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December 6, 2001
Who's
buying the Daly complex -- and why
Eureka's Redevelopment Advisory
Board invited the public and the press on a tour of the historic
Daly building complex last week and to meet the man who may become
the property's new owner.
Dan Ollivier is in negotiations
with the building's current owner, the Humboldt State University
Foundation, which bought the property in 1998 using a $700,000
interest-free loan from the Eureka Redevelopment Agency.
Ollivier declined to comment
on financial details, describing negotiations as "still
liquid." But Ollivier did identify his primary interest
in the property: Parking.
The developer's plans call for
tearing down the oldest portion of the complex, the original
Daly's Department Store, built in the 1890s at Fourth and F streets,
to create 38 parking spaces. Ollivier already owns the newly
remodeled Gross Building -- Johnson's at Fifth and F streets
and adjacent to the original Daly's --he needs parking for future
tenants of the Gross.
![[architectural drawing of Daly's complex proposed redesign]](news1206-dalys.jpg) Ollivier is looking at the Daly's complex, which
covers half a city block in the heart of Eureka, as three distinct
structures. He said he is interested in developing only the newer
portion of the Daly store, an addition constructed in the 1960s
at the corner of Fourth and G streets. He declined to comment
on future uses of that commercial space, but said that portion
of the building is structurally sound.
The third portion of the Daly
complex, known as the Sweasy Building, houses the old State Theater.
On the tour Ollivier said he was not interested in developing
the theater, but that he would work with anyone who could make
it happen.
According to Eureka City Manager
Dave Tyson, the reason for the tour was "to make everyone
aware of the state of the building."
"We wanted the [Redevelopment
Advisory Board] to have a sense of what's going on inside,"
he said. In fact, many on the tour were alarmed at the stench
of mold and rot and the visible water damage inside.
"It has really deteriorated,"
said Charlotte McDonald of the Eureka Main Street Program. "And
it's not just the interior. The exterior is just terrible,"
she added, pointing to the ornate façade on the Sweasy
Theater that has visibly buckled in the last few years.
"We recognize that the
building is something the community wants to preserve, especially
the theater," said Tyson in an telephone interview Tuesday.
"Does the city have the resources to do it? No, not at this
time. But it is important that some control be taken over the
asset."
Tyson said building officials
who are knowledgeable about development and preservation are
quite concerned that the theater was starting to show signs of
significant deterioration due to neglect.
"It's important that someone
step up and at least move toward preserving the building. I think
that's something the city could do. What we're talking about
is securing the roof and some of the façade and putting
heat back in the building."
Tyson and McDonald fault the
university for failing to adequately maintain the structure since
it took over ownership three years ago.
Don Christensen, Humboldt State's
vice president of development and administrative services, takes
credit for putting the Daly purchase together, but he is not
eager to take the blame for the building's decline.
"We spent a lot of time
cleaning up," Christensen said. "We carted out something
like seven or eight dumpster loads of trash that was left behind.
We had to maintain a lot of things for our insurance carrier
to keep the coverage. We spent a lot of money replacing windows
in that building, satisfying insurance stipulations."
The leaking roof?
"It was leaking when we
acquired it," said Christensen. "Our plant operations
people went down and did some patching and repair on the roof.
But understand, you don't want to put a lot of money into a building
that you knew that some of it was seismically unstable and you
were going to demolish anyway."
While the university's plans,
which were abandoned last year due to inadequate funding, did
not call for a complete demolition of the original Daly building,
Ollivier's plans do. That's what concerns Mary Ann McCulloch,
president of the Eureka Heritage Society.
"Here we go again,"
said McCulloch, referring to the recent battle over the planned
demolition of buildings a block away to provide parking for developer
Kurt Kramer's refurbished Professional Building. (See Journal cover story, "Are these buildings historic
-- or just plain old," Sept. 13)
McCulloch sees a pattern with
developers receiving redevelopment money to work on a building.
"And then it's, `Oh, my God, we have to find them parking,'
so down comes a [historic] building.
"It's a short-sighted kneejerk
reaction, something that has to happen quickly or it's going
to put a developer in financial straights," McCulloch said.
"The city feels obliged to help them because, of course,
revitalization helps the city. But there's no long term thought,
no foresight 10 years down the road."
Will the building's demolition
require review by the city's Historic Preservation Committee
or other entities?
"Probably not," said
McCulloch, who concedes that she and the Heritage Society may
not have any say about the future of the Daly Building.
Headwaters
$$ meet Dec. 11
Humboldt County's economic development
staff is charting a course for the $22 million Headwaters fund,
and it points directly at a 1999 economic development plan.
As part of the 1999 purchase
of the Headwaters Forest property from Pacific Lumber Co., Humboldt
County received the money from the state and federal government
to replace timber yield taxes and other lost revenue. A consensus
emerged during community development meetings last year that
the money should be spent for economic development -- but not
how.
A draft charter plan, released
Nov. 20 and slated for a hearing before the Humboldt County Board
of Supervisors next week, recommends the money be split up into
three different parts -- $5 million to create an investment fund
for large grants, $8 million for a revolving loan fund, and the
remainder to a liquidity fund, with the interest used for smaller
community grants. The money would be administered by the Board
of Supervisors guided by a community advisory board.
The draft plan refers to the
1999 economic development document, called Prosperity! The
North Coast Strategy. That document identified nine industry
clusters that form the basis of Humboldt County's economy, including
dairy, timber, tourism, research, arts and manufacturing.
During public meetings last
year, county officials learned that citizens not only wanted
the fund principle to remain intact, they also wanted the Headwaters
money to have an immediate impact. Debets said that's a tall
order.
"We want it to make a difference,
but we want [the Headwaters money] to be in the community forever.
There's no model for that."
The draft charter is available
online at www.co.humboldt.ca.us/planning/index.asp. Prosperity!
is available on line at www.northcoastprosperity.com.
The public meeting on the draft
plan will be Dec. 11 from 7-9 p.m. in the Wharfinger building,
1 Marina Way, Eureka.
PL closes
last Scotia mill
The last mill in Scotia went
silent last week as Pacific Lumber ceased operations at Mill
A, leaving 140 workers without a job. The company said the move
was necessary as part of a restructuring strategy that would
end years of unprofitability.
PL placed the blame for its
financial losses -- more than $200 million over the last three
years, according to statistics -- on the Habitat Conservation
Plan agreed to as part of the 1999 Headwaters Agreement.
"The HCP is not working,"
said PL spokesperson Mary Bullwinkel. She said the plan had been
agreed to by the company as a means of establishing some certainty
and predictability in the regulatory process. That has not happened,
she said.
The HCP has caused two problems
for the company, according to a letter from Robert Manne, PL's
president and CEO. The biggest difficulty for the company is
the loss of harvestable land. In the letter, Manne said that
62 percent of PL's forest volumes have been put off-limits by
habitat protections.
"Over $500 million of our
valuable timber assets have been withdrawn from operations by
these restrictions," Manne said.
PL also maintains that rising
logging costs have also contributed to its financial woes. According
to Manne's letter, logging costs have more than doubled since
the HCP's implementation.
Not everyone believes that the
HCP is the cause for PL's losses, however. Paul Mason, executive
director of the Environmental Protection Information Center,
said he "does not buy that they have a lack of logs."
Under PL's Sustained Yield Plan,
also agreed to as part of the Headwaters agreement, the company
can only harvest 178 million board feet a year. This year, it
is expected to harvest an amount close to that limit --170 million
board feet.
Bullwinkel said the harvest
level this year was an anomaly. Harvest levels had been as low
as 100 million board feet in 1999 and were likely to dip again
in the future. "We're running out of places to place timber
harvest plans," she said.
The real reason for Mill A's
closure was a business decision, Mason said. Mill A was an older
mill designed to process large-diameter logs. Because the company
cannot harvest old-growth forever, "they'll need to operate
with newer equipment" meant to process smaller logs.
The company is blaming the HCP
because it "increases its bargaining position," Mason
said. "They can say the agencies have been so unreasonable
that they are shutting down mills."
And there are in fact negotiations
over the HCP on the horizon. PL has submitted a packet of proposed
changes to state and federal regulatory agencies. Bullwinkel
declined to comment on the substance of those changes, other
than to say they "would certainly help" the company's
financial position.
The backdrop to the debate over
why PL had to close the mill is a deteriorating market for timber
products, especially redwood.
"Prices are certainly down,
and there are substitutes being developed for redwood,"
said Steve Hackett, a professor of economics at Humboldt State
University. Products like synthetic decking are making it harder
for the redwood niche economy.
That does not mean that the
HCP hasn't hurt PL's bottom line, Hackett said. "As an outsider
looking in, I don't feel I have enough information to make that
call."
What he does know is that the
town of Scotia, entirely owned by PL and populated with PL workers,
has lost much of its economic base this year. "The concern
-- and that is different from a prediction -- is that you will
see the same thing here you saw in other boom-bust towns. It's
a very dangerous and scary thing for that community, because
they have all their eggs in one basket.
"If you're in county economic
development right now, you'd have to look at Scotia and think
seriously about some economic development alternatives for that
area. The risk if you don't is that there will be a permanent
long-term decline. And you don't want to sit on your hands too
long. There's a long lag time between starting those programs
and seeing an effect."
Economic development isn't something
PL has even considered yet, Bullwinkel said. "Right now,
our focus is just on getting the company economically viable
so we can stay in business."
Bonds for
Eureka schools
Eureka City Schools, citing
a need for school facility improvements, will put a pair of bond
issues totalling $43 million on the March 5 ballot.
The bonds, approved unanimously
by the district's board Nov. 27, would help pay for safety improvements,
modernization and seismic retrofitting. The $43 million would
be matched by more than $16 million in state money.
The school system will be hosting
tours of the facilities Dec. 8 for residents who would be affected
by increased property taxes. See this week's Calendar
for details.
Shakeup
at hospital
An administrative shakeup at
Mad River Community Hospital Nov. 30 resulted in the termination
of at least two employees, including Charlene Pellatz, director
of ancillary services and a 21-year veteran of the privately-owned
hospital. Also gone is Stacy Kadle, assistant to hospital Administrator
Doug Shaw.
Neither Pellatz nor a hospital
spokesman would say if the two were fired, resigned or were retiring.
"I just want to say I've
had so many pleasant years at Mad River. It's a great group of
managers and there are so many wonderful employees," Pellatz
said. "It's a sad day."
Arcata official
charged
Alex Casillas, Arcata's former
superintendent of public works, was charged this week with crimes
related to the illegal dumping of asphalt emulsion on city property
last May.
Casillas allegedly ordered city
employees to bury a large amount of the toxic substance at a
piece of city property located at Arcata's southern edge, just
50 feet away from Humboldt Bay. The emulsion has since been removed
and testing has shown that the bay was not polluted by the emulsion.
He now faces a four-count misdemeanor
complaint. Humboldt County District Attorney Terry Farmer said
in a press release that Casillas is being charged with illegal
disposal of hazardous waste under criminal law and water pollution
under the Fish and Game code.
Casillas, who was fired by the
city in May, did not respond to queries for this report.
Millionaire
fugitive caught
A nationwide manhunt for a millionaire
fugitive who lived off and on in Humboldt County for the past
seven years ended Nov. 30 with his arrest for shoplifting in
a small town in Pennsylvania, just one day before his case was
broadcast on America's Most Wanted.
Robert Durst, 58, allegedly
stole a sandwich, a newspaper and a Band-Aid even though he had
$500 in cash on him at the time of his arrest.
Durst is wanted in Texas on
charges of beheading a 71-year-old man. New York investigators
are hoping to interview him about the disappearance of his wife
19 years ago. Police in Los Angeles are investigating the murder
Christmas Eve of Susan Berman, a close friend of Durst, who made
her living writing about organized crime.
The Journal reported
last week that Durst sold his house in Trinidad last year and
continued to rent in the area while planning to build a new home.
He was reportedly sighted in mid October by a campground manager
near Salyer. However, police called it an unconfirmed report.
Durst was arrested Oct. 9 in
Galveston, Texas, and released on bail the next day. A nationwide
manhunt was launched Oct. 16. Police traced his flight route
from New Orleans to Maryland before his arrest in Bethlehem,
Pa., Friday.
Four members
for water board
Gov. Davis ended a standstill
at the North Coast Regional Water Quality Control Board Nov.
30 when he appointed four new members to the board.
The agency deals with pollution
that negatively affects the "beneficial uses" of the
North Coast's waterways, including sewage, agricultural runoff
and silt from timber harvesting activities. For months, the board
has lacked a quorum and has been unable to take official action.
Two of the new members are from
Humboldt County: John Selvage of Eureka and John Corbett of McKinleyville.
Selvage comes to the board with
extensive experience in environmental engineering -- in fact,
he helped found Eureka's SHN Consulting Engineers and Geologists.
Corbett is trained as an attorney
and has been the general manager of the North Coast Co-Op for
two decades. He is retiring from that post and running for 5th
District Humboldt County supervisor. This appointment would not
conflict with his campaign, Corbett said.
Selvage and Corbett join fellow
Humboldter Dina Moore, appointed this spring, on the board. The
other board members appointed Nov. 30 were Richard Grundy of
Santa Rosa and Shawn Harmon of Ukiah.
The water board has been at
the center of a controversy over Pacific Lumber Co.'s timber
harvest practices. The board's staff has been consistently critical
of the PL's science and has recommended the company be required
to conduct water monitoring on its harvests.
`Cinder-Elta'
dead at 93
Elta Cartwright, one of the
greats in Humboldt County sports history, died Nov. 29 in Fortuna.
Cartwright, who earned the name
"Cinder-Elta" for her performance in the 100-meter
dash on the cinder tracks, went to the 1928 Olympics for that
event. She went on to become the first female athlete to be named
to the Humboldt State Sports Hall of Fame.
Board OKs
grants, donations
Grants and donations approved
by the state's Wildlife Conservation Board Nov. 28 will protect
more than 600 acres of Humboldt County for wildlife preservation.
By far the largest chunk of
land is the South Spit of Humboldt Bay. The 598-acre donation
by Pacific Lumber to the state was approved by the board. The
land, which contains habitat for snowy plovers and endangered
plant species, will be overseen by the Bureau of Land Management.
The board also granted $606,000
to Sanctuary Forest, Inc. for the purchase of 40 acres just north
of Whitethorn, and $75,000 to the Jacoby Creek Land Trust for
a conservation easement for about 10 acres along Jacoby Creek.
Balloon
buildings going?
Union Pacific railroad, owners
of the undeveloped parcel near downtown Eureka known as the Balloon
Tract, has requested permission from the city to tear down eight
buildings on the land.
The buildings, among them the
blacksmith shop, carpenter shop, radio shack and car shed, are
being destroyed because of "unauthorized occupation,"
said Sidnie Olson, senior planner with the city. Homeless individuals
often camp out on the parcel (see "Finding
Beauty in the Blight," Oct. 11).
The demolition requires a coastal
development permit. The city will vote on the permit at the regular
council meeting Dec. 4, after press time. n
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