Like other voters in Newberry Springs, I have recently received my mail-in ballot for the upcoming election. Separately, I also received another one of several flyers promoting Dawn Rowe for reelection to the Third District's supervisorial seat.

    I have also received a Happy Birthday card from her political action committee.

    During the last few weeks, I have been in communication with Rowe and members of her staff. At the last county Board of Supervisors general meeting on February 6, 2023, at the Newberry Springs Community Alliance's request, Dawn Rowe did us a favor by having an Environmental Justice ordinance that was pending approval, temporarily removed from the board's agenda.

    This is an ordinance that has been sneaked through by the Land Uses Services Department and approved by the Planning Commission with little public notification or participation. The current proposal fits fine for urban areas but it lacks what we need in the rural High Desert. This is an important ordinance that will impact future Newberry Springs development.

    I have had a recent 45-minute video conference with Land Use Services Director Mark Wardlaw and Planning Director Heidi Duron in which I tried to stall the proposed ordinance that is directed at Environmental Justice Focus Areas, such as Newberry Springs. It needs to be beefed up to reflect our rural needs.

    While these two County officials listened, they didn't hear, and with the Planning Commission's preapproval, they pushed the proposal forward for the Supervisors' expected rubber stamping on February 6th.

    Dawn Rowe did her job and she stepped in as requested by us and she managed to postpone the ordinance's approval. Hopefully, to allow the High Desert's residents an opportunity to enhance the ordinance. For Rowe's intervention, I am very grateful. However, Dawn Rowe has not earned my vote for reelection.

    Voters in Newberry need to consider Dawn Rowe's overall record. Newberrians suffer daily as a result of Rowe. She is one of the Supervisors who ignored Newberry residents' data-driven input and she voted against us on the Clearway project.

    She is a responsible party for the greatly increased levels of microscopic crystalline silica dust that everyone in our community now has to breathe. The substance is a California Prop. 65 recognized carcinogen that over time can cause chaos with human organs.

    This is increasing the health ailments in the elderly and is damaging to the long-term health of our children. Who, if they remain in Newberry Springs, will be breathing the damaging dust the most. I consider Rowe as having Newberry's blood on her hands.

    Certain Newberry CSD board members seem mesmerized by her, particularly Paula Deel, who apparently relishes Rowe. So, there are sufficient dim lights in our supervisorial district that I expect will reelect Rowe.

    Personally, my soul can't be purchased and I will be voting for Chris Carrillo. I have communicated with him and I feel that Newberry would have a far stronger voice and a definite better road for improvement with him representing us. He has a high level of integrity and he worked in Senator Feinstein's office on many of her environmental desert projects. In speaking with him, I found that he understands and is sympathetic to Newberry's solar plight.

    As of this publication's date, Dawn Rowe has failed to ever have a staff representative attend a single Newberry CSD meeting. This demonstrates her indifference to our community as she operates from Redlands.

    Dawn Rowe, as she publishes in a recent campaign flyer, is for "Reducing the Cost of Housing," by "...streamlining regulations, eliminating red tape, and protecting property rights."

    Dawn Rowe, while earlier living in the city of Twentynine Palms, tried to do an improvement on her private property. She ran into regulations that she rebelled against. While not appreciating the reason and protection to the public for the regulations, she has been bitter about them ever since.

    Having since moved into public service, she has crusaded for the removal of regulations to land development. As a newly appointed county supervisor, she was happy to support the construction of the Clearway Energy project despite the objections of Newberry residents. As long as she is our representative, she will likely continue to favor industrial solar development in Newberry Springs.

    She has indeed demonstrated her desire to protect property rights... the property rights of industrial solar developers.

    I am a desert environmentalist and Dawn Rowe is again opposite to my thinking. Despite the Cadiz water project hanging by a thread, Rowe is throwing it a lifeline to resurrect it despite the enormous environmental damage that it will do to a portion of our sensitive desert and her district. She has fallen into an endorsement trap set by Cadiz, Inc., to have the County once again support the project.

    The State is highly opposed to the Cadiz project. Environmental groups are angered by it. Most of the residents in her district are opposed to it, so why is she supporting it?

    The real question is what is she getting for her support?  What is her friend, Supervisor Paul Cook, who helped to propel Rowe into office, also receiving for his Cadiz support?

    For those who have followed the history of the Cadiz, Inc. water grab, it is a fascinating story of deep state 'Chinatown' corruption. Much like the William Mulholland story in the Owens Valley.

    Dawn Rowe made a personal appearance at the recent Newberry 3rd of July festivities and provided the CSD with a small donation, and has done some minimal district support as she politically boosts. Proportionally to Newberry's population, her donations of taxpayer funds have been a fraction of what she has given to other communities.

    The writings of John Locke, Edmond Burke and James Madison reflect a fundamental belief that no power is granted to our representatives as individuals. These representatives are fiduciaries that must act to achieve the best interest of those the representative represent. This is a basic principle of stewardship that Dawn Rowe has yet to understand.