Top 10 Sonoma news stories of the year

Hey Sonoma, it wasn't all about leaf blowers.

While the debate over banning the Toro Super Leaf Blower with Vacuum Shredder – and others of its ilk – certainly had its place at Valley dinner party conversations, there was no shortage of other important issues Sonomans grappled with in 2015. While the drought is an over-arching concern all communities in California are contending with, we refined our choices to a few of the only-in-Sonoma topics that, as they say, had the whole town talking.

We hope you enjoy this walk down memory lane – or, if you prefer, cardio-perambulation down East Napa Street.

Without further adieu, here are the top 10 stories, in somewhat chronological order, from 2015 Sonoma. Oh, and Happy New Year, Sonoma!

Cozy cottage, sleeps 10; $350 a night...

AirBnB and VRBO were more than just terms in need of a few more vowels – they were the words that had come to define the changing community character of the Valley. In the debate over what sort of regulations should dictate how and when a homeowner can rent their property to vacationers, what emerged was a struggle between property rights and neighbors' rights – as the reality of Sonoma tourism jumped from the Plaza shops and Wine Country tasting rooms into the avenues and cul de sacs of quiet suburbia. Simple folk earning extra money to supplement their retirement income – or faux vacation-rental businesses dodging the proper transit occupancy taxes? That's the surface question. In a larger reality, however, it comes down to strange new faces dominating the neighborhood, and some dude's El Camino parked in my spot at Diamond A.

Habeas corpus at City Hall

As the City Hall clock ticked toward midnight last March 21, a pickup truck pulled up near the Plaza horseshoe and tossed a blue, 55-gallon plastic barrel onto the pavement. Its dark cargo: the body of 64-year-old Cazadero resident Ronald Gordon Sauvageau, who met his end earlier that evening on the business end of a hammer. Minutes later, bloodied Sonoma resident Christopher McNatt, 40, would be detained by a Sonoma County Sheriff's deputy at a traffic stop, mention his friend 'Ron' who was now 'in heaven' and subsequently be arrested for the murder. According to the Sheriff's office, McNatt would later detail a horrifying account of the fateful night's events, which began at the Acacia Grove Mobile Home Park when, according to McNatt's confession, the two casual associates had an argument which led to the younger man attacking Sauvageau with various yard items and an umbrella, before graduating to the aforementioned toolbox staple. McNatt, who's had a long history of run-ins with the law, allegedly said the rift started when Sauvageau called him by his first name.

SDC to close

The Sonoma Developmental Center has been a major presence in the Valley since 1891, serving thousands of developmentally disabled people over the years, while employing more workers in Sonoma Valley than any other entity. When the state Department of Developmental Services in May announced plans to close SDC by 2018 – as such facilities are no longer the accepted paradigm for caring for those special-needs residents – stake-holding families, and many others in the Valley who grew up with SDC as part of day-to-day life, were dismayed. Community pleas for a compromise fell on deaf ears in Sacramento, or so it seemed to many, while those with other priorities salivated at the thought of new uses for such prime Eldridge real estate. Meanwhile, about 400 SDC residents face a jarring and uncertain future, as forces beyond their control steer them toward strange and chilling waters.

Sunset's sunrise at Cornerstone

Sunset magazine, the 117-year-old national lifestyle publication, announced in June plans to relocate its main test gardens and outdoor test kitchen to Cornerstone, the Arnold Drive outlet known for artisanal shops, eye-popping gardens and greatly oversized patio chairs. The addition of the high-profile magazine's 'test' centers to the community could go a long way toward raising Sonoma's national reputation on those Cornerstone coattails. At least that's the idea – and why several civic leaders, such as Supervisor Susan Gorin and former Sonoma Valley Visitor's Bureau director Wendy Peterson, lent their support to ownership group Kenwood Cornerstone, which spent months wooing Sunset, after the magazine announced its impending move from its longtime Menlo Park location. Sunset is set to arrive sometime in 2016.

Independent wineries lose a pair

Two more locally owned wineries were plucked from the bunch in 2015 – Benziger Family Wineries sold to Livermore-based Wine Group in June, then B.R. Cohn Winery went to Vintage Wine Estates in July. With millions of dollars on the line and the ever-increasing difficulties of independent wineries competing in an industry dominated by conglomerates, the Benziger and Cohn sales are likely more trend than outlier. Still, last summer, small-town Sonoma got a little less small.

Springs gets a brush up

The colorful Springs community got a tad too colorful for some last July, after an artist contracted by the County livened up several businesses along Highway 12 with a dash of hot pink here, a splash of electric purple there. When the newly kaleidoscoped neighborhood got a peak at Sebastopol painter Rico Martin's flowery designs, community Facebook forums erupted with premonitions as to the end of the Springs' 'community character.' But upon closer inspection – and following reports that business was up within the freshly decorated walls of such places as Plain Jane's and La Michoacana – the majority of residents decided the vibrant painter's palette fit the community's palate just fine.

Sonoma Music Fest rocks down the highway to the Field of Dreams

Sonoma crossed 'meet a Beatle' off its bucket list. That was thanks to the newly dubbed Sonoma Music Festival, which not only changed its name from the B.R. Cohn Fall Charity Music Festival, but also moved from the Cohn Winery to the Field of Dreams while welcoming one of its most impressive lineups ever – which included Ringo Starr, Todd Rundgren, Chicago, Gregg Allman and the ever-popular Doobie Brothers. Starr may have whizzed off in his limo before the final chords to 'With A Little Help from My Friends' sounded (as one festival volunteer described the former Beatle's exit), but the memories lingered far longer than the post-festival contact high. And so will the 'hundreds of thousands in proceeds' raised by the event, as reported by festival officials, which went to such causes as Fisher House, Redwood Empire Food Bank, Bread and Roses, among others.

Leaf blowers? The answer is blowin' at the ballot box...

Noisy, dusty, noxious? Or efficient, tidy and cost-effective? Leaf blowers are many things to many people in Sonoma.

And, as of Oct. 5, they're one more thing: The likely subject of an initiative on the November 2016 ballot.

That's where the Sonoma City Council was headed last fall when it unanimously moved to bring the controversial issue over whether to ban the blustery landscaping tools to the voters. Anti-leaf-blower group Sonoma Neighbors Against Leaf Blowers (SNALB) lobbied for a straight up-or-down vote from the council, but councilmembers agreed that the three-plus year debate over leaf blowers warranted a community referendum.

Stay tuned for later this year, when the election draws closer and the leaf blower winds start blowing with a greater fury than ever.

Sonoma Splash makes waves over Paul's Field

A community pool is more than just a drop in the bucket for most towns – which is why the Sonoma Valley Health and Recreation Association is hoping to end the Valley's longtime swimmin'-hole dry spell by constructing a state-of-the-art backstroke Babylon at its Verano Avenue property, formerly home to Paul's Resort. But after extensive fundraising efforts and a revenue-generating plan that includes pool memberships, food service and an onsite fitness club, SVHRA – aka Sonoma Splash – announced in December it was still running shy of its funding goals and had its sights set on an additional revenue stream – a housing development on the site of Paul's Field, the beloved Little League diamond upon which town tots have been snagging fly balls since 1958.

A 'Save Paul's Field' campaign bounced up quicker than bad-hop grounder in the hopes of sending the ballfield's fate into extra innings.

Sonoma meets Irma Castillo

Eighty-four-year-old widow Irma Castillo was in a plight no one at her time of life should face – her home on Broadway was a wreck, family scattered elsewhere and health-and-safety violations had spurred a city eviction notice from her residence of 40 years. It was like a plot out of a black-and-white movie from the 1930s, only no Capra-esque happy ending appeared in the script.

Enter: Sonoma. When news of Castillo's impending Halloween-night eviction hit the front pages of local media earlier this fall, residents and civic leaders took action – vowing to bring her house up to code, advocate for her legally and cover her permitting fees. Today, the long-ago Lithuanian immigrant remains in the Broadway house she shares with best friend Topey the St. Bernard, heading into the New Year with a sense of hope, companionship and community. With due respect to Frank Capra, sometimes it is a wonderful life.

Email jason.walsh@sonomanews.com.