 You're tuned in to the COVID-19 community report here on KDRT 95.7 FM in Davis, California. I'm your host, Autumn Lab A. Rineau, and today is Tuesday, March 24th. We're sharing local news and resources focusing on what's impacting Davis and nearby cities in Yolo County during the COVID-19 pandemic. My calling guests today are Davis, Poet, Laureate, James Lee Job, and Elizabeth Gray with the Yolo County Library. We'll have that first interview in just a few minutes. This show airs live at noon on Tuesdays and Fridays and repeats at 5 p.m. both days. You can also listen live online at kdrt.org and find a compilation of resources there. This Friday, join us for an interview with Yolo County Supervisor Don Saylor and also an update from Yolo Public Health. I think that's going to be Dr. Ron Chapman, but I'm working to confirm that. Next Tuesday, we'll chat with Heidi Kellison about local businesses and Jessica Hubbard of Yolo Community Foundation regarding the impact of the situation on nonprofits. And on April 3rd, I'll interview Congressman John Garamendi. As you all know, this last week has been surreal as cases of COVID-19 have been steadily increasing and we have a state of emergency declared in California. Yolo County saw its first virus related death this week and we are all learning how to shelter in place. And while bills for economic relief struggled to find footing in Congress, many of us grew increasingly worried about paying rent or mortgages, access to food and cleaning supplies and our own well-being in a time of social distancing. It is a lot. We're all dealing with a lot and I'm sending good wishes out to all in our community. I know that right now our city and county leaders are all working to address the economic concerns we have and I'll be reporting back on all of that soon. Before we take our caller, our first caller, one quick piece of news is that the Yolo County Jury Service has announced that if you were scheduled for jury service through April 30th, all jury panels had been canceled. I was actually called for service for yesterday, March 23rd and when I checked last week, juries had been canceled through March 30th and today when I checked again, it's April 30th. You don't need to do anything else and you may be called in at a later date. As we're about to talk with our poet laureate, I'm going to focus on the arts and entertainment sector here for just a few minutes. With much of life on hold, many musicians and venues are struggling in a big way. I love the creativity that's bubbling up even as people are distanced from one another. Here are a few local examples. With the sad news this week that the Davis Music Festival has been canceled, our good friends at their partner organization, the Davis Live Music Collective, have launched the Song of Day project on their social media channels. The Collective is a non-profit, volunteer organization formed to organize and promote diverse, high quality concerts in Davis, California. They're currently inviting local musicians to submit a video recording of a song, one that was either recorded in quarantine or a favorite recorded earlier prior to social distancing. The DLMC will share songs on their social media and direct viewers to ways they can financially support musicians at this time when they've lost their income. Bands can send videos to Una, and that's E-U-N-A-H, at davismusicfest.com. Preferred video formats are MP4 or YouTube or Vimeo Links, and you can find out more about that at davislivemusic.com. And here's a shout out to Ms. Una Cho, who is also a longtime KDRT DJ. As well, kudos to all the wonderful local musicians who are staging concerts from their homes via Facebook Live, we've seen them from living rooms, we've seen them from bedrooms. So far I know about Rita Hosking and Sean Feder, Joe and Hattie Craven, Meisner and Smith, Duval Speck, and Boot Juice. I know they're going to be more and more, so check your favorite social media and see what they're up to. All right, please enjoy a little music while I get set up for our call with poet laureate James Lee Job. Davis is fortunate to have our very own poet laureate here to tell us what that means and about the role of poetry during a time of social distancing is James Lee Job. Thanks for joining us, James. Hi, I missed the first thing you were saying when you were introducing me. What is it I'm telling them about exactly? Well, you're talking about the role of poetry during a time of social distancing. Tell us what you do as poet laureate and tell us how you're dealing with what you can't do at this time. Okay, well what I can't do is post poetry readings are going to classrooms and that's been a big part of this two-year appointment. We need poetry and the arts in general, not just poetry. We need the arts to keep us connected to our humanity and also it's another way of connecting to the community. What I've got going now since we're all in our homes is some digital stuff. I'm going to do a live Facebook reading on Thursday at 8 p.m. that anyone could tune in just by going to, you know, if you're on Facebook, just by going to my Facebook page, which is facebook.com slash James Lee Job and that'll be at 8 p.m. I'm not the biggest tech guy in the world, so I've been practicing. I did a live reading for like three poems this morning to make sure I knew which buttons to push and stuff. Nice. Also, I've set up a blog where anyone can send in their poems and I'll put them on this blog. And the web address, it's called Yolo County Poems and the web address, let me go slow so people can reach for a pencil. Yolo County Poems, all one word, yolocountypoems.blogspot.com and if you email me any poem that is not obscene, I will put it there. It's not like a judgment call where I'm like an editor of a magazine. This is for the people to use. So you can email me at jameslejoe at gmail.com and the third thing is I've always had up and going a lot of poetry videos on my YouTube channel. You can go there now and that's YouTube, I mean, you know, not when you're listening to Kater, of course. YouTube.com slash jameslejoe, but there's dozens and dozens of them there. So anyway, I have a COVID poem. We would like to hear that. Let me just say first though that, you know, I think a lot of poetry comes out of times of unrest and uncertainty. So I don't know about you, but I'm seeing that people are sharing more poems like a poem a day kind of thing on Facebook just randomly. Oh sure. And I'm looking forward to hearing what you and other folks, you know, come up with during this time. So yes, please let's hear your COVID poem. It's been a time of unrest before this virus happened. Certainly. Whatever side of the political aisle you're on, it's like two armed camps, almost. I don't want to say armed, but two distinct camps that are very much against each other, you know. Okay, the COVID poem. The COVID virus like nightfall is making its way around the world. I can just manage not giving into fear. But grief? How does one handle grief for thousands? Here, as I write, it is sunrise. And the light is golden as it tops the dark green pines to my east. Lovely. So lovely. As soon as you hang on to beauty. Yes, what the job of the poet laureate is, it's to promote poetry in the community. The basic answer to that. And I've got a lot of poems about the area. This is kind of a short one about just loving the location. All of the valley was more precious than gold to me. Cuda Creek and Cache Creek are golden. The Sacramento River golden. There is gold in the clods of dirt. The earth of the valley floor itself is made of the purest gold. Oh, don't take me literally. I can be a fool. I mean that my love of the place where I make my home is my reward in life. To be one with the land is to be whole. Is to be complete. I belong. I belong. So lovely, James. Thank you. My mind and my heart are going to be filled up with those images of the valley you just provided us with. All right. Once again, we've been talking with Davis poet James Lee Job and that's J-O-B-E and you can find him on Facebook and check out some of the many resources he just mentioned for us. Poetry in the time of COVID. Thanks again. Take care. I hope that was a nice little sanity break for everyone. It was for me sitting here in the KDRT studio. I want to take just a minute to give a heartfelt shout out to all the volunteers that make KDRT happen on a regular basis. This is a largely volunteer driven community low power FM station and what that means is that many hands make a relatively light lift and they can't come in here and produce live content right now. And it's hard on them and it's hard for the community that's missing out on a lot of music and great entertainment. So we're going to see what we can do to address that to get some fresh programming on the air. And I also want to share with the KDRT DJs that I've gotten some really nice comments this week as people are tuning into this show. They tell me, wow, I had no idea about KDRT. I had no idea how much local content is on there. So please check out the schedule at KDRT.org. Get your spirits lifted with a lot of good music and some public affairs, you know, that's reruns at the moment. Check it out KDRT.org. All right, we're going to share a few more resources before we take the next call. All right, yellow farm to fork wants you to know that eating is not canceled. That's good news. The organization which teaches about the value of farm to table food has compiled a great resource listing for Davis restaurants. I've seen similar resources shared for Woodland and Winters as well. And I'm seeing in my social media feeds a groundswell of support for local restaurants in particular as they retool to a curbside pickup or take out only model. You can find the Davis list and learn more about their work at yellowfarmtofork.org. And for many in our local communities, especially at those who are at high risk of contracting the virus, getting access to any food can be especially challenging. Local markets, including Nugget and the Davis food co-op that I'm aware of there may be more have implemented senior only shopping hours during the early morning hours where seniors can come in after the stores have been disinfected and shop early. The feedback I'm getting from the community is that people aren't paying attention to the rules so much and that the stores are actually very crowded at those hours. But I think it's a good effort and a good direction to head in. And I know that stores like Costco and Trader Joe's have limited the number of people available in the store. So you'll see videos of people waiting online outside those stores and maybe we'll go to that. This is a huge shout out to the yellow food bank who's doing yeoman's work handing out food and delivering directly to homebound seniors throughout Yolo County. I am aware that they are in need of all sorts of volunteers and resources, etc. And you can contact them at yellowfoodbank.org or 530-668-0690 and we'll get them on here in a few weeks and talk about their experience. Okay, and one more. Stake, which stands for the short term emergency aid committee, announces that its April food donations neighborhood collection program has been canceled. But food donations are needed and can be dropped off to its food closet at 642 Hawthorne Avenue in Davis, which is in the parking lot behind St. Martin's Church. You can learn more at stake.org. And I mentioned this last week, but I talked with market manager Randy McNear over the weekend when I went to Farmers Market and winter hours at the Davis market will continue until further notice. And those are Wednesdays from 3 to 6 p.m. and Saturdays from 8 a.m. to 1 p.m. Many farmers are now offering prepacked grab and go options and certified farmers markets are an essential part of our community's food security and even under statewide shelter in place measures. The markets are exempt. My experience out there was that they're all doing a great job spacing the booths out and finding ways to get food to their customers in a safe manner. You can find out more at davisfarmersmarket.org. All right, we're going to go to the music for just a minute again while we get set up for our chat with Elizabeth Gray from the Yolo County Library. Modern libraries are so much more than places to get books, whether it's public access to computers, bilingual story hours, after school study sites or even maker spaces. We're fortunate to have a strong local system in Yolo County with multiple branches across our communities. The library has been a wonderful partner to Davis Media Access over the years. And here today to tell us what is and isn't happening at the library during the pandemic is Elizabeth Gray, who serves as the library's central services manager. Hi there, Elizabeth. Hi, Autumn. How are you doing today? Good. Good. Well, I'm glad to be here and I'm glad we could get someone from the library on. So thanks for doing that. Thank you for having us. So I think we all know by now the library, like everything else is closed. And, you know, that's a big hit, especially to families with young kids and people who rely on, you know, the free resources of the library. But I know that not all is lost. So first, can we talk about what the closure means in terms of people? You know, I've heard a couple of people saying, do I return my books? Do I not return my books? Let's start with that. Thank you. That is a big question on people's minds. And we want to urge people to hang on to their library materials. Any library materials that you have right now will not accumulate any kind of late fees. And there is no need to return them to the library until we reopen. Okay. We do have a number that you can call Monday through Friday from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. If you have questions or other concerns about your account or any library-related questions. And I'll give you that number. Okay. It's 530-666-8005. And again, that's 9 to 6 Monday through Friday. Okay. All right. One of the questions I've had are, again, I've seen in my social media feeds people saying, does anybody know if the Yellow County Library offers eReader services? And I know that the answer is yes. I know that the program has a name and I know that there may be some other options out there. So I'm hoping you'll take us into that today. Oh, okay. So eReader, explain to me a little bit more. That's kind of a general term to me. It is a general term. For example, I have a Kindle. And so I have content delivered electronically on my Kindle. Other people may read things on an iPad. I think there's a variety of ways, but I want to focus on how do we get that content from the library? Absolutely. So we have quite a bit of content that can be accessed either on a desktop, a laptop, a tablet, whether you use Microsoft, Apple, Google, any of those platforms. You can even access it on your smartphone. So what you would want to do is go to our library website, www.yolocountylibrary.org, and click on Reading. And then you'll find some apps. There's a Libby app for Overdrive. And that has eBooks and eAudioBooks. So you would click on Libby, you download it on your device, and you can read books through your browser, or you can download the books, or you can even get them to your Kindle app. So there's multiple ways to access it. And there's also on that Reading tab you'll see Flipster for eMagazines. And again, that's as simple as downloading the app, clicking on the app, finding Yolo County Library, entering your library card number, and then you're logged in for a period of between 30 to 60 days. So for both of those apps, it's kind of that same system. And I just wanted to mention that with our eMagazines, you can have as many as you want downloaded or read them browsing. We have two excellent selections for young children who are at home, say elementary school children. One is Highlights, and the other is Ask. And they are both full of activities and fun reading for children to do at home. Oh my goodness, and Highlights has been around since I was a young child. It's been around forever. Okay, so there's a lot of resources there. Now because you just mentioned, I'm sorry, is there anything else we should talk about with regard to e-readers and how people can get that content? Well again, the number I mentioned, if you have problems, we will be available by phone to answer questions about e-readers for you. And then both of those platforms also have great help pages on their website. So I would urge you to look at their website help first and then if you still can't resolve any problems, you can give us a call. One of the things you mentioned talking about the resources for young kids, our library does such a great job providing programs for families. And I really want you to know I think it's a tremendous loss to the community right now. Everyone understands of course, but I know that there are a lot of families missing you right now. Right, I know. I feel like it's going to be a rough time because it seems to be extending longer than maybe I had anticipated and I know that families are going to find new ways to reach out to friends and find activities to do. I think it's also difficult for our senior population or even just adults at home. We've had a lot of phone calls from people looking to access library services. Yeah, well I mentioned this earlier, but it's a place where a lot of people come to use the public access computers when they don't have other access to a computer or to broadband. And so really our libraries are, as I said, so much more than a place to just get books these days. Absolutely, yeah. Well, I want to thank you for your time today. And I also want to direct people to the Yolo County Libraries Facebook page in particular where they're sharing a lot of links, ideas for... I saw everything for unemployment insurance information to activities and books and recommendations for fans. Making Play-Doh, and we also have an Instagram page. I do, okay. Facebook and Instagram, yes, please visit us. Thank you for that. Great. All right, we've been speaking with Elizabeth Gray, who's the Central Services Manager for the Yolo County Library. And Elizabeth, thank you again for your time and sharing information about e-readers with us. Thank you for all you do to keep our community informed. All right, you take care. Okay, take care. Bye-bye. All right, we're going to go back to music for just a minute so I can get a sip of water and then we're going to continue on with a whole bunch more resource listings. All right, we're back. And if you're tuning in now, this is the COVID-19 community report on KDRT 95.7. All right, I want to keep steering listeners to Yolo Public Health's COVID-19 resources, which you'll find spotlighted at YoloCounty.org. And also to the COVID-19 Yolo Community Response Group on Facebook, which we talked about last week. And that's a phenomenal place to offer or receive help. I have a medical guest from Public Health confirmed for Friday's show. I'm still working on, or they're still working on who exactly that's going to be. But I'm looking forward to having a conversation with them about how the county is interpreting and implementing the Shelter in Place protocol. And also if there's any new information surfacing about when testing will be more widely available. So stay tuned for that on Friday. All right, if you've lost income due to COVID-19 or the Shelter in Place order, you may be eligible for paid sick leave, family leave, or unemployment insurance. You can find out more from the California Labor and Workforce Development Agency's website, which is labor.ca.gov. And you can also call them by the county's 211 number. This is a good time to mention the county's 211 number. It's a PBX exchange that can connect you to a wide variety of social service resources and other community resources. And that's all you have to do. If any of you are old enough to remember in the days when you used to be able to just, you know, dial 411 for information or dial popcorn to get the time. I'm dating myself here, but 211, you can call there and you can get a lot of info that way. All right, some news from the DMV this week. They have granted an extension to those who need to renew driver's licenses and other routine tasks. And all behind the wheel tests have been canceled, which is another sad blow for a lot of our teenagers. I'm sorry, teenagers. The federal government has extended the timeline for real ID implementation in an effort to ease visits to DMVs at present. A trip to their website this morning showed me that they do have some limited hours and some limited tasks they're providing. And second-hand accounts have indicated that they're doing a great job of observing the six-foot protocol and all of that. But the point is, if you don't need to go, it may now be possible for you to delay some of the things you were thinking you had to go to the DMV for. So to find out more, visit dmv.ca.gov or call 800-777-0133. All right, back to a little bit more county news. The State of Emergency Declaration included implementation of price gouging protections in effect through September 4th. If you've tried to buy cleaning supplies or a thermometer recently, you may understand why this is necessary. It essentially says that after an emergency is declared, the price on retail items or consumer services cannot be jacked up more than 10%. And that's what that means. Yolo County District Attorney Jeff Reisig announced that his office will investigate and prosecute cases of price gouging for as long as Yolo County is under a state emergency. And Reisig encouraged Yolo County residents to report any instances of price gouging when shopping for consumer goods or medical supplies. You can learn more about that at yoloda.org. All right, we are getting down to the end of our show. I'm going to end with one more announcement. International House, davis.org, bilingual survey. And that's it for this episode. Stay home, wash your hands. I'm Audemars Laberino and this has been the COVID-19 Community Report.