Jeff Pelline's Sierra Foothills Report

Who’d have thunk it? On Wednesday Mark Meckler, the Tea Party Patriot co-founder who is from our county and generating a lot of ink, is “re Tweeting” a message from a fellow TTP coordinator to sign a petition to support Arizona’s new immigration law.

“RT @jenuinejen: Do U support AZ’s new immigration law? Sign the petition hre: http://ht.ly/1EpQx #teaparty #tpp #tcot #sgp #tlot #iamthemob,” it reads.

“I am in support of Arizona’s new Immigration Law, and believe in the right of each state to protect its own citizens from the effects of illegal immigration.
Step One: Sign the petition.
Step Two: Share with everyone on your Facebook pages.
Step Three: Use the ‘I Support Arizona’ image on your Facebook and Twitter profiles.”

Isn’t social networking cool for getting the word out?

Local GOP supporter Aaron Klein, meanwhile, isn’t so sure about the immigration bill in a blog post here.

Like I keep saying, extremism is splitting up the Republican party, in our neck of the woods and elsewhere. Any politician (or newspaper publisher/editor) who bet on the wrong horse with their constituents, ought to be jumping off and running in the opposite direction ASAP. Jerry Brown must be LOL.

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Snowplows hit the streets in foothill towns such as Nevada City late Wednesday, clearing a late winter storm that caused traffic accidents and raised concerns that the cold weather might damage crops.

Accidents were reported in Grass Valley and Nevada City, with ambulances called to the scene in some of them, according to the CHP website. Chain controls continued to be in effect on Highway 20 from Nevada City to Interstate 80.

Farmers said they were in a “wait-and-see” mode when it comes to the risk of frost damage. Fruit trees and grapes for wine growing have begun to bud throughout the area.

“Growers in the Sierra Foothills are in for a rough night. Hail stones right now, frost expected in the morning. Holding our breath,” one winegrower said.

The weather is supposed to clear later in the week, continuing the risk of frost damage if temperatures get too cold.

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“I do not support Meg Whitman for governor of California for a variety of reasons, the main one being, she is a liberal, surrounded by liberals,” writes Jane Jamison, editor of the conservative news and commentary blog uncoverage.net. “Going ‘third party’ with some of the alternate candidates is a sure-fire way to end up with Jerry Brown for governor this fall. Going ‘moderate’ with a liberal Republican like Whitman is also a proven losing strategy.”

It seems to me the real losing strategy is for McClintock and the “far right” to split the loyalty of the Republican party, burning up GOP cash in the primary and clearing the way for Jerry Brown to become governor. In our area, Aaron Klein (a community college trustee), Republican Assemblyman Dan Logue and Republican Senator Sam Aanestad also have endorsed Poizner. Kim Pruett, whose spouse is running for the supposedly nonpartisan county clerk-recorder position, is a local McClintock staffer.

All along, I and many others have predicted a Whitman-Brown race for governor. This just shows how far “out there” some of our local politicans are.

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On Tuesday, our five county supervisors (all of whom are conservatives and/or Republicans) voted unanimously to direct the Rood Center staff to look into the feasibility of adopting an energy-efficiency program called AB811.

Assembly Bill 811 authorized local governments to create districts to finance the installation of energy conservation improvements on existing residential, commercial, industrial and other real property.

The findings are expected in about six months. At the public meeting, a member of the Nevada County Contractors Association — whose PAC often supports conservatives — spoke about the benefits of the programs in creating jobs.

But over on the blog of Russ Steele — the “de facto” spokesman for the far right in our county — he’s throwing rocks at Nevada City and Mayor Reinette Senum for touting Nevada City as a “solar city.” He forgot to mention that Nevada City’s ranking came from a report by Environmental California that was publicized in the Los Angeles Times and elsewhere.

You can nitpick the results if you want to. Our you can be constructive and listen to the residents, contractors and others who are looking for ways to “jump-start” an economy with double-digit employment. Our cottage solar industry here is an economic bright spot. What worked in the past won’t work now.

The moderate Republicans in our county recognize that too.

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“The Nevada City Chamber of Commerce and the Grass Valley/Nevada County, South County and Penn Valley Chambers of Commerce have contracted with The Union Newspaper to produce the 2010/2011 Official Visitor’s Guide to Western Nevada County,” according to an email I received on Wednesday.

“The Visitor’s Guide is our most popular marketing tool to draw visitors to Grass Valley, Nevada City and surrounding areas. 25,000 copies will be published for delivery in the Union Newspaper.”

OK. Where else will it be distributed? “They will be available all year long at the Grass Valley, Nevada City, Penn Valley and South County Chambers of Commerce and mailed to anyone requesting information about Nevada County. They will also be distributed in racks around the area and posted online.”

Oh. A visitor’s guide that is circulating to people who already are here. Glad to hear we’re at least mailing some out on request and putting the information on The Union’s website. Let’s hope we can draw some people who just decided to walk into the chamber office without any plans.

•How about distributing the visitor’s guide outside the area rather than just around here?
•How about an RFP (or request for proposal), which is Business 101? The editor/publisher of The Union sits on the Nevada City Chamber’s board, a potential conflict of interest. As I understand it, the issue this year was more about having too little time to consider other options. Do the boards ask any questions about matters like this?
•It’s time to shed the provincialism around here if we expect to draw tourists from the Bay Area, Sacramento, Reno and Tahoe/Truckee to our “cute little towns” as well as grow our chambers.

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