Morning News for Wednesday, February 27th
After a high speed chase, where the passenger fired a handgun at a Mendocino Sheriff's Deputy's car, police are seeking Christopher Skaggs,30, from Redwood Valley, and Walter Miller (33-,Ukiah,) as persons of interest in this incident.
The public should consider them to be possibly armed and dangerous.
Anyone with information on the whereabouts of Skaggs and Miller are urged to contact the Sheriff's Office at 463-4086 or the Tip-Line at 234-2100.
About 30 Protesters against the Willits bypass yesterday stopped Caltrans subcontractors from building a fence — and bulldozing a path through the brush — at a site on East Hill Rd north of Warbler's tree sit .
Protesters discovered several bird nests in the brush Caltrans had already cleared, and sat in the path of the bulldozer.
CHP OFFICERS were told by protesters they wanted to talk to California Fish & Wildlife.
A biologist from SHN Consulting, which had done a bird survey in January, came to look at the nests, along with an environmental compliance officer from Caltrans. Both handled and moved the two still intact nests, breaking one of them. When Fish & Wildlife Warden Rusty Boccaleoni arrived, he was also told that witnesses had seen birds flying from the tree.
Caltrans’ compliance officer told the game warden that it appeared to be an old nest.
BOCCALEONI eventually told protesters that JoAnn Dunn, a staff environmental scientist for Fish & Wildlife would be coming to the site to look things over.
Dunn later told protesters that Fish & Wildlife would be returning to do a more complete survey, which would take a few days.
Naomi Wagner provides an update for Tuesday when two protesters once again stopped CalTrans construction.
The Ukiah Planning Commission will hold a public hearing Wednesday on the draft Environmental Impact Report (EIR) for a proposed Costco store at 6 p.m. in the council chambers at 300 Seminary Avenue.
According to the staff report, David Babcock and Associates applied for the construction of a Costco warehouse store and fuel station at the south end of Airport Park Boulevard on 15.33 acres, located between the Ken Fowler Auto Center and the southern end of Airport Park Blvd.
The warehouse store would be a maximum of 148,000 square feet and include a bakery, pharmacy, optical center, food court and tire center. The tire center is 5,692-square-foot, building that includes a tire installation facility.
The EIR identified The Significant and Unavoidable impacts, those which "cannot be eliminated or reduced to a less than significant level," as "air quality, transportation and traffic and global climate change."
This Thursday, the Ocean Protection Coalition invites the public to a discussion of the proposed expansion of the Gulf of the Farallones/Cordell Bank Marine Sanctuary, at 7 p.m. February 28 at the Fort Bragg
Library Community Meeting Room, 499 E. Laurel St.
We will finalize our letter of recommendation for submission the following day, March 1st.
The Marine Sanctuary expansion offers permanent protection from offshore oil drilling and other polluting activities to just north of Point Arena. For information, contact David Gurney at 961-1339.

