(ANDERSON VALLEY ADVERTISER - December 8, 1999)

ANDERSON VALLEY ADVERTISER

Vol. 46, Number 49
BOONEVILLE, CALIFORNIA

December 8, l999

OFF THE RECORD SECTION:

REMEMBER THE PARROT PEOPLE of Point Arena? The last time the Goulds and their macaws were in the news is when they coughed up $1,120.00 to appeal the Department of Building and Planning's decision that parrots somehow were a hazard to the turkeys down the street -- Windy Hollow Road, to pinpoint the location of this fowl dispute. The eviction notice from B&P is not supported by science or even common sense. But B&P's cease and desist order to the Goulds and their modest flock of parrots IS supported by the powerful Stornetta family who just happen to lease an otherwise unproductive piece of land on which a British-owned turkey farm is located. There isn't an elected or non-elected official in this county who dares take on the Stornettas, including supervisor Colfax, the alleged champion of little versus big among an otherwise slavishly pro-big board of supervisors. Colfax made noises like he would help the Goulds then disappeared.

BUT HERE'S the biggest rub of many in the parrot versus the turkeys case: The turkeys were already flying off to a new nest in the state of Wahington when the Goulds and their parrots conveniently arrived in the neighborhood, this giving the turkey farmers an excuse to break their lease with the Stornetta. The Stornettas immediately squawked that the parrots were forcing the turkeys to leave in order to remove the turkeys sole excuse to comlete their move to Washington. The Goulds, meanwhle, are getting the famous Mendo Shuffle. County officials, diving to the prone position at the mere mention of the Stornettas, want the Goulds' parrots out of Point Arena by dawn, Y2K. The County Counsel's office and the DA's office seems to be attempting to fast track the Goulds back to Arizona, but the Goulds are holding out for due process, much to the annoyance of the Stornettas and thier tax-funded golfers in Ukiah.

THE GOULDS have yet to be given a hearing date before the Planning Commission and still have not been furnished with the complaint against their operation. The Goulds have also sent the Building and Planning Department $65 for a permit to gravel their road as B&P advised them to do. No permit has been issued. The road work will cost them an etimated $10,000. While the Goulds try to do everything to satisfy B&P, no one at all in official Mendoland is doing anything to either help the Goulds or clarify their unhappy situation vis a vis TheStornettas and the Nicholas turkey farm.

AND SOMEONE or someones is shooting at the Gould's Point Arena property, aiming specifically (so far) at their dogs. Some time late last Sunday night or early Monday morning, the Goulds' dog Pounce was shot in the head as Pounce lay beneath the window of the Goulds' grandchildren. This is the second shooting of a Gould family pet since their arrival in PA. Two months ago, another of their dogs was also shot as it lay beneath the grandchildren' bedroom window. It was shot in the neck.