Bloody Coup at the Feather River Canyon CSD (Part 1)

Subject: I'm a Sheep to the Slaughter (Part One)

Hello all,

Sorry it's taken so long to write about this event which took place last Monday, 13 September at my last water board meeting before being driven out in "disgrace" by a right-wing, phony Libertarian  coup. I endured forty minutes of outright attack on my character and motivation, in public and on the record, against all tradition to do such things in closed session, with Joan Chandler, the water treatment operator, recanting her recantation as she moved to stay with the winners. I was accused, by the previous treasurer of misogamy and even sexual harassment while others listed such sins and misdemeanors as misuse of funds, improper profanity and numerous other sometimes self-contradictory charges.

I'll be going into this in great detail on my website soon but it's taken me a week before I can begin write about the experience. It was surreal as the room was filled with ringers, mostly from the gated community Old Mill Ranch but also my neighbors the Wilsons, Jeffery & Dorothy, back from a vacation in Scotland and in for the kill. It was one of the most amazing experiences of my life. All these pictures were taken at about 5:45 PM, fifteen minutes before the meeting was due to start. I wanted to have them to update the website with the new director, Rocki Norris, the new Chair and new board member, henceforth referred to as "The Viper". Next to me is Laine Lehman, retired refinery worker from the Bay Area who relocated up here in the mountains and, as I've mentioned before, a pretty good amateur pot farmer himself. He had been Chairman for the past five years and had been on the board for seven years. He was relived when Rocki accepted the Chair(person) position. I had some hopes for her too, an extremely naive view on my part.

Down at the end of the room, out of focus is Joni Chandler, our one employee and water treatment operator. Next to her, Rocki acting casual as the knives are sharpened. Next to her on her left is Ken George. He was treasurer before me and he's a sorta big deal in county society. Besides being a five year past treasurer of our board, he was also president of the local Chamber of Commerce, the Elks, Lions, advisory panels, etc. He owns a Pizza Factory franchise restaurant in downtown Quincy and live in the same Old Mill Ranch gated community. In other words, he's a respected member of Plumas County society and, as we shall see, I am not.

There are earlier pictures of Ken George on my website, currently shut down for major renovation.  "Revenge is a dish best served cold." I thought that Shakespeare said that and part of my thinking as to why I decided to take my time with my website reply. You may have noticed I was wearing my Shakespeare '86 T shirt and it would have seemed fitting with the Shakespearian drama that was about to unfold with me as the central villain. (Just checking the quote, the attribution seems to be:  "...la vengeance se mange très-bien froide."   from  Mathilde by Marie Joseph Eugène Sue not that the author matters as much as the thought.)

But I'm getting ahead of myself as you do not yet know the relentless attack I was about to experience...

Here the room is filling up. It would be jammed with close to fifty by 6:00 PM, apparently all absolutely attracted to the blood sport about to unfold. That's Mike Mondot in the blue shirt and across the table from me, the Paxton big time legal pot farmer and fellow board member and, up until this night, what I considered a friend and ally.

That ricktus of a grimace is a smile on the face of my neighbor Dorothy Wilson, wife of my nemesis Jeffery and she was sitting there before I sat down. Most likely since she knew what was about befall me. 


She made a perfunctory response when I asked casually how she liked Scotland and she even mentioned that they had stayed in Keith. Then she got up and moved out of my eye sight. Those guys on the stools are Ken and Dick, owners of Dickens Drilling. They successfully dug the Tobin well and were here to discuss the problems with the well at Old Mill. I consider them to be very good and honorable guys and the got up and went outside when the attack began on me. I should point out that this meeting was held not at Paxton, as usual, but in the closed bar and restaurant, Hot Springs, owned by the Norris's, Rocki and her husband sitting back there in the green shirt. In  other words, she had me on her home turf. This is the last picture I took before the meeting began.  That's Jeff Wilson standing there in white and you can she Dorothy has moved, no longer smiling and out of my view as the meeting began.

Of the many things I regret, and I replay the episode over and over and over again always thinking about what I should have said. At one of those extreme moments in life when courage under fire I have again failed.I have to get ready for work at the PO. Did I mention that most of my neighbors do not come in for their mail while I am there and most get their stamps and mail their packages elsewhere? Really strengthens the level of community spirit I feel for Tobin, where Mary & I will have lived for 35 years this 1 October.

To cut to the chase, this is going to be a story of major failure on my part as the inmates successfully took over the asylum, the only sincere environmentalist kicked off the board and me making my plans for a major and extremely public counter attack. My biggest failure, besides what I should have said but did not, was, when under extreme fire, I forgot that my new Nikon camera has a audio feature and I could have recorded every word of the lies and character assassination against me.

Discussing what I was actually accused of will take a while but I was almost accused of several crimes against women, so they are very serious. This is the "He said, she said" accusation that no man, once muddied, ever completely clears. I could drag out testimonials of every woman I have ever known well and/or intimately, including my ex-wife, with nary an accusation of misogamy will be found. Many may have numerous other complaints, but that's another story. 

Had I absconded with several thousand dollars in board funds I could not have been treated with more contempt by the entire room as I left. It reminds me of reeducation under Chairman Mao. Or "self-examination" under Stalin.

Gotta go. I will survive and believe me, I will counter attack. They say that freedom of the press belongs to those who own one and fortunately for me, I know how to post a website and they do not, at least without help which I hope turns out to be very expensive for them.

John

PS: Since the 13 September coup of the Feather River Canyon CSD (aka water board) by what I now term the "Coalition of Unrepentant & Brain-Dead Water Wasters" or CU&BDWW, a suitably ugly acronym, I have updated my website. I was vanquished in battle through treachery but now, having licked my wounds and adopted "La vengeance se mange très-bien froide." as newly adopted my cri de cour so follow the links from my Canyon Graphics website homepage to the "Not the FRCCSD Website" site.