The Manure Maiden

Esperanzassanctuary
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The Manure Maiden is your guide to composting, regenerative living, and community powered change in the Coachella Valley. Learn practical skills, hear real stories, and explore how hope can grow from the ground up.

Episodes

  1. Oct 20

    Who Will Speak For Our Water: D1 Candidate Sunshine Herrera

    In this episode of the Manure Maiden Podcast, we sit down with Sunshine Herrera, one of three candidates running for the Division 1 seat on the Coachella Valley Water District board. Water is everything here in the desert, and the people who sit on that board make decisions that shape our farms, our families, our rates, and our future. We asked Sunshine the questions that matter to the people who actually live with those decisions. A note on the other candidates: John Aguilar was scheduled to interview with us but canceled. We have offered him the opportunity to submit written responses to our questions instead. If he sends them, we will publish them in full. If he chooses to sit down for an interview, it will be recorded and uploaded here just like this one, so every voter gets the same chance to hear directly from him. Lewis DaSilva has also been invited to participate. We are waiting on his responses and will update this page and our channels as soon as we receive them. Our goal is simple: give every candidate the same questions and the same platform so voters in Division 1 can make an informed choice. What each candidate does with that opportunity is up to them. Brought to you by Esperanza’s Sanctuary, a regenerative farm sanctuary and community resource hub in Sky Valley, CA, working for food sovereignty, animal welfare, and community resilience in the Coachella Valley. https://esperanzassanctuary.com/compost-files/b/Who-Will-Speak-For-Our-Water Is the full written responses to 39 questions

  2. Jul 28

    Your Water District Pays For What?!

    This episode: Mission Springs Water District paid a private PR firm over 167,000 dollars, some of it to write the General Manager's own public statements. Their outside law firm bills 10,000 dollars a month for lobbying and 750 dollars an hour for a lawyer who spent over a decade running Cadiz Incorporated, the company behind an 800 million dollar plan to sell Mojave Desert groundwater. The General Manager's own 2021 notes talk about bringing Cadiz water to Mission Springs. And when a public records request asked for the communications behind all of it, the district's attorney cited something called a Common Interest Agreement to keep it hidden, a document even some board members may never have seen. This episode also lays out the Steven Hernandez and Manny Perez connection: a 2024 email thread showing Hernandez, using his Riverside County government email rather than his City of Coachella one, personally brokering water district communications, three months before Perez landed a seat on the Riverside LAFCO, the exact commission that has to approve this deal. Every figure in this episode comes from documents obtained through public records requests. Sources and timeline are laid out in full for anyone who wants to verify it themselves. If you are a Mission Springs ratepayer, call the district and ask them why. Email them too. Ask for the Common Interest Agreement, the board vote that authorized it, and a full accounting of what has been paid to CV Strategies and Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck. It is your water district. It is your money. Sky Valley and Desert Hot Springs water accountability. ID8. Mission Springs Water District. Coachella Valley Water District. Public records. Government transparency.

  3. Jun 29

    They Want to Charge You for Asking Questions. Let's Talk About That.

    Tabitha Davies, the Manure Maiden, covers 48 hours of updates across three active investigations in the Coachella Valley and issues an urgent call to action on state legislation moving Monday. In this episode: the 50-year Cadiz water agreement CVWD approved with "N/A" in the legal review column, and what we still do not know about who drove that deal. The documented fact that CVWD Director Castulo Estrada also serves as Utilities Director for the City of Coachella, the same city that approved the Stronghold data center agreement, and what that means structurally. The termination of Stronghold Power Systems' agreement with Coachella and the open questions that did not end with it. The defense contractor Armtec Defense Technologies, a TransDigm subsidiary, that turned up sharing a water permit and a consultant with Stronghold in CVWD's own CPRA production. And AB 1821, the California bill being heard by the Senate Judiciary Committee on June 30 that would allow government agencies to charge you by the hour for public records and sue you for asking. Tabitha also announces in-person and virtual CPRA workshops for anyone who wants to learn how to use California's public records law themselves, plus an open invitation to come volunteer with the animals at Esperanza's Sanctuary in Sky Valley. To oppose AB 1821 before Monday's hearing:Call the Senate Judiciary Committee at 916-651-4113Email sjud.fax@sen.ca.gov with subject line: OPPOSE AB 1821 Esperanza's Sanctuary: esperanzassanctuary.comVolunteer and workshop inquiries: esperanzassanctuary@gmail.com

  4. Jun 21

    From waste to worth what we actually do here. And a coffee and canines moment that made our whole week.

    Breaking down the newly launched composting course From Waste to Worth, built for horse facilities and homesteads ready to turn a waste problem into a closed-loop system. She covers what is in the course, the free implementation tools, and how to get hands-on support beyond the curriculum. Then she gets into what is happening at the farm right now: compost available, plants you can order any day of the week for on-site or farmers market pickup, and the Saturday market running every week 8am to 1pm. Two dog training slots just opened. And she shares a Coffee and Canines moment this week that stopped her cold: two reactive dogs, twenty feet apart, laying calm while their families drank coffee and did the work. No stress. No aversive tools. Just progress that belongs entirely to the families who showed up. She closes with a direct ask for summer volunteers because the desert does not take a season off and neither do the animals. Come find them Saturday.

  5. Jun 4

    Ask for the Records: How to Use the California Public Records Act to Protect Your Tap

    This episode explains how groundwater and Colorado River water are managed in the Coachella Valley, why water is scarce and valuable, and how a proposed transfer of the ID8 system to Mission Springs raised concerns about transparency, development, and water quality (including chromium-6). Host Tabitha Davies also walks listeners through how to use the California Public Records Act (CPRA) to request documents, demand accountability from water agencies, and protect community water resources.

    Ask for the Records: How to Use the California Public Records Act to Protect Your Tap

  6. May 17

    What's Really in Your Tap? The Truth About Local Water and Who's Watching

    This episode examines what is in local tap water, who monitors it, and why residents should demand clearer answers from agencies like Mission Springs Water District and local city halls. It explores risks from cannabis cultivation runoff, industrial uses such as data centers, and legacy contaminants, and stresses the difference between awards for transparency and real accountability. The host offers practical steps: get an independent water test, attend public meetings, support local grassroots groups, and keep asking questions to protect children, gardens, and shared groundwater.

    What's Really in Your Tap? The Truth About Local Water and Who's Watching

  7. May 3

    Water Is Not a Luxury: Who Decides Who Gets Clean Water?

    This episode explores how access to clean water is decided in public meetings and why transparency matters. It explains the disparities in water quality, the role of laws like the Brown Act, and how vague agendas and inaccessible meetings can exclude communities from decisions that affect their health. The host outlines concrete actions listeners can take: find your water district, attend and comment at meetings, push for hybrid and translated meetings, and make notification a normal part of community conversations to hold officials accountable.

    Water Is Not a Luxury: Who Decides Who Gets Clean Water?

  8. Feb 9

    Compost Is Resistance: Reclaiming Nutrients and Power

    Compost is a choice. This episode explores how community composting reconnects people to soil, returns nutrients to local systems, and challenges centralized control of resources and waste. Listeners will hear why diverse materials, from food scraps to crop residues and responsibly handled human or animal remains; matter, how compost builds resilient soil, and how collective action counters extraction and builds community power.

    Compost Is Resistance: Reclaiming Nutrients and Power

  9. Jan 19

    Cardboard, Calories & Community: Feeding Soil Without Burning Out

    Tabitha of Esperanza Sanctuary explains how cardboard becomes reliable carbon for community composting, practical fixes for common compost problems, and why food production must be planned for real needs—not aesthetics. Learn simple steps to shred and store cardboard, balance compost ratios, design spoon-friendly gardens, and build resilient community systems that feed people and the soil.

    Cardboard, Calories & Community: Feeding Soil Without Burning Out

  10. Jan 8

    Desert Garden Battlefield: Winning the War on Cucurbit Pests

    Tabitha from Esperanza Sanctuary breaks down the common pests attacking melons, squash, and cucumbers in the Coachella Valley. aAphids, whiteflies, leafhoppers, squash bugs, and root-knot nematodes—and how to identify the damage they cause. Learn practical Integrated Pest Management steps: cultural controls like companion and trap crops, row covers and silver reflective mulch, monitoring with sticky traps, targeted treatments only when thresholds are met, and sanitation and biological options to keep crops healthy without broad spraying.

    Desert Garden Battlefield: Winning the War on Cucurbit Pests

  11. 12/07/2025

    Manure into Magic: Enrichment, Cooperative Care & Compost Laws

    In this episode Tabitha from Esperanza Sanctuary explores how enrichment and cooperative care for farm animals, on-site composting of manure and food scraps, and California’s organic waste laws (like SB 1383) intersect to build healthier animals, richer soil, and more resilient communities. She explains practical enrichment and cooperative care techniques, how manure and food waste become fertility instead of trash, and how state policy is driving local climate action and food sovereignty. Tabitha also shares a local update: the first dog training graduates with the City of Desert Hot Springs and ongoing one-on-one behavior work that supports families and keeps pets in homes.

    Manure into Magic: Enrichment, Cooperative Care & Compost Laws
  • 11 Episodes

About

The Manure Maiden is your guide to composting, regenerative living, and community powered change in the Coachella Valley. Learn practical skills, hear real stories, and explore how hope can grow from the ground up.

Information

  • Creator
    Esperanzassanctuary
  • Years Active
    2025 - 2026
  • Episodes
    11
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © Esperanzassanctuary
  • Show Website
    The Manure Maiden