Faced with a mounting fiscal crisis, local environmental nonprofit Humboldt Baykeeper is in the process of dramatically downsizing its organization. The office staff was reportedly laid off recently, and this week Executive Director Jessica Hall learned that she, too, is being laid off. Only Policy Director Jennifer Kalt, whose position has been reduced to part-time, […]
Ryan Burns
Ryan Burns worked for the Journal from 2008 to 2013, covering a diverse mix of North Coast subjects, from education, politics and marijuana to human suspension, sex parties and amateur fight contests. He won awards for investigative reporting, feature stories and news coverage.
Posted inLetters + Opinion
Pot POWs
When a mega-grow gets busted in Humboldt County, it makes a splash in local media — photos of lush greenhouses, irrigation pipes and bricks of processed weed, plus names and numbers (money, pounds, plants) that read like sports stats. What we don’t see are the repercussions of those busts, what becomes of the growers after […]
Posted inLetters + Opinion
Sticky Stigma
How many of Humboldt County’s 134,623 residents are involved in the weed industry? Twenty percent? Thirty? Half? Last week, a pot cop working in the county to our south suggested that the figure is even higher than that. Rich Russell, commander of Mendocino County’s major crimes task force, raised eyebrows and a few hackles by […]
Posted inNews (NCJ)
The Back Slap
In case you missed it yesterday, the Times-Standard‘s Thaddeus Greenson delivered the definitive account of 3rd District Supervisor Mark Lovelace’s sarcasm-powered slap-on-the-back, which he delivered last week to fellow supervisors Virginia Bass and Rex Bohn at a meeting of the California State Association of Counties in San Jose. Lovelace was reportedly frustrated at being replaced by Bass […]
Posted inNews (NCJ)
Meet Your Next Eureka Councilmember via Facebook, Vol. 3
Today, in our third and final installment of Facebook-centric introductions to aspiring Eureka City Council candidates, we meet the social media profile of Barry Smith, president and founder of Barry Smith Construction. That “SARCASM” sign up top is his profile pic. It’s clear from a quick glance at his photos that Smith loves his chopper. […]
Posted inNews (NCJ)
This Funny-Sad Local Reddit Post Wins the Day
The hilarious and poignant picture below, which was submitted to Reddit by user “Galaga88,” has racked up nearly three-quarters of a million views in just 15 hours. The heading reads, “My dad died yesterday. But he had his priorities straight before he went.” Bravo, Steve. Note the hospital logo in the upper-right corner. And if […]
Posted inNews (NCJ)
Meet Your Next Eureka Councilmember via Facebook, Vol. 2
Yesterday we channeled Facebook to introduce you to Chet Albin, one of three candidates hoping to get appointed to the Eureka City Council next month by Mayor Frank Jager. Today, in our second social media intro, we check out the Facebook persona of local TV news veteran Leslie Lollich. (Click here and scroll down for her […]
Posted inNews (NCJ)
Co-op and Union Reach Tentative Agreement
Labor negotiations have been tense between the North Coast Co-op and the Local 5 of the United Food and Commercial Workers Union, but a union rep just released the following press release: After 7 difficult months of contract negotiations, UFCW Local 5 is pleased to announce they have reached a tentative agreement with the North […]
Posted inLetters + Opinion
Liberation at Last
Humboldt County residents sure love state and federal law enforcement. And rightly so. Some readers are probably too young to remember this, but 30 years back, the largest law enforcement task force in the United States — the multi-agency Campaign Against Marijuana Planting, or CAMP — was deployed in California with the goal of eliminating […]
Posted inNews (NCJ)
Meet Your Next Eureka Councilmember via Facebook, Vol. 1
UPDATE: Albin’s Facebook page seems to have disappeared: Original post: In less than a month, Eureka Mayor Frank Jager will select one of three candidates who have thrown their names in the hat, hoping to replace 5th Ward representative Lance Madsen on the Eureka City Council. Yesterday we showed you the applications each candidate submitted […]
Posted inNews (NCJ)
Developer Group Seeks to Rewind General Plan Update
In the wake of the recent rewrites of the guiding principles for the county’s general plan update, a politically active contractor association is asking the county to rewind the entire update process by sending the plan back to the county planning commission, a body that’s been stacked with the group’s political allies. The Humboldt Builders’ […]
Posted inNews (NCJ)
Humboldt County is About to See More Feds Hunting Marijuana
As we reported last year, Humboldt County Sheriff Mike Downey has long been asking the federal government for help tracking down and arresting marijuana growers, and now he’s gonna get it. Today the White House announced that Humboldt County has been lumped into the Northern California “High-Intensity Drug Trafficking Area,” or HIDTA. What does that […]