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October 11, 2001
KVIQ-TV
sale announced
The Ackerley Group, a media
and entertainment conglomerate that purchased KVIQ-TV Channel
6 in 1999, has itself been sold.
In an agreement announced Monday,
Clear Channel Communications Inc. will acquire Ackerley in an
all-stock transaction valued at $800 million at the close of
business Oct. 5. The figure includes the assumption of approximately
$294 million of debt.
What that means for KVIQ's local
news department is unclear. In a cover
story June 29, 2000 ("More news, more often"),
then-General Manager Jeanne Buheit told the Journal that
the Ackerley Group had invested more than $1 million in the news
department. The number of shows grew from five hours per week
to 22, including a live morning show. The news department employed
20 reporters and technicians at the time.
Today, the entire KVIQ staff
consists of one on-air reporter, Dave Silverbrand. Weather and
other reports are fed to the station from its sister station
in Santa Rosa.
Since the Journal report
last year, KAEF-TV Channel 7, with north state news coverage
originating from Redding, has dropped all reporting from Humboldt
County. KIEM-TV in Eureka, the industry leader according to Nielsen
Reports, reports that its staffing level is unchanged.
"We have 15 in the news
department, same as last year," said Bob Browning, KIEM
station manager. "It's our intention to maintain our news
coverage at its current level."
Humboldt County is one of the
smallest television markets in the United States, ranking 189
out of 210 Nielsen markets nationwide.
Airport
security lax
Twice as many security violations
were detected by the Federal Aviation Administration at Arcata-Eureka
Airport as at other similar airports in Northern California,
according to a report in the Oct. 3 Santa Rosa Press Democrat.
Fifty security violations were
noted over the last decade, compared to an average of about 24
at other Northern California airports. In one instance, a plainclothes
FAA employee was able to sneak weapons past the security checkpoint.
Airport officials say that the
figures are somewhat misleading. The Arcata-Eureka airport handles
several times as many flights as other small municipal airports.
This
year's Nutcracker may be cancelled
Since 1974 the Redwood Concert
Ballet has presented an annual holiday production of The Nutcracker,
but this year's production is in doubt.
The Nutcracker's fall event, "Tea and Ballet," scheduled
for Oct. 14, has already been cancelled.
A contentious meeting of the
non-profit ballet's board of directors Sept. 24 resulted in the
dismissal of Virginia Niekrasz-Laurent, RCB's artistic director
and founder. She had been the main force behind The Nutcracker
performances in past years.
Since the meeting the RCB board
has seen two of its long-term directors resign. The board, which
had recently added four new members, made the decision to dismiss
Niekrasz-Laurent in closed session. Since it is a personnel issue,
no one will say exactly why the decision was made. Board Chair
Mary Glavich would only say that the decision had "a financial
basis."
"The bottom line was nonprofit
versus profit," said Glavich, who added that she feels the
end result of the controversy will be positive for RCB.
Niekrasz-Laurent still runs
the Dancer's Studio in Eureka, a for-profit business that has
been the source of most dancers in the Redwood Concert Ballet.
The Redwood Concert Ballet has
suffered from growing pains in recent years, particularly since
May of last year when the company took possession of a newly
remodeled 6,000-square-foot building on F Street in Eureka, a
gift from Eureka businessman Rob Arkley and his wife, Cherie
Arkley, who sits on the Eureka City Council.
A final decision on the fate
of the holiday show will be made at the next board of directors
meeting Monday.
"It's up to the board and
the new artistic director," Glavich said.
At the meeting the board will
also officially offer the empty artistic director slot to Danny
Furlong, a dancer from the San Francisco Opera Ballet who has
been working with Niekrasz-Laurent as ballet master, Glavich
said.
Jacoby's
Storehouse sold
Arcata's most famous historic
building, Jacoby's Storehouse, was sold earlier this month by
the family that had owned it for four generations.
A group of four investors purchased
the building Oct. 1. Two of those investors, Chris Smith and
Bill Chino, know the building very well. They own and operate
the two restaurants inside, Abruzzi and the Plaza Grill.
"I think the building is
the jewel of the Plaza and we are appreciative of the opportunity
to carry on that stewardship," Smith told the Journal.
The two additional investors have chosen to remain anonymous.
Originally built by Augustus
Jacoby in 1857 as a store for miners in the Trinity Alps, the
building was taken over in 1880 by the Brizard family. The Brizards
saw the building through two major restorations and more than
120 years.
"We just want to continue
that storied tradition," Smith said.
Board names
new CAO
Rio Dell City Manager Loretta
Nickolaus was chosen as Humboldt County's new administrative
officer Oct. 5.
In a unanimous vote, the Board
of Supervisors decided in closed session to appoint Nickolaus
to the post, ending a six-month search.
Like retiring CAO John Murray,
Nickolaus has experience in county government. Before becoming
Rio Dell's city manager, she worked as an administrative analyst
in the department she is now going to lead. Familiarity with
Humboldt County was a big factor in her selection, said 3rd District
County Supervisor John Woolley.
"Loretta has both the knowledge
of the county and the ability to work with different governmental
agencies," he said.
Sun
Healthcare settles
Injuries, dehydration, humiliation
and in some cases death. These are the problems that prompted
California's Attorney General Bill Lockyer to file criminal and
civil charges against Sun Healthcare, the state's largest nursing
home company.
Sun, which operates four Sunbridge
nursing homes in Eureka, has a history of keeping staffing levels
so low that its facilities routinely collect deficiency citations.
That trend reached a climax in Eureka in 2000 when a resident
in a wheelchair fell down a set of steps and died.
(Conditions at the four Humboldt
County homes were detailed in a cover
story, "Nursing Home Neglect," Nov. 9, a report
that earned the Journal a California Newspaper Publishers
Award this year for investigative reporting.)
Under a settlement between the
state and Sun Healthcare, the company pleaded guilty to a charge
of felony elder abuse charges. The company will have to rectify
conditions and give an annual progress report to the attorney
general. The company is already required under current state
law to correct its deficiencies and report to the state.
Co-op manager
leaving
"Originally, when I went
to work for the Co-op, it was only going to be for a short time,"
said John Corbett, general manager of the North Coast Co-op.
That was nearly 30 years ago.
Corbett announced last week
that he will really be leaving the Co-op soon. He has started
winding down his responsibilities and a search for his replacement
has begun, he said.
Plans -- outside of having "a
hell of a garden" -- may include a run for public office.
"I'm looking very hard
at local politics," Corbett said.
KEET collects
conversion cash
Public television station KEET
was brought a step closer to digital conversion when the federal
government granted the station $494,769 last week.
The money, from the Public Telecommunications
Facilities Program, will help the Eureka-based station to make
the change to digital television. The planned conversion will
allow KEET to broadcast several programs simultaneously and is
part of a larger effort to include more locally produced programming.
It is not, however, optional.
A Federal Communications Commission rule states that KEET must
convert to the digital format by 2003. The federal grant brings
KEET's total capital fund for the conversion project to $1.1
million; $4.6 million is required.
Amber Sanders and many of her
classmates from Zoe Barnum Continuation High spent last Friday
baking pies in the school's kitchen instead of enjoying the sunshine.
The pies were sold to help raise funds for victims of the Sept.
11 attacks as part of the Humboldt Helps benefit held Oct. 5
in Eureka.
Photographer's
Assembly bid
Nature photographer, environmental
activist and real estate salesman Douglas Riley Thron announced
earlier this month that he will run for the 1st District Assembly
seat as a candidate for the Green Party.
According a press release, his
priorities would include education, local business, retiree benefits
and the environment.
Riley Thron is probably best
known through his photos. A graduate of Humboldt State University's
photography program, Riley Thron has taken many widely reproduced
images of the forests of the North Coast.
Riley Thron is the sixth candidate
to announce for the 1st District. The seat is held by Virginia
Strom-Martin, who will be forced out of office by term limits
next year.
CR starts
women's soccer
The College of the Redwoods
will start the 2002 academic year with something new -- women's
soccer.
"I think it's long overdue
given the success of female soccer in the area," said Nick
Ortiz, head coach of the future team. There are approximately
1,300 girls playing soccer in Humboldt County and many of them
showed talent, Ortiz said.
"You have the beginnings
of some phenomenal players in the Humboldt-Del Norte High School
Soccer League," he said. "I believe some of the good
players would stay in the area to play for CR."
CR will be part of the Golden
Valley Conference, comprised of community colleges in Shasta,
Lassen, Siskiyou and Butte counties.
Coming out
to guerilla bar
When Josh Hazard and his friends
got fed up with the absence of a gay bar in Humboldt County,
they decided to make one -- or, to be more precise, to temporarily
take one over.
Their tactic is to pick a straight
bar and flood it with what Hazard calls "a rainbow of people."
Called a "guerilla"
bar, the tactic has been used for years in larger cities.
Hazard, who co-chairs the Queer
Student Union at Humboldt State University, said the take-over
is "just for fun."
"This is really a pretty
nice community anyway. You can just be yourself and be out anywhere,"
he said.
The next guerilla bar is scheduled
for Oct. 12, just one day after National Coming Out day. For
information, call 822-3959.
Bayside
Cutoff one way?
The Arcata City Council, impatient
with Caltrans' progress on improving safety at one intersection
on Highway 101, is considering whether to take matters into its
own hands.
The Bayside cutoff, which connects
101 and Old Arcata Road, is considered to be a hazard because
of cars which try to cross the fast-moving traffic on the highway
to turn left. The intersection has above-average accident rates.
The City Council has proposed
changing the Bayside cutoff to a one-way street, preventing cars
from entering the freeway via the road, which is within city
limits. Caltrans officials say that action may aggravate traffic
patterns on other roads and are recommending that the council
wait until the results are in from a traffic flow study in November.
The item is on the council's
Oct. 17 agenda.
Teach-in
by HSU profs
Students longing for some variety
in their education have gotten their wish: Professors at Humboldt
State University are holding a teach-in Oct. 17 as part of a
program involving all 22 California State University campuses.
The teach-in is designed to
shed light on trends in the CSU that the California Faculty Association
thinks are damaging the quality of the education they provide.
Chief among those are increased corporate influence and the decreased
role of faculty in university governance.
The teach-in starts at 11 a.m.
in the Goodwin Forum. A rally will be held on the quad starting
at noon, with the regular teach-in resuming at around 1:15 p.m.
The CFA is in a contract dispute
with the CSU administration. Humboldt's CFA representative, John
Travis, said that while issues like corporatization weren't being
discussed by the union, they had led to the current situation.
"A lot of the issues we
have at the bargaining table are the result of a change in university
governance," the political science professor said.
If no agreement is reached by
later this year, there is a possibility of a faculty strike,
Travis said.
Two waterways
impaired?
Two more Humboldt County streams
are being recommended for impaired status under federal law,
and a third may be on the way.
Jacoby Creek and Mad River are
being proposed for inclusion on a list of impaired waterways
by the staff of the North Coast Regional Water Quality Control
Board. Jacoby Creek is being suggested because of siltation and
the Mad River because of high summer water temperatures. The
board recommended that Humboldt Bay be monitored further for
contamination by PCBs, an industrial chemical with far-reaching
health effects.
Inclusion on the list of impaired
waters would trigger a state regulatory process, the heart of
which is a pollution control measure called the Total Maximum
Daily Load. Figuring out what a waterway's TMDL is -- or if one
is even necessary -- has been contentious, as it can have profound
effects on land use. (See Who's
afraid of the TMDL, cover story, Jan. 4.)
The water board has until April
to decide what waterways to include on its list.
Homeless
shelter gets $250,000
The fund-raising process for
a homeless shelter in Eureka took a big step forward when the
St. Joseph Health System donated $250,000 to the Redwood Community
Action Agency last week.
The Multiple Assistance Center
will provide housing, vocational training and substance abuse
treatment to homeless individuals. Slated to be located in the
former Humboldt Door and Window building at First and Y streets,
it should be operational by winter of 2002. The property was
purchased by the city of Eureka, but the shelter will be administered
by the RCAA.
The project is gaining momentum
as supporters throw their support behind it, as was clear from
the press conference announcing the donation.
"When we began this process,
we would hold public hearings and see this many people opposed
to the project," said Eureka city planner Gary Bird as he
looked out at a crowd of about 50 shelter supporters.
P A S S A G E S
Buddy Brown
Oct. 27, 1945 - Oct. 2, 2001
![[photo of Buddy Brown]](obit1011-buddybrown.jpg) "They call it stormy Monday,
but Tuesday's just as bad."
On Tuesday, Oct. 2, Richard
Duggins, known to the world as Buddy Brown, died in his sleep
in his Blue Lake home.
Born Oct. 27, 1945 in Newark,
N.J., Duggins learned to play clarinet in junior high. (He would
have preferred saxophone but they were all taken.) His family
moved to Oklahoma when he was a teenager and he finished high
school in the Tulsa area. He learned guitar while in college
and began his lifelong study of the blues and all forms of American
music.
After spending a couple of years
in the service working as a clerk, he got himself discharged
in Paris, bummed around Europe, then headed for California. After
spending a decade living here and there, he settled in Humboldt
County in the 1980s, bought and lost a place in Southern Humboldt,
then bought a home in Blue Lake. Somewhere along the way he picked
up a Fender Telecaster, a National steel and a nickname, and
he learned to play some serious licks.
Buddy was a guitar player fluent
in the many forms of the blues. Whether it was crying with a
slide on his steel guitar or rockin' on his electric, he played
with feeling and passion.
In 1986 Buddy put together a
rhythm and blues band with harmonica/sax player Doug Crumpacker.
Bassist Dale Cash joined soon after. With typical self-deprecating
humor he called the combo Buddy Brown and the Flounders. Figuring
that the name might be "self-defeating," he changed
it to the Hound Dogs, a name he borrowed from a classic R&B
song by Big Mama Thornton that became an early hit for Elvis
Presley.
"That's the heart of roots
music," Buddy told me in an interview a few years back.
"You have a white guy with a country background singing
rhythm and blues tunes. The roots of rock 'n' roll are in the
black music of the rural South. That's where rock came from --
from that place where black and white shake hands musically."
He explored that musical handshake
over the course of three albums with the Hound Dogs. He was particularly
proud of the fact that his music was very well received in Europe
where he loved to play. The British blues magazine Blues and
Rhythm raved about his record. An Italian publication identified
him as "di Marc Chagall del blues." (He laughed
when he showed me the review, saying he had no idea what it meant.)
His latest disc, New Tricks,
was recorded with a Who's Who of local blues and jazz players
in five different studios over seven years. It captures his eclectic
taste ranging from slow, sexy blues to rockin' rhythm and blues
with a side trip into Cajun country.
The last time I talked with
him was at the Humboldt Folklife Festival in Blue Lake where
my job was to introduce him to the crowd before his solo country
blues set. As he tuned his shining National steel guitar I asked
him what he wanted me to say.
He shrugged, smiled and said,
"I don't know. You don't have to say much, just tell them
I'm going to play some blues."
COVER
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