On Thursday, July 17, an estimated 250 local demonstrators walked/rollerbladed/bicycled/rolled/skateboarded on the newly opened Humboldt Bay Trail across the Eureka Slough Bridge and north for a mile and back along the trail paralleling U.S. Highway 101. Dubbed Good Trouble Lives On Day by protesters, the nationwide event honors Congressman John Lewis, a Georgia Democrat who, […]
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Without Precedent
If a group of disgruntled Blue Lake residents succeeds in their effort to simultaneously recall three members of the city council, it will thrust the city into unprecedented territory. According to Journal consultations with more than a dozen legal experts and legislative analysts, the triple recall would leave the city with a council potentially unable […]
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The Conductor
Sweatshirts and jeans brushed against silk dresses and suits, leather and corked dress shoes creaked across the same carpeting as sneakers and sandals. Attending any night during the five programs and 10 performances of the Eureka Symphony’s 2024-2025 season pulled one into a bright, buzzing world peopled by an audience from every stage of life, […]
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The Disappearing Registrants
For years, Elizabeth Thurston used the website as a kind of salve. She’d check it for affirmation, clicking her abuser’s name so it would come up for the world to see, reinforcing that through the awful experiences that shaped her childhood and, in turn, her life, she’d taken a stand as an 8 year old […]
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Earth Flag Appeal Denied
The Earth flag appears set to maintain its current third-rung position on municipal flagpoles in Arcata after the First District Court of Appeal recently upheld a local judge’s decision finding that a citizen-led initiative requiring the city to place the so-called “Blue Marble” image in the top spot violated state law mandating the U.S. flag […]
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‘This Tax Could Kill This Industry’
A substantial tax hike for California’s faltering legal cannabis market took effect July 1, despite an aggressive industry campaign to suspend the increase that won the support of Gov. Gavin Newsom and other political leaders. The excise tax for weed is 19 percent as of July 1, up from 15 percent — the result of […]
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Huffman: Senate Budget Bill a ‘Betrayal’
North Coast Congressmember Jared Huffman issued a blistering statement calling the budget bill narrowly passed by Senate Republicans shortly before the Journal went to press July 1 a “betrayal,” warning it will have devastating economic, environmental and health impacts. “The Senate just jammed through a scorched-earth reconciliation bill so toxic that it is worse than […]
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A Place to Stop and Rest
When the Wiyot Tribe decided to leverage its resources to tackle Humboldt County’s housing crisis, it didn’t just start buying land to develop. Instead, tribal officials spent two years listening. “We spent two years studying housing,” says Dishgamu Community Land Trust Director Michelle Vassel. “We went to big events, farmers markets and just asked people […]
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‘Inflammatory and Prejudicial’
An Alderpoint man found guilty of first-degree murder in 2023 appears headed for a new trial after a state appellate court recently overturned his conviction, finding a local judge erred in allowing the jury to be presented with “inflammatory and prejudicial” evidence that may have changed the outcome of the case. Jake Henry Combs, who […]
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The Man Who Unsolved a Murder
On Aug. 28, 1976, sometime between 7:30 and 8 p.m., a 6-year-old boy named Willie Cook disappeared from the bed of his father’s pickup in Happy Camp, a secluded logging community in Northern California’s Klamath National Forest. Willie’s father, Bill Cook, had been working on his lawnmower at a repair shop in the center of […]
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Thousands Demonstrate in Eureka at No Kings Protest
From H to J streets, thousands of protesters took to the pavement as part of the No Kings protest, with the Eureka Police Department estimating 3,000 to 4,000 protesters were on site. The protest was one of many held across the country as millions were reported to be in attendance nationwide. Starting from 11 a.m. […]
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Crab Season Closing to Protect Whales from Entanglement
The North Coast’s commercial Dungeness crab season is officially closing on June 20 at 6 p.m. after a risk assessment was conducted by the California Department of Fish and Wildlife’s (CDFW) Director Charlton H. Bonham on June 13. A confirmed entanglement of a juvenile humpback whale with two different sets of crab fishing gear was […]