Ukiah Daily Journal from Ukiah, California • Page 1

A's end season in Kelseyville A-6 The Commerce File 3 UKIAH LIFESTYLES Special section hi Brief Letters dass.ads..&4 Lottery Comics Crossword. Forum A-4 Jumbte TV listings Landers Weather A-12 50 cents tax included The Ukiah Mendocino County's local newspaper URNAL Tomorrow: Mostly cloudy WEDNESDAY June 30, 2004 RAPPELLING PART OF UKIAH FIRE DEPARTMENT'S ORIENTATION High-flying firefighters Volunteer Firefighter James Palmer rappels down the training tower on Tuesday. By LAURA CLARK The Daily Journal Orientation training Tuesday at Ukiah Fire Department sent a handful of firefighters over the edge. Rappelling just for the fun of it off the tower behind the city fire department followed a lesson on proper techniques of using rope, hardware and mechanical advantage systems. The two-week "aggressive orientation program" is fairly new to the department, Ukiah Fire Chief Kurt Latipow said.

"We've made'jonie changes over the last 10 months here. One of the things we've changed is how we bring full-time people new firefighters onto the job. In the past, it was not uncommon for firefighters on their first day to be immediately assigned to the new shift and boom to calls," Latipow said. This sink-or-swim scenario is no longer the case. Now, Latipow said, the first two weeks on the job are spent in the orientation program.

"We already mandate that our full-time firefighters have graduated from an approved academy and are state certified Firefighter Is. So they aren't coming in blind but now we fine tune. We expose them to the equipment at the station in Ukiah, expose them to the manner in which we respond to calls, and what resources they have available to them as Ukiah firefighters'," the chief said. At the end of the two-week orientation, Latipow receives a recommendation from the fire captain and the Emergency Services bat- See TRAINING, Page A-10 Amy Daily Journal Ukiah Fire Department Explorer Tucker Mattern, 15, rappels down the training tower during exercises on Tuesday. (Left) Charlie Miller secures Scott Byers to the belay rope.

(Right) Miller addresses a small group of new firefighters on Tuesday regarding pulley systems used In rescues. is jUSt the fun part Of all Of CHARLIE MILLER, Ukiah Fire Department Projected deficit for city now at $635,000 Fiscal year budget under discussion By MARK HEDGES The Dally Journal On Tuesday, the Ukiah City Council began its marathon consideration of the city's draft budget for fiscal year But, like Finance Director Gordon Elton stated, the current budget situation is "unlike any other" in terms of its uncertainty of funding sources from the state. The Ukiah City Council has been steadfast in its desire not to see reductions in police or fire services in the face of what looks to be a $635,000 deficit at this time. The deficit is the increased cost for the city to maintain the same level of services as the previous year, which at this point could only be paid by a dip into General Fund reserves. Such an act, Elton stated "may be the first in the history of Ukiah," See BUDGET, Page A-10 Conspirator sentenced in Hells Angels '86 slayings ByPEIJEANTSAI The Dally Journal The last of three conspirators convicted of covering up the October 1986 Hells Angels massacre of a Fort Bragg family was sentenced to three years in state prison on Tuesday.

Shasta County resident Mary Anne Hodgson, 46, was one of three co-defendants convicted in May for participating in an extensive coverup that included threatening witnesses and falsely informing investigators. On top of the three-year sentence, she was ordered to pay $600 restitution. Two others convicted in the same trial recently received shorter prison sentences for obstructing justice in the 18-year-old murder case. Robert Laurence Huffman, 62, was sentenced to 20 months for loaning a van used in the arson of the murdered family's home. Sammie Louise See SENTENCE, Page A-10 Tokyo's governor amid the big trees of Northern California By JOHN DRISCOLL The Eureka Timee-Standard One of Japan's most powerful men is jealous of our parks.

While thousands of park rangers keep watch on American national parks, only a handful guard Japan's natural treasures. Shintaro Ishihara wants to change that. Following a whirlwind tour of Grand Canyon National Park and Redwood National Park, the governor of Tokyo is taking home lessons from the far-grander-scale parks on the east side of the Pacific Ocean. While the hot and dry Arizona canyonlands were a bit under-vegetated for Ishihara, the ocean- blown redwoods outside Orick made him feel at home. Home needs help, Ishihara knows.

"I'm really feeling envious about the huge amount of land you have," Ishihara told park adminis- trators at the visitors' center just north of Freshwater Spit Monday. The whole of Japan measures 146,000 square miles, compared to California's 164,000 square miles but Japan has 90 million more people than the state's 35.4 million. Ishihara may be the man who can prompt a change in Japan, which he said for decades put all its resources behind reducing mercury contamination and air pollution. It was the byproduct of rapid industrialization. Seen by many as a nationalist, Ishihara is undoubtedly a lightning rod who appears to have a distaste for the bureaucracy and politics he said are slowing the conservation and preservation of Japan's important open lands.

Japan's parks are neglected, and Ishihara said he, as Tokyo's governor, and people from a nearby village started the country's first park ranger pro- gram. After the visitors' center stop, Ishihara and a group of aides followed park service employees to Elk Meadow, north of Orick. Bull elk, their antlers in heavy velvet, frolicked in the field while cow elk rested in the sun. One of the reasons, Ishihara came was because some of his own have been volunteering with Redwood National Park. Wataru and Momoko Suzuki have been here since January.

Wataru is assistant director of the Wildlife Division of the Nature Conservation Bureau, part of Japan's Ministry of the Environment, which Ishihara worked with for years. It wasn't long before Ishihara's contingent shuffled him to Wolf Creek School, the park's educa-. tional facility in the redwoods outside Prairie Creek State Park. Yurok tribal member and park service employee Dale Webster hunched over a bed of madrone coals surrounded by sticks heavy with spring Klamath River salmon. He explained how American Indians catch salmon, steelhead and sturgeon.

"Spring-run fish are the best See TOKYO, Page A-10 John 'Clmci-SUniUrd Tokyo Qov. Shintaro Ishihara, center, with Japanese park volunteer Momoko Suzuki, Ian, and her huaband Wataru Suzuki, right, look ovar a table of traditional Yurok Implements made by Data Webster at Wolf Craak School In Redwood National Park..