For Marin restaurants, late 2020 presented a puzzling predicament: with outdoor dining banned as part of the state's stay at home order, they were forced to rely entirely on takeout and delivery throughout the holiday season and to operate at a tiny fraction of their usual operations. The nearly bare cupboard forced restaurant owners to vastly cut back on staff, again, and many employees had to turn to unemployment insurance – if they qualified.

Amidst it all, Marin restaurateurs created a petition, calling on Gov. Gavin Newsom and state Public Health Director Mark Ghaly to reconsider the ban on outdoor dining during the stay at home order, and asking Marin County Public Health Officer Dr. Matt Willis to allow outdoor dining once able to do so under state's order.

The heartfelt petition spearheaded by Guesthouse owner Dustin Sullivan appealed to decision makers to consider the impact on working families suffering through the holiday season without the ability to earn a living or, in many cases, qualify for unemployment insurance. The petition, which has garnered nearly 6,300 signatures to date, also pointed out that COVID-19 case counts spiked dramatically in Marin in December despite outdoor dining being shut down for most of the month. 

So here we are in mid-January. COVID-19 case counts remain high but are trending downward from an pandemic high of 172 on Jan. 6, and the Bay Area region's ICU capacity, the key trigger for getting out from under the stay at home order, is at 4.7%, far below the 15% minimum requirement.

Doesn't seem like the best time to ask for an exemption to an outdoor dining ban during a stay at home order, does it? 

The Mill Valley Chamber and its restaurant members aren't at all ignorant or insensitive of the horror of coronavirus. But they want to move the conversation forward, now, so that the outdoor dining ban can be reversed, quickly, when the time is right.
 
"We fully acknowledge that the metrics around COVID-19 case counts and ICU capacity make this a tough conversation right now, but we hope that state and county officials will be ready to allow outdoor dining as those metrics improve and the Bay Area region emerges from the Stay at Home Order. Our local restaurants are deeply committed to the health and safety of our customers, our employees and the entire Mill Valley community," says Felicia Ferguson, chair of the Mill Valley Chamber's board of directors and co-owner of Piazza D'Angelo, which is closed during the stay at home order. "We want this decision to be about hard data, and we just haven't seen data to support an outdoor dining ban." 

The Mill Valley City Council and City Manager Alan Piombo agreed, sending letters to Newsom and Ghaly, as well as Willis,
asking then "to exempt outdoor dining in any further extension of the current Stay Home Order, to lessen the harmful economic impact of the current restrictions. We also request that any further restrictions on outdoor dining are based on empirical data/science that directly indicates that the activity is a potent contributor to the spread of coronavirus. We have seen case counts continue to spike while outdoor dining has been shut down, leading us to believe that the elimination of outdoor dining from permitted activities during the Stay Home Order is excessively restrictive."

The letter noted that "if you do decide that restrictions on outdoor dining must continue, we ask you consider allowing the activity with additional modifications, such as a density reduction requirement, as has been in place for indoor retail shops. Restaurants could be required to reduce table size, limit customers permitted in the service area, and/or increase spacing between tables."

The hunt for hard data on outdoor dining has been largely unsuccessful. Los Angeles County officials suffered a legal setback in November when a Superior Court judge found that county officials “acted arbitrarily” when deciding to close outdoor dining back in late November and that officials have a specific duty to “perform the required risk-benefit analysis” when making decisions about restaurant closures. The judge noted that County officials “could be expected to consider the economic cost of closing 30,000 restaurants, the impact to restaurant owners and their employees, and the psychological and emotional cost to a public tired of the pandemic.”

Marin Independent Journal columnist Dick Spotswood also called on government agencies to rely more on science to justify shutdowns and bans on specific sectors. "While indoor actives are a proven virus spreader, the science supporting elimination of commercial outdoor activities is lacking," he wrote. 

In a mid-December letter to Bay Area region public health officers, including Willis, eight professors at the University of California, San Francisco Division of Prevention Science, drew on their 30 years of behavior change research "to reduce the harm that HIV has caused in our communities," they wrote: "Some of the current restrictions are not evidence-based and little effort seems to have been made to justify them. This erodes trust."

"​There appears to be little or no research showing that outdoor dining with 1) adequate ventilation, 2) distancing, and 3) using masks when not eating is associated with outbreaks," they added, noting that "there also has been no evidence presented showing that keeping hair salons open with multiple precautions in place increases risk. "For the most part, Bay Area residents have tried hard to stay informed and comply with COVID-related restrictions to date, which makes the heavy-handedness of this latest order all the more puzzling."

In its letter to Dr. Willis, the City requested "that if and when Governor Newsom removes the Stay Home Order, Marin County does not impose additional restrictions banning outdoor dining and limiting restaurants to take-out only. We also request that any further restrictions on outdoor dining are based on empirical data/science that directly indicates that the activity is a potent contributor to the spread of coronavirus." The letter added the aforementioned possibility of outdoor dining density restriction if  necessary.

The City's letters sparked a flurry of media coverage throughout the Bay Area, including the Marin IJ, KRON4, KTVU, SFGate, NBC Bay Area and Eater. 

Marin Public Health responded to the flurry of media coverage by saying, “We are not in favor of encouraging an activity that promotes mixing households where masks must be removed to eat or drink. We are experiencing unprecedented numbers of new cases daily and support the regional stay at home order as a means to protect our community.”

The UCSF doctors had retort for that claim: "We are already seeing posts on social media from people who were previously hosting outdoor gatherings ... or only visiting hair salons that took careful precautions, now prioritize doing these activities in ways that allow them to evade detection. In addition to inviting relatives to stay with them, people are contacting their hair dressers to make house calls and moving their outdoor gatherings indoors."

"In the case of COVID, the failure of the current shelter-in-place restrictions to make a distinction between low and moderate risk activities may thus be placing people at greater risk," they wrote. "It is clear that we need a more nuanced approach, based on principles of harm reduction and with justification for the specific behaviors prohibited."

That nuance is lost, says Sullivan, particularly because the loss of outdoor dining "eliminates a safe, monitored, outdoor gathering spot and forces people indoors and likely leads to more transmission, more illness, and more death."

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As real estate agent Karron Martin laid the groundwork for her wedding four years ago, she knew she could lean on her organizational skills to create a great wedding.

"I thought I could do it all, no problem," she says. 

But somewhere along the way, it became clear to Martin that she needed help, and she connected with lifelong Mill Valley resident Khadija Hansia-Gibson, who had just chose passion over profession, halting her career in marketing and launching her Limelight Productions event planning business and specializing in weddings, specifically multi-cultural and interfaith weddings that celebrate diversity.

"Khadija was a major, major life saver," Martin says. "I don’t know how I would've done it without her. I needed her in my life. She is so personable and went so far above and beyond," including taking Martin's 80-something mother-in-law home as the party continued.

Hansia-Gibson was born and raised on Seaver Drive, attending Edna Maguire Elementary, Mill Valley Middle and Tam High before going to College of Marin and San Francisco State. She began her career at NanaWall, the family business founded in 1986 built around innovative, stackable, folding glass walls.

All the while, Hansia-Gibson was among the many in her family who loved helping create and support her Muslim Indian family's weddings – lavish events that overflowed with creativity, design and multi-faceted planning. "It's always been a fun hobby," she says.

That hobby eventually became much more than that, as Hansia-Gibson decided four years ago to make the leap of a lifetime and leave the family business in favor of launching her own. "I decided I was way too comfortable – same job, same everything," she says. "I decided to give myself six months to start something."

She got a call out of the blue from a friend of a friend. It was Martin. "I want to take a chance on you," she told Hansia-Gibson.

Within two months, Hansia-Gibson had hit a home run with Martin's wedding and had booked nearly a dozen more. Business picked up quickly, as she became a go-to planner for an array of multicultural, creative weddings and events. She produced between 35 and 45 weddings per year over the past few years, including her own to Rondell Gibson in 2019. Hansia-Gibson has produced weddings all over Marin and beyond, from Old Mill Park and Mill Valley Community Center to the Community Congregational Church in Tiburon, Cavallo Point, Peacock Gap and Slide Ranch.

And then the COVID-19 crisis hit. A raging waterfall of business turned into a trickle. The hardest part of running an event production business when there aren't any events to produce, Hansia-Gibson says, is that each event requires three times the work "because everything is constantly changing," she says. 

But the pandemic has also produced a huge silver lining for Hansia-Gibson's family. Their son Eesa turned one in December, and the pandemic has allowed their young family to spend a ton of time together. And they're expecting another child very soon, all while remodeling their house.

Given her lifelong roots in Mill Valley, Hansia-Gibson is expanding her footprint here. She joined the board of the Mill Valley Library Foundation seven months ago, as well as the Mill Valley Chamber.

"She’s bright, she’s smart and she knows exactly what she doing doing," Martin says. "She sat with us during the tasting with  the caterer – I didn't ask for that. She's just phenomenal."

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Since the killing of George Floyd in May 2020, sparking a movement to enact impactful change on systemic racial inequality throughout the U.S. and beyond, those efforts in Mill Valley have largely centered around one thing: patience.

The series of peaceful protests that took place in Mill Valley and all over Marin in the spring and summer made one thing clear to local elected officials: they were on the clock. The Mill Valley City Council responded, pledging their commitment to make impactful change on inequity, creating a Diversity, Equity & Inclusion Task Force, selecting Dr. Patricia Patton to facilitate it and letting the task force drive the process without direct council or city staff involvement.

The task force selection process yielded 22 task force members, led by residents Naima Dean and Elspeth Mathau, and that group unveiled its full report and recommendations in early December in the form of a 93-page, 28-recommendation, multiple ”wow”-inducing document that spanned affordable housing, cultural and recreational engagement, economic opportunity, education and policing, the latter of which was the focus of 13 of the 28 recommendations.

Now the ball's in the city's court, and council members say they are asking for the same degree of patience they showed to the task force in producing its massive document. City staff is organizing the recommendations into a series of categories, including those that have already been implemented, those in progress, those requiring additional consideration, those beyond direct city control but where the city can still influence the process and those the city is not likely to pursue. They hope to hold a public hearing on the recommendations at the council's Feb. 1st or Feb. 18th meeting.

Noting that the council didn't have the opportunity to provide input on the task force's recommendations, Vice Mayor John McCauley pointed to Mathau's comment in December that the task force's process worked because it gave the group space to work. "Now the city is taking space to work," McCauley said. "We can't comment until we have staff reports before us. The council has been very supportive. The council is not being pulled along here. Your councilmembers are very interested in moving things forward within the confines of what the city can do."

Councilmember Urban Carmel agreed. "Change is necessary, for so many reasons," he said. "This is a necessary cultural shift that the city needs to make. I want to make sure that we accomplish something. Change is not making list of 65 things you want to done. You pick two, three, four or five things – that’s how you get things done. That’s how you really make change."

Task force members have kept up the pressure on the council to move forward with their two tentpole recommendations: that the city create a permanent equity commission built in the mode of the city’s subject-specific panels like the Bicycle Pedestrian Advisory Committee (BPAC) and Emergency Preparedness Commission, and that it develop a citywide equity plan led by professionals.

"Despite repeated explicit requests from the task force that were echoed in over 100 written and oral comments from the public, council members managed to evade these two most important issues," Dean and Mathau wrote.

​READ THE FULL REPORT HERE. 

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[UPDATE 1.12.21: Marin County Public Health Officer Dr. Matt Willis said this week that the state will be increasing the frequency of its evaluations of the ICU capacity metric that serves as the trigger remaining under the stay at home order. That allows the Bay Area region, which includes Marin, to get out from under the order more quickly than it could have under the previous three-week increments the state had previously been doing its evaluations.]

​With the exception of retail shops, which are operating at a fraction of its usual customer density, just about every major, consumer-facing business sector in Mill Valley is stuck in a crippling holding pattern during the stay-at-home order imposed by the state. Restaurants must rely entirely on takeout and delivery in what is traditionally one of their slowest months of the year, hair and nail salons are shut down and fitness facilities must operate outside only during a wet January.

The stay-at-home order, triggered by a region's available ICU capacity falling below 15%, officially kicked for the Bay Area region that includes Marin on Dec. 8. According to Marin County Public Health Officer Dr. Matt Willis, it will almost certainly be extended further, as the Bay Area region's ICU capacity currently sits at around 4%, well below the minimum target. Marin's ICU capacity is around 10% but is subject to the Bay Area region-wide capacity.

​"We are right now in a crisis of ever-increasing number of cases," Willis said, pointing to a post-holiday surge that saw an alarming amount of new cases, including 145 on Dec. 30, the highest one-day tally to date. "It's not surprising but it is disappointing given all of our communication around indoor avoiding indoor. This is unprecedented and the measures we are taking are also unprecedented. Unfortunately that is the reality that we inherit."

Those unprecedented measures mean that Marin restaurant owners' Change.org petition, which has garnered more than 6,100 signatures to date, won't likely achieve the reversal on outdoor dining anytime soon. 

READ THE PETITION HERE. 

The state is expected to examine the Bay Area region's ICU capacity data on Jan. 7, Willis said. With the region's current ICU capacity well below the minimum 15%, "we will not likely be coming out of the state stay-at-home order on January 8."

State and county officials examine case count data to determine the potential impact on hospitalizations and ICU capacity four weeks out, "and right now the lines are going downward," Willis said. A region's stay-at-home order had been subject to a three-week minimum under the order, but will now be analyzed more frequently, meaning that it could be reversed more quickly than three weeks if ICU capacity improves quickly.

The stay-at-home order "is the best policy for reducing a surge in cases," and "we do not have any margin for increased cases that would occur, even in settings like outdoor dining," Willis told the Marin County Board of Supervisors. "We encourage residents to support your local restaurants and have that dine-out experience but do so in the safety and  comfort of your household by getting takeout or delivery."

"There's lot of energy being directed at the state on this," Willis said. "Ultimately, it’s up to the state. (The County) would be in violation of state law if we allowed outdoor dining. It is about the fractional contribution of any activity in terms of increasing mobility and thus transmission, and outdoor dining increases the frequency of people moving outside their home and increasing transmission."

"Reduced transmission in the community is ultimately what we’ll need," he added.

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As happens at the beginning of every new calendar year, a slate of new laws went into effect in California on Jan. 1, and many of the new legislative arrivals reflect the tumult of 2020, when wildfires, the pandemic and criminal justice reform were front and center for so many of us.

Here’s a look at some of the laws that went into effect at the dawn of 2021, from CalMatters and the New York Times.

Minimum wage
Employers must pay a minimum wage of $14 per hour, a $1 increase from last year’s hourly minimum. Businesses with fewer than 26 workers must increase their hourly wage to at least $13. Some cities, like Palo Alto, Sonoma and Mountain View have already increased their minimum wages to $15 or more this year. Marin County's minimum wage is $15.40. 

Expansion of paid family-leave benefits
A new law that went into effect this year expands family-leave benefits for nearly six million residents. It also ensures that Californians who work for an employer with at least five employees are included in job protection benefits. Previously, 40 percent of residents were at risk of losing their jobs if taking leave simply because their employer was too small. The new law also expands on the potential reasons for taking leave, making it possible for workers affected by Covid-19 to take time off to care for a parent, sibling or grandchild.

Increased consumer financial protections
The California Consumer Financial Protection Law gives the revamped Department of Financial Protection and Innovation, which is modeled after the federal Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, a broad set of new powers and restores certain financial protections. Pandemic-inspired scams that promise Covid-19 cures or aim to cheat people out of stimulus checks are on the rise throughout the state.

Workplace Covid-19 protections
The new law requires employers to take specific actions, like written notifications to employees, within one business day of a potential exposure to Covid-19 in the workplace. The notification must be written in English and another language, if applicable.

Inmate firefighters
A longstanding program that relies on incarcerated individuals to fight wildfires will now allow nonviolent offenders to petition to get their records expunged and to use their training to gain employment as firefighters. Inmates were previously barred from becoming professional firefighters after release because of their criminal records. After a devastating fire season, when many inmate firefighters were released early because of the pandemic, prisoner firefighting crews served a crucial role. However, critics of the program compare it to slave labor, since prisoners flighting blazes on the front lines make just $1 an hour while working in treacherous conditions.

Criminal justice reform
The California Racial Justice Act expands opportunities for defendants to challenge a charge or conviction by demonstrating that there was racial bias present in their case. For judgments issued on or after Jan. 1, challenges can be made if racially coded language is used in court or if there were displays of intentional discrimination by a lawyer, judge or juror. In addition, convictions or sentences can be challenged if there is evidence that people of one race are disproportionately charged or convicted of a specific crime or if one race is singled out to receive longer or more severe sentences.

Some new laws won't go into effect until later this year. In February, Proposition 19, which requires people who inherit property to use it as their primary residence or have its tax value reassessed, goes into effect. In July, Californians will be prohibited from buying more than one semiautomatic rifle in a 30-day period. And a flavored-tobacco ban that was set to go into effect at the end of 2020 won’t be adopted until at least 2022.
​
MORE INFO, INCLUDING ONE-MINUTE EXPLAINER VIDEOS, FROM CALMATTERS.

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As of the first week of January, Marin remain's under the state's Stay-at-Home order, halting both indoor and outdoor dining as COVID-19 cases continue to spike and ICU capacity, the primary metric under the order, remains below the 15% minimum in the Bay Area region.  ​

Despite the continued massive setback, Mill Valley's restaurants have innovated their way through the COVID-19 crisis in a variety of ways, particularly by making takeout and delivery a seamless experience. The below list contains each of the known options for restaurants and food shops in town.

Here's a guide to takeout (available at all of the restaurants and stores listed below) and delivery available here in Mill Valley:

Sit down in any cafe throughout the 94941 – OK, maybe not in the past 10 months – and you're bound to overhear a conversation about a great idea, either from an entrepreneur or someone hoping to make a difference for those in need.

A group of Mill Valley residents have decided to organize themselves about funding some of those great ideas, launching the Marin chapter of the Awesome Foundation, a worldwide community of donors focused on "forwarding the interest of awesome in the universe." Created in Boston in 2009, the foundation distributes $1,000 grants, no strings attached, to projects and their creators. At each fully autonomous chapter, the money is pooled together from the coffers of 10 or so self-organizing “micro-trustees” and given doled out.

Mill Valley residents Victoria and Philip Woo opened the Marin Chapter, rallying fellow local residents and friends like Sharon Kramlich, Katrina Kehl and Sandy Onken Fiek, all local real estate agents, as well as architects Antonina Markoff and Bruce Fullerton, among others.

Each participant outs a minimum of $100 per month into a pool. "The idea is that we donate at least $1000 per month to viable projects," Kramlich says. "Individuals apply for a grant through the website, are we are really looking to fund small businesses in the education or arts that are very community focused. We're on the hunt for more projects in Mill Valley."

To date, the Marin chapter has donated to a broad range of businesses and organizations, including Extra Food, Feed the Frontlines, Marin City Boxing, Trips for Kids, Youth in Arts and many more. 

"We try to focus on the most viable business ideas or those that are deemed the most worthy thing," Kramlich says. "Each month we expect to provide a $1,000 grant to support projects which address educational and/or community needs and are ingenious, creative and collaborative. We aim to spark dialogue, elevate unique opportunities, deepen conversations and provide community-wide benefits."

If you know of an organization that fits the Awesome Foundation's ethos, submit for a grant here, or reach out to vic@victoriaw.com with questions.

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Stephanie Moulton-Peters, a three-term member of the Mill Valley City Council, officially joined the Marin County Board of Supervisors this week as the representative for residents of District 3 in Southern Marin. Moulton-Peters was administered the oath of office on Dec. 30 by Congressman Jared Huffman.

Moulton-Peters, who won her seat with 80% of the vote in a March 2020 election after Sausalito’s Kate Sears chose not to run for re-election after two terms. participated in her first meeting January 5 and was feted by an array of local officials, family and friends. In a short speech at the outset of the supervisors meeting, Moulton-Peters identified health, equity and the environment among her highest priorities.
 
A Los Angeles native and Stanford graduate, Moulton-Peters managed environmental regulatory compliance and sustainability programs at Pacific Gas and Electric Company for more than a decade and has additional experience in communications and nonprofit philanthropy. In her 12 years on the Mill Valley City Council, she served as mayor three times and emphasized wildfire safety and preparedness, streetscape and transportation improvements, and climate change adaptation.
 
“As I adapt to representing Southern Marin on the Board, I will continue to promote responsive, transparent and inclusive local government,” Moulton-Peters said. “I and my staff will be reaching out to our local communities and using creative ways to engage with our residents and businesses to hear what’s on their minds and how we can be of service.”
 
Katie Rice, who represents the Ross Valley as District 2 Supervisor, handed the gavel to Supervisor Dennis Rodoni as she completed her second term as Board President, guiding the County government through a tumultuous 2020. She thanked the County staff, emergency and essential workers, and all local public servants for adapting to the COVID environment and continuing service delivery to the residents of Marin. She also acknowledged the wildfires, the apocalyptic smoke, the threat of Public Safety Power Shutoffs (PSPS), the economic challenges, and the isolation prompted by the sheltering order that took place during her tenure as Board President. 
 
“This has been not only a pandemic but a nationwide awakening, a reckoning, with racial injustice and socioeconomic inequities that exist,” Rice said. “The past year challenged us as individuals, as organizations, as a community, and as a nation. It has changed the way we think about community and our sense of responsibility to each other. Everything the government does from here on out must be considered through the equity lens – honestly, openly, with humility, and with a commitment to creating a more equitable community so that everyone thrives.”
 
Rodoni, an Olema resident and West Marin native, was first elected to the Board in 2016 and was sworn in at the first meeting of 2017.
 
“I am truly honored to be Board President,” he said. “I know 2021 will continue to test us, but I am confident we are ready and able to meet those challenges. Getting our communities vaccinated will start us on the road to recovery with some stability for our businesses, schools, and residents. Recovering and moving forward together, everyone is essential to having a community and county that flourishes.”
 
As Board President, Rodoni will run the Board’s meetings while continuing the County’s ongoing commitment to encouraging public participation. The President speaks for the Board once the Board has acted and works with County staff to set Board of Supervisors’ meeting agendas.
 
The Board meets most Tuesday mornings via online conference as long as the pandemic prevents meetings at the Marin County Civic Center’s Board chamber. Meeting start times are usually 9 a.m. but are subject to change. Occasionally agenda items are heard by the Board in the early afternoon and special workshops sometimes begin at 5 p.m.
 
All Board meetings are televised live on Comcast channel 27 in Marin County and streamed live on www.marincounty.org. Videos of the meetings dating to 2005 are archived on the website as well.

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Gov. Gavin Newsom this week proposed a $4.5 billion spending plan for 2021, a budget that adds $575 million to the $500 million the state set aside in November to provide small businesses with grants between $5,000 and $25,000.

Newsom's proposal seeks a total of $1.075 billion for the State’s Small Business COVID-19 Relief Grant Program, with priority given to "regions and industries impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic, disadvantaged communities and underserved small business groups."

The proposal includes $25 million dedicated for small cultural institutions, such as museums and art galleries, that have been unable to operate or are otherwise financially challenged by the pandemic. Coupled with the federal Save Our Stages Act, which was approved as part of the $900 billion federal stimulus package in December, provides $15 billion "in dedicated funding for live venues, independent movie theaters, and cultural institutions. That could bolster the 94941 sector most ravaged by the COVID-19 crisis: live music, theater and entertainment venues like the Sweetwater Music Hall, Throckmorton Theatre and Marin Theatre Company, which have been thrashed by their complete inability to gather people in a room to experience live music and performance since mid-March. 

In what should be good news for a large part of the economic pie chart in Mill Valley, Newsom's proposal also calls for $71 million in fee waivers for bars, restaurants, barbershops, hair and nail salons and other sectors that have been required to close down or limit their capacity during the pandemic. 

The proposal would also extend a popular tax credit for small businesses. Many businesses had to lay off or furlough workers because of the pandemic. Last year, Newsom signed a law that promised to give small business owners a tax break if they hired those workers back. Business owners got a $1,000 credit on their state tax bill for the net increase of each new worker between July 1 and Dec. 1. Newsom said more than 9,000 businesses have reserved $54 million of those credits so far. His proposal would spend $100 million to extend that program, but offered no further details.

The plan also calls for $765 million for job creation and economic development efforts, including $430 million to increase a tax credit for businesses that relocate to or grow in California, $100 million to extend a hiring tax credit for small businesses and $100 million to defray sales taxes on manufacturing equipment.

The governor also proposes supporting job growth through a $353 million funding increase for worker training and apprenticeship programs; $300 million in one-time money to tackle deferred maintenance and greening projects, such as the installation of electric vehicle charging stations at state buildings; and $500 million in grants to bring down the cost of housing developments.

The proposed budget places a massive emphasis – $1.5 billion – on encouraging people to buy electric cars and build the charging stations necessary for drivers to use them, part of Newsom's goal to ban the sale of new gas-powered cars in California by 2035.

In a normal year, California’s budget would not take effect until July 1. But Newsom said he will ask the Legislature to approve the money for small businesses before July 1

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EO Products, the San Rafael-based natural and organic personal care products company co-founded by longtime Mill Valley resident Susan Griffin-Black, is closing its EO Exchange retail shop in downtown Mill Valley, the company announced this week. The shop, which opened in 2012, is holding a customer appreciate sale, with 25 percent off all products through its final day of Jan. 17.

"This was a very difficult decision," Griffin-Black says. "With the onset of COVID, to really honor what really needs to happen with having a retail store rather than a manufacturing company, it's been a labor of love. It's just time to service our customers and and community in the different way."

Griffin-Black notes that EO Products will remain widely available in the 94941 at shops like Mill Valley Market, both Whole Foods Markets, Good Earth Natural Foods and Safeway, among others. EO's ecommerce sales have been growing in recent years, and the COVID-19 crisis created a surge in demand for the company's hand sanitizer and hand soap product lines. 

"When you layer on top of that ecommerce growth that we make hand sanitizer – for several months we were only making hand soap and hand sanitizer – it's taken a while for us to shift our capacity and focus on manufacturing and shipping," says Griffin-Black, who co-founded the business with Brad Black in their Potrero Hill garage 25 years ago. "Retail at this time doesn't honor the work we've had to do to keep people safe."

"And we'll figure out a way to welcome people into our headquarters in San Rafael at some point – when the tides turn," she adds.

"It has been an honor and great pleasure to enjoy and be of service to this beautiful downtown community," says Sabrina Bedell, the shop's manager for the past several years. "I will miss it!"

MORE INFO ON EO PRODUCTS.

Kamala Harris, Anthony Fauci, Patti Smith, Greta Thunberg, Michael Moore, Colin Kaepernick, Emma Gonzalez, Wavy Gravy and Alice Walker among the subjects of latest exhibit.

In 2017, not long after she was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame with a speech in which she urged society to "repeal and replace brutality and make compassion a priority,” legendary singer-songwriter and activist Joan Baez brought Mischief Makers, a series of acrylic paintings of some of the most famous “risk-taking revolutionaries,” to the renowned Seager Gray Gallery at 108 Throckmorton Avenue.

Donna Seager and Suzanne Gray had long wanted to host an exhibit at their downtown Mill Valley gallery that centered around human rights and social change, and Baez delivered with portraits that served as a reaction to the collapse of decency and moral standards which is currently being made obscenely evident in our government and its supporters,” she said at the time. “In stark contrast, the ‘Mischief Makers’ are people who are willing to accept suffering, but never inflict it, to die for their cause, but never kill for it, and keep a sense of mischief through it all.”

The paintings spanned a veritable who’s who of activists who brought about social change through nonviolent action, including Martin Luther King Jr., Malala Yousafzai, Bob Dylan, the now late Congressman John Lewis, farm worker heroine Dolores Huerta and many more. All of the exhibit's paintings sold out immediately, a boon to all involved, particularly Carecen SF, the organization to which Baez is donating a portion of the proceeds.

Now Baez is back with Mischief Makers 2, a follow up that features acrylic portraits of the likes of incoming Vice President Kamala Harris, Dr. Anthony Fauci, the late Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg, Patti Smith, Greta Thunberg, Michael Moore, Colin Kaepernick, Emma Gonzalez, Wavy Gravy and Alice Walker, among others. Baez’s portrait of Harris went viral earlier this year when she posted it with the word “badass.” 

The virtual show opens January 6 and runs through February 14 at Seager Gray Gallery. In celebration of her 80th birthday, a virtual reception will be streamed at 5:30pm PT January 9 with an interview, a virtual tour of the show and other festivities and “mischief” to mark this milestone occasion. Tix are $15 in advance at https://bit.ly/JoanBaezLiveStream

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The COVID-19 crisis has had profoundly distressing impacts on so many layers of the Mill Valley community.

There are the frontline hospital workers treating coronavirus patients and administering vaccine, as well as the essential workers ping-ponging between crazy schedules to being furloughed. And there are the business owners constantly having to reinvent a business model with every twist and turn of the reopening rollercoaster, all the while investing in ever-increasing workplace safety protocols to keep their employees and customers as safe as possible amidst a pandemic.

So when we launched our Mill Valley Thrive Fund this week to support Mill Valley businesses with tax-deductible donations from the community, we quickly heard from a number of donors who were looking for ways to bolster all of those critically important elements of our community at once.

The result has been $25,000 in donations that deliver a "win-win-win" salve: direct donations to a number of local restaurants, providing much-needed revenue for local eateries at a moment in which indoor and outdoor dining are both shut down through at least the first week of January. Those restaurants can use those funds however they want, for operations or pass-alongs to their employees, many of whom have been furloughed during the shutdown.

Many of the restaurants are using some of the funds to buy gift cards that will be passed along to essential workers. One anonymous donor designated Grilly's as a recipient to provide 200 gift cards to employees at The Redwoods' senior community. (Donation recipients: the Mill Valley Chamber can recommend gift card recipients – email us here for some "Secret Santa" suggestions).

MAKE A TAX-DEDUCTIBLE DONATION VIA MARINLINK HERE. 

Indicate recipient(s) in the "In Honor of" portion of the form – we'll split the donation evenly among them. If you don't designate a business, we will pool not-designated donations to support the continued creation of $1,000 direct cash grants to the businesses that applied to our GoFundMe campaign in the spring and summer but weren't fulfilled with the funds raised.

Key details:

• We welcome donations of any size to the Mill Valley Thrive Fund to help our business community, and we have already received donations from $25 to $25,000.
• Donations of less than $100 will go into the General Fund for businesses that have previously applied for $1,000 direct cash grants. Applications for these grants closed in July 2020. We are no longer accepting new applications due to the overwhelming demand.
• Donations earmarked for a specific business must be $100 or more.
• Folks can specify multiple recipients at the $100+ level.
• Not one nickel of the funds raised will go to the Mill Valley Chamber. This is one more way we are trying to help an incredible community in pain. After you donate, please spread the word! 

To make a donation by check, please make checks out to "Mill Valley Thrive Fund" and mail to:

MarinLink
5800 Northgate Mall, Suite 250
San Rafael, CA 94903

Questions? Email us.

Want to know what's happening around town? Click here to subscribe to the Enjoy Mill Valley Blog by Email!

Restaurant owners from Mill Valley and all over Marin County threw their weight this week behind a Change.org petition crafted by Dustin Sullivan, owner of Guesthouse in Kentfield. In doing so, they sought a reconsideration of the current ban on outdoor dining for any region whose intensive care unit capacity has dipped below 15 percent during the current stay-at-home order and as COVID-19 case counts continue to climb statewide.

"I am writing to you on behalf of the employees who work for us; the employees who power our economy," Sullivan wrote. "Employees whose children are going hungry during the holidays, many of whom will likely get evicted from their homes once federal eviction moratoriums are lifted. Employees that I am personally purchasing groceries for out of my own pocket. Employees for whom I am their only lifeline."

READ THE FULL, HEARTFELT LETTER AND PETITION HERE. 

As of Dec. 31, the petition has garnered more than 4,500 signatures.

Want to know what's happening around town? Click here to subscribe to the Enjoy Mill Valley Blog by Email!

While most Americans consider Abraham Lincoln one of our nation’s greatest heroes, some ridicule him as a country bumpkin or decry him as a dictator. And while most historians see the “Great Emancipator” as a champion of freedom for African Americans, some view him as a racist and hypocrite.

A presentation via the Outdoor Art Club's Zoom by historian Mick Chantler will delve into how these kaleidoscopic images of Lincoln evolved over time and explore which are valid.

This event, set for Thursday, January 14 at 1pm, is hosted on Zoom by the Outdoor Art Club. To register, click here: http://bit.ly/34Veae3
​
Want to know what's happening around town? Click here to subscribe to the Enjoy Mill Valley Blog by Email!

Through the spring and summer of 2020, the Mill Valley community locked arms with local small businesses, donating to the Chamber's COVID-19 Mill Valley Business Fund, our campaign to raise funds for as many $1,000 direct cash grants as possible at a moment of crisis amidst the pandemic.

You donated, en masse, raising nearly $100,000 to support almost 100 grants to businesses. Due to the ever-murky prospects for local Mill Valley businesses on the horizon, we're hoping you'll take the opportunity to support your local community again, in a slightly different but no-less-meaningful way.

The biggest differences this time are that you have the ability to designate your donation specifically to your favorite business(es) and your donation is tax-deductible via MarinLink.org, our fiscal custodian and nonprofit partner. To make a donation online by credit card, click the Donate button below to be directed to the MarinLink website. 

In the "In Honor of" field, type in the names of the business(es) you'd like your donation to go to – we'll split the donation evenly among them. If you don't designate a business, we will pool not-designated donations to support the continued creation of $1,000 direct cash grants to the businesses that applied but weren't fulfilled with the funds raised.

MAKE A TAX-DEDUCTIBLE DONATION VIA MARINLINK HERE. 

Indicate recipient(s) in the "In Honor of" portion of the form – we'll split the donation evenly among them. If you don't designate a business, we will pool not-designated donations to support the continued creation of $1,000 direct cash grants to the businesses that applied to our GoFundMe campaign in the spring and summer but weren't fulfilled with the funds raised.

Key details:

• We welcome donations of any size to the Mill Valley Thrive Fund to help our business community, and we have already received donations from $25 to $25,000.
• Donations of less than $100 will go into the General Fund for businesses that have previously applied for $1,000 direct cash grants. Applications for these grants closed in July 2020. We are no longer accepting new applications due to the overwhelming demand.
• Donations earmarked for a specific business must be $100 or more.
• Folks can specify multiple recipients at the $100+ level.
• Not one nickel of the funds raised will go to the Mill Valley Chamber. This is one more way we are trying to help an incredible community in pain. After you donate, please spread the word! 

To make a donation by check, please make checks out to "Mill Valley Thrive Fund" and mail to:

MarinLink
5800 Northgate Mall, Suite 250
San Rafael, CA 94903

Questions? Email us.