JANUARY
■ As they do every year, community members from Colusa County and the surrounding area flocked to the Grand Island Fire Station in Grimes on New Year’s Day in 2022 for a full spread of breakfast foods. The popular event, unsurpassed just about anywhere, was provided to the public at the cost of a donation. The beloved event raises money for the Firefighters Association’s scholarship fund and other charitable purposes. The Grand Island department is a division of the Sacramento River Fire Protection District.
■ SARS-CoV-2, the novel coronavirus that caused COVID-19 disease, entered its third calendar year after emerging in Colusa County in early 2020. The pandemic’s 26th victim was announced on Jan. 4. The 81-year-old woman was the first documented fully-vaccinated individual listed as a COVID death, Health and Human Services Director Elizabeth Kelly reported. Although COVID no longer dominated the headlines in 2022 as it did the previous two years, the active weekly positive case rate would peak on Feb. 20 at 693 before drastically dropping to an average of about 21.4 per week for the remainder of the year, as the Colusa County Public Health Department continued efforts to roll out vaccines, which greatly reduced hospitalizations. By the end of 2022, two more elderly people who tested positive for the virus would die, bringing the total number of Colusa County residents killed by the virus to 28.
■ The Colusa County Board of Supervisors on Jan. 4 rotated leadership after Chairman Gary Evans turned the gavel over to Merced Corona, who served at the helm for the first time throughout 2022. Corona was elected to the District 1 seat in 2018.
■ The Rotary Club of Colusa hosted their 2022 “Nite at the Races,” on Jan. 8. The event is the Club’s largest fundraiser of the year. Community members enjoyed dinner, raffles, silent auction, and video horse racing at the Colusa County Fairgrounds to raise money for charity. Dinner was served by the Colusa Ducks Youth Shooting Club and Colusa High School Future Businesses Leaders of America. Rotarians Michael West and Frank Davison served as masters of ceremonies.
■ The Colusa High School tradition of alumni paying tribute to inspirational staff members resumed on Jan. 8, as former ag teacher Ralph Minto was presented with the “You Inspired Me” Award by former student Clint Jewett, along with Alumni Association committee members Jerry Davies, Mary Lyttle, and Patty Hickel. Minto’s name was enshrined alongside 26 other recipients on a wall of honor inside Colusa’s football stadium.
■ A prison inmate was killed in his cell on Jan. 8 in what investigators said was a homicide by his cellmate. Benjy Stephen Wade, 40, had been serving time in High Desert State Prison for just five months when he was killed. Wade’s death was the second by a cellmate in a California prison that day, California State Prison officials said.
■ The Colusa County Department of Public Health distributed their first allocation of at-home self-test COVID-19 (Coronavirus) kits to Colusa County residents using a drive-thru distribution on Jan. 14. The kits, which were distributed in just 15 minutes, were part of an initial allocation of 280 kits the county received from the California Department of Public Health. County schools also received an allocation and began distributing COVID-19 test kits to student families.
■ Supporters of Friends of the Colusa County Animal Shelter celebrated what would have been Golden Girls actress Betty White’s 100th birthday on Jan. 17, by donating to the local organization in White’s memory. White, who passed away on New Year’s Eve 2021, dedicated herself to protecting and improving the quality of life for animals worldwide.
■ Maxwell native and former Colusa County Fair CEO Carolan Ferreria was selected to lead the Western Fairs Association Board of Directors in 2022.
■ The City of Colusa’s dream for an $8 million marina on the Sacramento River was quashed when the State of California announced funding would go elsewhere. The City of Williams had applied for two smaller grants from the same very competitive pot of Proposition 68 funding, but were also denied. Colusa had hoped to build a marina, upgrade Levee Park with new picnic areas and a viewing and fishing platform, while creating better pedestrian and motor vehicle access to the downtown. Williams had hoped to upgrade two city parks with walking trails, butterfly gardens, and sport and play facilities.
■ The Colusa City Council on Jan. 18 adopted a policy that requires city staff to better document and distribute donations made by benefactors that help support city-sponsored events and recreation programs. City officials said the policy provided guidance for individuals, community groups, and businesses that wish to make donations to the city. The formal process also established standards for city employees and city officials regarding the acceptance of gifts during their performance of city business. The policy, intended to aid transparency and accountability, was implemented following criticism from the public on how city staff went about collecting donations from businesses and developers for the lavish Country in Colusa music festival in the summer of 2021.
■ The Colusa County Board of Supervisors on Jan. 18 approved a strategic communications plan that kept the county’s contracted communications consultant on retainer. The plan, which the board rejected the first time it was presented, retained Caporusso Communications to develop and distribute information about county and community programs. Caporusso was contracted at $45,000 annually to provide regular and ongoing online communications about County of Colusa and other local programs, and helped to develop the county’s quarterly online publication “Colusa County Connections,” which was just recently launched.
■ The Williams City Council on Jan. 19 committed $1 million from the general fund for road repairs in 2022. City officials said according to their Pavement Management Plan, the city would need to spend about $4 million a year to bring roads up to par over 10 years, and spend at least $850,000 to $1 million a year on general maintenance to prevent damage to roads in good condition. Based on estimated costs and priorities set in the plan, the city agreed to spend about $650,000 to maintain some of the city’s better roads by filling and microsurfacing to keep them from deteriorating to the point that they have to be reconstructed. City Administrator Frank Kennedy said he hoped the improvements, which were just recently completed, would have been enough to show residents what the city could do if they had an additional $1 million every year to invest in roads. However, voters would come to reject the sales tax measure on Nov. 8 that would have brought at least $750,000 in new revenue into the city to do road repairs on an ongoing basis.
■ The City of Colusa’s new cannabis ordinance, which paved the way for marijuana retail establishments to operate within city limits, made it past its first major hurdle. The Colusa Planning Commission approved the draft regulations on Jan 26, before moving it to the City Council for final consideration and adoption. The 3-0 vote, with two members absent, approved eligibility for cannabis storefronts to operate on property zoned light industrial, particularly Colusa Industrial Properties and East Clay Street, but specifically excluded Colusa’s Riverfront District, in keeping with the general consensus of the public to keep pot shops out of Colusa’s historic downtown after hearing months of testimony. The City Council would later toss aside the Planning Commission’s recommendation to allow pot shops virtually anywhere in Colusa’s commercial and industrial areas, so long as they are 1,200 ft. from a school.
■ Colusa calls to police continued to soar into the New Year. Colusa Police Lt. Sara Martin said the agency handled 5,000 calls for service in 2021, up from 3,800 in 2020, a 24 percent increase. Martin said the department’s historically average call volume of about 250 to 290 calls for service increased to about 400 calls per month, starting around May of 2020. The highest activity for the Colusa Police Department was in May 2021, with 453 calls for service. In December, calls dropped to 381, although that number was still higher than previous years for the holiday month. As of late January of 2022, Colusa police calls were on track to again hit 400 calls for service, and Martin believes a number of factors is contributing to the rising crime rates, including changes in the laws pertaining to bail and sentencing, along with the mental health challenges the community faces.
FEBRUARY
■ Opening day of the Colusa Farm Show on Feb. 1 brought a flood of visitors through the gates of the Colusa County Fairgrounds to learn about the latest in farm equipment and agriculture-related services. Those who attended the exposition said they couldn’t wait for the show’s return, after the event was canceled in 2021 because of the pandemic. Visitors were greeted for the three-day run of the show by manufacturers and retailers of farm equipment, conserversation experts, and others who provide one-stop shopping for all farm services. Sweepers, sprayers, combines, tractors, shakers, scrapers, tillers, mowers, risers, and farm vehicles were just some of the equipment on display.
■ The Colusa County Board of Supervisors on Feb. 1 approved a request from the Sheriff’s Office for a new record management system that will bring the department into the 21st Century. The board awarded a sole source no-bid contract in the amount of about $378,000 with Sun Ridge Systems to provide software to the agency that will allow the Sheriff’s Office to share the same record management platform as the Colusa and Williams police departments. The system allows the three local agencies to be linked together for the purpose of sharing reports. At the time of the update, Colusa Sheriff’s Office personnel still hand wrote most of their reports, instead of relying on modern software.
■ The Arbuckle FFA Field Day returned to in-person activities on Feb. 5. Between students, spectators, and advisors, about 600 people were on the Pierce High School campus in cool but sunny weather, where FFA members competed in about 20 agriculture-related hands-on, written, and oral events that tested their technical competence, leadership, and communication skills. The Arbuckle FFA Field Day, one of the largest student-organized high school FFA competitions that meets the requirements of a state-qualifying event, is one of the first FFA competitions of the year. For FFA members from dozens of high schools across the state, the competition was not only a test of their individual skills, but exposure to a variety of opportunities available to them in the agriculture industry.
■ The 30th annual Glenn-Colusa Cattlemen’s and Cattlewomen’s dinner at the Colusa County Fairgrounds on Feb. 5 celebrated a milestone. Over 400 people attended the Holiday Topper event, which raised money to award scholarships to college students from Glenn and Colusa counties. The dinner first started in 1992 under the leadership of Lady Bug Doherty, of Maxwell, and the late Heddy LaGrande, of Williams, both westside cattle ranchers and members of the Glenn-Colusa Cattlewomen’s Association and California CattleWoman’s/Cattlemen’s Association, a nonprofit organization that has represented California’s ranchers and beef producers in legislative and regulatory affairs for more than 100 years.
■ Plans for an Arco gas station in Colusa moved forward. The Colusa Planning Commision on Feb. 9 approved a tentative parcel map to divide approximately five acres of vacant property immediately south of the Bridge Street shopping center into four commercial lots for the future “Colusa Town Center.” The property, which is owned by Amarjit Cheema, of Yuba City, is located on the east side Highway 20, immediately behind Round Table Pizza. Starbucks is expected to occupy one of the parcels along the highway, just south of the proposed gas station.
■ The City of Colusa’s event ad hoc committee pitched three city-sponsored events to the City Council on Feb. 15, and a reasonable amount of money they found the city should raise and spend. The council gave direction to city staff to move forward in 2022 with the Fourth of July celebration, Taco Festival, and a music (Country in Colusa) festival, in addition to summer recreation programs, including Concerts in the Park. The ad hoc committee of Mayor Tom Reische and Councilman Daniel Vaca was formed in 2021, after the public raised questions about the cost to taxpayers for a string of nearly back-to-back events, which officials said were well received by the public, but very expensive and skirted around the city’s established policies. The committee’s preliminary budget for all three events was about $108,000, but the city ultimately spent far less.
■ With hospitalizations and new cases of COVID-19 dropping, California reported on Feb. 16 that 83.6 percent of the state’s population had been vaccinated, with only 57 new cases of COVID-19 per 100,000 people reported statewide the previous week.
■ The Williams City Council finalized a new ordinance on Feb. 16 that they hoped would curb illegal fireworks use by allowing police officers to cite the person who controls the property from where fireworks are launched – not just the individual who lights the device.
The City Council hoped the new law would put an end to people launching illegal aerial fireworks almost nightly because homeowners or tenants of rental property from where fireworks are launched can now be issued an administrative citation that carries with it a $1,000 penalty.
■ The Pierce Joint Unified School District Board of Trustees selected one of five proposed site plans at its regular Feb. 17 meeting for the construction of two new buildings at Arbuckle Elementary School to educate their youngest students. The site selection followed months of stakeholder meetings, which began in 2021 in hopes of securing funding from California’s Full-Day Kindergarten Facilities Grant Program. The funding would allow the district to build two new buildings, which would provide four additional classrooms, without moving the fifth grade to the Junior High – a proposal that was immensely unpopular with board members and parents. Pending state approval, the district hopes to build the classrooms by the outdoor play area, and move the eight portable classrooms from the east side of the campus to the west side of the campus along 9th Street. The district also plans to reconfigure the walking track path.
March
■ Cases of COVID-19 in Colusa County and across the state continued to plunge, prompting health officials to shift their approach to the virus. For the first time in two years, Health and Human Services Director Elizabeth Kelly, on March 1, referred to COVID-19 conditions as “endemic” rather than “pandemic,” as are most officials throughout the state. As of March 1, California no longer mandated the wearing of face coverings in most indoor settings. Masking in schools was dropped on March 11. Health officials believe the virus that causes COVID-19 will remain endemic in a way that is similar to the seasonal flu or cold, rather than be fully eradicated.
■ The Colusa City Council on March 1 approved the use of American Rescue Plan Act funds to purchase two 2022 Ford Police Interceptors AWD vehicles and Motorola police communication equipment for the Colusa Police Department. The City of Colusa received $724,839 in ARPA funds.
The City Council previously authorized $106,201 for employee premium pay, and budgeted $75,000 from ARPA for broadband at the city’s mid-year budget review in February. The two Ford Police Interceptor Utility AWD vehicles were ordered on Oct. 29, 2021, to replace a police vehicle lost in a traffic collision and another with a failed transmission and costly maintenance issues.
■ The Colusa County Board of Supervisors on March 1 unanimously approved a letter pleading for the state to restore Williamson Act subvention funding to California counties. The state-run Williamson Act program had been in place since 1965 in order to reduce urban sprawl. Prior to the state eliminating the subvention payments to counties in the 2009-2010 state budget, Colusa County received about $856,000 from the state annually to make up for the lost revenue in property taxes, officials said. AB 1773, written by Assemblyman Jim Patterson, R-Fresno, which had bipartisan support from Northern California legislators, would have appropriated $40 million from the state’s general fund to resume subvention payments to counties, but the bill died in committee in November.
■ The City of Colusa, Griff’s Feed and Seed, and a volunteer group called the “Barrel Brigade” teamed up to restore color in the downtown. Volunteers worked with the local plant supplier to return the city’s wine barrel planters, which were purchased with COVID-19 pandemic funds in 2021, to Market, Main, Fifth, and Fremont streets. Colusa volunteer Patti Hickel, who spearheaded the project, pitched the idea to the Colusa City Council on March 1. The barrels with the flowers are maintained by the businesses where they are placed.
■ After multiple starts and stops, court proceedings resumed March 14 for accused double murderer Martin Chritian Ehrke after he was found competent to stand trial and participate in his defense. Ehrke, 53, is charged with killing Kimberly Lynn Taylor, 39, and Jessica Lynn Mazak, 25, in a fit of rage at his family’s farm on January 25, 2018, according to court testimony. He was returned to the custody of the Colusa County Jail on March 8, after staying less than a year in a California State mental hospital. Ehrke has pleaded not guilty to the two first degree felony murder charges. Ehrke has allegedly admitted to killing Taylor with a rock while she slept after first killing Mazak, who was walking her dog on the property, according to law enforcement testimony at a preliminary hearing.
■ The Williams City Council allocated about $38,000 of their COVID relief funds from the CARES Act to purchase 45 new jackets for Williams Fire Protection Authority emergency medical services personnel. The council approved the purchase, along with an additional $10,000 to reimburse the WFPA for personal protection equipment, on March 16, after Authority officials made an impassioned plea for the funding. The new lightweight jackets are worn by firefighters to respond to all medical-related incidents, which could also reduce possible carcinogens from fire and smoke from being carried into people’s homes on their regular fire turnout gear, which is not cleaned on a regular basis.
■ The Williams City Council, at their March 16 meeting, approved the purchase of 12 handheld Motorola APX 6000 radios and 12 APX 8500 vehicle radios in the amount of $180,756, plus $15,049 from Sutter Buttes Communications for the mounting equipment and accessories, including an IQ Quattro X3690 scanner. The $195,804 purchase of radios that meet new encryption standards was made in response to the California Department of Justice and FBI’s mandate for law enforcement agencies to cease transmitting a person’s identifiable information, such as name, drivers license numbers, criminal history, and driving record while interacting with dispatch.
■ With the rain holding off until late afternoon on March 19, it was quilts on display all over Colusa that made the biggest splash. Hundreds of quilts were draped over bushes and fences, hanging on porches, and displayed inside local businesses for the second annual Quilts Around the Block. Friends Around the Block and the City of Colusa started the event in 2021 as a way to get people out in the neighborhoods and businesses to discover and appreciate the talents of quilting artists from around the county. The event included a scavenger hunt, a Pacific Flyway Quilters display in Davison Park, and a display of the Pacific Flyway Quilters’ community service quilts on 8th Street. The Colusa Library hosted a crafting event where kids learned to make cardboard quilt blocks, using colored paper.
■ The Colusa City Council on March 22 approved the purchase of splash pad equipment that include a “duck” sprayer, a “spray way” arch, a Popp Drop, a “fill and spill” bucket water drop, a Ladybug spout, and a tractor sprayer. The council in 2021 authorized the splash pad to be built in Davison Park, next to the swimming pool, using the city’s $177,000 per capita allocation from Proposition 68, a Park and Water Bond Act of 2018. The splash pad’s water features, which cost about $98,000, were purchased from Water Odyssey. The new park feature is expected to be ready by summer 2023 after supply chain and other issues delayed the construction of the project in 2022, officials said.
■ Colusa’s Premier Mushrooms and Colusa County Chamber of Commerce hosted the annual Grant Breakfast on March 24 at Market Street Grill to award the 2021 community grants to local nonprofit organizations. Colusa Swim Team, Colusa County Library (Literacy Program), Stonyford Museum Youth Club, Maxwell Park and Recreation District Auxiliary, Williams Art Club, and Pacific Flyway Quilters each received awards of $200 or more for the 2021 gant cycle. Premier Mushrooms has provided small community grants since 2010 to help local nonprofit organizations fulfill their missions. The money is raised from the sale of mushrooms donated by the company at the Colusa Farmers Market.