ANDERSON VALLEY ADVERTISER

DECEMBER 15, 1999

OFF THE RECORD SECTION:

GEOFFREY AND BARBARA GOULD, aka the Point Arena Parrot People, have been ordered by the county's Planning and building department to move their 100 or so breeding parrots off the Gould's Windy Hollow Road property just outside PA. The owners of a nearby turkey breeding farm contend that the parrots represent a health hazard to their turkeys. The Stornetta family, who leased land to the turkey breeders, claim the turkeys are moving to Washington because the parrtos are living nearby. The county says parrots, classified i nMendo as household pets, can't be raised in an area zoned for agriculture. The state's leading expert on avian matters, Dr. West of UC Davis, says the parrots present no threat to turkeys so long as basic precautions are taken to keep the disparate flocks apart. And then it all gets mean, violent and crooked. The turkeys were moving to Washington before the Goulds and their parrots arrived in Point Arena. The Stornettas did not want the turkeys to move because they get a very good rent for the piece of property they rent to the British-owned turkey farm. The Stornettas leaned so hard on what passes for local authority, including supervisor Colfax, to get the parrots off Windy Hollow Road to deprivethe turkey farmers of their pretext for departing Point Arena for Washingson, that Commissioner Colfax, assisted by the County Counsel's office and Barry Vogel of the DA's office, simply waived the Gould's right to due process that ordinarily begins with a hearing before the Planning Commission and scheduled the Goulds for a hearing before the supervisors next Monday, December 20th, at 9am. In theory, the Goulds will get to appeal Planning and Building's red tag eviction of their parrots from Point Arena, and in theory the five persons listening to the Goulds will be listening with minds as unpredisposed one way or another as a bisexual infant. But Colfax was overheard telling his fellow supervisors that the Stornettas wanted the Goulds out by Christmas, and what the Stornettas want, the Stornettas get or this isn't Mendocino County. How will the supervisors vote? 5-0 for the Stornettas, count on it. Count on a lawsuit against the county from the Goulds, too, who have endured a virtual blizzard of treachery from local officialdom and have had two of their dogs shot to emphasize the fact that they've moved to a place wher the rules depend entidrely on who's got the dough to ignore them.

Note - Colfax was not 'overheard'. this statement was made at a board of supervisors meeting, as an off agenda item, in front of reporters from at least two newspapers, and members of the public.