Page 2 - Don Saylor News Today

Divided Board of Supervisors weighs in on drug-treatment facility for felons Shares The Yolo County Board of Supervisors voted this week to support in principle legislation that would allow the county to create a secure drug treatment facility for felony offenders who would otherwise be incarcerated in jail or prison. The vote was narrow, with three supervisors in favor, one in opposition and one abstaining. AB 1542 was authored by Assemblyman Kevin McCarty, D-Sacramento, in partnership with Yo...

Davis Media Access: Getting back into the routine Shares Excitement is building for vaccine availability and the prospect of life beginning to return to normal. I’m starting to field many questions about when Davis Media Access will “reopen,” and would like to take this opportunity to address a number of them in one place. Some things to know: * While many KDRT programmers continue to produce from home, DMA has largely reopened to solo KDRT programmers for whom that was not possible. We�...

Dear Assembly Members Jones-Sawyer and McCarty: Human Rights Watch opposes the AB 1542 Yolo County pilot program that authorizes judges to sentence people to confinement in a locked treatment facility instead of prison or jail if the judge determines that their crime was motivated in part by substance abuse. We ask legislators to reject this bill and take a more holistic, rights-respecting approach to addressing problematic substance use and crime that may be connected to it. The apparent premi...

Farmworker advocates call for vaccination priority With COVID-19 vaccines still in short supply, reprioritizing who gets them and when becomes, as Yolo County’s health officer said Tuesday, “a zero sum game.” “Whenever you expand eligibility for one group, you take away vaccines from another group,” Dr. Aimee Sisson told the Board of Supervisors. Up until last week, there was no game involved — the state was requiring counties to prioritize residents 65 and older before moving on to...

County grapples with racial disparity in foster care The increase in Yolo County children entering foster care in recent years has compounded existing racial and ethnic disparities within the child welfare system, particularly for Black children, according to a self-assessment performed by the county. In 2019, Black children made up about 2.5 percent of the total child population in Yolo County but 23 percent of the population in foster care here. They were also more likely to be placed in care...

Shares BRAVO, BRAVO… While I would certainly like to take all the credit for remedying the awful, late-night train car noise situation that’s plagued North Davis the last few weeks, I’ll admit my grouchiness about it in a recent column was likely not the lone factor that led to the actual change. So, bravo to city council members Lucas Frerichs and Will Arnold, as well as county supervisor Don Saylor, who worked together to reach a resolution with the California Northern Railroad, which h...

I strongly disagree with the Yolo County Board of Supervisors’ decision to reject an independent advisory committee empowered to redraw district maps. On Jan. 12, the board voted 4-1 (Saylor opposing) to form an advisory committee with final decision-making left to the Board. District boundaries are

Valley Clean Energy has new board leadership Support Local Journalism As a new year dawns, Valley Clean Energy announces a change in leadership for the not-for-profit local electricity provider. Dan Carson, a Davis City Councilmember, was elected to chair the VCE board for 2021, and Winters City Councilmember Jesse Loren was elected to the position of vice-chair. Both votes were unanimous. Jesse Loren has taken over as vice-chair for the Valley Clean Energy board. Courtesy photo The VCE board i...

City, county pledge to cooperate on homeless camp No issue in Davis has prompted more constituent complaints in the past year for Yolo County Supervisor Jim Provenza than the ever-growing encampment between F Street and the Cannery along the railroad tracks. Support Local Journalism No issue in Davis has prompted more constituent complaints in the past year for Yolo County Supervisor Jim Provenza than the ever-growing encampment between F Street and the Cannery along the railroad tracks. Stretc...

Railroad agrees to cease nighttime operations The city of Davis has reached a resolution with California Northern Railroad regarding nighttime operations. For the last several weeks, train switching on the north-south railroad line in North and Central Davis had been occurring, typically starting very late at night and into the early hours of the morning, causing noise and disruption to local residents. California Northern Railroad (the rail operator on the line owned by Union Pacific Railroad)...