan Carlos Torres Fellow at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s (MIT) Kavli Institute for Astrophysics and Space Research (MKI) in Cambridge. “In contrast, the new planet, called Pi Mensae c, has a circular orbit close to the star, and these orbital differences will prove key to understanding how this unusual system formed.”

Next is LHS 3884b, a rocky planet about 1.3 times Earth’s size located about 49 light-years away in the constellation Indus, making it among the closest transiting exoplanets known.

The star is a cool M-type dwarf star about one-fifth the size of our Sun. Completing an orbit every 11 hours, the planet lies so close to its star that some of its rocky surface on the daytime side may form pools of molten lava.

The third – and possibly fourth – planets orbit HD 21749, a K-type star about 80 percent the Sun’s mass and located 53 light-years away in the southern constellation Reticulum.

The confirmed planet, HD 21749b, is about three times Earth’s size and 23 times its mass, orbits every 36 days, and has a surface temperature around 300 degrees Fahrenheit (150 degrees Celsius).

“This planet has a greater density than Neptune, but it isn’t rocky. It could be a water planet or have some other type of substantial atmosphere,” explained Diana Dragomir, a Hubble Fellow at MKI and lead author of a paper describing the find. It is the longest-period transiting planet within 100 light-years of the solar system, and it has the coolest surface temperature of a transiting exoplanet around a star brighter than 10th magnitude, or about 25 times fainter than the limit of unaided human vision.

What’s even more exciting are hints the system holds a second candidate planet about the size of Earth that orbits the star every eight days. If confirmed, it could be the smallest TESS planet to date.

TESS’s four cameras, designed and built by MKI and MIT’s Lincoln Laboratory in Lexington, Massachusetts, spend nearly a month monitoring each observing sector, a single swath of the sky measuring 24 by 96 degrees.

The primary aim is to look for exoplanet transits, which occur when a planet passes in front of its host star as viewed from TESS’s perspective. This causes a regular dip in the measured brightness of the star that signals a planet’s presence.

In its primary two-year mission, TESS will observe nearly the whole sky, providing a rich catalog of worlds around nearby stars. Their proximity to Earth will enable detailed characterization of the planets through follow-up observations from space- and ground-based telescopes.

But in its month-long stare into each sector, TESS records many additional phenomena, including comets, asteroids, flare stars, eclipsing binaries, white dwarf stars and supernovae, resulting in an astronomical treasure trove.

In the first TESS sector alone, observed between July 25 and Aug. 22, 2018, the mission caught dozens of short-lived, or transient, events, including images of six supernovae in distant galaxies that were later seen by ground-based telescopes.

“Some of the most interesting science occurs in the early days of a supernova, which has been very difficult to observe before TESS,” said Michael Fausnaugh, a TESS researcher at MKI. “NASA’s Kepler space telescope caught six of these events as they brightened during its first four years of operations. TESS found as many in its first month.”

These early observations hold the key to understanding a class of supernovae that serve as an important yardstick for cosmological studies. Type Ia supernovae form through two channels. One involves the merger of two orbiting white dwarfs, compact remnants of stars like the Sun.

The other occurs in systems where a white dwarf draws gas from a normal star, gradually gaining mass until it becomes unstable and explodes.

Astronomers don’t know which scenario is more common, but TESS could detect modifications to the early light of the explosion caused by the presence of a stellar companion.

All science data from the first two TESS observation sectors were recently released to the scientific community through the Mikulski Archive for Space Telescopes (MAST) at the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore.

More than a million TESS images were downloaded from MAST in the first few days,” said Thomas Barclay, a TESS researcher at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, and the University of Maryland, Baltimore County. “The astronomical community’s reaction to the early data release showed us that the world is ready to jump in and add to the mission’s scientific bounty.”

George Ricker, the mission’s principal investigator at MKI, said that TESS’s cameras and spacecraft were performing superbly.

“We’re only halfway through TESS’s first year of operations, and the data floodgates are just beginning to open,” he said. “When the full set of observations of more than 300 million stars and galaxies collected in the two-year prime mission are scrutinized by astronomers worldwide, TESS may well have discovered as many as 10,000 planets, in addition to hundreds of supernovae and other explosive stellar and extragalactic transients.”

TESS is a NASA Astrophysics Explorer mission led and operated by MIT in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and managed by NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center. Additional partners include Northrop Grumman, based in Falls Church, Virginia; NASA’s Ames Research Center in California’s Silicon Valley; the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics in Cambridge, Massachusetts; MIT’s Lincoln Laboratory; and the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore. More than a dozen universities, research institutes and observatories worldwide are participants in the mission.

Francis Reddy works for NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center.
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Dennis Fordham. Courtesy photo.

In second marriages, it is common to find gifts to stepchildren, especially when the stepparent raised the stepchild during their minority and/or the stepparent has no other children of their own.

It is much less common, however, to find the parents of the stepparent naming the same stepchild as an alternative beneficiary to their own child; it is more natural that they would name another child or close family relative.

What effect does divorce – between a stepparent and the parent of a stepchild – have upon testamentary transfers from the stepparent or the stepparent’s own parents to a former stepchild?

California law is very clear with respect to gifts made to an ex-spouse.

Under section 922 of California’s Probate Code all bequests by a decedent to his or her former spouse – contained in a testamentary instrument (i.e., a will, a trust or a death beneficiary form, such as for a life insurance policy) while the couple was still married – are treated as though the surviving ex-spouse had predeceased the decedent: the former spouse fails to inherit, as would the former spouse’s own issue if the gift to the ex-spouse is, “by right of representation”.

So long as the status of the marriage was resolved by court order prior to the deceased spouse’s death, a surviving ex-spouse cannot claim any gifts made under the decedent’s will, trust or as a designated death beneficiary to any life insurance, annuity, or retirement account.

Exceptions exist, however, when the gift to an ex-spouse is reaffirmed after the divorce and also when the original document specifically provides that the gift should survives a future divorce.

When marital dissolution proceedings were still ongoing when a spouse died, the court may sometimes retain jurisdiction to enter a nunc pro tunc (retroactive) court order. That is, if either a status only judgment, as to the termination of the marriage has been entered, or the dissolution case was fully submitted – i.e., just awaiting a decision – then the family court retains jurisdiction.

California’s Probate Code, however, is silent about whether gifts to stepchildren are nullified by the divorce when the gift instrument was signed by the stepparent prior to the divorce from the stepchild’s parent.

California case law offers guidance as to how gifts to former stepchildren are treated. In Estate of Hermon (1995), 39 Cal. App. 4th, 1525, 1531, the Court of Appeal, First Appellate District, opined that, "… when a testator provides for his spouse's children, he normally intends to exclude children of an ex-spouse after dissolution, unless a contrary intention is indicated elsewhere in his will. (Underlining added).”

Then in Estate of Jones (2004), 122 Cal. App. 4th, 326, the Court of Appeal, Third Appellate District, reiterated the foregoing rule but said the Court could look beyond the instrument also and consider evidence of the deceased stepparent’s ongoing relationship with the stepchild after the divorce to see if the deceased former stepparent would likely have wanted the gift to the former stepchild.

Without evidence of an ongoing relationship, however, the Court in Estate of Jones presumed that the deceased former stepparent did not intend to provide for the children of his ex-spouse.

There is no case law speaking to gifts by grandparents to their children’s former stepchildren (“stepgrandchildren”). Nonetheless, the foregoing analysis would logically appear to be relevant to such gifts.

Uncertainties regarding gifts to former stepchildren, or former step grandchildren, are best addressed by the person who is making the gift, while still alive, proactively updating his or estate planning documents. Even during a pending divorce, a stepparent can still make, or revise, a will.

The stepgrandparents have no restriction on updating their estate planning documents, while their child’s own divorce is pending, and so are free to address all gifts made by them to their son’s own stepchildren prior to the conclusion of the divorce.

Dennis A. Fordham, attorney, is a State Bar-Certified Specialist in estate planning, probate and trust law. His office is at 870 S. Main St., Lakeport, Calif. He can be reached at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. and 707-263-3235. His Web site is www.DennisFordhamLaw.com.
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The Fanny Farmer Cookbook. OttawaAC [CC BY-SA 3.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], from Wikimedia Commons.

Every family has a family recipe – whether it be Aunt Linda’s lemon tart recipe, or the instructions for making great grandma Carolynn’s chicken pot pie.

If you’re lucky, you have a legible copy of the recipe, with the ingredients clearly marked, and their portions easy to read. Each time you pull the recipe out to recreate the family favorite, it’s like sitting down to dinner with great grandma Carolynn all over again.

But for the rest of us, that’s not how it usually goes.

Instead, we usually have a grungy scrap of paper – crusted with bits of unidentifiable food – that looks like it could be part of the Dead Sea Scroll, and it certainly smells like it could.

This recipe is invariably written in a hand that suggests great grandma had had just enough time to jot down the recipe before the paramedics took her away, and would indeed make any doctor proud.

But don’t sweat it; it doesn’t really matter if you can read the chicken scratch, because from the looks of it, great grandma never heard of teaspoons, tablespoons or cups. Instead, her dish apparently requires several pinches of this, a goodly amount of that, and a handful of something else.

In life, your great grandma was 5 foot 2 and 110 pounds sopping wet. You, on the other hand, are 6 foot, easily pushing 200 (it’s the holidays, so 210) and have hands the size of a dinner ham. Your pinches and handfuls sure aren’t the same has hers, and you have no clue how much a “goodly amount” really is.

You love your great grandma, sure. But by now, you’re probably shooting dirty looks towards that picture of her that hangs in the hallway, and you’re beginning to think the old goat had no intention of anyone else cooking her dish, even if they were family.

Before you throw in the towel – and say some things you’ll later regret – understand that your great grandma might not have meant to be so obtuse after all. Depending on when the recipe was written, she might have simply been passing down the recipe as she herself had been taught it.

Before the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, home cooking was an imprecise art form. It relied on the oral transmission of knowledge, from one generation of women to the next. Those women who lacked such an important mother figure in their lives loss out on this teaching, and their cooking usually suffered.

All of that changed in the 1890s when home economics teacher and revolutionary chef, Fannie Farmer, published her cookbook – the Boston Cooking-School Cookbook.

In it, Fannie presented to the world, for the first time ever, the modern recipe. No more “pinches and “handfuls” in the kitchen, thank you very much. Instead, as she wrote in her book, “Correct measurements are absolutely necessary to ensure the best results.”

Although she didn’t invent the teaspoon and tablespoon, she was the one responsible for popularizing the use of such precise measuring devices for cooking. She was, by all accounts, the 19th century’s version of Julia Child. In fact, Ms. Child recalled using Fannie’s cookbook as a young girl, whipping up pancakes, popovers and fudge.

When she published the cookbook, Fannie Farmer was working as a teacher at the Boston Cooking School – a school that was created to enable women of modest means to find work as cooks in private homes and institutions.

Although Farmer herself didn’t come from modest means – she hailed from a genteel family in nearby Medford – she did understand the power cooking had to elevate the status of women in society.

When she was just 16 years old, Farmer suffered partial paralysis in her legs, likely due to polio. Before this, she had intended to attend university and become a schoolteacher, but her handicap effectively ended those dreams. Looking at a long, unremarkable life as an old spinster bereft of useful employment, Farmer was distraught.

All of this changed when her father finally allowed her to leave the house to go work as a governess for a family friend. While there, her new employers encouraged her to take up cooking – a pursuit in which Farmer had already shown some promise.

Over the next several years, the young woman spent as much time in the kitchen as possible. She had finally found something worth pursuing; something she could see herself doing for the rest of her life, despite her handicap. At the age of 31, she left work as a governess and enrolled in the Boston Cooking School.

Immediately upon graduation in 1889, she returned to the school as staff. It was during her years as a teacher there that she developed the technique of precise cooking that would lead to the publication of her internationally famous cookbook.

Like the great celebrity chefs of the 20th and 21st century, Fannie Farmer took advantage of the success of her cookbook, and began touring the nation as a lecturer. In 1902, she opened her own cooking school, Miss Farmer’s School of Cookery, which became so profitable that she was able to buy land, build a large house and support her elderly parents.

It came as a shock to all when Miss Farmer died of a stroke on Jan. 15, 1915. She was only 57 years old. Although her life was cut short, her legacy lived on – and continues to live on to this day. To date, more than seven million copies of her cookbook have been sold.

Which begs the question – what was great grandma thinking when she wrote down that recipe?

Then again, we can’t all be Julia Childs – or Fannie Farmers.

Antone Pierucci is curator of history at the Riverside County Park and Open Space District and a freelance writer whose work has been featured in such magazines as Archaeology and Wild West as well as regional California newspapers.

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Mrs. Torres’s kindergarten class at Kelseyville Elementary School in Kelseyville, Calif., pictured here on Tuesday, January 8, 2019, was the top donating class in the “Pennies for Paradise” effort with $416.62 donated. Courtesy photo.


KELSEYVILLE, Calif. – Children in the Kelseyville Unified School District are lending a hand to the community of Paradise as it begins its recovery from the devastating November Camp fire.

When the students at Kelseyville Elementary returned to school, after having an extra week off during Thanksgiving break due to smoke conditions from the Camp fire, they were ready to hit the playground running and give back to the Paradise Unified School District.

The Kelseyville Elementary PTO ran a two-week long Pennies for Paradise coin fundraiser in 24 classrooms.

The students at Kelseyville Elementary know what it’s like to be affected by wildfires.

The 2015 Valley fire forced the students to start school late. They also have been impacted by the 2015 Rocky and Jerusalem fires, and the 2016 Clayton Fire in 2016.

Last year’s Mendocino Complex also delayed the start of schools in local districts.

Teachers, students and parents came together to support the Paradise Unified School District.

Together the Kelseyville Elementary raised $2,400 and $95 in gift cards.
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This artist’s impression shows how J043947.08+163415.7, a very distant quasar powered by a supermassive black hole, may look close up. This object is by far the brightest quasar yet discovered in the early Universe.Credit: ESA/Hubble, NASA, M. Kornmesser.

Astronomers using data from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope have discovered the brightest quasar ever seen in the early Universe — the light received from the object started its journey when the Universe was only about a billion years old.

Quasars are the extremely bright nuclei of active galaxies. The powerful glow of a quasar is created by a supermassive black hole which is surrounded by an accretion disc. Gas falling toward the black hole releases incredible amounts of energy, which can be observed over all wavelengths.

The newly discovered quasar, catalogued as J043947.08+163415.7, is no exception to this; its brightness is equivalent to about 600 trillion Suns and the supermassive black hole powering it is several hundred million times as massive as our Sun.

“That’s something we have been looking for for a long time,” said lead author Xiaohui Fan (University of Arizona, USA). “We don’t expect to find many quasars brighter than that in the whole observable Universe!”

Despite its brightness Hubble was able to spot it only because its appearance was strongly affected by strong gravitational lensing. A dim galaxy is located right between the quasar and Earth, bending the light from the quasar and making it appear three times as large and 50 times as bright as it would be without the effect of gravitational lensing.

Even still, the lens and the lensed quasar are extremely compact and unresolved in images from optical ground-based telescopes. Only Hubble’s sharp vision allowed it to resolve the system.

The data show not only that the supermassive black hole is accreting matter at an extremely high rate but also that the quasar may be producing up to 10 000 stars per year.

“Its properties and its distance make it a prime candidate to investigate the evolution of distant quasars and the role supermassive black holes in their centres had on star formation,” explains co-author Fabian Walter (Max Planck Institute for Astronomy, Germany), illustrating why this discovery is so important.

Quasars similar to J043947.08+163415.7 existed during the period of reionization of the young Universe, when radiation from young galaxies and quasars reheated the obscuring hydrogen that had cooled off just 400 000 years after the Big Bang; the Universe reverted from being neutral to once again being an ionised plasma.

However, it is still not known for certain which objects provided the reionizing photons. Energetic objects such as this newly discovered quasar could help to solve this mystery.

For that reason the team is gathering as much data on J043947.08+163415.7 as possible. Currently they are analysing a detailed 20-hour spectrum from the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope, which will allow them to identify the chemical composition and temperatures of intergalactic gas in the early Universe.

The team is also using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array, and hopes to also observe the quasar with the upcoming NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope.

With these telescopes they will be able to look in the vicinity of the supermassive black hole and directly measure the influence of its gravity on the surrounding gas and star formation.
Notes

The Hubble Space Telescope is a project of international cooperation between ESA and NASA.

The results were presented at the 233rd meeting of the American Astronomical Society and will be published in the Astrophysical Journal Letters.

The international team of astronomers in this study consists of Xiaohui Fan (University of Arizona, USA), Feige Wang (University of California, USA), Jinyi Yang (University of Arizona, USA), Charles R. Keeton (Rutgers University, USA), Minghao Yue (University of Arizona, USA), Ann Zabludoff (University of Arizona, USA), Fuyan Bian (ESO, Chile), Marco Bonaglia (Arcetri Observatory, Italy), Iskren Y. Georgiev (Max Planck Institute for Astronomy, Germany), Joseph F. Hennawi (University of California, USA), Jiangtao Li (University of Michigan, USA), Jiangtao Li (University of Michigan, USA), Ian D. McGreer (University of Arizona, USA), Rohan Naidu (Center for Astrophysics, USA), Fabio Pacucci (Yale University, USA), Sebastian Rabien (Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics, Germany), David Thompson (Large Binocular Telescope Observatory), Bram Venemans (Max Planck Institute for Astronomy, Germany), Fabian Walter (Max Planck Institute for Astronomy, Germany), Ran Wang (Peking University, China), Xue-Bing Wu (Peking University, China).


This image shows the distant quasar J043947.08+163415.7 as it was observed with the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. The quasar is one of the brightest objects in the early Universe. However, due to its distance it only became visible as its image was made brighter and larger by gravitational lensing. The system of the lensed images and the actual lens is so compact that Hubble is the only optical telescope able to resolve it. Credit: NASA, ESA, X. Fan (University of Arizona).
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Cash and drugs seized during the arrest on Friday, January 11, 2019, of Roger Vigil of Clearlake, Calif. Photo courtesy of Clearlake Police Department.


CLEARLAKE, Calif. – A Clearlake man was arrested on Friday after a Clearlake Police Officer found him with a large amount of money as well as methamphetamine in his vehicle.

Roger Vigil, 56, was taken into custody on Friday morning, according to Sgt. Rodd Joseph.

Joseph said that at 11 a.m. Friday Officer Mauricio Barreto stopped Vigil’s vehicle for a simple vehicle code violation.

From outside the vehicle, the officer observed a bag of methamphetamine in plain view near the center console, Joseph said.

Vigil was immediately arrested. During a search of Vigil’s clothing, Joseph said additional methamphetamine was located to include a significant amount of US currency.

During a further search of the vehicle, more methamphetamine was located inside to include drug paraphernalia, Joseph said.

Joseph said Vigil admitted some of the methamphetamine that was located – which was over an ounce – was possessed for sales.

The vehicle Vigil had been driving was later found to have false license plates on it and was towed, Joseph said.

Vigil was later booked into the Lake County Jail on felony charges of possession of narcotics for sale, transportation of narcotics and forged vehicle registration, according to Joseph.
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LAKEPORT, Calif. – A special Lakeport Unified School District Board meeting that had been called to discuss the transition regarding the district superintendent’s position has been rescheduled, the district reported.

Originally set for Saturday afternoon, the special board meeting has now been moved to 4 p.m. Monday, Jan. 14, according to Tami Carley, the district superintendent’s secretary.

The Monday meeting is meant to discuss the transitional team the board wants to establish in the process to choose a new superintendent.

Carley said the special board meeting had to be rescheduled “due to a lack of available board members for a quorum.”

She said the agenda will be posted on the district’s Web site 24 hours in advance of the meeting.

Board member Jennifer Hanson separately reported on social media that a regular board meeting will take place at 5 p.m. Monday.

At that point it’s expected that the meeting location will be confirmed. Normally, the meetings are held at the district office 2508 Howard Ave., but this week’s meeting had a large audience that spilled out the front lobby.

At that meeting on Wednesday the board majority voted to terminate the contract with Superintendent April Leiferman.

That was followed on Thursday by the resignation of Board member Lori Holmes.

Hanson stated on Facebook that Holmes’ resignation led to the need to reschedule the meeting from Saturday to Monday.

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.
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Lakeport Unified School District Board member Lori Holmes. Courtesy photo.

LAKEPORT, Calif. – The morning following a heated Lakeport Unified School Board meeting in which the superintendent was released from her contract, the board member who was the dissenting vote in that decision tendered her resignation.

Board member Lori Holmes told Lake County News that she notified Lake County Superintendent of Schools Brock Falkenberg on Thursday morning that she was leaving the board.

Separately, Lakeport Unified Board Chair Dan Buffalo told Lake County News that they received an email about Holmes’ resignation on Thursday morning, and that he confirmed Falkenberg had been notified.

Holmes is the senior board member in time served, having been first elected in the fall of 2011.

Last month, Buffalo, Carly Alvord and Jennifer Hanson – who had been elected in November in a united campaign effort – took office. Since then, they have participated in two regularly scheduled meetings, in addition to a special meeting called Dec. 27, when the district was closed and both Holmes and Superintendent April Leiferman were on vacation.

Holmes, who was in Mexico on a family vacation, had nonetheless managed to call in and participate in the Dec. 27 meeting, during which the board majority voted to hire its own attorney to advise it on its relationship with Leiferman. Holmes had disagreed with that action, pointing out that the board had access to legal help that had been paid for already.

Then at the board’s meeting on Wednesday night, Alvord, Buffalo and Hanson overruled Holmes and voted to terminate Leiferman’s contract without cause, as Lake County News has reported. Board member Phil Kirby abstained.

Leiferman, hired in May 2017, has a three-year contract that stipulates that she must be paid a year’s salary totaling $154,234 and health and welfare benefits not to exceed $14,500 each year.

Much of the impetus for the decision to end Leiferman’s contract appears to stem from the previous board’s October decision to remove Terrace Middle School Principal Rachel Paarsch from her position. Paarsch was then transferred to a teaching position she refused, and she said she is suing the district.

Paarsch’s removal by the board was based on a formal district investigation led by Leiferman that found many instances of serious misconduct — including issues with job performance and personal behavior — reported by numerous witnesses, according to a copy of the document obtained by Lake County News.

Paarsch, who has denied the allegations, is the daughter of Kirby and a longtime friend of Alvord, and was present for the Wednesday night announcement of Leiferman’s contract termination.

Holmes had told the other board members after the termination decision on Wednesday that she didn’t agree with them, and that Leiferman’s intent had always been focused on what was best for children.

She also told them that they were moving really fast, that she found it scary and that they were spooking district staff. Holmes also had told them that their decision to hold the special closed session on Dec. 27 was a bad move.

Holmes said on Thursday that since the three new board members took office, they didn’t meet with Leiferman and actually rebuffed her requests to sit down with them to discuss district business, which Holmes said made it difficult for Leiferman to do her job.

On Thursday, Holmes took swift action herself, deciding to step aside. “It was just time for me to go.”

In her resignation letter, which she shared with Lake County News, Holmes wrote:

“After 8 years, it is with great reluctance that I resign my position as a member of the Lakeport Unified School Board. Serving the people of this wonderful school district has been one of the greatest honors of my life. Over the years, I have met so many capable and committed employees – superintendents, administrators, department heads, certificated and classified staff – who put the children they teach, support, and care for at the center of their work. I thank them for their service to our community.

“As a board member, I have taken seriously my legal obligations. A school board is designed to have independent-thinking individuals meet at open public meetings and use board policies and laws to do what is in the best interest of the students. Until recently, that has been the established practice of the Lakeport board. Now, however, I believe critical decisions have been made recklessly that do not serve the best interests of this district. Because I do not share the new board's vision, I believe it is time for me to step down.

“I wish the new board success. The future of our students depends upon on their ability to do what is best for the district.”

She told Lake County News that the new board needs to slow down and listen, and to meet with the district’s administrative team, and the teachers’ and classified employees’ unions.

“I want them to succeed. I feel like the district depends on them succeeding, but I’m just sick about what I’m seeing,” she said.

The board has called a special meeting at 2 p.m. Saturday at the district office to discuss its superintendent recruitment and transition.

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.

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