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November 1, 2001
Voters to the polls Tuesday
On Oct. 22 there were lines
of people out the door at the county Elections Office. That was
the last day to register to vote for next Tuesday's election.
"I was surprised,"
said Lindsey McWilliams, director of administrative services
for Humboldt County, especially because voter turnout is expected
to be low.
There are no countywide races.
The contests for superintendent of schools, 5th and 4th District
supervisors and county department heads, including sheriff and
district attorney, are all slated for the March ballot along
with the statewide partisan races, including the primary race
for governor.
Tuesday the races are strictly
local, with 31 different ballots for contested seats on school
boards and services districts throughout the county. "Some
areas have no ballot at all because no one ran against the incumbents,"
McWilliams said.
What are some of Tuesday's hot
school board races to watch?
For nearly a decade there have
been few candidates willing to run for the Southern Humboldt
school board. Most of the current board members were appointed
and there was even talk of reducing the number of board members
from seven to five. Last year declining enrollment prompted the
board to make a number of controversial decisions, including
the closure of Miranda Junior High School. Suddenly, there are
six of the seven seats open and 15 candidates.
There is a lively race for three
seats and a majority on the Arcata School board. Incumbents David
Narum, a professor at Humboldt State University, and Mary Wells,
an HSU administrator, are being challenged by a trio known as
the Arcata Citizens' Coalition for Education. They are Gregory
Allen, a musician and attorney who had represented the now closed
cannabis center; Sarah Lindauer, a teacher's assistant; and Charles
Douglas, an HSU student. Narum and Wells have joined forces with
Erin Taylor, a mother of two and an attorney who is not currently
practicing. Taylor has qualified for the ballot as a write-in
and is campaigning hard. A League of Women Voters forum was scheduled
for Tuesday night after press deadline.
Again, there are two incumbents
-- Harvey Kelsey and Howard Stauffer -- and three challengers
running together to unseat them in the race for the Jacoby Creek
School District Board. The challengers are all parents: Susan
Brater, an accountant, David Collentine, an environmental manager,
and Ethan Heifetz, a teacher. The issues are familiar -- declining
enrollment and budget pressures, plus traffic and other safety
concerns. Teachers' aides were cut this year and some parents
are not happy.
Although school board races
are nonpartisan, a hotly contested seat on the Eureka City Schools
board has taken on partisan overtones. John Fullerton, an accountant
who has served on the South Bay School Board for 20 years and
a Republican, is seeking a seat vacated by Democratic stalwart
Debbie Israel who recently moved from the area. Cai Williams,
a director of veterans affairs at HSU, has been endorsed by the
Democratic Party Central Committee.
In other races of note, the
McKinleyville Community Services District contest is all harmony
compared to years past. Don Harling, of Beau Pre Golf Course,
is retiring after 20 years and Jill Geist is stepping down to
run for 5th District supervisor. Board President Ordell Murphy,
an incumbent, is considered to be a shoo-in for re-election.
Vying for the two seats being vacated are Bill Wennerholm, a
chiropractor; Scotty Turner, owner of 24/7 Real Estate; and John
Fleury, who works for 101 North Glass.
An MCSD candidates forum sponsored
by League of Women Voters will be held from 7-9 p.m. Thursday,
Nov. 1, at Azalea Hall. Candidates will undoubtedly face questions
about McKinleyville incorporation and other development issues.
Dennis Hunter drew no opponents
and will retain his seat on board of the Humboldt Bay Harbor,
Recreation and Conservation District. Ronnie Pellegrini, who
was appointed to fill the vacancy created when Jimmy Smith was
elected to the Board of Supervisors in the 1st District, is facing
two challengers, Godfrey Tudor-Mathews and Neil Aitken. Pellegrini,
who co-owns a fishing boat with her husband and is endorsed by
Smith, will likely retain her seat.
Ron Fritzsche, a fisheries biologist
at Humboldt State, is facing a tougher challenge for his seat
on the harbor district board. His opponent, Pete Oringer, co-owner
of two sporting goods stores, is active in numerous community
organizations including Friends of Humboldt County, which successfully
fought to keep WalMart from locating on the Balloon Tract in
Eureka, Citizens for Port Development, the Eureka Chamber of
Commerce and the Taxpayers League, and he is a vocal advocate
for reopening the railroad.
While Oringer has been busy
rounding up endorsements and erecting lawn signs throughout the
3rd District, Fritzsche's campaign has been low-key.
"I'm not much of a political
animal," he said. But he does point to changes that have
occurred since he came on the harbor board.
"Five years ago the relationships
between the harbor district, the city [Eureka] and the county
were strained. There were a number of entities with interests
in the bay who weren't even talking," Fritzsche said. Today
a group of dozens of local, state and federal agencies meet monthly
and a comprehensive bay management plan is underway now that
the bay dredging project is complete.
The first step is a complex
layered mapping system of the bay that includes everything from
property lines, overlapping jurisdictions, eel grass beds and
other sensitive biological inventories. The site, hosted by HSU,
is set to go on-line soon. Fritzsche and Dennis Hunter are co-chairing
the Harbor Revitalization Committee with funding from the district,
city and hopefully soon the county.
Oringer said while it was understandable
the harbor district was preoccupied with dredging, other issues
were not getting needed attention. He would like to see an inventory
of industrial land around the bay made and an agreement (memorandum
of understanding) signed between the city, county and harbor
district.
"I'm not saying the incumbent
has done a good or a bad job. The issue is what I want to see
done which is to move ahead on both a business and an environmental
perspective (and) to aggressively market the bay," he said.
"There's been a certain
myopia in the harbor district," Oringer said. The district
should have been actively involved in the county general plan
update, the Headwaters money allocation, watershed management
issues and even ocean fishing policies. "Everything that
affects the bay."
-- reported by Judy Hodgson
TMDL for Trinity
An important environmental document
that gives a picture of the health of the Trinity River has been
released by the Environmental Protection Agency, but don't expect
any action just yet.
The EPA study, called a Total
Maximum Daily Load, details how much pollutant can be in a waterway
without harming its "beneficial uses." In the Trinity,
the main pollutant is sediment and the main beneficial use being
threatened is salmon habitat. The study therefore looks for the
source of the sediment in the river.
"We looked at several sediment
sources, and the prime ones were all road-related," said
Chris Heppe, EPA project officer. Land-use activities like timber
harvesting and mining also played a role, he said.
The question of how to reduce
the river's sediment load is still unanswered. Coming up with
a plan to implement the science in the TMDL is the responsibility
of the North Coast Regional Water Quality Control Board, which
has so far written only one.
"We're working on implementation
plans now," said Dave Evans, a senior engineer with the
water board staff. Evans said it was likely that several implementation
plans would come out simultaneously, after the only plan currently
written -- for the Garcia River in Mendocino County -- is passed
into law.
So when is an implementation
plan expected on the Trinity?
"If we decided to do the
Trinity, it could be early next year," Evans said. "But
it could also be a lot longer."
One critical issue left unaddressed
by either the TMDL or its implementation plan is the amount of
water in the river. The Trinity has long been dammed to provide
water to users in the Central Valley. Insufficient flows are
believed to be a major cause of its declining salmon populations.
"(But) the TMDL can't allocate
flows," said the EPA's Heppe, "Flows aren't considered
a pollutant."
NCRA looking for commitment
After cutting ties with its
previous operator, the North Coast Railroad Authority is seeking
a long-term replacement.
The NCRA board voted Sept. 19
to terminate its contract with Northwestern Pacific Railways,
which had been running the trains along the 43 miles of the line
now open. A search immediately began for an interim operator
to run freight along the line. That search has now been abandoned,
said Max Bridges, the NCRA's executive director.
"We did some surveying
and found that anyone who would run the track on an interim basis
wanted a subsidy which we did not have to offer," he said.
That subsidy would cover the
costs associated with starting up service along the line. The
NCRA decided to wait until a long-term operator could be found
because such a firm would be able to recoup startup costs through
profitable operation of the railroad over a long period, Bridges
said.
The NCRA board has also directed
staff to look at alternative ways of funding the repair and opening
of the railroad line to its northern terminus at Humboldt Bay.
Humboldt County's portion of the line has been closed since the
track running through the Eel River canyon suffered extensive
damage during storms in 1997-1998.
Federal disaster funds for repairing
the line in the canyon may be shifted to help clean up the southern
end of the line, but the end goal still is to open the line all
the way north to Humboldt Bay, Bridges said.
The idea of shifting federal
funds to the southern end met with resistance at the board's
Oct. 17 meeting. Some believe doing so could entail the reduction
of already-allocated funds or the loss of eligibility for future
federal funds.
"We need to find out what
the truth is concerning the use of these funds and the eligibility
for future funds," he said. "Then we can weigh the
alternatives."
Megram timber logging on hold
A National Forest Service plan
to log timber killed during 1999's Megram fire has been put on
hold.
The plan would have allowed
the harvest of trees as a means of clearing "fuel breaks"
where future forest fires could be checked. The Megram fire burned
some 50,000 acres of Six Rivers National Forest over a period
of several months.
Environmental groups oppose
the plan, saying it is simply an excuse to log and will have
little or no positive effect on fire management.
It is the second postponement
for the Megram fire sales. The Sierra Club and the Environmental
Protection Information Center successfully sought a preliminary
injunction in federal court in July which stopped the timber
sale until appeals could be heard by the service. Those appeals
have now been heard, but with little time left in the logging
season, the Forest Service will hold off on logging until at
least spring.
In this case, postponement may
amount to cancellation. Burned timber loses value quickly, and
it is not clear if the trees can be profitably harvested next
spring.
Some CR funding restored
Gov. Davis has signed a bill
that restores some of the community college funding that was
cut during the budget process.
When the state budget was passed
in July, the College of the Redwoods found that they were missing
critical funding. Money for instructional materials and capital
projects had been removed from the budget by Davis.
CR had not planned any major
capital projects this year, so the college did not stand to lose
any funding in that category. The losses for instructional materials,
however, amounted to $340,000.
It's unclear how much of that
money may now be returned. A bill signed Oct. 14 restores only
a third of the budget for instructional materials, and the distribution
of those funds had not been announced as of press time.
"Even if we don't get any
money restored, we appreciate the support community colleges
received from the public and state legislators," said Scott
Thomason, vice president of business services.
Other legislation signed Oct.
15 includes two bills authored by 1st District Assemblymember
Virginia Strom-Martin. The new laws will extend telephone service
to isolated rural areas and develop professional standards for
teachers.
Cedar disease closing trails, roads
The rainy season is starting,
and with it comes one of Brian Morris' least favorite annual
rituals: Morris, a ranger with the Smith River National Recreation
Area, has to close down trails and roads to prevent the spread
of Port-Orford cedar disease.
"We do not like to close
national forest land to people, but as good land stewards, that's
what we have to do," Morris said.
The disease is a fungus that
destroys the roots of cedars. A close relative of sudden oak
death, the disease is easily spread -- tires, horses' hooves
or hiking boots that can pick up small amounts of mud act as
ideal carriers. There are only two sizable areas that haven't
been infected, Morris said: the Siskiyou Wilderness and High
Plateau, north of the Smith River.
The Little Bald Hills trail
has already been closed, Smith said, and many more road and trail
closures are likely to follow in the near future. The roads will
likely stay closed until June 1.
Logging
continues on THP 520
Pacific Lumber Co. continued
logging this week on a controversial piece of land adjacent to
the Headwaters Reserve with little interference -- but that may
change.
Timber Harvest Plan 520 -- popularly
known as the "Hole in the Headwaters" because it is
surrounded by protected land -- is going to be a focus of protests,
according to members of North Coast Earth First.
"This harvest is getting
a lot people back into action who have been out for a while,"
said an EarthFirst activist known as Shunka. "I could see
it being a pretty huge campaign," he said.
So far, activists have been
cited and released by law enforcement, but no arrests have been
made.
Trinidad gets more police
Trinidad has hired a new police
sergeant and is looking for an additional police officer, but
it is unclear how their salaries will be paid once grant funding
runs out.
The two new positions are being
funded by a $100,000 annual grant from the state Citizen's Option
for Public Safety program. But that grant lasts only two years.
"The city is pursuing additional
revenue sources so that in two years we will be able to retain
this full force," said Trinidad Mayor Dean Heyenga. That
revenue might come from a contract to provide police services
to surrounding areas like Westhaven, additional leases for antennae
space on Trinidad Head or a sales tax increase.
First priority for the City
Council is still to sort out Trinidad's general fiscal situation.
"When our council took over in April 2000, the city's finances
were a mess," he said. New financial software and an upcoming
audit will help clear up discrepancies, but Heyenga said the
council "still doesn't have a good handle on [Trinidad's
finances]."
Anthrax hoax by Arcata man
An Arcata man has been charged
with sending an anthrax hoax through the mail.
Michael Christopher Murphy sent
an envelope with the word "anthrax" written on the
back to a friend at Reedley College in the Central Valley. The
envelope contained a birthday card and a sand dollar. The envelope
reached the attention of authorities when it leaked a white,
granular substance.
Murphy, who included his return
address on the envelope, told the FBI the "anthrax"
message was a joke. He faces serious consequences, however. If
convicted of sending a threat through the mail, he could serve
up to five years in federal prison.
Activist's off-again, on-again
suit
Activist Ellen Taylor, removed
from a lawsuit filed by Pacific Lumber Co. against people protesting
its timber harvesting activities, may not be out of the woods
yet.
PL will appeal Judge Leighton
Hatch's Oct. 11 ruling that removed Taylor from a suit that seeks
lost wages and damages allegedly caused by timber protesters.
Taylor has said that she never
entered PL property during protests this spring over logging
of old-growth Douglas fir in the Mattole Valley. Dozens of EarthFirst
activists have been named in the civil suit.
Humboldt Redwoods gets a plan
Humboldt Redwoods State Park
has a new framework following the Oct. 26 approval of a revised
plan by the State Parks Commission.
The plan includes the creation
of two new protected areas within the park. Wilderness designation
was given to a 10,450-acre area, to be called the Bull Creek
Wilderness. An additional 3,520 acres were granted natural preserve
status as Carl Andersen Redwoods Natural Preserve. Development
is severely restricted within both wilderness and preserve areas.
Inspecting instructional materials
Parents trying to keep tabs
on what their children are learning at school now have a chance
to preview textbooks and decided whether they like them.
Course material being considered
for California's elementary school classes in reading and language
arts is now on display at the Humboldt County Office of Education
in Eureka.
Parents and members of the public
may look at the instructional materials and send comments to
the State Board of Education, which will be selecting educational
materials next January.
For more information or to set
up an appointment, call 445-7077.
Cleanup at Wiyot
Drive along Table Bluff Road
in the Wiyot Reservation and you'll find more than rural scenery:
More than 2,000 cubic yards of waste litter the landscape, left
there by illegal dumpers.
That will soon come to an end.
Under a plan approved by the State Integrated Waste Management
Board at its Oct. 24 meeting, the state will pay $188,000 for
the trash to be hauled out of the reservation and properly disposed
of.
The Table Bluff Wiyot Reservation
has developed a plan to prevent the trash from building up again.
Signs, access restrictions and aggressive enforcement will make
it a lot harder to unload trash, tires and debris on Table Bluff
Road.
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