Viewpoint: De Vaul violated the law

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• Dan De Vaul's Sunny Acres will be overseen by a receiver, judge rules

  Dan De Vaul's Sunny Acres will be overseen by a receiver, judge rules

  A receiver has been appointed by Superior Court Judge Charles S. Crandall to oversee code compliance at the San Luis Obispo ranch owned by Dan De Vaul, who runs a sober-living facility on the property.

  Crandall issued his ruling Friday, sharply rebuking De Vaul’s contention that he has been trying to bring his facilities and living conditions up to code at the ranch called Sunny Acres. The order appoints David J. Pasternak as receiver and takes effect immediately.

  “Although Sunny Acres claims there is no longer any health and safety emergency, this argument is meritless,” Crandall wrote. “The best way to gauge the future is by examining past history. Given what has transpired so far, the court can reasonably expect that illegal human habitation will recur once the county inspections cease.”

• Viewpoint: Cutting through the blather

  Viewpoint: Cutting through the blather

  It is high time that someone responded to the blather that is being circulated concerning programs to serve the homeless and the nature of the homeless problem.

  The prime source is one Becky Jorgenson, a self-designated “homeless advocate,” who has little, if any, training or experience in dealing with the homeless and the homeless problems in this area, other than working for a short time at the De Vaul Ranch.

  Jorgenson would have us disband and get rid of all homeless services providers and facilities, such as the Maxine Lewis Memorial Shelter and the Prado Day Center and solve the problem of homeless merely by asking the generous people of San Luis Obispo to open their houses and take in a homeless person.

• Viewpoint: Be proactive to meet needs of homeless

  Viewpoint: Be proactive to meet needs of homeless

  It has come to my attention in the last few months — as I attempted, with mixed results, to aid Dan DeVaul and Sunny Acres in becoming a sober living center for the homeless and indigent — that there were other organizations, more established, not completely serving these clients.

  At first I thought, well, how can this be? Surely the county and various private organizations such as churches were meeting the needs of itinerant and not-so-itinerant homeless. (A large percentage of local homeless, I’ve found out, are long-term local residents who have fallen on hard times.) People like Becky Jorgeson, also a long-time resident and former Sunny Acres volunteer, were making what appeared to be “wild” statements about the unwillingness of the Prado Day Center and Maxine Lewis Shelter to assist “her” clients (she has become a self-styled independent advocate) when they were, for whatever reasons, expelled from the one shelter or refused services at the dropin center. Jorgeson kept meeting these people on the streets

• De Vaul told to prove his claims of benefits

  De Vaul told to prove his claims of benefits

  If San Luis Obispo rancher Dan De Vaul wants fees waived on his proposals for expanding his sober-living facility, he must prove to county supervisors that he is indeed providing the service he claims to be providing.

  Supervisors, who over the years have expressed irritation, anger and weariness in their interactions with the irascible — and, some say, intractable — De Vaul, on Tuesday demonstrated outright mistrust.

  At a hearing during which De Vaul was seeking fee waivers on improvements he wants to make at his 72-acre ranch and sober-living facility at 10660 Los Osos Valley Road, supervisors questioned him closely about the services he gives.

• Letters to the Editor, Nov. 6

  Letters to the Editor, Nov. 6

  People’s agenda is simple

  I’m sick and tired of listening to what the media and politicians are feeding us. “We the people,” the 99 percent, have our own agenda and it’s really basic:

  1. Housing: fair and affordable (mortgages and rents);