Newsroom

Washington, DC, Sep 5, 2012 - Congressman Mike Thompson (CA-1) today announced an agreement between the United States Coast Guard (USCG) and the City of Ferndale to keep the Mendocino Lighthouse Lens in Ferndale. Later this month, the USCG is going to begin the process of dismantling and storing the lens. The city will then build an artifact exhibit at the Ferndale Museum. The city will also raise funds to reassemble, stabilize and partially restore the Fresnel lens. Once the funds are obtained and the exhibit is built, the city will obtain a 25-year loan, renewable upon mutual consent.

Sixty-six years ago, Alejandro R. Ruiz was honored for a near-suicidal charge to save his fellow soldiers during World War II. Now, his name will live on locally, at a post office near his final home and burial place.

The post office at the Veterans Home of California officially received its new name during a ceremony Wednesday morning â€" the Private First Class Alejandro R. Ruiz Post Office Building.

The effort is a follow-up to a July 19 agreement that requires the Department of Defense to purchase only U.S. made American flags.

Congressmen Mike Thompson (CA-1) today led a bipartisan group of 22 U.S. Representatives in calling on House Leadership to require that every American flag purchased by the Federal Government be manufactured in the United States, from articles, materials, or supplies that are 100 percent grown, produced or manufactured in the United States. Currently the Federal Government is not required to buy American made flags.

For the fifth consecutive year, the federal deficit is expected to exceed $1 trillion. Our national debt recently surpassed $15 trillion. If our debt was divided among the U.S. labor force, every single American worker would owe more than $100,000.

This is unsustainable â€" a national crisis, and we can't wait to fix it.

Although it has taken far too long, it appears that the U.S. government is finally beginning to get serious about its treatment of military veterans.

On Monday, President Barack Obama signed the Honoring America's Veterans and Caring for Camp Lejune Families Act of 2012. The bill is a bipartisan effort designed to help provide improved health care, housing, education and memorial services for veterans and their families.
It is about time. For decades, really, it has been is a national scandal how poorly combat veterans have been treated by the country that has sent them to war.

Though water shortages are common during peak summer months, the nationwide "Feds Feed Families" program is addressing another summer shortage: Food droughts at local food banks.

A handful of local donors dropped off food products at Congressman Mike Thompson's Woodland office Monday, kick-starting the third annual summer food drive to benefit local food banks.

Through the month of August, nonperishable food items are being collected in the back courtyard of the congressman's office at 712 Main St., and will locally benefit the Food Bank of Yolo County.