Valley Solutions

Too hot or too cold for posse

Fox26. Merced County Sheriff’s Posse returns home after trip to Independence Day Parade. 
Synopsis: The Sheriff’s Posse was honored to be asked but didn’t get the chance to parade in honor of America’s 250^th birthday. The parade was canceled in the face of 100-degree heat with real feel of 109 degrees in downtown Washington, DC.
MAD Note: Too hot or too cold! The story doesn’t mention it, but this was the second time in 18 months that the MSO Posse has been invited to celebrate in a Capitol parade, and the second time weather has kept them from participating. In January 2025, the Posse was scheduled to march in Donald Trump’s inaugural parade but extreme cold forced cancellation of the parade. Now, extreme heat caused the Freedom 250 Parade to be canceled, too. Too cold, too hot -- next time is bound to be just right.

Pity for salmon fishers?

Ag Net West. CA’s commercial fishing industry faces mounting challenges, says Morro Bay fisher. 
Synopsis: Ag Net West’s interviewers talked to commercial fisher Lori French, who describes her struggling industry. She says that in 2020 there were nearly 6,000 commercial fishing licenses active in the state; now there are only 3,200. Fish landings have fallen dramatically in places like Morro Bay. This, in turn, has forced other businesses – marina operators, fuel docks, mechanics – to go under. She wants to see ocean zones where fishing is prohibited to save threatened species opened to fishing. Having grown up in the Central Valley, she says “Farmers are not the bad guys, and fishermen are not the bad guys” since both are food producers. 
MAD Take: When the Golden State Salmon Assn cast its lot with groups like Restore the Delta, SF Baykeepers and the NRDC in the fight to direct nearly all of CA’s freshwater water away from farms and into the ocean, they pretty well anchored fishermen as some of the “bad guys” in farm country. Every year, at least half of CA’s precipitation (snow and rain) remains in the environment; some years it is 80%. But it’s never enough for groups who insist that salmon aren’t smart enough to deal with drought despite their continued presence in California for the past 6 million years – which is about 5,975,000 years longer than humans. It’s too bad that “landings” have fallen, but fewer fishers equals fewer fish being caught. Finally, if salmon are so important in California -- and they are -- then we need to stop killing them. The salmon resurgence seen in 2025 following a three-year fishing ban is all the proof we require.

Merced embarks on Pao Park

Merced Sun Star. Merced ready to break ground on park named for Hmong leader.
Synopsis: The official groundbreaking for General Vang Pao Park will be Saturday at 10 a.m. at West Cardella and Freemark in north Merced. It’s named for a hero of the “Secret War” in Southeast Asia who helped Laotians resettle in California. The ADA-accessible playground at the park will be named for Aletha June Schelby Nel. The 8-acre park will include an on-grade hill slide, a shaded playground, swings, rope-climbs and rubber-surfaced play areas.

Medline rises from ashes

Stocktonia. Medline, rebounding from massive fire, leases giant warehouses in Tracy, Stockton. 
Synopsis: Less than a month after the massive fire destroyed its million-square-foot warehouse in Tracy, Medline has leased two facilities – one in Tracy, one in Stockton. The Tracy warehouse on Sugar Road is 925,000 square feet and about 10 miles from the destroyed space. The Stockton warehouse is 709,000 square feet, or about the size of 12 football fields, but won’t open until January. No location was provided, but several warehouses are under construction east of Hwy 99 on Mariposa Road.

Dredge away the clams?

Maven’s Notebook. Could dredging invasive clams boost fish food in Suisun Marsh?
Synopsis: The invasive overbite clam has consumed much of the phytoplankton in the San Francisco Bay estuary, creating a “food desert” for fish. Now a UC Davis researcher has presented a plan to dredge areas of Suisun Marsh colonized by the Asian clams, crushing them in the process. Suisun Marsh is a natural breeding area for Delta and longfin smelt and migrating salmon but has long been bereft of fish due to the clams. The clams arrived in 1986 and by the mid-1990s had “carpeted the bottom of Suisun Marsh” with 2,000 clams per square foot. Yes, the clams might return after dredging, “But that’s an unknown – and nothing else works.”

West Nile found on West Side

Westside Connect. West Nile virus detected in Stanislaus as officials urge precautions.
Synopsis: As is common most years, West Nile virus has been detected in Stanislaus County. No human case has been reported, but the virus was found in a dead bird. There have been several detections, ranging from Escalon and Stockton in San Joaquin County to Gustine in Merced County. In all, 24 counties have confirmed West Nile. Officials ask that all standing water be emptied, pointing out that mosquitos can lay eggs in a teaspoon of water.

Screwworm cases rising

Ag Daily. New World screwworm cases rise to 32 inside the U.S.
Synopsis: The USDA reports there are now 32 cases of New World Screwworm in Texas and New Mexico. The agency has created a screwworm dashboard that shows the quarantine areas for infestations. Most of the cases are in southwest Texas, but it is moving north. Cows, sheep, horses, dogs and pigs have all been infested with the maggots that feed on living flesh before killing the host animal if untreated.

LA Times. Deadly screwworm threatens US cattle herd as cases climb. 
Synopsis: As the case-count climbs, people are asking how the screwworm – eradicated in the U.S. 50 years ago -- got back into Texas. The Trump administration say it is Joe Biden’s fault, though when he left office, the nearest known screwworm was 900 miles from the Texas border. Democrats say cuts to USDA inspectors and reductions in border enforcement allowed ranchers to evade checkpoints or unknowingly bring infected cattle across the border. But both arguments miss the point. Better question: Why, after years of releasing sterile flies in Panama, did cases there jump from fewer than 60 to more than 6,500 in 2023? Regardless: “It’s not going to be good enough to just sterilize our way out of this if there’s constant reinfection and reinfestation through illegal cattle movement.”

Fire burns atop Priest Grade

KCRA. Priest Fire: 3 firefighters injured battling Tuolumne County Fire, Cal Fire reports.
Synopsis: Three firefighters were hurt in separate incidents while fighting a brush fire where Old Priest Grade comes back into Hwy 120 at Big Oak Flat. It started as a vehicle fire and spread to vegetation prompting a short-lived evacuation. Cal Fire contained the fire to 10 acres.

Firebaugh FFA wins honors

Westside Express. Firebaugh FFA earns award for excellence. 
Synopsis: The Firebaugh High FFA was recognized with several statewide awards – including the award for Outstanding 5/6 Person Department. The department includes Gene Lieb, a 13-year ag teacher, Erica Correia, Graciela Martinez, Michael Ortiz and Katelyn Smith. Lieb was recognized as the Teacher of Excellence by the CA Ag Teachers Association. He is acting president of the CA Ag Teachers Assn.

Water can cut nitrogen needs

Sustainable Conservation. New guide to help winegrape growers perform recharge on vineyards.
Synopsis: Sustainable Conservation and the CA Sustainable Winegrowing Alliance have put together a model and guide to help growers plan and implement on-farm groundwater recharge. The planning is part of Flood-MAR (managed aquifer recharge) during wet periods. A side benefit to flooding is that flooded vineyards “tend to use less nitrogen fertilizer than many other crops, reducing groundwater contamination risk.”

Calling for another audit

Stocktonia. Stockton vice mayor asks state to investigate after petition blasts transit district. 
Synopsis: Vice Mayor Jason Lee has called on the state’s Controller’s Office to look into San Joaquin Regional Transit District, which he says has been mismanaged. He sent a three-page letter on June 24 after receiving a petition signed by TRD riders, former drivers and former district leaders. The petition says RTD executives lack required qualifications and that they have squandered the district’s reserves, which have fallen from $62 million to $26 million in just three months. The Controller’s Office began auditing Stockton’s city government in January, an investigation that is said to be “almost complete.” The letter and petition include 12 main concerns.

Candidate quits as prosecutor

Fresno Bee. Fresno council candidate quits US prosecutor job over ICE criticism; blames Trump. 
Synopsis: District 1 Fresno city council candidate Rob Fuentes has resigned his job as a federal prosecutor for immigration cases after his comments condemning ICE were posted on the Fresnoland website. “I was pushed out by the Trump administration after I criticized ICE publicly,” he told The Bee. He told Fresnoland that he wanted to “abolish ICE” and said, “It’s very clear to me, both as a private citizen and as an attorney, that ICE has used unlawful tactics in numerous instances, and I’ve expressed that criticism internally.” Fuentes told The Bee that he does not want ICE abolished, but that it must be “significantly reformed.” Fuentes is in a runoff with Naindeep Singh in the Nov. 3 general election. Fuentes attended Stanford then Harvard and got his JD from Yale.

Making getaway on a ‘giraffe’

Fox26. Thief rides giraffe while stealing donations outside thrift store in Easton.
Synopsis: It doesn’t get much weirder than this. A man sitting astride a stuffed giraffe was caught stealing donations from a thrift store in Easton. He told the store’s owner that he had donated the items the night before and had become remorseful and was simply trying to retrieve his property. The thrift store owner called police.