UPDATE, 3:26 p.m.: Turns out there was only seven hats. So, Mission: Hat Retrieval accomplished. UPDATE, 2:45 p.m.: Seven of the 11 stolen hats have been recovered and the alleged perp is in custody. Here’s the news release: After the theft occurred from the museum, staff and deputies immediately began notifying pawn shops, and various […]
Carrie Peyton Dahlberg
Carrie Peyton Dahlberg was editor of the North Coast Journal from June 2011 to November 2013.
Posted inNews
Sewage Settlement
The city of Blue Lake has agreed to keep a closer eye on whether any of its treated sewage might be seeping into the Mad River. It will also spiff up its sewage treatment ponds, repairing dikes and adding more aerators to provide oxygen for crud-gobbling microbes. That’s all part of a settlement reached late […]
Posted inNews
Operator Error
Rumors are swirling about the St. Joseph Health System, a presence in Humboldt County since the Sisters of St. Joseph of Orange began treating flu patients here during the 1918 epidemic. While much remains unconfirmed, St. Joseph Hospital in Eureka and its sister facility, Redwood Memorial Hospital in Fortuna, both have made dramatic medical blunders […]
Posted inNews
Hospital says state is wrong, declines to provide details
UPDATE, Dec. 29: Surgeons at St. Joseph Hospital in Eureka did not leave two different objects inside two different patients after surgeries this summer, the state Public Health Department said Thursday. That only happened once. Two episodes involving “retained foreign objects” show up on the state website because St. Joseph doctors reported them, as required […]
Posted inNews
Marijuana Murkiness
For anyone trying to regulate medical marijuana, 2011 was a mess. A somersaulting, upsidedown-roller-coastering, stomach-churning flip-flop of a mess. Although the Obama administration started out a couple of years ago making nice to states that allowed some kind of medicinal pot use, it seemed to forget all that this year. In June, a federal […]
Posted inNews
Nursing Home Woes
Back in April, almost all of the nursing homes in Humboldt County were taken over by a new operator, owned by unspecified investors and a Los Angeles man named Shlomo Rechnitz. The arrangement allowed the previous owner/operator to sidestep a monitoring agreement that was part of settling a huge class action lawsuit over understaffing. Instead […]
Posted inLetters + Opinion
Didn’t We Say No?
Slipping in almost after the Top 10 deadline and almost under the radar, it’s … (chirpy/gagging adjective of your choice) … Wal-Mart. In a nation full of loathsome business practices, Wal-Mart has become symbolic of the slimiest of the slime. Pay lousy wages? Check. Offer miserly benefits? Check. Rely on oppressive overseas labor practices? Check? […]
Posted inNews
Surgeon Leaves 10-inch Device inside St. Joe’s Patient
UPDATE, DEC. 21: After initially making an 11:30 a.m. appointment to speak with the Journal on Wednesday, St. Joseph Hospital canceled. Spokeswoman Leslie Broomall said the hospital had decided it wanted written questions instead. We politely declined. Broomall later did email an unsigned media statement saying that St. Joseph Hospital takes the error “very seriously” […]
Posted inNews
You’d Better Watch Out, You’d Better Not Cry …
OK police. OK occupiers. You’re being watched. Or more accurately, you’re gonna be watched, very soon, by specially trained independent observers. (No, not TV reporters!) An independent observer program that was active in the early 2000s during timber protests is being revived and will start training new observers next month. Mark your calendar for Sunday, […]
Posted inNews
The Face of Deterrence
Update Friday Dec. 2: The dogs are now out, picked up by a friend of their owner. …. Nov. 30: Two black dogs are back in a cage at the county animal shelter today, and the homeless guy who cares for them is in county jail, at a cost of roughly $84 a night. He’s […]
Posted inNews
Sewage Seep?
Pretty little Blue Lake has a dirty little problem. Its aging sewage treatment plant, built in the 1950s for a mostly residential town, is at risk of being seriously overworked by the effluent from newer, bigger users, including a casino and a brewery. Even worse, that effluent burbles through a few treatment ponds that are […]
Posted inNews
Guest Post: The Trey McIntyre Project
Stephanie Silva, who writes about dance for the Journal, was able to watch the Trey McIntyre Project dancers rehearsing and performing on Wednesday, Nov. 9. She writes: For decades, contemporary dance has favored a high-tech, high-gloss style, with astonishingly athletic dancers performing lightning quick choreography, filled with Olympian jumps and daring lifts. The Trey McIntyre […]