The proposed increase from $125 to $195 is happening not only at a time when many families’ disposable income is shrinking but also when many of us have been raising money to keep state parks open and have been trying to rebuild confidence with a skeptical public.

During a four-day period last month, 845 Santa Rosa Junior College students signed a petition requesting that the Sonoma County Superior Court review the Doyle Trust. We want to ensure it is being properly administered to protect our interests as SRJC students. We are, after all, the main beneficiaries of the trust.

Housing discrimination takes many forms. It can be blatant, as when an ad for an apartment rental states ‘no children.’ Or it can be subtle, as when a lender offers to lend at a slightly higher mortgage interest rate to a Latino homebuyer than the normal rate offered to similarly qualified Caucasians. A recent report prepared for the cities of Santa Rosa and Petaluma and the county of Sonoma finds that these and other forms of housing discrimination may be a bigger problem in Sonoma County than other areas.

‘As educators, we ask for your support to help ensure that Sonoma County is a place where families want to raise and educate their children. Join us in the effort to strengthen school funding by supporting the state tax initiative to restore California schools.’

‘For years, I have been fighting proposals to close and privatize our parks because we fail all Californians when we sell off our state’s most important, most iconic assets. The purpose of a for-profit company is to maximize profits.’

Now that a vote is expected on long-term legislation that would fund surface transportation projects, the House majority has filled the bill with poison pills. Their bill halts funding for high-speed passenger rail projects. It opens up the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska for oil drilling. It ends important competitive grant funding for road improvements, port upgrades, bridge maintenance and light rail.

Dream on, Press Democrat editors. Your “Occupy movement in ashes” editorial on Wednesday was wishful thinking. Our phoenix will rise during this month. You wait. You watch. You’ll see.

If we want to reclaim our democracy, we can start by supporting the simple, straightforward constitutional amendment proposed by the group known as Move to Amend. The amendment states that ‘corporations are not people’ and that ‘money is not speech’ and can therefore be regulated without interfering with First Amendment rights.

Repealing the tax that funds efforts to build the SMART commute rail line in Sonoma and Marin counties is a bad decision, says Lisa Wittke Schaffner, CEO of the Sonoma County Alliance, and Gary Helfrich, executive director of the Sonoma County Bicycle Coalition. If the repeal effort succeeds, they say SMART still must honor $200 million in contracts, forcing residents to pay for something and getting nothing in return.

The state’s decision to grab local redevelopment funds will have a big impact in Santa Rosa, according to City Manager Kathleen Millison and Economic Development Director David Gouin. They say the city will lose more than 2,800 construction jobs and $84 million it had planned to invest in projects, programs and services. They want residents to contact the Legislature and urge lawmakers to postpone the Feb. 1 deadline.