Two items on the Porterville City Council agenda for Tuesday, March 4, 2025 are listed below. At the Mayor’s behest, and with the apparent support of at least the Vice-Mayor, the council will consider two items attacking the LGBTQ community in Porterville. The city council has a long history of hate directed at it’s LGBTQ community.
On the consent agenda:
17. Request for Proclamation – Women’s Rights Re: Considering approval of a request to proclaim Women’s Rights in the City of Porterville
On the Scheduled Matters agenda:
24. Consideration of Proposed Establishment of Ordinance to Protect Women’s Safe Spaces Re: Council direction on the proposed establishment of an Ordinance to Protect Women’s Safe Spaces
These are the first two steps in an attempt by the mayor to impose an ordinance prohibiting trans women from using women’s toilets or locker rooms, and ban them from women’s sports. Despite there being no credible examples, arrests, or convictions of trans women sexually assaulting cis women in those spaces, and that this ordinance will put the city in violation of California law, Meister has decided this is a solution he can get behind.
The head of the NCAA testified before Congress recently that in the 510,000 athletes in the association, he knew of fewer than ten who were transgender. A check of the sporting records does not show a takeover of top spots by trans women. They seem to fall in a random scale among women taking medals or setting records. There is no evidence of an ‘unfair advantage’ for trans women in any sport.
Safe access to public restrooms is an essential need for participation in civic life, in the workplace, in educational settings, and other public spaces. This is no different for transgender people. However, access to public restrooms according to gender identity has sparked controversy to the extent that transgender people face embarrassment and even expulsion from these spaces. The lack of access of the transgender population to public restrooms has a negative impact on the physical and mental health of this population. Thus, this article aims to address the main consequences that the ban on the use of bathrooms has for the transgender population, specifically the access of transgender women to the women’s restroom. We covered some legal aspects of “bathroom laws” and the main arguments in this discussion. We understand that the prohibition of access to the restroom constitutes a form of gender violence and discrimination, as we conclude that the arguments that express concerns about safety are not supported.
Now, I know research and facts will not sway right-wing nut jobs (not that I’m accusing the Mayor of being one, but if the shoe fits…), but the council should know that the larger LGBTQ community and our allies will not stand quietly by while they attack the trans community with lies and hatred. We will be heard and seen.
A public protest will occur before the City Council meeting, at 4:30pm, across from City Hall. The address of City Hall is 291 N. Main Street. Regular council meeting starts at 6:30 pm. Because of the way Porterville handles it’s council meetings, it could be late in the evening before the matter is handled, and public comments are heard.
I asked ChatGPT for an image of Elon Musk, reading emails, with a confused look on his face. It wouldn’t create one, telling me that was a violation of it’s community guidelines. I suspect you can’t use a real person’s image as the basis for a hack job, I mean a creative interpretation. Oh well. This teenaged DOGE simulation will work almost as well.
So last week, Musk sent out that now notorious email to every federal employee, where he ordered them to respond by Friday, listing five things they did last week. He then Tweeted that if they didn’t respond by the deadline, he would take that as their resignation.
Somebody really needs to explain how the government works, because he doesn’t have a clue.
Anyway, I’m on Social Security, after paying into the program since 1974, so I better respond, right? Here’s my letter to Elon:
Here are the 5 bullet items I did last week, Elon. (As a Social Security recipient, I figure you’d want my response, too.) 1. I attended a City Council meeting. Two of them. The work session, and the regular session. 2. I attended a local sales tax oversight committee meeting. 3. I mowed my lawn 4. I took my husband to dinner several times during the week 5. I fed, watered, and emptied our dogs. (Thanks, David Gerrold, for the “empty the dogs” line! I love it! Sorry, I digress.)
There is the obvious way many people treat them, but I’m talking about their behavior.
Today’s missive is about how they act when you tell them to come back into the house, but they want to stay outside.
Once you get them to look at you, so they can’t think “I didn’t hear you” or “I didn’t know you were calling ME”, and they start walking towards you…. they start slowing down the closer they get to the door.
They keep looking at the gate, like they need to go back there and chase away a murderous mob.
You give them “the voice”, and they take a few more steps, each one slower than the previous, as they make their way sullenly towards you.
If you stop with the “get in here!” commands they will stop, turn, and begin to move away.
Children.
Good thing both the real ones and the furry ones are so darn cute.
It’s like déjà vu all over again. Porterville’s current Mayor, Greg Meister, has proposed a new city ordinance, which he is calling “Protect Women’s Safe Spaces”. In it, he wants to bar “biological men” from using women’s facilities, locker rooms, or playing in women’s sports. Meister is quoted in the Porterville Recorder saying the ordinance is “really drawing some lines for sure”.
In 2008, Porterville became the only city in California to adopt a formal position on Proposition 8, which would have inserted into the state Constitution limits that would only recognize marriage as between a man and a woman (it passed, but was later rendered moot as SCOTUS made marriage equality the law of the land with Obergefell v. Hodges)(In 2024, California voters removed the language of Prop 8 from the state Constitution with Prop 3). The city council voted to urge Porterville voters to support Prop 8.
In 2013, then Mayor Virginia Gurrola issued a proclamation recognizing June as LGBT Pride Month in Porterville. All hell broke loose. In a fiasco-ridden panic to rescind the Mayor’s Proclamation (a proclamation she was entirely authorized to issue), it took three months for the other council members to get their act together and not only rescind the proclamation, but to remove the Mayor and Vice-Mayor from their ceremonial positions.
In 2014, then Mayor Cameron Hamilton became the right-wing echo chamber’s darling for his infamous “grow a pair” remarks, when a student-led anti-bullying program called “Safe Zones” was brought before the Council for support, by councilmember Virginia Gurrola. The conservative majority on the council wasn’t having anything to do with what they thought was a LGBT positive proposal. They shot it down, and Mayor Hamilton earned his 15 minutes of fame on Fox by uttering his now-infamous line.
In 2019, glimmers of hope were seen in Porterville, as then Mayor Martha Flores issued a proclamation recognizing May 22, 2019, as Harvey Milk Day. It was signed by the Mayor, and council members Milt Stowe, Monte Reyes, and Daniel Penaloza. Vice Mayor Brian Ward (author and instigator of many previous anti-LGBTQ actions by the Porterville City Council) did not sign the proclamation. (He was out of town at the time, but rest assured he would not have signed it regardless, in my opinion)
Also in 2019, on October 15, (a few days late due to scheduling issues) Porterville City Council recognized October 11 as National Coming Out Day. That proclamation was signed by Mayor Martha Flores, Vice Mayor Monte Reyes, council members Virginia Gurroloa, Milt Stowe, and Daniel Penaloza. Mayor Flores did throw some cold water on the festivities, however, when she, in an attempt, I assume, to sound inclusive, mentioned that she had “it” in her own family, referring to homosexuality.
We thought Porterville had turned a corner. We should have known better.
In 2021, more animus towards the LGBTQ community was on display when the city council decided that it needed to regulate billboards in the city, after The Source LGBT+ Center put up a couple of advertisements for STI testing.
Fast forward to 2025, and with a new administration in power in Washington, D.C., Porterville has decided it hasn’t been demonstrating it’s LGBTQ animus strongly enough recently. The Mayor, therefore, has decided to jump on the ‘transgender women are the devil’ bandwagon. Even though it very likely violates California’s Unruh Civil Rights Act, Meister wants the city staff and attorney to bring an ordinance before the council that would ban “biological men” from “women’s spaces”.
Here’s an email I sent to Mayor Meister and the other members of the city council:
Greg Meister, Porterville Mayor, and members of the City Council:
If the anti-trans bathroom ordinance proposed by Mayor Meister passes, and should the person pictured below have reason to visit your city, do you REALLY want him to walk into the women’s restroom?
Meet Luke Ireland, U.S. Air Force. Both of these pictures are from the Air Force Times, the first from about a decade ago, the other from about three years ago.
He is a trans man, and your proposal would require him to use the women’s facilities in Porterville. This proposal is a solution in search of a problem. There are no verifiable arrests or convictions of a trans-woman sexually assaulting a cis-woman or girl in a bathroom or locker room. It’s just not a thing, but you seem determined to embarrass Porterville by adding to its already notorious reputation as anti-LGBTQ. I thought Porterville was making progress, but we’ll see if and when this comes up for a vote if that progress is real, or just fantasy.
I want you to consider the following scenario:
A man decides to follow a woman (or a young girl) into a restroom in order to sexually assault her. He does not want to attract attention, so what does he do? Just walk in? Risky. He stands out dressed like a man. Maybe someone sees him following his target into the restroom. As the ordinances stand now, if he wants to get in without attracting attention, he’ll need to get into some kind of women’s wear.
Under your proposed ordinance, it will be common to see people who look like men walking into the women’s restroom, because you’ve required trans-men to use them. Our bad guy can now just walk right in, and if anyone challenges him, he can claim to be a trans-man, who you required to use this restroom. Nobody will know the difference, unless you’re going to post genital inspectors at the door.
Knock off the anti-trans discrimination and hate, Mr. Mayor. It’s a bad look for you, and sets Porterville back a decade.
In the Trump administration’s ongoing attempt to make transgender people disappear, they’ve removed the “T” from LGBT on the Stonewall National Monument webpage. How incredibly ironic (and stupid) is that? Do they think we’ll forget who started the resistance to the police raid? Do they think they can tell the history of Stonewall without mentioning the “T”?
Martha P. Johnson is, at least apocryphally, credited with throwing the first brick (or rock, or bottle, or whatever it might have been), as police raided the Stonewall Inn in 1969.
The National Park Service, is of course, bending to the Executive Order that Orange Idiot signed recently. I don’t know how they’re going to be able to tell the story of Stonewall without mentioning transgender activists who led the fight. In moments of cynicism, I suspect they’ll figure out some way to credit the resistance to some obscure white guy, a bit like a recent movie tried to do. (whatever happened to that movie? I think it might have clunked it’s way down to the basement of forgotten films rather quickly.)
From the National Park Service’s Stonewall opening page:
“By the time of Stonewall…we had 50 to 60 gay groups in the country. A year later…1500.” Before the 1960s, almost everything about living openly as a lesbian, gay, bisexual (LGB) person was illegal. The Stonewall Uprising on June 28, 1969 is a milestone in the quest for LGB civil rights and provided momentum for a movement.
Check out our video series about the history of the Stonewall uprising, the LGB rights movement and Stonewall NM today!
Last updated: February 13, 2025
(bolding and italics added by me)
From another part of the Stonewall page on the National Park Service’s site I ran across the following:
(Someone missed some banned language and letters here.)
The Stonewall Inn, a bar located in Greenwich Village, New York City, was the scene of an uprising against police repression that led to a key turning point in the struggle for the civil rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) Americans. In a pattern of harassment of LGBT establishments, the New York City police raided the Stonewall Inn in the early hours of Saturday, June 28, 1969. The reaction of the bar’s patrons and neighborhood residents that assembled in the street was not typical of these kinds of raids. Instead of dispersing, the crowd became increasingly angry and began chanting and throwing objects as the police arrested the bar’s employees and patrons. Reinforcements were called in by the police, and for several hours they tried to clear the streets while the crowd fought back. The initial raid and the riot that ensued led to six days of demonstrations and conflicts with law enforcement outside the bar, in nearby Christopher Park, and along neighboring streets. At its peak, the crowds included several thousand people.
The events of Stonewall, as the uprising is most commonly referred to, marked a major change in the struggle for “homophile rights” in the U.S., with lesbian women, gay men, bisexual and transgender people beginning to vocally and assertively demand their civil rights. Stonewall is regarded by many as the single most important catalyst for the dramatic expansion of the LGBT civil rights movement. The riots inspired LGBT people throughout the country to organize and within two years of Stonewall, LGBT rights groups had been started in nearly every major city in the U.S. Stonewall was, as historian Lillian Faderman wrote, “the shot heard round the world…crucial because it sounded the rally for the movement.”
Today, the site of the uprisings in Greenwich Village is recognized as a National Historic Landmark (NHL) by the National Park Service and is considered significant under NHL Criterion 1 because of its association with events that outstandingly represent the struggle for civil rights in America. This NHL includes the bar, Christopher Park, and the streets where the events of June 28-July 3, 1969, occurred. The Stonewall Inn is located at 51-53 Christopher Street, New York City, New York and is open to the public.
The link to the President’s Proclamation, however, leads to this page:
Now, I don’t think Trump himself is all that worked up about transgender people. It’s his minions, especially Elon Musk, who are driving this. Musk has misgendered and dead-named his trans child, so I suspect much of this erasing is coming from his personal hatred of transgenderism. He’s not a person used to not getting his way, and he’s striking out and hurting whoever he can. And he doesn’t care who gets hurt.
Oh, BTW, don’t let NPS know they missed some of the forbidden words on this page. Let us hope they’re there because someone at NPS’s IT office knows the Orange Idiot’s minions wouldn’t think to look past the splash page. shhhhhh
So here’s the latest on the solar panel repair fiasco. They, of course, refuse to pay ME $100 for THEIR missing an appointment, although if the missed appointment had been MY fault, they would charge ME $100. My take on the situation? Don’t deal with Sunnova if you can avoid it.
02/11/2025
Dear Jim Reeves,
Thank you for reaching out and sharing your concerns about the appointment.
I understand your frustration regarding the missed appointment and the lack of communication surrounding it.
After reviewing your case, I would like to clarify that while we strive to adhere to our service protocols and keep our customers informed, in this instance, the situation did not meet the criteria for a $100 fee as outlined in our policy. As a company, we do not apply fees for situations where we fail to meet the scheduled appointment window, and unfortunately, the circumstances surrounding your case do not qualify for a credit.
Please know that we take your concerns seriously, and I apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused. We will continue to review our procedures to ensure better communication and service moving forward.
If you have further questions or need assistance, please reply to this email or log in to your MySunnova portal and chat with one of our friendly agents. They are available to help you with anything from account inquiries to troubleshooting.
Start Chat: Look for the chat icon in the lower left of your screen and initiate a conversation.
Our agents are ready to assist you promptly from 7 AM to 7 PM, Monday to Saturday.
Kindly, Jenifer C. Customer Service Representative Sunnova Energy Corporation Hours of operations are (CST): Monday – Friday 7:00 AM to 12 midnight Saturday 7:00 AM to 9:00 PM Sunday 12:00 PM to 12 midnight
The prior email chain:
RE: System SO0024XXXX I was scheduled for a repair appointment for 2/5/2025, with the technician scheduled to arrive between 8am and 11am. I was home and available during those hours. No one came to my home, and I was not contacted about a delay or a cancellation. In the text message I received confirming my appointment is the following: “$100 missed visit fee if the tech can’t access the system OR you cancel after 5pm the day before the appt.”
Since Sunnova’s text message says “we reserve the right to charge a $100 missed visit fee…”, I expect you’ll return the favor. I expect a $100 credit on my account for your tech not showing up to the scheduled appointment in the scheduled window (indeed, not showing up or contacting me for the entire day).
Please respond with confirmation that my account has been credited $100, and schedule a repair appointment since the original problem still exists.
Thank you for contacting Sunnova Energy regarding your appointment.
Please accept my sincerest apologies for the inconvenience that the rescheduling of your visit has caused. Due to protocol issues, we were compelled to change the date. However, I would like to emphasize that the fee will only be applied if the client is not at home when our technician arrives. If you are not present at the time of the technician’s visit, I extend my deepest regrets for the inconvenience. Nevertheless, I would like to underscore that the visit has already occurred.
Should you have further questions or need assistance, please reply to this email or log in to your MySunnova portal and chat with one of our friendly agents. They’re available to help you with anything from account inquiries to troubleshooting.
Start Chat: Look for the chat icon in the lower left of your screen and initiate a conversation. Our agents are ready to assist you promptly from 7:00 AM to 7:00 PM.
Thank you for choosing Sunnova! Best regards, Jorge H. Sunnova Energy Corporation Customerservice@sunnova.com
2/7/25
“Jorge”,
The problem was not the need to reschedule my appointment due to “protocol issues” (whatever that means), my complaint was/is that the text messages confirming the original appointment included notice that my missing the appointment, or cancelling after 5pm the day before, would trigger a $100 fee. Sunnova technicians did not arrive during the originally specified window, and did not notify me that they would be unable to fulfill their appointment, and especially for not alerting me to that before 5pm the prior day. Therefore, since it is clearly Sunnova policy that appointments that are missed without notice prior to 5pm the day before are subject to a $100 fine, I expect no less than the same treatment in return. I expect and demand that Sunnova credit my account $100 for Sunnova’s failure to arrive during the scheduled appointment window, and for not notifying me before 5pm the day prior.
Jim Reeves Sent from my iPhone
*********************************************
Here’s the text message I received once sending a confirmation of the appointment they set:
SUNNOVA APPT CONFIRMED for 2/05/2025 between 8:00 AM – 11:00 AM $100 missed visit fee if the tech can’t access the system OR you cancel after 5PM the day before the appt. RESCHEDULE/CANCEL via MySunnova appt link OR agent chat. Reply STOP to opt out of appt texts
*********************************************
So in the final analysis, if the customer screws up and misses the appointment, they’ll charge $100 fee to the customer’s account. If Sunnova screws up and misses the appointment, it’s “oh well, we don’t pay you for our failure”.
EDIT: Addition:
This is not the only problem I’ve had with them, just so you know. They charged an exorbitant amount ($8,400) to remove and then later reinstall the panels to allow a new roof to be installed. They also failed to obtain the proper city permit to do the job, and then took 6 months to “investigate” the issue, all the while charging me for estimated production that my panels did not produce while they sat in my backyard waiting to go back up on the roof. Needless to say, after all that it may be a decade before I see any real financial savings from the system.
If you decide to have solar panels installed on a lease program, or any program where you don’t pay upfront for your own privately held system, be sure you won’t need a new roof during the life of the contract. It won’t pay if you have to remove-reinstall the system. The only benefit now will be in monthly cash-flow, as my electricity bill will decrease by some.
Needless to say, I’m not a happy camper right now.
On 2/4/205, Chief Operating Officer, Air Traffic Organization, Timothy L. Arel of the FAA sent out the following order:
Screenshot
The Orange Idiot’s administration has decided that “Notice To Air Missions” was too inclusive and equitable for it’s administration, so it ordered the change back to “Notice To Airmen”.
Here’s the email I sent to Michael R. Beckles, Director of Policy at the FAA:
Mr. Beckles, I am disappointed that the deliberate divisions being sown by the new Administration have been allowed to reach into the FAA. To change “Notice To Air Missions” back to “Notice To Airmen” is a sad reflection of misogyny and disrespect being allowed to infiltrate FAA. I assume, of course, that you are aware that women are pilots, and have been for as long as flying machines have existed. I would have included the current occupant of the office of President in that statement, but with him I’m not sure of much of anything. While I’m aware that the President appoints the Director and Deputy Director, I have long believed the FAA was an independent agency, not manipulatable by the day-to-day political winds that blow through Washington, D.C. I was apparently incorrect in that belief. As I said, disappointing.
I suspect the powers-that-be won’t be impressed by my email, but at least it will be logged somewhere. Maybe some historian decades from now will run across it, and wonder.
The Orange Idiot and his minions continue their attacks on everything decent and good in our country. It’s almost like a Russian dictator was pulling strings, and reviewing videos.
It doesn’t matter if Orange Dimwit orders the “T”in LGBT be dropped from government websites and documents. It’s not going away from where it really matters: our communities. It doesn’t matter if the right wing echo chamber talking heads say trans people don’t exist. They’re lying and are fools. It doesn’t matter because we have your backs, and won’t stop fighting the bigotry and hatred. This applies to the “Q+” as well. And every other part of the “alphabet mafia”, too. We’ve come too far, and destroyed too many closets. We’re not going to walk quietly into new ones. We’re here, we’re queer, and they just poked the tiger.
Random thoughts, occasional rants, illuminating commentary, and an odd story now and then from the world of 9-1-1 dispatching. All this and more from a gay liberal atheist living in California’s Bible belt. I recently married, so MAGA beware! I’m your worst nightmare! Some names have been omitted to protect the innocent, but the guilty will be hung out to dry!
JimmieJoe / KC6YRU 
Porterville Mayor attacks LGBT community
February 28, 2025
Jim Reeves commentary, Gay, News, Personal bathroom bills, gender, lgbtq, men in womens sports, politics, porterville, porterville city council, transgender, transwomen, Tulare County Leave a comment
Greg Meister, Mayor of Porterville, California.
Two items on the Porterville City Council agenda for Tuesday, March 4, 2025 are listed below. At the Mayor’s behest, and with the apparent support of at least the Vice-Mayor, the council will consider two items attacking the LGBTQ community in Porterville. The city council has a long history of hate directed at it’s LGBTQ community.
On the consent agenda:
17. Request for Proclamation – Women’s Rights
Re: Considering approval of a request to proclaim Women’s Rights in the City of
Porterville
On the Scheduled Matters agenda:
24. Consideration of Proposed Establishment of Ordinance to Protect Women’s
Safe Spaces
Re: Council direction on the proposed establishment of an Ordinance to Protect
Women’s Safe Spaces
These are the first two steps in an attempt by the mayor to impose an ordinance prohibiting trans women from using women’s toilets or locker rooms, and ban them from women’s sports. Despite there being no credible examples, arrests, or convictions of trans women sexually assaulting cis women in those spaces, and that this ordinance will put the city in violation of California law, Meister has decided this is a solution he can get behind.
The head of the NCAA testified before Congress recently that in the 510,000 athletes in the association, he knew of fewer than ten who were transgender. A check of the sporting records does not show a takeover of top spots by trans women. They seem to fall in a random scale among women taking medals or setting records. There is no evidence of an ‘unfair advantage’ for trans women in any sport.
Let’s look at some research. This is posted at the National Institute of Health‘s National Library of Medicine, the National Center of Biotechnology Information:
An official website of the United States government
(Musk and his minions have obviously not stumbled upon this page. Nobody tell him, OK?)
Trans Women and Public Restrooms: The Legal Discourse and Its Violence
Abstract
Safe access to public restrooms is an essential need for participation in civic life, in the workplace, in educational settings, and other public spaces. This is no different for transgender people. However, access to public restrooms according to gender identity has sparked controversy to the extent that transgender people face embarrassment and even expulsion from these spaces. The lack of access of the transgender population to public restrooms has a negative impact on the physical and mental health of this population. Thus, this article aims to address the main consequences that the ban on the use of bathrooms has for the transgender population, specifically the access of transgender women to the women’s restroom. We covered some legal aspects of “bathroom laws” and the main arguments in this discussion. We understand that the prohibition of access to the restroom constitutes a form of gender violence and discrimination, as we conclude that the arguments that express concerns about safety are not supported.
For the entire publication, check here.
Now, I know research and facts will not sway right-wing nut jobs (not that I’m accusing the Mayor of being one, but if the shoe fits…), but the council should know that the larger LGBTQ community and our allies will not stand quietly by while they attack the trans community with lies and hatred. We will be heard and seen.
A public protest will occur before the City Council meeting, at 4:30pm, across from City Hall. The address of City Hall is 291 N. Main Street. Regular council meeting starts at 6:30 pm. Because of the way Porterville handles it’s council meetings, it could be late in the evening before the matter is handled, and public comments are heard.
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