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LAKE COUNTY, Calif. — Authorities are continuing to investigate the cause of an early Monday morning structure fire in Clearlake.
The fire in the area of Cottonwood Street and Walnut Avenue was first dispatched shortly after 3 a.m. Monday.
Firefighters arriving at the scene found downed power lines, according to radio reports.
Lake County Fire Chief Willie Sapeta said crews arrived on scene to find a fully involved motorhome, with the fire also burning a mobile home and an extension building, and destroying a garage.
There also was damage to the awning on another nearby mobile home and charring of the exterior of a stick built home, Sapeta said.
Sapeta said there were no injuries.
Firefighters remained on scene for mop up and patrol until 6:30 a.m. Monday, Sapeta said.
He said on Tuesday that they were still working to determine the cause, but they have ruled out fireworks.
Assisting Lake County Fire were agencies including Cal Fire, Kelseyville Fire, Northshore Fire and South Lake County Fire, Sapeta said.
Email Elizabeth Larson atThis email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. . Follow her on Twitter, @ERLarson, or Lake County News, @LakeCoNews.
The fire in the area of Cottonwood Street and Walnut Avenue was first dispatched shortly after 3 a.m. Monday.
Firefighters arriving at the scene found downed power lines, according to radio reports.
Lake County Fire Chief Willie Sapeta said crews arrived on scene to find a fully involved motorhome, with the fire also burning a mobile home and an extension building, and destroying a garage.
There also was damage to the awning on another nearby mobile home and charring of the exterior of a stick built home, Sapeta said.
Sapeta said there were no injuries.
Firefighters remained on scene for mop up and patrol until 6:30 a.m. Monday, Sapeta said.
He said on Tuesday that they were still working to determine the cause, but they have ruled out fireworks.
Assisting Lake County Fire were agencies including Cal Fire, Kelseyville Fire, Northshore Fire and South Lake County Fire, Sapeta said.
Email Elizabeth Larson at
LAKEPORT, Calif. — The Lakeport Police Department issued an update on its efforts to stop illegal fireworks usage during this week’s Independence Day celebration.
Lakeport Police once again partnered with the Lakeport Fire Protection District this year, with the two agencies launching their first undercover unit to deal with illegal fireworks.
The police department said that their combined efforts with Lakeport Fire resulted in the seizure of approximately 15 pounds of illegal fireworks and the arrest or citation of five subjects.
In addition, police and fire officials maintained visibility in the problem areas and issued public education to other violators.
“We know we’re not able to address every illegal fireworks incident as it is a daunting task for our limited resources to keep up with the amount of violators we have,” the police department said in a statement.
As a reminder of the dangers of these illegal and dangerous fireworks, police said they responded to one incident where a citizen reported being burned by fireworks debris after a fireworks charge prematurely exploded in a mortar tube.
All seized fireworks will be turned over to the fire marshal for safe destruction, police said.
The Lakeport Police Department will present a full after action report to the Lakeport City Council in the near future.
MIDDLETOWN, Calif. — The Middletown Area Town Hall will hold an “unofficial” meeting to discuss local issues this week.
MATH will meet at 7 p.m. Thursday, July 8, via Zoom. The meeting is open to the public.
To join the Zoom meeting click on this link; the meeting ID is 935 1671 5770. Call in at 888-788-0099.
The group reported that, due to the July 4 holiday, the agenda did not go out in time for an official MATH meet this Thursday, so the meeting will be “unofficial.”
They will gather to allow community members to meet, share improvement items they have posted to the Lake Area Planning Council and discuss community concerns.
Items they expect to discuss include needed stop signs, a discussion of reconvening in person, sharing of Area Planning Council posts and the monthly report from Supervisor Moke Simon.
The MATH Board includes Co-Chairs Rosemary Córdova and Monica Rosenthal, Secretary Lisa Kaplan, and Ken Gonzales and Paul Baker.
MATH — established by resolution of the Lake County Board of Supervisors on Dec. 12, 2006 — is a municipal advisory council serving the residents of Anderson Springs, Cobb, Coyote Valley (including Hidden Valley Lake), Long Valley and Middletown.
For more information emailThis email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. .
Email Elizabeth Larson atThis email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. . Follow her on Twitter, @ERLarson, or Lake County News, @LakeCoNews.
MATH will meet at 7 p.m. Thursday, July 8, via Zoom. The meeting is open to the public.
To join the Zoom meeting click on this link; the meeting ID is 935 1671 5770. Call in at 888-788-0099.
The group reported that, due to the July 4 holiday, the agenda did not go out in time for an official MATH meet this Thursday, so the meeting will be “unofficial.”
They will gather to allow community members to meet, share improvement items they have posted to the Lake Area Planning Council and discuss community concerns.
Items they expect to discuss include needed stop signs, a discussion of reconvening in person, sharing of Area Planning Council posts and the monthly report from Supervisor Moke Simon.
The MATH Board includes Co-Chairs Rosemary Córdova and Monica Rosenthal, Secretary Lisa Kaplan, and Ken Gonzales and Paul Baker.
MATH — established by resolution of the Lake County Board of Supervisors on Dec. 12, 2006 — is a municipal advisory council serving the residents of Anderson Springs, Cobb, Coyote Valley (including Hidden Valley Lake), Long Valley and Middletown.
For more information email
Email Elizabeth Larson at
LAKE COUNTY, Calif. — The Board of Supervisors’ last meeting of June saw its members confronted with numerous issues related to employment, from workplace safety to a notable retirement, and ongoing challenges with recruitment.
It was during the same meeting that numerous In-Home Supportive Services workers rallied outside on the courthouse steps and spoke to the board during public comment about wanting better working conditions and wages. Their union, California United Homecare Workers Union Local 4034, had closed session negotiations with the board, sitting as the IHSS Public Authority, on that day.
The board also approved new updates to the county’s COVID-19 workplace safety rules and honored retiring county Risk Manager Jeff Rein after 30 years of dedicated service.
One of the main employment-related items was the board’s discussion and approval of drafts of a hiring incentive policy and an updated referral policy, both of which offer cash to bring in new employees.
County leadership said they continue to struggle with recruitment, despite giving out raises to staff in the fall based on the classification and compensation study. At that time the county vacancy rate was at 20%. It’s now at 21%, county officials reported.
The challenges are being attributed, in part, to the pandemic.
County Administrative Officer Carol Huchingson said the county’s classification, compensation and recruitment committee was largely responsible for the draft policies.
That committee includes Huchingson, Supervisor Moke Simon, Supervisor Tina Scott, Human Resources Director Pam Samac, County Auditor-Controller/County Clerk Cathy Saderlund, analyst Diana Rico of Human Resources, Health Services Director Denise Pomeroy, Sheriff Brian Martin, Social Services Director Crystal Markytan, Chief Probation Officer Rob Howe, and deputy county administrative officers Steven Carter and Matthew Rothstein, a group Huchingson said during the meeting included “the best minds.”
Huchingson said staff wanted to workshop the drafts with the board and then take them to meet and confer with the county’s employee unions. The drafts would then return to the board before the policies are put in place, which could take place in July.
Samac said the committee had worked over the course of several months to develop a hiring incentive policy to attract and retain hard to fill positions.
The document defines hard to fill as those which have had two failed recruitments in a six-month period, resulted in fewer than three to five qualified and available candidates, candidates have declined job offers due to wages and benefits, non-entry level positions that have turned over multiple times in the last three to five years, and promotional recruitments that are not eligible for hiring incentives.
The positions are not entry level, with Samac adding, “Promotional recruitments are not eligible for this incentive.”
The list the committee sent to the board includes positions in 10 classifications that have typically been hard to fill. Those classifications are for attorneys, engineers, licensed medical staff, mid/senior level management, planners, safety, senior accounting and finance, senior social workers, mental health and substance abuse, and specialized skills and certifications.
Samac said they will look at those positions twice a year and ask to have more positions added to the list twice annually.
Proposed incentives as initially presented to the board were $6,000 for deputy sheriffs, deputy probation officers and welfare fraud investigators; $5,000 for correctional officers and dispatchers; and all other positions would be 10 percent of the overall salary, not to exceed $10,000.
Board Chair Bruno Sabatier said he had asked Human Resources for a list of all vacancies. He said that list showed 237 vacant positions but the list of jobs proposed for incentives covered only 60 of them.
He said every one of the positions that are vacant need to be supported. “How are we going to fill those positions?” he asked, adding, “We don’t need a list.”
Sabatier said the plan shouldn’t be specific to pay and that it doesn’t matter why the position isn’t filled.
He also noted the “insane” competition for public safety employees, adding he’s talked to the sheriffs of surrounding counties about it.
Scott said they needed to look at the proposal as “one brick in the wall,” and she was fearful of completely opening the incentives up to all jobs.
During the pandemic the county’s recruitment has been in a “holding pattern,” said Huchingson, noting that the vacancies now may look different than they would if not for emerging from a pandemic.
“Ultimately, we are looking for an overall fix,” said Simon, calling the incentive list a tool.
Huchingson said the incentives will be funded by cannabis tax for general fund departments, and for self-funded departments with salary savings, they will cover it themselves.
Sabatier wanted to have the matter brought back to the board once $100,000 in incentives have been spent.
“That would be a miracle,” said Huchingson, who suggested that the program might have traction in three to four months from implementation.
Huchingson said staff plans to bring back to the board at a future time the county relocation policy that offers $3,500 to new employees; she said the goal is to increase that amount.
Department heads ask for additional jobs, more money
Sheriff Martin told the board that with the proposed increase to $6,000 for deputies, “I wouldn't say we’re competitive at $6,000. I’d say we’re more competitive.”
Neighboring agencies also offer incentives — some of them substantially more.
Martin said the Ukiah Police Department pays $10,000 to recruits out of the academy, $8,000 to live in the city and $20,000 for lateral transfers.
“It’s tough to compete with that,” he said.
He said awhile back the committee’s name was changed to also include a focus on retention. “The current employees we have are arguably more important,” with more experience and dedication, Martin said.
“In my department I’m dealing with a retention issue as much as a recruitment issue,” said Martin, explaining that he’s hiring people and losing them more quickly.
Since taking a draft budget to the board a few weeks before, his number of employees had dropped from 121 to 114. The next conversation, he said, needs to be about retention.
Not discussed during the meeting was the fact that when many county employees were given raises last year as a result of the classification and compensation study, the deputies did not receive a raise. In June, the deputies’ union returned to negotiations with the county.
During the discussion, other department heads raised their own concerns.
Todd Metcalf of Behavioral Health Services explained his department is used as a training ground, with people staying only a few years.
Crystal Markytan of Social Services said a committee isn’t needed to figure out that Lake needs to pay its employees on par with other counties, because the county is spending an enormous amount of money to train people only to lose them.
Public Works and Water Resources Director Scott De Leon asked to have the board add the county surveyor position, which he said will be hard to recruit. It is being vacated due to a retirement.
Health Services Director Denise Pomeroy told the board that if her agency doesn’t have the staff to draw down funding from the federal government, the government will take away the funds.
She said the Public Health Department is a training ground, hiring licensed staff out of school who stay a few years and then leave. She said they have had some positions vacant for as long as nine years.
Huchingson said the updated hiring policy could be implemented on July 13 and three months after that the county could see changes in recruitment outcomes.
Sabatier said that looking at the hard to fill vacancy list, the average pay of vacancies on the priority list is $30 an hour.
Other vacancies average $22 and hour. He said those support staff positions will be very hard to fill if nothing is done.
“I’m still very uneasy with just pushing this forward when it seems very top heavy as to who we’re trying to recruit versus what does our county need,” Sabatier said.
He said the county won’t be able to fill $14 an hour positions with no incentive.
The board reached consensus to raise the incentive for public safety employees to $10,000.
Samac said Animal Care and Control Director Jonathan Armas asked for the veterinarian and vet tech positions also to be added.
The board also supported the second policy change, raising the employee referral incentive from $500 to $750 for most positions and up to $1,000 for hard to fill positions.
The new employee has to work for 90 days and mention who referred them for that person to receive the incentive, staff explained.
Huchingson said they were asking to increase the amount for the referrals due to minimal success.
Simon said he wants to entertain increasing the referral bonus for all positions to $1,000 in the future.
Email Elizabeth Larson at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. . Follow her on Twitter, @ERLarson, or Lake County News, @LakeCoNews.
It was during the same meeting that numerous In-Home Supportive Services workers rallied outside on the courthouse steps and spoke to the board during public comment about wanting better working conditions and wages. Their union, California United Homecare Workers Union Local 4034, had closed session negotiations with the board, sitting as the IHSS Public Authority, on that day.
The board also approved new updates to the county’s COVID-19 workplace safety rules and honored retiring county Risk Manager Jeff Rein after 30 years of dedicated service.
One of the main employment-related items was the board’s discussion and approval of drafts of a hiring incentive policy and an updated referral policy, both of which offer cash to bring in new employees.
County leadership said they continue to struggle with recruitment, despite giving out raises to staff in the fall based on the classification and compensation study. At that time the county vacancy rate was at 20%. It’s now at 21%, county officials reported.
The challenges are being attributed, in part, to the pandemic.
County Administrative Officer Carol Huchingson said the county’s classification, compensation and recruitment committee was largely responsible for the draft policies.
That committee includes Huchingson, Supervisor Moke Simon, Supervisor Tina Scott, Human Resources Director Pam Samac, County Auditor-Controller/County Clerk Cathy Saderlund, analyst Diana Rico of Human Resources, Health Services Director Denise Pomeroy, Sheriff Brian Martin, Social Services Director Crystal Markytan, Chief Probation Officer Rob Howe, and deputy county administrative officers Steven Carter and Matthew Rothstein, a group Huchingson said during the meeting included “the best minds.”
Huchingson said staff wanted to workshop the drafts with the board and then take them to meet and confer with the county’s employee unions. The drafts would then return to the board before the policies are put in place, which could take place in July.
Samac said the committee had worked over the course of several months to develop a hiring incentive policy to attract and retain hard to fill positions.
The document defines hard to fill as those which have had two failed recruitments in a six-month period, resulted in fewer than three to five qualified and available candidates, candidates have declined job offers due to wages and benefits, non-entry level positions that have turned over multiple times in the last three to five years, and promotional recruitments that are not eligible for hiring incentives.
The positions are not entry level, with Samac adding, “Promotional recruitments are not eligible for this incentive.”
The list the committee sent to the board includes positions in 10 classifications that have typically been hard to fill. Those classifications are for attorneys, engineers, licensed medical staff, mid/senior level management, planners, safety, senior accounting and finance, senior social workers, mental health and substance abuse, and specialized skills and certifications.
Samac said they will look at those positions twice a year and ask to have more positions added to the list twice annually.
Proposed incentives as initially presented to the board were $6,000 for deputy sheriffs, deputy probation officers and welfare fraud investigators; $5,000 for correctional officers and dispatchers; and all other positions would be 10 percent of the overall salary, not to exceed $10,000.
Board Chair Bruno Sabatier said he had asked Human Resources for a list of all vacancies. He said that list showed 237 vacant positions but the list of jobs proposed for incentives covered only 60 of them.
He said every one of the positions that are vacant need to be supported. “How are we going to fill those positions?” he asked, adding, “We don’t need a list.”
Sabatier said the plan shouldn’t be specific to pay and that it doesn’t matter why the position isn’t filled.
He also noted the “insane” competition for public safety employees, adding he’s talked to the sheriffs of surrounding counties about it.
Scott said they needed to look at the proposal as “one brick in the wall,” and she was fearful of completely opening the incentives up to all jobs.
During the pandemic the county’s recruitment has been in a “holding pattern,” said Huchingson, noting that the vacancies now may look different than they would if not for emerging from a pandemic.
“Ultimately, we are looking for an overall fix,” said Simon, calling the incentive list a tool.
Huchingson said the incentives will be funded by cannabis tax for general fund departments, and for self-funded departments with salary savings, they will cover it themselves.
Sabatier wanted to have the matter brought back to the board once $100,000 in incentives have been spent.
“That would be a miracle,” said Huchingson, who suggested that the program might have traction in three to four months from implementation.
Huchingson said staff plans to bring back to the board at a future time the county relocation policy that offers $3,500 to new employees; she said the goal is to increase that amount.
Department heads ask for additional jobs, more money
Sheriff Martin told the board that with the proposed increase to $6,000 for deputies, “I wouldn't say we’re competitive at $6,000. I’d say we’re more competitive.”
Neighboring agencies also offer incentives — some of them substantially more.
Martin said the Ukiah Police Department pays $10,000 to recruits out of the academy, $8,000 to live in the city and $20,000 for lateral transfers.
“It’s tough to compete with that,” he said.
He said awhile back the committee’s name was changed to also include a focus on retention. “The current employees we have are arguably more important,” with more experience and dedication, Martin said.
“In my department I’m dealing with a retention issue as much as a recruitment issue,” said Martin, explaining that he’s hiring people and losing them more quickly.
Since taking a draft budget to the board a few weeks before, his number of employees had dropped from 121 to 114. The next conversation, he said, needs to be about retention.
Not discussed during the meeting was the fact that when many county employees were given raises last year as a result of the classification and compensation study, the deputies did not receive a raise. In June, the deputies’ union returned to negotiations with the county.
During the discussion, other department heads raised their own concerns.
Todd Metcalf of Behavioral Health Services explained his department is used as a training ground, with people staying only a few years.
Crystal Markytan of Social Services said a committee isn’t needed to figure out that Lake needs to pay its employees on par with other counties, because the county is spending an enormous amount of money to train people only to lose them.
Public Works and Water Resources Director Scott De Leon asked to have the board add the county surveyor position, which he said will be hard to recruit. It is being vacated due to a retirement.
Health Services Director Denise Pomeroy told the board that if her agency doesn’t have the staff to draw down funding from the federal government, the government will take away the funds.
She said the Public Health Department is a training ground, hiring licensed staff out of school who stay a few years and then leave. She said they have had some positions vacant for as long as nine years.
Huchingson said the updated hiring policy could be implemented on July 13 and three months after that the county could see changes in recruitment outcomes.
Sabatier said that looking at the hard to fill vacancy list, the average pay of vacancies on the priority list is $30 an hour.
Other vacancies average $22 and hour. He said those support staff positions will be very hard to fill if nothing is done.
“I’m still very uneasy with just pushing this forward when it seems very top heavy as to who we’re trying to recruit versus what does our county need,” Sabatier said.
He said the county won’t be able to fill $14 an hour positions with no incentive.
The board reached consensus to raise the incentive for public safety employees to $10,000.
Samac said Animal Care and Control Director Jonathan Armas asked for the veterinarian and vet tech positions also to be added.
The board also supported the second policy change, raising the employee referral incentive from $500 to $750 for most positions and up to $1,000 for hard to fill positions.
The new employee has to work for 90 days and mention who referred them for that person to receive the incentive, staff explained.
Huchingson said they were asking to increase the amount for the referrals due to minimal success.
Simon said he wants to entertain increasing the referral bonus for all positions to $1,000 in the future.
Email Elizabeth Larson at
LAKEPORT, Calif. — At the June 22 meeting of the Lake County Board of Supervisors, two new commissioners were appointed to the First 5 Lake Commission.
Tarin Benson is the coordinator of student services for Konocti Unified School District and Justin Gaddy is the program manager for Hope Rising Lake County.
Both appointees will each serve two-year terms as at-large commissioners.
Benson qualified for consideration as a commissioner as a representative of a local school district, and Gaddy qualified as a parent of a young child, under the age of 6, and recipient of project services included in the First 5 Lake strategic plan.
“I want to be part of organizations that are taking the lead in developing growth opportunities for our children and creating a brighter future for our community. I don’t just want to talk about change; I want to be part of the change that’s talked about,” said Gaddy.
“I am interested in helping to make the connections between 0-5 and education, and in building up our community by making a positive impact at the earliest ages because what happens in early childhood impacts a lifetime,” said Benson.
“We are excited to have Commissioners Benson and Gaddy at the First 5 table going forward,” said Carla Ritz, executive director for First 5 Lake. “There were several qualified applicants, each with varied backgrounds and experiences that would have been valuable to the First 5 Commission.”
Ritz added, “The recruitment and selection committee members were particularly focused on finding qualified candidates who could represent children and families in District 2 which was underrepresented on the commission at the time. Equity is a core value of First 5 Lake, and we believe that representation is essential to the pursuit of that value.”
Both Benson and Gaddy grew up in the south shore area of Lake County and attended schools within Konocti Unified School District, and both are graduates of Lower Lake High School who now work in Clearlake and Lower Lake.
The next meeting of the First 5 Lake Commission will be held via Zoom on Wednesday, Aug. 25, at 2 p.m. Members of the public are welcome and encouraged to attend and offer comments. More information about First 5 Lake, its investments and priorities can be found at www.firstfivelake.org.
Using funds derived from CA Proposition 10’s voter-mandated tax on tobacco products, the First 5 Lake County Commission funds programs and services that benefit the health and development of young children and educate parents, grandparents, caregivers and teachers about the critical role they play during a child’s first five years.
Since its inception in 2000, First 5 Lake has supported thousands of families with programs and services designed to help Lake County children grow up healthy and ready to succeed in school and life.
The First 5 Lake commissioners are:
— Chair Tina Scott, Lake County District 4 supervisor.
— Vice Chair Carly Swatosh-Sherman, Lake County Office of Education, education specialist.
— Brock Falkenberg, Lake County superintendent of schools.
— Crystal Markytan, Lake County Social Services director.
— Denise Pomeroy, Lake County Health Services director.
— Allison Panella, mother of children under age 5.
— Fawn Rave, education director, Robinson Rancheria.
— Tarin Benson, coordinator of student services for Konocti Unified School District.
— Justin Gaddy, father of a child under age 5.
LAKE COUNTY, Calif. — With the Lake County Rodeo saddling up this month after a year off due to the pandemic, organizers are once again seeking youngsters to take part in its Cutest Cowpoke Competition and mutton bustin’.
The 91st annual Lake County Rodeo takes place Friday, July 9, and Saturday, July 10, at the Lake County Fairgrounds, 401 Martin St., Lakeport.
Rodeo is for all ages and on Friday the Cutest Cowpoke Competition takes place, while mutton bustin’ will take place on both nights.
Cutest Cowpoke Competition
The Cutest Cowpoke Competition will take place between 6 and 7 p.m. at the fairgrounds.
This contest is open to boys and girls, ages 3 to 8, with no limit on the number of entries.
The Clear Lake Junior Horsemen and the Scotts Valley 4-H sponsor the Cutest Cowpoke Competition. You will also see the Clear Lake Junior Horsemen each evening as they perform their very excellent Drill Team routines.
Applications are available online at www.lakecountyrodeo.com and the Lake County Chamber of Commerce at Vista Point in Lakeport.
The deadline to enter is Friday, July 9, at 5:30 p.m. at the fairgrounds.
All participants should arrive at the rodeo on Friday, no later than 5:15 p.m. to check in at the rodeo office.
It is necessary to purchase tickets to the rodeo to participate, but there is no entry fee for the competition. Admission to the rodeo for children 6 and under is free.
Children are encouraged to dress in “rodeo style,” but no live props are allowed.
The winning boy and girl will each be awarded a special silver buckle for their prize.
For questions concerning this event, please call 707-245-7431.
Mutton Bustin’
Most youngsters have played at being cowboys and cowgirls as they were growing up. Being a rodeo performer is also a dream for many.
On Friday and Saturday, that dream will come true for 10 youngsters each night who have entered the Mutton Bustin' Competition.
The competition will take place each day between 6 and 7 p.m.
Boys and girls between the ages of 4 and 8 years old will have the thrill of their life seeing how long they can ride a sheep. The winner each night will be awarded a silver buckle.
Presale rodeo tickets are available in Middletown at Koontz and Rainbow Ag; Pasquinellis Deli and Barreda’s Lower Lake Feed; Upper Lake Grocery; and in Lakeport, at Rainbow Ag, Lake County Chamber and West Lake Auto Center.
The ticket prices are adults $15 and youth $10, both nights. Presale tickets for Saturday evening are $2 off.
DJ Ken Steely will play for a dance following the rodeo on both Friday and Saturday, beginning between 9 and 9:30 p.m.
The 91st annual Lake County Rodeo takes place Friday, July 9, and Saturday, July 10, at the Lake County Fairgrounds, 401 Martin St., Lakeport.
Rodeo is for all ages and on Friday the Cutest Cowpoke Competition takes place, while mutton bustin’ will take place on both nights.
Cutest Cowpoke Competition
The Cutest Cowpoke Competition will take place between 6 and 7 p.m. at the fairgrounds.
This contest is open to boys and girls, ages 3 to 8, with no limit on the number of entries.
The Clear Lake Junior Horsemen and the Scotts Valley 4-H sponsor the Cutest Cowpoke Competition. You will also see the Clear Lake Junior Horsemen each evening as they perform their very excellent Drill Team routines.
Applications are available online at www.lakecountyrodeo.com and the Lake County Chamber of Commerce at Vista Point in Lakeport.
The deadline to enter is Friday, July 9, at 5:30 p.m. at the fairgrounds.
All participants should arrive at the rodeo on Friday, no later than 5:15 p.m. to check in at the rodeo office.
It is necessary to purchase tickets to the rodeo to participate, but there is no entry fee for the competition. Admission to the rodeo for children 6 and under is free.
Children are encouraged to dress in “rodeo style,” but no live props are allowed.
The winning boy and girl will each be awarded a special silver buckle for their prize.
For questions concerning this event, please call 707-245-7431.
Mutton Bustin’
Most youngsters have played at being cowboys and cowgirls as they were growing up. Being a rodeo performer is also a dream for many.
On Friday and Saturday, that dream will come true for 10 youngsters each night who have entered the Mutton Bustin' Competition.
The competition will take place each day between 6 and 7 p.m.
Boys and girls between the ages of 4 and 8 years old will have the thrill of their life seeing how long they can ride a sheep. The winner each night will be awarded a silver buckle.
Presale rodeo tickets are available in Middletown at Koontz and Rainbow Ag; Pasquinellis Deli and Barreda’s Lower Lake Feed; Upper Lake Grocery; and in Lakeport, at Rainbow Ag, Lake County Chamber and West Lake Auto Center.
The ticket prices are adults $15 and youth $10, both nights. Presale tickets for Saturday evening are $2 off.
DJ Ken Steely will play for a dance following the rodeo on both Friday and Saturday, beginning between 9 and 9:30 p.m.