A 65-year-old Santa Rosa writer living on $1,260 a month says a referral is not housing and asks that success be measured by people safely housed.
Renee Belinda Cooper. (Photo by Renee Belinda Cooper)
Sonoma County
Point-in-time homeless counts by area, 2024 through 2026, from the staff report to the Sonoma County Board of Supervisors for its Oct. 27, 2026, meeting. (County of Sonoma)
Sonoma County homeless count holds flat, officials warn
Sonoma County counted 1,951 homeless people this year, one fewer than 2025, but health officials told supervisors the count hides rising chronic and youth homelessness as funding dries up.
Penny the Goose, a penny-covered statue in Lucerne, in 2019. (Roger Coryell/Wine Country Gazette)
Lake County tops state for fentanyl, overdose death rates
Lake County had the highest fentanyl and overall overdose death rates of any California county in 2025, preliminary state figures show, while Mendocino County’s fentanyl deaths fell for a fourth straight year.
Roger Coryell / Wine Country Gazette
Lake County winery licenses fall to 38 as grape prices slide
Five Lake County winery licenses have lapsed since June, leaving 38, state records show. Lake grape prices fell 38% in two years, far more than in Mendocino, Sonoma or Napa.
Bodega Harbor, seen from the east shore in Bodega Bay on May 14, 2026. (Roger Coryell / Wine Country Gazette)
Bodega Bay’s icehouse replacement slips to 2027, county says
A $75,000 state grant for the Spud Point Marina ice plant asks Sonoma County for a final report when the work is done, and no later than Dec. 31.
A sign welcomes visitors to Cloverdale on Feb. 25, 2023. (Sarah Stierch / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 4.0)
Cloverdale council warns Morgenstern, stops short of censure
The council voted 4-0, with one abstention, to issue Councilmember Marjorie Morgenstern a formal warning over her treatment of city staff instead of adopting a draft censure resolution.
A sign reading “Monte Rio Awaits Your Return” hangs above a street in Monte Rio in front of a house and wooded hills, Nov. 9, 2009. (Stepheng3/Wikimedia Commons, public domain)
Sonoma County ends ADU ban on 3,997 lots, 494 in Monte Rio
Sonoma County will stop banning ADUs on 3,997 unincorporated parcels Nov. 5. About half touch high or very high fire hazard land, and half of the Monte Rio lots touch the river’s flood area.
Looking down the one-lane roadway of the Wohler Bridge over the Russian River on June 24, 2012, years before the seismic retrofit began. (Frank Schulenburg / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0)
Sonoma County’s Wohler Bridge will stay closed past Oct. 30 target
Sonoma County now expects to reopen the century-old Wohler Bridge over the Russian River this winter, about a year later than the county first said.
WavebreakMediaMicro/Adobe Stock
Santa Rosa nursing home on federal list of troubled homes
Federal inspectors found that missed skin checks led to maggots in a resident’s toe wound and the amputation of his toe.
Current and proposed maximum base rates for Sonoma County Fire District ambulance transports in Exclusive Operating Area 1. Source: Sonoma County Department of Health Services. Graphic: Wine Country Gazette
Sonoma County supervisors weigh 9% ambulance rate increase
Sonoma County Fire District had asked for 16.36% and has agreed to cooperate with an independent financial audit. Supervisors take up the 9% increase on their consent calendar Tuesday.