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August 2, 2001
The year in budget highlights
With the end of the fiscal year
June 30, local, county and state governments began the annual
parade of budgets: A time for showing where priorities are set,
which infrastructure projects were funded and to whom raises
were granted.
Early in the process many entities
were eyeing the large state surplus -- the one that began shrinking
as the full impact of the energy crisis became known. Once again,
belts were being tightened from Sacramento to Rio Dell.
Listed below are some of the
places where governments decided to put what money they had.
(Blue Lake and Trinidad did not have information available by
press time.)
In general, municipal and state
surpluses are down or have disappeared entirely. Humboldt County
was forced to order 5 percent across-the-board cuts in order
to fund necessary services. Current service levels were maintained,
but in some cases barely. That's made for some hard decisions.
The state came to an agreement
on its budget just last week, a month after the document was
to take effect.
Ironically, the state budget
has many projects pushed for by area legislators; it appears
rural counties like Humboldt may have won in this year's state
budget game.
But for some cities and the
county, this year is one where budget savings were looked for
wherever possible. Several long-term issues like deferred road
maintenance remain unaddressed. Without additional funding, it's
unclear when they will be.
For those governments, the future
can be summed up in one word, said 3rd District Supervisor John
Woolley:
"Tough."
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STATE OF CALIFORNIA: $79.2 billion
Across-the-board reductions in funding
for natural resources and transportation
$19.3 million in tax relief for users of propane, the price of
which has skyrocketed with the energy crisis
$18 million in assistance to rural law enforcement
$8 million in rebates and tax relief for farmers
$275,000 for Humboldt County ballparks
$30 million to combat methamphetamine problem
"This has turned out to be a very difficult budget year,
but I am basically satisfied with the final outcome."
-- 1st District Assemblymember Virginia Strom-Martin
HUMBOLDT COUNTY DRAFT BUDGET
Final expected in October: $183.7 million
5 percent across-the-board budget cuts
4 percent pay raises for county employees
$90 million for the Department of Health and Human Services
$15.6 million for sheriff services, including the jail
$2.3 million in supplemental budgetary requests still to be decided
"This year it was a status quo budget without a lot of additional
enhancements."
-- 4th District Supervisor Bonnie Neely
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EUREKA: $37.2 million
$7.2 million into drinking water system
$2.3 for Harris Street rehabilitation
$1.5 million for roads
$1.8 million surplus
35 percent increase in energy costs absorbed primarily by general
fund
"The priority was to maintain basic levels of service for
the city going into the budget."
-- Eureka City Manager Dave Tyson
FORTUNA: $5.6 million
25 percent estimated increase in fuel costs;
50 percent estimated increase in utility costs
$3.3 million in capital improvement projects
$15,000 surplus, compared with $250,000 last year
"We're continuing to make substantial investments in improving
the city's parks, in street paving projects and in upgrades to
the water and sewer systems."
-- Fortuna City Manager Dale Nieman
ARCATA: $27.7 million
$2.5 million for roads
$2.5 million for low-income housing programs
$3.2 million in upgrades and repairs to sewer
$75,000 for two rangers to patrol city parks
"It was a very tight budget year, but we were able to do
some deferred maintenance"
-- Finance Director Janet Luzzi
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Tax rebates in the mail![[Refund chart]](RefundChart.jpg)
The first wave of checks have
been mailed out pursuant to President Bush's tax rebate plan,
but not everyone will be getting them at once -- or at all.
The checks are being mailed
out over the next 10 weeks. When you receive yours depends on
the last two digits of your Social Security number (see chart).
If you qualify for one, that
is. According to the nonpartisan Citizens for Tax Justice, the
poorest 26 percent of income tax filers won't get a check because
they didn't pay income taxes. Another 13 percent will only receive
partial rebates. In California alone, 3.7 million filers will
not get checks.
And while Congress and the president
have been hailing the rebate checks as an economic stimulus,
putting money in consumers' pockets isn't cheap. The treasury
unofficially estimates that mailing the checks will cost the
government $80 million.
Meeting
place threatened
"When you're first in recovery,
you don't know what to do with yourself," said Jimmy VanMeter,
Jr.
That's why VanMeter runs the
Meeting Place at 607 Summer St., Eureka. It is a space for recovering
alcoholics and drug addicts to learn to socialize without the
help of mood-altering substances. Started in 1999 by VanMeter's
late father, who was himself a alcoholic and compulsive gambler,
the Meeting Place serves between 500 and 1,000 people a month.
"We do dances, a clean
and sober campout. We even have karaoke night," VanMeter
said.
But the Meeting Place is in
trouble. VanMeter said he has been putting between $800 and $1,000
of his own money into the establishment every month to cover
costs.
The organization is under the
nonprofit umbrella of the Trinity Baptist Church in Arcata, but
has had a slow start obtaining grant funding.
VanMeter is turning to the community
for help. People who are interested in the space -- because they
need a clean and sober place to hang out, to donate or both --
are encouraged to visit. The place has a special meaning for
VanMeter, who said he sees it as his father's legacy and a valuable
community service.
"I took over this place
because my father's last wish was that it be kept going. Now
I'm doing it because it's neat to see people progress."
Visitor
inquiries rise -- again
High gas prices and the deflation
of dot-com industry don't seem to be hurting Humboldt County's
tourist industry.
Requests for visitor information
are running 25 percent ahead of last year, marking the second
year of record growth, according to numbers released last month
by the Humboldt County Convention and Visitors Bureau.
That interest is reflected in
increased numbers of people staying here. The Index of Economic
Activity, put together once a month by Humboldt State University
Professor Steve Hackett, shows a 4.1 percent increase in hotel
occupancy rates during May. That marks the best May for tourism
Humboldt County has had since 1998.
Strom-Martin water bill signed
Gov. Davis signed a bill this
week that will examine the ways in which water resources across
the state are administered and which systems work best.
The bill, authored by Assemblywoman
Virginia Strom-Martin, was originally aimed directly at the Sonoma
County Water Agency. The agency, managed by the Sonoma County
Board of Supervisors, has control over water resources that come
from Humboldt County.
Strom-Martin has suggested restructuring
the agency to make it more independent and allow more input from
people affected by its actions. The bill, which requires the
legislative analyst to compare different ways of managing water
resources, was supported by environmental groups, the Humboldt
County Board of Supervisors and the Marin Municipal Water District.
EPIC sues
PL over Clean Water
Using a federal law usually
associated with factories and sewage treatment plants, the Environmental
Protection Information Center in Garberville is suing Pacific
Lumber over dirty water.
The case focuses on ditches,
pipes and culverts on PL's land in the Bear Creek watershed.
EPIC claims that sediment and herbicides carried through these
channels by stormwater runoff constitutes a "point source"
of pollution. "Point source" means that the source
of pollution can be narrowed down to one geographic point.
That would require PL to get
a permit for discharge under the federal Clean Water Act.
Timber harvesting activities
have not been considered point sources of pollution, but they
should be, said Michael Lozeau of the Earthjustice Legal Defense
Fund. Lozeau, who is representing EPIC in the suit, said that
"non-point sources of sediment aren't covered by the Clean
Water Act, but culverts, ditches and erosion channels have been
defined as point sources."
PL spokesperson Mary Bullwinkel
said such an interpretation of the Clean Water Act would affect
everyone with runoff, including homeowners. The company plans
on challenging EPIC's contentions in court.
Centerville
Beach to BLM
The Bureau of Land Management
is poised to acquire another 40 acres of oceanfront property
in Humboldt County -- but this time it's from another part of
the federal government.
A House Armed Services subcommittee
authorized the transfer of the Centerville Beach Naval Facility
to the BLM July 27. The base, used as an undersea surveillance
station for 35 years, was decommissioned in 1993.
The transfer was scheduled be
taken up by the full House Armed Services Committee Aug. 1.
Human Rights
bill passes
"For over 30 years the
state of California has authorized counties to create commissions
on human relations," said Sen. Wesley Chesbro in a press
release. "The time has come to update the law to recognize
that such commission properly have a broader range of interests."
The law was in fact updated
July 22, when Gov. Davis signed Chesbro's bill dealing with the
commissions.
The bill expands the jurisdiction
of human rights commissions to include relations between people
of different ancestry, economic status, civic interest, gender,
gender orientation, physical or mental abilities and marital
status.
The Humboldt County Human Rights
Commission experienced a setback earlier this year when it was
barred from observing protests on Pacific Lumber lands. In March
the Board of Supervisors voted to prohibit the commission from
observing the protests because of liability and insurance questions.
It is unclear whether this bill will affect that decision.
Sunny Brae
THP revised again
Sierra Pacific's plans to log
on land near the Arcata neighborhood of Sunny Brae have been
delayed due to action by the North Coast Regional Water Quality
Control Board.
The board filed a notice on
the Sunny Brae THP requesting that additional erosion control
be included in the plan. The California Department of Forestry,
which ultimately has the power to approve the plan, agreed.
The nonconcurrence refers to
a section of California's Forest Practice Rules that is just
a year old. The relatively new rule states that active erosion
sites have to be identified and remediation performed, where
feasible.
Sierra Pacific had already looked
at how it could avoid creating more sediment but hadn't identified
all the erosion sites, said Bill Snyder, deputy chief of forest
practices for CDF. Snyder said in a telephone interview from
Santa Rosa that "erosion sites on roads and culverts had
already been identified and would have been repaired," but
other naturally occurring erosion had not yet been studied.
Sierra Pacific has already made
substantial changes to the plan to address neighbors' concerns,
including the use of pilot cars to accompany logging trucks and
an agreement not to use herbicides.
Mark Lovelace, spokesperson
for the Sunny Brae-Arcata Neighborhood Alliance, said that while
the plan isn't perfect, he was "very happy with some of
these results."
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