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TheHealdsburg HealdsburgTribune Tribune The Enterprise & Scimitar Enterprise & Scimitar
Visit for daily updates on local news views www.healdsburgtribune.com for daily updates on local news andand views Our 157th year, Visit Number 51 www.healdsburgtribune.com Healdsburg, California 1865 –December 22, 2022
Our 155th year, Number 00© ur 155th year, Number 00©
KELLEY LEADS FIRST COUNCIL MEETING AS NEW MAYOR
Healdsburg, California Healdsburg, California
Date, Date, 20202020
ZOOMING IN FROM A REMOTE LOCATION, ARIEL KELLEY TAKES CHARGE By Christian Kallen
➝ Kelly Leads Meeting, 5
Photos by Christian Kallen
It’s not usual for the Healdsburg City Council to have two meetings in December, one of them just a week before Christmas. But a technological breakdown at the Nov. 21 meeting meant there remained a lot of year-end work to do, so the council met on Dec. 19 to attend to this. One problem, Healdsburg’s new mayor, Ariel Kelley, was out of town, having planned “some family holiday travel, assuming the meeting would be canceled,” as she told the Tribune. But thanks to the pandemic-adjusted rules for civic meetings, she was able to chair the meeting remotely and called it to order at 6pm on the dot. The meeting needed to happen in order for the council “to conduct some routine business items, like adopting the fire and building codes, which were set to expire at the first of the year,” said Kelley. It was also a good time to schedule two personnel issues that can affect the city’s business for the coming year: appointing councilmembers to various local and regional committees, and vetting the four candidates to replace Jerry Eddinger on the city’s Planning Commission. Eddinger resigned from the commission at the end of October, bringing to an end 48 years with the city in various roles, including council members and mayor. He was given an emotional send-off by the council at their Dec. 5 meeting, complete with an ovation from many community members who had worked with him or used his
SNACK WORTHY Rescued donkey Poppy nibbles on a bag of straw at John and Laura Somers’ Healdsburg ranch. They adopted three from Oscar’s Place, a donkey sanctuary in Hopland.
Media Exec Reborn as Donkey Protector RON KING’S HOPLAND SANCTUARY RESCUES DONKEYS HEADED FOR ‘KILL PENS’ By Christian Kallen
The seasonal legend is that the carpenter went door to door in Bethlehem looking for lodging while his very pregnant young wife was carried by an ass. Thirty-three years later, that grown child rode a donkey into Jerusalem to culminate his ministry. Whatever one may think of these stories, the fact that donkeys may now be an endangered species is alarming. Donkeys? The butt of many a joke, donkeys have nonetheless been part of human history for millennia, having been domesticated in Africa as many as 7,000 years ago and
used as work animals ever since. The scientific name is Equus asinus, hence its common name (donkey is a relatively modern name, quite possibly used because the term “ass” is troubling for some). But as people developed machine technology to plow, hoe, reap and bear, the common ass has become somewhat irrelevant. But as with bears, tigers, rhinoceros and pangolin, donkeys are among the species being illegally slaughtered worldwide to supply raw material in Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM). The “valued” portion of the donkey is its hide, from which a gelatin called ejiao is extracted. Worldwide specialists of TCM often focus on herbal or physical remedies, but many practitioners in China and Vietnam rely on a supply of ejiao, which can only be replenished by the slaughter of donkeys. It is used in edibles, tonics and face
DONKEY LOVE Ron King and Veijo embrace in mutual respect and comfort at Oscar’s Place in Hopland. creams, and prescribed for all sorts of ailments. Similarly, deer antlers are the base for many TCM concoctions as well. Though ejiao’s use has been around for centuries, its modern popularity was boosted by a 2012 Chinese TV melodrama which
showed ejiao used to promote fertility. One of the world’s largest ejiao producers paid for its products to be placed in the scripts, and ejiao appeared in multiple episodes over the four months the show aired in Hong Kong. Now, it is estimated
that 4.8 million donkey hides a year are taken to satisfy annual demand for ejiao, according to a recent report from the Donkey Sanctuary (thedonkeysanctuary.org.uk). At its current pace, the global
LITTLE SAINT ANNOUNCES IMMINENT SINGLETHREAD SEPARATION
management of business when Vertice Hospitality concludes its oversight as of Jan. 6, 2023. The news was announced in a press release dated Dec. 14, but the restaurant’s press offices requested the news be quarantined until after a staff meeting that afternoon to share the news. It was apparently a wellkept secret, as employees confirmed that they were unaware of the pending changes. “Our initial concept for Little Saint, which debuted in the former SHED space in early 2022, was to return a treasured destination to our town of Healdsburg in the form of a plant-based all-day gathering place,” said the Ubbens in a press release from Little Saint. Vertice also operates SingleThread Farm and
TWO SIGNATURE HEALDSBURG RESTAURANTS WITH GARDEN-BASED MENUS END ARRANGEMENT By Christian Kallen
Photo by Christian Kallen
DOG WALK A quiet morning at Little Saint, in the iconic SHED building
on North Street, Healdsburg.
Little Saint, the ambitious all-vegan restaurant, market and event venue at 25 North St., dropped an early Christmas surprise last week when it was announced that the owners, Laurie and Jeff Ubben, will take over full
➝ Donkey Protector, 2
➝ Little Saint Pivots, 4