Bull Chaney

Setting right our side-tracked brothers

Before leaving prison five years ago, Frederick "Mr. Bull" Chaney knew there was only one way to stay clean, sober and out of trouble: service to others.

While in prison, Chaney read material by Bo Lozoff, whose Human Kindness Foundation sponsors undertakings such as the Prison-Ashram Project aimed at helping inmates and ex-offenders find a better way in life. The organization stresses three basic principles, to which Chaney is strongly committed: "Simple living, a dedication to service, and a commitment to personal spiritual practice."

Chaney became friends with Lozoff and together they developed a plan for Chaney’s dream of creating a Sober Living House for non-violent ex-offenders with a history of substance abuse. "He and I have been friends quite a while," Chaney says. "There was something real in him, something intriguing. Through Bo, and having HIV, I decided I wanted to help others."

Through the Gryphon House, a non-profit organization dedicated to helping former inmates break the cycle of crime and imprisonment, Chaney found a home in San Luis Obispo to provide a stable place for men getting back on their feet.

In September, the home opened and soon was housing six men. "We’re all addicts," Chaney says, pointing out that everyone at the house is working a 12-step program to stay clean and sober. Additionally, each is holding a job to support himself.

As Chaney relaxes in his office adjacent to the kitchen, one of the residents comes in with a bag full of food items. "Where’d that come from?" he asks. Someone donated the food, he’s told. The community, says Chaney, has been great, donating furniture and other household items, volunteering to help when possible. The residents of the home work hard together to be like a family, he adds. People see that and want to help out.

"These guys aren’t bad guys," Chaney says. "They just got sidetracked. They’ve become a family here and that’s phenomenal for that to happen."

–Stacey Warde

Bill Denneen

Laughing patron saint of the tree-huggers

Hollywood could not have produced a better character for the role of the wise elder of the environmental movement than biologist Bill Denneen. At 77, with snowy hair and tangled beard, he’s a Walt Whitman look-alike on a bike. He doesn’t drive a car, brags about never having set foot in a Wal-Mart and also claims to be a "certified tree-hugger."

That last moniker became official Dec. 3, when 4th District Supervisor K.H. "Katcho" Achadjian laid a plaque in his honor at the base of a sprawling, South County Live Oak. "I love that tree, I try to hug it every day," laughs Denneen, who says he is touched that the community honored him while he was still alive to appreciate it.

Even those who hate Denneen’s views can’t deny that he lives by them. Seven years ago when his truck broke down, he began living without a car. Now he thinks everyone needs to either live without one or drive them minimally. His legwork has earned him the right to criticize the lack of convenient public transport.

Denneen raised conformists’ hackles by initiating Non-Mother’s Day, but he backs up his views on overpopulation by sitting outside a Planned Parenthood Center every Wednesday to protect women coming in to have abortions. "On the other side of the street, there is always a group of pro-life advocates praying," he says. "I walked over to them the other day and said, ‘I don’t believe in abortion either, but what’s your alternative?’ "

Typically, Denneen will opt for dialogue, even for his number one issue, getting off-highway vehicles banned from his beloved Oceano Dunes. While the issue is being debated in the courts, Denneen leads weekly hikes on the dunes to show why they deserve protection. His beard whipping in the wind, he points out rare creatures like the silvery legless lizard, and laughs.

While he has lots of things to be concerned with, Denneen’s found a lot more to laugh about.

–Anne Quinn

Isabel P. Ruiz

Survivor who never surrenders

Isabel P. Ruiz was recently reminded that the community outreach work she does for SLO County Public Health actually saves lives. This reminder came in the form of a phone call from a woman whose daughter had watched Ruiz demonstrate how to perform a monthly breast self-exam on KSBY’s Evening News.

Ruiz was told that after watching her on TV, the daughter asked her mother to show her how to do the breast self-exam. While the woman was showing her daughter, she discovered a lump in her own breast, and yes, it was cancerous.

Ruiz, herself a breast cancer survivor, knows how important early detection is as a weapon in the battle against breast cancer. That firsthand knowledge, that urgency, coupled with her linguistic skills makes the Peru native the ideal person to reach out to Latino women who normally lack access to health care.

While the numbers of women diagnosed with breast cancer are similar between Caucasians and Latinos, the mortality rate among Latino women is higher, which indicates to Ruiz and other public health officials that Latino women are not discovering that they have breast cancer early enough and then not getting help until it is too late.

Ruiz contacts women as they wait in the Food Bank line or at the Farmer’s Market–anywhere will do as her classroom. She wants them to know that cancer is not necessarily fatal, a fact she proves by her own vibrant example.

Ruiz also informs women that there is funding in California for a free mammogram for every woman who is 40 years old or over. In addition, Cellular One in San Luis Obispo County has contributed funds to provide free mammograms for younger women.

Ruiz says she works at night and on weekends, because "We cannot reach this population if we work 8-5, Monday through Fridays," but mostly because "we have to overcome all obstacles" to defeat this plague on our womenfolk.

–Anne Quinn