|
 
COVER
STORY | FROM
THE PUBLISHER | CALENDAR
Dec. 5, 2002
Promises
kept
Q&A with former Eureka
Mayor Nancy Flemming
by
JUDY HODGSON
SHE ARRIVED IN EUREKA IN 1972,
a 20-something mother of two and wife of the new manager of Westfall
Stevedore Co. She brought with her a irrepressibly sunny disposition,
a style of dress that can only be described as '50s New York
(tailored suits with piping) and the gentle southern manners
of a home-grown Alabama girl.
 In her new city she threw herself into things she
cared passionately about --things to do with the sea, plus a
new group called the Eureka Heritage Society. She loved to entertain
and her home was often full of international visitors arriving
by ship, be it cargo or yacht. ("Our house was like the
U.N.")
Along the way she divorced and
started her own business, a kitchen store and coffee shop in
Old Town called the Gourmet Gallery. One of her trademarks was
her elaborate shop window displays, a talent that got her an
unusual assignment from the Heritage Society in 1982. The group
wanted to do a tour of "old working Eureka" and on
the list of possible sites was a shack on Indian Island,
accessible only by boat. She was asked if she could go visit
the island and figure out how to make it presentable in a hurry
for the upcoming tour just one week away.
At the time she was single and
dating a young Coast Guardsman named Mark Staniland. They went
together to the island. She stepped out on the rickety dock in
her black high heel shoes and her cream-colored organza skirt
was soon splattered with mud. ("That outfit was over the
top!") But the minute she set foot on the island, she said,
she knew she was meant to live there.
They had no money -- "Never
did," she says -- but sought out the owner and negotiated
a deal to lease the shack with the money going toward a down
payment. They moved in and were married on the island two years
later in 1984. The couple commuted by skiff in all weather, stormy
and calm, from the tiny island to Eureka to work.
In 1990 Nancy Flemming ran for
mayor. It just made sense to her. The city was in disarray, a
ship with no hand on the tiller. Two members of the council were
being investigated for attempting to unduly influence department
heads and other city officials. (No charges were ever filed but
one incumbent councilmember was soundly defeated and the second
the subject of a recall attempt.) But her main reason for running
was the city was not paying enough attention to the waterfront.
"An incredible asset was being ignored," she said.
"There was no vision, no plan."
Voters responded to her message
and she won 53 percent of the vote in the crowded primary that
year against five men, including the popular ex-council member,
Jim Howard. The win surprised everyone but her. "I knew
I would win."
Flemming was on the cover of
the new North Coast Journal in1990. In that interview
she laid out her vision of Eureka's future and she made a list
of goals -- promises, really -- she wanted to accomplish. Flemming
leaves office this week and in this exit interview conducted
last Saturday at Avalon Cafe, a chic new Old Town bistro, readers
will learn that this is a story of promises kept. It's a story
about how a mayor of a city who can only vote in case of a tie
was able to complete an agenda she drafted 12 years ago.
JOURNAL: First, the clothes.
You are always so well dressed -- formal, in fact, for Eureka.
What's with the wardrobe?
FLEMMING: It's my Southern
upbringing. It was the way I was raised. You dressed to go to
the grocery store. My secret is I shop secondhand stores. I had
a favorite [in San Francisco] that just closed after all these
years.
We have a ceremony planned [at
City Hall] next week for the swearing in of the new mayor and
council. I will be wearing the same suit I wore 12 years ago
for my swearing in -- the red one with black trim.
Q: On to more serious topics,
I just reread the 1990 Journal interview. You had a checklist
that was pretty ambitious --on the bay for economic development,
a home for the rowing team, a boardwalk, boat rentals, farmers'
markets, youth participation in government, restoration of buildings,
beautification ...
A: Yes. And it's all happening.
Except E and F streets still need to be much more major avenues.
You can't have a wonderfully successful city without major avenues
and those two really are -- F Street especially because of its
history. It is the avenue. We need to get lovely trees
there, twinkly lights -- all of that -- to really command attention,
to actually seduce you from [Highway] 101 down to the waterfront.
Yesterday was wonderful in Old
Town watching family after family, proud of their city, bringing
their families down to the waterfront.
Q: You also talked about
demonstrations of practical and historical work being done on
the waterfront.
A: That will happen. We just
got the funding two weeks ago [for C Street]. Visitors will be
able to see our fishermen at work. It augments tourism as well.
I think what I've been talking about for my 30 years here, is
that [the waterfront] is such an incredibly authentic place.
It looks right, it feels right because it's real.
Q: The extension of Waterfront
Drive is part of that?
A: If you have an alternative
-- a scenic drive -- into Eureka along the waterfront from the
south, you meet our fishermen, you see our marina, you see them
working, you see our oyster company, you see Pacific Choice [Seafoods]
-- all of that a working waterfront. And then you come to our
beautiful boardwalk. That is your introduction to who and what
Eureka really is. Then in Old Town you see beautiful art galleries
and antique shops, unique clothing shops -- shops of high quality,
not T-shirt shops. That is Eureka.
Q: What about the sensitive
environmental habitat of the marsh?
A: People talk about is as an
alternative truck route when actually it's an alternative
scenic drive that gives people the option of coming along
the water. If you think about it, no one is going to take better
care of and love and cherish and protect that marsh, that waterfront
area, [than the city, which is able] to take ownership and create
access through it. The plan as I understood it is to build on
existing fill and the railroad bed where it doesn't damage the
marsh. I truly support it.
The entire waterfront for more
than 100 years has been kept separate and apart from most of
the citizens of Eureka. They didn't know or care about it and
now they do. They will protect it. You are driving along the
most magnificent bay and you don't know it's there. Now you just
see commercial buildings and billboards.
Q: Let's talk recent history.
Since you came into office as mayor 12 years ago, you saw three city managers in a row fired. You supported
all three.
A: I came into office when there
was literally scandal at City Hall. We came into a climate of
mistrust where it was difficult for department heads to work
closely with elected officials with very good reason. City officials
were keeping memos -- that's why it was called "memogate"
--protect themselves from elected officials. They kept memos
of all their conversations. Our first four years was spent creating
a safe, comfortable climate for the staff to become confident
enough to become creative, to use their educations and to reach
out and trust us -- to see the goals we had in mind were really
good. The first four years were about creating a safe culture
and climate at City Hall.
Still, those four years we got
an enormous amount done. I had the good fortune, since I won
in the primary, to work with Mayor Fred Moore and he was very
generous. I got excellent training from the City Design for Mayors
Institute. I went to them to talk about the waterfront and had
them analyze it. They were so intrigued by the possibilities
that one professor at Berkeley took it on as a project and for
an entire year students came here and worked and had incredible
ideas. It was transformational. People were excited. We had the
pulse of the people.
Q: Then City Manager David
Tooley was fired.
A. Because of that [forward
push] I think David was fired. It was an exciting time of moving
forward and there were people who really wanted to pull back
the reins. We formed the sister city relations with Japan, too.
That very week we were there on a visit, they [the council] fired
him. I flew home for the vote.
Negativity is a form of laziness
because you really don't have to produce very much. With a positive
energy, it's harder. You have to create, you have to produce.
Q: You were re-elected in
1994 ...
A: Without much opposition.
The same group of what I consider negative people, disgruntled
types, came together and got the same person to run against me.
Q: Then City Manager John
Arnold was fired.
A: John was very creative. He
helped formulate the plans for the waterfront. It was so exciting
to actually put up billboards [signs] along the waterfront showing
what the plans were, how it all would come together, like pearls
on a necklace. We had an overall plan. It created momentum. Then
he was fired. [Councilmember] Jack McKellar came into office
promising he'd fire Tooley. And he did. He also headed up the
campaign to fire Arnold.
That was the worst part of being
mayor. ... You build a relationship, a level of trust with such
well educated, creative people. They were visionary. I felt privileged
to work with them. I still do, with all our staff.
Q: Then City Manager Harvey
Rose?
A: The same thing. It's easy
to get a 3-2 vote. Council members get angry, usually at different
times. That happens. There are groups of people out there who
work to raise the hackles on the back of your neck. They teach
mistrust. They whisper in ears. It's like junior high. It's not
very deep. It's more visceral. There's a whole philosophy of
keeping things unsettled. With a 3-2 vote it was always very
easy to fire a city manager on a given day and the council certainly
knows when that day is -- when they have three.
Now that David has the four-vote
clause [it takes four votes to terminate the contract of current
City Manager David Tyson], we will have a more stable city government.
It will be very difficult to ever fire a city manager. I wish
I had had that luxury of a stable city government.
Q: Let's move forward to
1999 and Measure J, the No on WalMart initiative. It was defeated by a 2-1 margin in that special election.
Why were you so gung-ho WalMart for the Balloon Tract
parcel and were the 2000 and 2002 city races a backlash against
you personally?
A: It wasn't really about WalMart.
I was put in that position [of WalMart support] by the anti-J
people. It was convenient. I was for people getting to say what
they wanted, that the citizens got a chance to vote, and they
did. And yes, I voted for Measure J.
I think it was important to
understand that in the '70s, our original general plan called
for the expansion of retail into the Balloon Tract area -- to
enlarge Old Town. To me we had the potential to expand using
WalMart's money to develop. We thought we had put together a
good plan for mixed use that would augment our beautiful new
marina and have some retail and light industry as well. We had
three local companies that wanted to expand their businesses
there. It included a park and a small lake, lots of parking and
retail that would help service the marina.
The marina is a little isolated
right now. There are people who come in on commercial boats and
yachts and sports fishermen, and they need services -- to go
to restaurants, to get supplies to go on board. There needs to
be public transportation, too. I thought we could create a better
hub. Unfortunately it was WalMart, but it didn't matter to me
what the store was. I just think the zoning needed to
be changed.
I kept trying to get that across.
To keep the focus on just anti-WalMart created a prejudice, because
there is a prejudice against poor people and poor people shop
at WalMart. That's grossly unfair. Poor people need to shop as
well as high end. They just wanted a WalMart wherever.
Smart development, smart growth
means intensifying and creating more density in existing space.
It's what we've been focused on for many years, to build the
city as a hub to service the entire region.
Q: What about the big-box
ordinance pending before the new council?
A: It won't change much. We
have almost all those requirements already in place because we
are in the coastal zone. It's just another moment to stand up
against "big-box" retailers, one more hurdle.
I have always thought the city
could have [more] diversity as the regional shopping center.
We have a successful mall. We could have successful big boxes
-- and we could have a very successful downtown-Old Town, Henderson
Center and Cutten retail areas, too, because you have different
needs that you are meeting. We are the center of the region and
we are the county seat, the central point for retail.
Q: Was Measure J a clash
between two powerful women, you and County Supervisor Bonnie
Neely, who helped lead the No on Measure J campaign?
A: Some people painted it as
personal, but it was much more profound. We became symbols of
different philosophies, different approaches to the future.
It was a watershed moment for
the region. I was in favor of continuing to expand the waterfront
mixed use. It was a wonderful proposal. She [Neely] became a
strong symbol for continuing focus on industry. The city was
torn and it was painful.
That discussion hasn't ended,
really. The concept of mixed use is more sustainable. Throughout
the nation there are successful projects being made from old
railroad yards. History will prove who was right. Today just
look at the Balloon Tract and look at F Street.
Q: Does that mean you no
longer think the railroad is viable?
A: Ten to 12 years ago I thought
it was doable. I don't think it has much of a chance now. We
just aren't going to be a huge industrial city. So what can
we do that's positive? We can have a great passenger shuttle
between the coastal towns, a local transportation system.
Q: After Measure J was defeated,
the candidates you backed for council in 2000 were trounced.
A: Trounced and trounced.
Q: And this election? Were
the "anti-Nancy" forces at work? You backed Cherie
Arkley for mayor and Peter La Vallee won.
A: It was very close. I strongly
supported Cherie. She and her husband Rob have done so much for
this city.
We've just had over a decade
of aggressively moving forward. It can be overwhelming because
there has been such change. So it may be a time to take stock
and assess things. Maybe that's what the voters were saying.
With Peter, he's more into social
services work. Maybe it's a good time to take a look more at
that. But the funding available for those kinds of programs is
generally through the county.
Q: How will you be remembered?
A: That I was tenacious. No
matter who the city manager was. Every time we got a new city
manager, we had to start over. But we hired good professional
people who came in and saw immediately that of course it was
important to revitalize the community and broaden the economic
base and to focus on the waterfront.
Q: And things left undone?
A: One of the things that is
terribly important is that H and I streets need to no longer
be one-way streets. They need to go two ways and straight up
the center should be beautiful plantings of trees and flowers.
We should return those to the neighborhoods. It will augment
the value of their homes, it will feel like a neighborhood and
they will be safer streets and will have a more even feeding
[of traffic] on 101 than we have now. I hope this new council
will take that on.
And of course the waterfront
[redevelopment] is just beginning. Government's job is to provide
the infrastructure for success. We can build the streets, provide
the beautiful lighting. It can help retailers be more successful.
And if you don't have successful retail, then you don't have
the money for social services. It's all a circle.
Q: Any other elected office
that interests you?
A: No. I had thought at one
time I would run for supervisor, but the timing wasn't right.
I thought for a while about being an assemblyperson. But I would
never want to live anywhere else.
Q: Is there life after being
mayor?
A: My [tenure] as mayor was
a service. It's not anything about my life. If you visited my
home, you would find no clue that I had ever been mayor. If you
read my diaries at home, there'd be no clue. Now at work, I have
12 years of diary entries about the city. But at home, it's about
the weather or what we're doing at home.
Q: Diaries at work? Is there
a future book in the works?
A: Probably not. The diaries
are already filed away. I need a year to think of what's next,
what's best for me. My 50s and 60s I want to be truly rewarding.
Editor's note: Flemming,
54, says her lifelong interest in painting was rekindled after
her husband bought her an easel and oil paints for her 50th birthday.
A show of her latest paintings, called "Humboldt Bay, a
sense of place," opens Dec. 8 at Avalon.
Coastal
Conservancy gets tough on Eureka marsh
by
KEITH EASTHOUSE
The California Coastal Conservancy
says it will consider suspending funding of the Eureka Boardwalk
project if the city continues to engage in "inappropriate
delays" of the problem-plagued, much-postponed effort to
restore the Eureka marsh.
In a three-page letter dated
Nov. 8, coastal conservancy executive director Samuel Schuchat
expressed impatience with the city's handling of the project.
"The conservancy understands
that some of the continuing delays result from causes beyond
the control of the city of Eureka. Yet these projects remain
incomplete and current progress remains inordinately slow,"
Schuchat said in the letter.
Despite receiving $1.5 million
in conservancy grants for the project, the city remains largely
stuck in neutral. It is also in violation of contractual agreements
it reached with the conservancy pertaining to the project. The
conservancy itself has not consistently bird-dogged the project,
which has further delayed things (see the Sept. 26 Journal
cover story, "Clashing
Visions").
Representatives of local environmental
groups have suspicions that the city is deliberately dragging
its feet on restoring the marsh out of concern that it could
interfere with the Waterfront Drive extension project, which
would run right through the middle of the 113-acre area.
Schuchat said that conservancy
funding of city projects besides the Eureka boardwalk project
could also be in jeopardy, but he did not specify what he was
referring to. He added that the conservancy may decide not to
fund future projects unless the city gets its act together.
Earlier this year, the conservancy
decided to provide the city with $1.5 million for the boardwalk
project, but Schuchat made clear that the conservancy, a state
agency charged with preserving coastal lands, is on the verge
of reconsidering.
City Manager David Tyson said
that he didn't see the letter as a threat, and that at this point
he wasn't alarmed by the possibility that funds could be withheld
from the boardwalk project. He said the city has an obligation
to live up to the terms of its agreement with the conservancy.
"They control the funds.
The coastal conservancy has been kind enough to support our programs.
Some things [on the marsh restoration project] we can't comply
with at this time."
One thing that genuinely seems
to be on its way to being corrected has to do with a 1992 contract
between the city and the conservancy that allowed the city to
lease over two acres of marshland to Bayshore Mall -- on the
condition that the property be used solely for parking, for the
mall and for those visiting the marsh.
For several years, a go-cart
facility called Oasis Fun Center and a scrap metal recycling
outfit have operated on the parking lot. Tyson said that city
staff, in recent talks with Bayshore Mall officials, have determined
that the recycling operation is not within the area covered by
the agreement, but that the go-cart facility is.
"The mall will relocate
all [Oasis Fun Center] operations and return marsh parking within
the next few weeks," Tyson said.
In another development, an eight-page
city memo dated Oct. 18 outlines in a fair amount of detail the
restoration work that remains to be done.
Environmentalist Christine Ambrose
said the memo is an encouraging sign, but expressed concern that
it is based on hydrological data that was gathered in the late
1980s and which may no longer jibe with on-the-ground realities.
One chronic problem with the
marsh is that due to previous human-caused disturbances, such
as the building of railroad lines and the depositing of fill
material, it does not drain properly and tidal circulation is
constricted.
In his letter, Schuchat outlines
several concerns, such as the city's failure to post signs on
Highway 101 directing the public to the marsh parking area; and
the lack of a "marsh interpretive display" either inside
Bayshore Mall or in the vicinity of the marsh parking area.
Schuchat demanded that the city
provide him with some evidence of progress on those two matters
this week. He also asked for evidence that the city intends to
abide by a legally-binding agreement to record a conservation
easement with the county on a parcel near the marsh called "Restoration
Area A." The imposition of an easement in this area, which
would prevent development, is considered critical to the goal
of restoring tidal circulation to the marsh.
Staff writer Geoff S. Fein
contrtibuted to this report.
Get ready for the
twin tanks
by KEITH EASTHOUSE
 The
giant water tank that towers above the intersection of Harris
and K streets in Eureka and serves as a local landmark is going
to have a twin.
If all goes as planned, for
a couple of months next summer there will be two seemingly identical
tanks side by side, same powder-blue color, same half-a-million
gallon capacity.
"The city is going to have
double-vision," joked public works director Brent Siemer.
The visual display will be short-lived.
The older tank, built in the 1950s, is out of line with the latest
earthquake safety standards and will be dismantled.
Common sense would seem to dictate
that the existing tank be taken down before the new one is erected.
But if that were done, Siemer said, the water supply to thousands
of Eureka households would be disrupted.
"The high tank provides
pressure to half the city. Without it, we would have to run pumps
to keep city water flowing in the upper areas.
"We'll make sure that the
new tank is ready to go into service and then fill it out and
then take out the old one," Siemer added.
A new $1.5 million pumping system
is going to be installed at the one-square-block, city-owned
site. It will send water to residents when the new tank is periodically
drained and cleaned. It will also serve as a backup water supply
in the event of a severe earthquake.
The cost of replacing the tanks
is $1 million.
The first phase of the project,
set to begin this month, calls for the removal of the large Monterey
cypress trees that line two half blocks at the site. Siemer estimated
there were about a dozen trees at the site and that they were
40 years old. Parks Superintendent Tom Coyle said there were
probably twice that many and that they were "well over 50
years old."
Siemer said some residents have
raised objections to the tree cutting, but that it's necessary
for security reasons; he said someone could gain entrance to
the fenced site simply by climbing one of the trees, crawling
out on a branch and jumping down.
Unfortunately, Siemer said,
the trees are falling victim to last year's terrorist attacks.
"We were looking at ways
to avoid cutting the trees, pruning them up instead. But 9-11
pushed that out of consideration. I hope it's not a knee-jerk
reaction but we feel we have to be prudent."
Siemer said the area would be
replanted with smaller trees. "They won't have the grandeur
that those [cypress] have, but they will look good in 20 years."
Judge
gives green light to PL
After issuing an order in August
that seemed to block further logging by the Pacific Lumber Co.,
a Superior Court judge turned around last week and gave the green
light to all the company's approved timber plans.
While dismissing Pacific Lumber's
contention that he didn't have the authority to order a halt
in the first place, Judge John Golden essentially negated his
earlier ruling by exempting at least 100 timber harvest plans
to avoid causing undue "economic hardship" to the company.
Spokeswoman Mary Bullwinkel
said, "obviously we're pleased with this ruling."Company
officials had argued that a cessation of logging would result
in layoffs this winter.
Cynthia Elkins of the Garberville-based
Environmental Protection Information Center, meantime, called
Judge Golden's latest ruling "a travesty of justice."
She said the real losers are Humboldt County's fish, forests
and wildlife.
So, apparently, ends a strange
chapter in the never-ending battle between PL and environmentalists,
one in which Pacific Lumber continued to log in the face of a
court order, arguing that the ruling did not apply to already-approved
logging operations.
The logging produced a spate
of tree-sits that continue to this day, as protestors argued
that PL was logging illegally.
A turning point came in September,
when the state Fish and Game department, along with the Department
of Forestry, sided with the timber company.
Elkins said her group is proceeding
with contempt proceedings against the company for violating the
stay before it had the exemptions, but with last week's ruling
the prospects don't look good.
However, a three-year-old lawsuit
filed by EPIC that challenges the "sustained yield plan"
that is supposed to govern logging on Pacific Lumber timberlands
for the next 100 years is coming to trial next month. The suit
was held up because the forestry department failed to turn over
to the court thousands of logging-related documents. It was that
failure that triggered Golden's initial order.
Indian summer
The sunny weather that has brightened
the North Coast for the past week or so has been unusual, to
say the least.
Last Wednesday, a record was
set when the mercury reached 72 degrees in Eureka, normally damp
and drizzly this time of year.
Given that the balminess followed
a cold snap in late October, the shirtsleeve weather seems to
qualify as a genuine Indian summer, a period of unusual warmth
following an autumnal frost.
It's all part of a longer-term
pattern of rain-free weather. According to the National Weather
Service, this has been one of the driest falls ever recorded
in Humboldt County.
Between July 1 and Oct. 31,
only .16 inches of rain fell, the least ever recorded.
"It's been a kind of persistent
weather pattern," said meteorologist Dave Soroka of the
weather service's Eureka field office. "By mid-October we
look for the summer-time pattern to start breaking down and it
didn't this time."
The one blip was a storm in
early November that dropped over 2 inches of rain and brought
rainfall up to about 30 percent of normal.
Soroka said that given the presence
of a moderate El Niño out in the Pacific, things could
turn wet in a few months.
Vandals
strike Humboldt park
Vandals caused $3,600 in damage
to Humboldt Redwoods State Park over the Thanksgiving weekend.
Two bear-proof garbage cans were stolen and a handicapped restroom
was demolished by a truck.
The garbage cans, bolted to
concrete slabs, were taken from Founders Grove and Blue Slide
day use areas. The cans, designed to keep bears and other animals
from removing and eating garbage, are worth $800 apiece.
Earlier, a handicapped restroom
at the Dyerville day use area appeared to have been hit several
times by a truck. The restroom was damaged beyond repair. The
facility was worth $2,000.
Cement parking barriers were
also removed from parking lots throughout the state park. The
barriers were connected to the ground with rebar.
Park rangers will increase patrols
throughout the park in the wake of the vandalism.
Charged
with arson
Two adults and three juveniles
were arrested last week on suspicion of setting a number of fires
in Hoopa.
More than 300 blazes broke out
on both the Hoopa and Yurok reservations this past year. Authorities
haven't said how many of those fires were the work of the five
charged with arson.
Michael Gabriel, 30, is being
held at the Humboldt County Jail in connection with a fire in
June that burned 10 acres near Cal Pac Road in Hoopa. That fire
cost $9,000 to fight and caused more than $4,000 in damage. If
convicted, Gabriel could serve up to six years in state prison.
Brian McKinnon, 33, could spend
20 years in prison if convicted for setting a fire near Big Hill
Road on Sept. 21 that scorched 177 acres and cost at least $1.2
million to put out.
Both men are from Hoopa.
One of the three juveniles is
charged with setting a fire in August that burned more than 400
acres and cost at least $2 million to fight.
The two other juveniles are
suspected of setting a 2-acre blaze that destroyed a trailer.
A call to the Bureau of Indian
Affairs We Tip Program helped lead law enforcement to the suspects.
Toxic algae
abates
Toxic blue-green algae in the
Eel River blamed for killing three dogs in August has subsided.
A rainstorm in early November
helped cleanse the river of the algae which produces deadly toxins,
according to county health officials.
Levee access
settled
The four-year-old battle for
public access to the Mad River Levee is over. The Humboldt County
Board of Supervisors is expected to acquire an easement to the
thin strip of land later this month.
The agreement avoids a legal
battle between property owner Manuel Morais, who blocked the
levee out of concern that his cattle could come into conflict
with dogs and people, and a citizen's organization called the
Mad River Levee Access Group.
As part of the agreement, the
state will pay $7,000 to Morais, who purchased the property five
years ago. Morais will still be able to restrict access during
July and August when he moves his cattle, but "no more than
two times each month," according to the settlement.
The levee had been open to the
public almost since the time of its construction in the 1950s.
Tackling
blight
The Humboldt County Board of
Supervisors approved an ordinance Tuesday establishing a redevelopment
agency (RDA). It's hoped the agency will lead to revitalization
of blighted areas throughout the county and spur economic growth.
The county will select 14 communities
to explore for redevelopment. Out of that, four will eventually
be considered as targeted communities. That selection is expected
to be made in January.
Areas being considered include
Samoa and Orick.
Burn barrel
ban
The North Coast Unified Air
Quality Management District is holding a series of workshops
over the next several weeks on new state regulations aimed at
eliminating cancer-causing substances produced by burning garbage.
The state is hoping to eliminate
so-called "burn barrel" use except in areas where the
population density is less than three people per square mile.
Residents in more populated areas will only be allowed to burn
vegetation -- branches, leaves and twigs.
Among the substances released
into the air by burning garbage is dioxin, a potent carcinogen.
The new regulations will go
into effect Jan. 1, 2004.
For information on the workshops,
aimed at tailoring guidelines to local areas, call 443-3093.
No relief
for farmers
Humboldt County farmers won't
be getting any federal emergency relief funds despite claiming
losses of $10 million in diminished hay, pasture and dairy production
caused by an extended drought.
The U.S Department of Agriculture
left the county off its list of counties eligible for drought
relief assistance.
U.S. Sens. Barbara Boxer and
Dianne Feinstein, both Democrats, as well as Rep. Mike Thompson,
D-Napa, are all looking into the matter.
Farmers and ranchers will only
be eligible for relief if the county can show a 30 percent loss
in production.
Pay up
It's tax time again; property
tax time, that is.
Property owners have until Dec.
10 to make their first payment for the 2002-2003 tax season.
Payments made after Dec. 10 could result in a 10 percent penalty.
About 70,000 tax bills were
mailed out and only 42,000 have been returned. To date the county
has received about $11 million in tax payments, leaving $24 million
to be paid by Dec. 10.
For more information call 476-2450.
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