Lane von Herzen: Email to Camille Leung of the San Mateo County Planning Office

My Third Novel's Conclusion, My Heartbreak

My heart begins to break when I think about completing this particular book -- because this narrative has sustained me like no other story I've known. It's both more personal and more universal than my other works. But beyond memory and archetype, it's a cri-de-coeur about needing to become the person one is destined to be. And in the writing, I have met my own life's work, my own fated journey -- having the sense all the while that the pages are suffused with a resonance, an energy, an electrified field that defies explanation. Writers hope and pray to be overtaken by a work in this way -- to be conscripted into passionate service of a profound story. To experience it even once in a lifetime seems a great privilege. I still have several months before this novel is complete, and this constitutes my reprieve. Because I'm not ready for the beauty to end.

Monday, March 6, 2023

Email to Camille Leung of the San Mateo County Planning Office

Email sent to: cleung@smcgov.org. From: lanemacwilliams@gmail.com. Date: March 6, 2023 at 8:29 PM

Re: FW: PLN2022-00333 Fire Supression Protocols

Thank you very much for sharing this information with me, Camille.

I regret that Bryan Apple has not been able to communicate with me directly concerning his basic biographical information, in specific his degrees with dates, and the institutions which conferred them.

As a result, I don't have the means of assessing his participation in this project as an open, honest, and accountable representative of MROSD.

I would simply say this to you: I believe you care about San Mateo County residents and wilderness areas. Our families, our homes, and our open spaces within the County are irreplaceable gifts.

I realize that, as a whistleblower of FBI malfeasance concerning programs which draw billions in congressional funding each year, I have made some within the agency concerned for their reputations. Those engaging in falsified law enforcement reporting for anti-democratic objectives are simply not accustomed to public exposure regarding their wrongdoing. Again, I recognize their discomfort. I simply believe that investigators from the Office of the Inspector General Hotline of the U.S. Department of Justice should be allowed the time and freedom in which to investigate that malfeasance without ongoing attempts by FBI personnel to assail my safety and my property. For the sake of the County, our neighborhoods, our wilderness areas, and every individual within San Mateo County who cares deeply about the future of this community and of this beautiful landscape, the FBI should be asked to pause.

This is home to us -- not to wayward FBI agents who are pursuing schemes of harm toward a law-abiding whistleblower. The objectives of far right FBI personnel in this instance are predatory, and do not comport with the values we share of thoughtful, engaged, honest, sustainable efforts to improve San Mateo County.

The very involvement of FBI personnel with #PLN2022-00333, given my status as a conscientious whistleblower who is striving for the civil liberties and human rights of all Americans, should postpone any thought of granting this project approval.

Camille, far right FBI personnel have already caused substantive harm to my family members in retaliation for my ethical stance about the agency's compromise of the Nationwide Suspicious Activity Reporting Initiative and its affiliated "target of interest" program. These agents are not "the good guys," unfortunately -- although it is my steadfast belief that many wonderful people do work within the auspices of the FBI.

The far right within the FBI and its affiliates needs to be told "no" if our democracy is to survive. If this project is really the lifelong dream of the FBI handler who has been in communication with the San Mateo County Planning Office, it will still be his lifelong dream next year. But if he intends to utilize access to my property to cause serious harms to my family and my property, as has been repeatedly alleged, he will wish to hurry.

Sometimes, the greatest wisdom can be found in simply asking everyone to patiently wait.

A year from now, the question of whether far right FBI personnel have engaged in falsified law enforcement reporting for anti-democratic objectives will have been conclusively determined by OIG Hotline investigators -- and no longer a matter of opinion.

Let's agree to defer to the process of those investigators out of respect for our democracy and those who are striving conscientiously to defend it.

With appreciation for your thoughtful engagement on this issue,

Lane MacWilliams

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The FBI is a deeply divided agency. There are many FBI employees who view their vows to the Constitution with the utmost seriousness and honor, and who strive to defend the fundamentals of our democracy with courage, fortitude and commitment. The fact that some segments of the FBI appear to have embraced a lawless course is not a justification to assail the FBI in general. The safety of FBI agents should be protected, just as the safety of the American citizenry should be protected. As President Joseph R. Biden has so rightly expressed, violence is never justified in any circumstance. The rules of law must always be honored and upheld. It is our shared determination to preserve the civil liberties and human rights of all Americans that renders the United States a democracy. We must never abandon this promisee. All of our most cherished freedoms depend upon it.