Accurate scientific data
Leona M. Butts ‘put down’ Al and Alexandria (RB March 6), and was probably right to do so. However, she used this to present falsehoods as truth. At the end of her letter she quotes Ian Rutherford Plimer, an Australian geologist, stating that the 1991 Mt. Pinatubo eruption produced more greenhouse gasses than mankind has in all of its existence. This is false.
Let me point the reader to one of several sites with more accurate information: volcanoes.usgs.gov/vhp/gas_climate.html. This is our very own US Geological Survey web site, with many accredited scientists, that shows a comparison of Anthropogenic (caused by humans)
CO2 emissions in 2015, 32.3 gigatons, to Mt. Pinatubo, .05 gigatons. It would take 700 Mt. Pinatubo eruptions to even equal human’s 2010 output.
And, while we have Al Gore’s education scores, our President has his hidden and will go to court to keep them that way. I would like to
remind the reader that Albert Einstein was not a physicist.
And, Ms. Butts, the sun is not tilted. Its equator describes the solar ecliptic and all eight planets are within a degree or two of this plane.
You would be better off using perihelion/aphelion variances.
—Kevin Bracken, Kelseyville
A burning issue
Every morning I would go outside, look up at Cow Mountain, and all I could see was a disaster waiting to happen. Well guess what? It finally did; a direct result of the incompetence of the Bureau of Land Management (BLM).
The River Fire came over Cow Mountain like a race horse. In my neighborhood alone, at least three homes were destroyed, and multi millions in tax payer money spent to fight it.
You can throw all the “feel good” solutions you want at the problem, but the fact remains there is only one way to prevent those kind of fires and that is through extensive control burning.
Control burning has many advantages. It improves wildlife habitat, creates fire breaks by reducing fuel loads, increases available ground water, which in this day and age is a major concern, is very cost effective, and much safer for fire fighters and our citizens.
I feel if our government can pay to fight these fires, then it can easily pay to control burn.
Clearing a 30 foot swath on each side of private driveways is going to do nothing to stop the likes of the River Fire, Ranch Fire, Valley Fire, Forks Fire, etc. etc.
What we need is people in managerial positions in the U. S. Forest Service, BLM, and Cal Fire with common sense. Also, all control burning should be exempt from Air Quality control. Then and only then will we see any reduction in large wildfires.
—Eugene Rentsch, Lakeport
Support tax measure proposal
We all need to support the tax measure being proposed by the Lakeport Fire Protection District. The only thing wrong with the proposed tax is that it should have been brought to us a year earlier. Our lives depend on this measure passing.
Let me explain what is known as the” Rule of Three”. It is generally accepted by emergency responders that a person can live three minutes without air, three days without water, and 30 days without food.
The Lakeport Fire Department is currently staffed by two people who respond to calls as they occur. If you have a heart attack, stroke, or an accident halts your breathing, you have about three minutes before your brain starts to die. If the Lakeport fire staff are busy with another call, Lakeport currently relies on mutual aid from the Kelseyville Fire Department or the North Shore Fire Department. While
these other fire departments are top-flight emergency responders, they do not have the ability to come to Lakeport in three minutes to save you! If they arrive in four minutes you may be gone. Every day we are playing Russian roulette whether you know it or not. We need the funding to restore staffing to what we previously had.
How did the situation come to be? Our firefighters are tough determined people who make do with what they have. They don’t whine! The Board of Directors of the Lakeport Fire department have grown up in this environment where they don’t waste and they pinch every penny. This mindset can only work so long in a world of rising demands and increased costs.
While you all know I’m the first person to criticize wasteful and unnecessary governmental spending of your hard-earned tax dollars, I’m not worried about the Lakeport Fire Department. Unlike the City of Lakeport who spent millions of dollars on projects like street trees that block stop signs, unneeded water meters, and extravagant solar projects that could have been acquired without public funds, I feel
confident that this won’t happen with the Lakeport Fire Department. The same mindset that has created our situation will prevent wasteful and unnecessary expenditures. This Board of Directors is frugal to a fault. I’m particularly impressed with one of the new directors who received his fiscal training under past County administrator Kelly Cox. Mr. Cox always kept the county fiscally sound and I’m sure that his
protégé will do his best to do the same with the Lakeport Fire Department.
I urge you to vote for the new fire tax, our lives depend on it.
—Bob Bridges, Lakeport.
