napa county

This special episode of Heritage Radio Network On Tour brings you the latest news on the California Wildfires that continue to burn throughout parts of Napa, Sonoma, Calistoga and Santa Rosa.

Kat Johnson reports on the most recent developments and speaks with Jeff Mosher, the Executive Chef of Robert Mondavi Winery.

16 October 2017 – Charles Gaba (@charles_gaba) comes back again to explain why Trump’s latest move against the ACA is so incredibly dangerous. This time, however, there are some really specific things we can be doing to help to keep the ACA from imploding. Join the Indivisible ACA Sign-up Project (@2018ACASignUps) and get involved on the ground with GetAmericaCovered.org. As I mention at the end of the interview, Charles is a national resource who is taking time away from his real job to maintain expertise and educate us in all kinds of ways on all the subjects associated with the ACA. Please go to Charle’s excellent website ACA Signups and support him. He is certainly supporting millions of us. At the top of the show I talk a bit about the fires in my in my hometown of Santa Rosa. Will talks about the hate that Trump is sending out and pushing right into Will’s home and that of every LGBTQ person in the country. I have handed-off my main block to Will and Joel. Will will tell you about it below. For all the years and years it will take to rebuild, I remain #SonomaCountyProud. Carrots! – Arliss For my block, we discussed millennials, guns, and regulation. Millennials aren’t willing to accept the all-or-nothing dichotomy we’ve been handed on the gun debate. We’re perfectly willing to let people keep their guns, but also perfectly willing to enact heavy restrictions such as a national gun registry, a ban on offenders convicted of domestic violence owning weapons, mental health screening, and gun insurance. This fact, that we tend to be both pro-guns and pro-gun control, confuses people. Due to time, I cut this block from the broadcast edition, but it’s in our podcast. For Joel’s block, we discussed the upcoming 2018 elections, the metrics beforehand, and what we can do to actually win.

This special episode of Heritage Radio Network On Tour brings you the latest news on the California Wildfires that continue to burn throughout parts of Napa, Sonoma, Calistoga and Santa Rosa. We have updates from winemaker Robert Sinskey, Brian Kenny of Hearst Ranch, and more.

“We need to focus on climate change and educate people to vote the environment. It needs to be the number one issue for all eligible voting citizens. The world has bigger problems than just the wine industry and these fires. We need intelligent, savvy politicians who will make climate change their top priority and we need to put others on notice that the world has moved beyond fossil fuel and chemical farming. I have said for years that vineyards are the canary in the coal mine. What we are experiencing now is what’s in store for the rest of world if we don’t move on from this carbon based economy.” – Robert Sinskey

Next, we take a look at some of the conditions that led to these fires. The New York Times published an article addressing the factors that made this wildfire season so deadly. Years of drought were followed by record amounts of rainfall, which spurred new plant growth, and then followed by months of extreme heat that withered the new growth and turned it into more tinder. Autumn winds from the northeast, known as diablo winds, began blowing through the region over the weekend at speeds of 70 miles an hour or more. It’s unknown what sparked the fires at this time, but state officials are looking into the possibility that downed power lines are one of the causes.

In this first half of this episode of The Farm Report, host Erin Fairbanks speaks with Becca Rimmel, co-manager of the Ithaca Farmers Market. Becca's experience as a professional naturalist led her to begin questioning the origin of the food on her dinner plate, and how food choices affected the landscape around her. Through this curiosity, she began exploring her own bio regional food system, completing her Masters in Sustainable Food Systems from Green Mountain College in 2016, and beginning as the manager of the Ithaca Farmers Market shortly after. When she’s not managing the Ithaca Market, she’s working to build her own business, Bottomland Farm.

After the break, we hear a recording from Erin's visit to Fishkill Farms in September. Owner/operator Josh Morgenthau walks us through the history of his family business.

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As of Tuesday, October 10th at around 6pm EST there are over a dozen wildfires raging throughout Northern California. The fires are concentrated in the wine and agricultural centers of the state in Napa and Sonoma Counties, where 12% of the state’s grapes are grown. On this episode we are providing up to date information on the impact this disaster is having on the residents of this region and how it is affecting the area’s food and wine producers. We are joined on the phone by Brian Kenny of Hearst Ranch and Adam Mariani from Scribe Winery to get their local perspectives and reports.

Scribe Winery issued this statement on Tuesday afternoon:

"We are heartbroken by the devastation the wildfires have caused to both the Sonoma and Napa Valley. We have been up for the last two nights working alongside the incredible Cal Fire and the local fire departments to keep the fire at bay. It was a very close call. If not for them this place we have called home for over a decade would be gone. We are also so thankful to the community and our friends for coming out to help over the last few days. Although Arrowhead Mountain is scorched, we are so grateful that the Hacienda and the other buildings have been spared. We are incredibly fortunate and appreciate the messages of love and support. Our thoughts and prayers are with the people who were not so lucky. It's beyond devastating."

The full personal, economic, and environmental impact of this devastating natural disaster will likely not be known until the fires have been controlled. HRN On Tour will be keeping you up to date on how the fires are affecting our food and wine producers and how you can help those in need. We will continue our coverage in a special segment of this week’s HRN Happy Hour, Thursday evening at 5pm, where we will be joined by more voices of Northern California’s food world.

*Map Data © Google 2017.

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