Editorial

Whether or not voters decide to vote yes this November for

There is real enthusiasm in Sonoma County for renewable energy and to that end the Board of Supervisors has voted to explore various public options. Over the next few years, they will try to run-to-ground the costs, consequences and benefits of forming a public power agency. Healdsburg has something to offer in this debate. Not one of the hypothetical possibilities in their study, but the best example in the county of a successful, living, breathing public power entity.

It’s a lofty goal to say you are striving for 100 percent of anything. So, when on Jan. 15, 2014, the Sonoma County Winegrowers committed to making Sonoma County the nation’s first 100 percent sustainable wine region by 2019, some may have questioned setting the bar so high.

As the Board of Directors of North Sonoma County Healthcare District and Chief Executive Officer we thank Healdsburg Tribune publisher, Rollie Atkinson, for his recent timely editorial (“Our hospital’s crystal ball,” Sept. 11, 2014). The editorial does a very good job of describing many of the obstacles facing small community hospitals in Sonoma County, such as our own Healdsburg District Hospital, as they struggle to adapt to these conditions and overcome their detrimental effect. Some hospitals will not make it: witness the recent closure of Palm Drive Hospital in Sebastapol. But we believe it can be done and we are committed to that outcome in our community.

Something unusual happened to me recently, and I think it serves a purpose to write about it here. I was attending a Healdsburg Museum opening celebration, and it was lovely. Good wine, good people and a lovely exhibit of local Farm to Table. I was about to leave for another event when someone said “Dr. Anderson, we need you right now!” I ran down the stairs only to find that a woman had passed out, and had briefly, before I got there, become totally unresponsive. You do your training thing, feel for a pulse, check for respirations, etc. She had a very faint and thready, but regular pulse, and was now responding to questions. She was very weak and sweaty. She was perhaps in her fifties, an active and supportive volunteer for the Museum. They were holding her in a sitting position, and I immediately told them to let her lay flat, so that despite her weak pulse, blood would more easily flow to her brain. Sure enough, within a minute or two she became more responsive, less sweaty, and her pulse became stronger. That is when you ask questions about her symptoms prior to this spell. She had no history of heart problems. Earlier she did have some chest pain, maybe some nausea. She had a history of fainting, but not for years. It was a very scary situation for her and for her friends who had seen this happen.  So I had to make a decision about what was the next step for her. I will get back to her situation in a moment, but let’s go on to phase two.

The holiday season is here with the accompanying shopping, decorating, gift giving, entertaining and feasting. As we celebrate, we also tend to generate lots of waste. Did you know that an extra million tons of waste is generated nationwide each week between Thanksgiving and New Year’s? Here are a few ideas and suggestions on how to have a wonderful, gift giving holiday season and still be earth friendly.

One might say that the current dispute about a flight school at the Healdsburg Municipal Airport is simply a NIMBY issue by folks who live near the airport. The rest of you could say,  “It doesn’t affect me”….or does it?

Americans have much to be grateful for. Freedom makes the top of the list for most of us because it’s expressed in so many aspects of our daily lives. Independence Day marks our celebration of freedom — it remembers we declared our independence from political and economic oppression by outsiders.

I recently had the opportunity to meet with Annie Millar, Director of Curriculum and Instruction for the Healdsburg Unified School District, to discuss, among other things, how the new Common Core State Standards (CCSS) are affecting the way she goes about her work.