Public Citizen

Larry Barnett lives in Sonoma where he was elected to three terms on the City Council and served twice as Mayor. A thirty-five-year resident, he currently serves on Sonoma's Planning Commission, where he recently was Chair for two years. Until her passing, he was married to his wife Norma for 50 years, has two daughters and three grandchildren.

Building Sonoma’s Affordable Housing Trust Fund

Redevelopment funding ended in 2012, and the city was slow to begin to replace it. The 20% portion of redevelopment funding that was dedicated to the creation of affordable housing accounted for millions of dollars used to subsidize larger affordable housing projects. The newly created... Continue

Clash of paradigms: the threat to our food supply

Since the pandemic we’ve been hearing more about “systems change,” a concept that has been floated ever since the advent of systems theory (a la Fritjof Capra et. al.) Systems theory describes the natural world as a system applicable to social systems as well. Clearly... Continue

Like a rock

Chapter 18: • Minnesota, The Clemens Farm ~ My grandparents were known for attending funerals. Relatives, close friends, acquaintances, people they barely knew—it didn’t matter—Barbara and Mathew went to all of them. It was their social center. If anyone wanted to visit them and a nearby funeral... Continue

Appeal for police accountability

End of summer, 1970, west of Minneapolis, Minnesota Just past midnight, an 18 year old woman drives a rust bucket 1963 Bel Air down a dark two lane road. She hears a siren, sees flashing lights in the rear view mirror and pulls over. Two... Continue

Follow the bouncing ball

We’ve pivoted from shutting our worldwide doors to the opening of stores and social settings. From zoom to podcasts and back to instagram, we squint at another required computer password. Then, pivot again through drought, dreading the fire season, hardly past elections and the tax... Continue

$2b County budget approved — so what’s funded?

It feels like just yesterday that the Board of Supervisors adopted the budget for the 2020/2021 Fiscal Year. Budget hearings were one of many things delayed last year amid the challenges and uncertainty as Sonoma County grappled with the impacts of COVID-19. This year was... Continue

The sweepstakes winner scam

My wife received a phone call and an email the other day announcing that she was a first-place winner in the Reader’s Digest Sweepstakes; $5.1 million was awaiting deposit into her bank account. Wisely, she made no response on the phone other than to say... Continue

Pleasing his mother was as easy as jumping over his knees

Chapter 17: 1920 • Minnesota ~ When the wheels needed to be changed or the axles greased, my father—not yet a man—lifted the more than 200-pound hay wagon with his back, raised it higher with his arms, and held it steady while his older brother Aloysius,... Continue

Roads, roads, roads…

It will come as no surprise that one of the top issues for residents of the First District is – of course – roads! The last year of shelter-in-place may have meant that we traveled less around the county, but it also caused us to... Continue

Don’t fear the ‘other’

Pacaso, this thing is on everyone’s lips. Right now it is the number one topic of discussion. Within this discussion the idea of the “other” has also surfaced. I have no love of this co-ownership business model. It was created by multi-millionaires to make more... Continue

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