R is for Rescue
Arcata’s Fire District’s tax measure leaves staffing levels – and response times – up to voters
Stapp Sentenced to 11 Years in Fatal DUI Crash
Humboldt County Superior Court Judge Lawrence Killoran sentenced a 25-year-old Fields Landing man to serve 11 years in prison today, months after he drunkenly crashed his truck into a Humboldt Hill house, killing Robert Beland, 64, who was sleeping in bed at the time. Ryder Dale Stapp tried to flee the scene of the crash…
Test for Second Possible Coronavirus Case ‘Indeterminate’
A novel coronavirus test on a second person who was showing symptoms of the respiratory disease after returning from a trip to mainland China has come back “indeterminate,” according to the county Department of Health and Human Services. “Regardless, we are managing the second individual exactly the same as the confirmed case as we have…
Sheriff’s Office IDs Man Killed in Southern Humboldt
The Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office has identified the man whose body was found on a property in the Ettersburg area on Feb. 18 as Southern Humboldt resident Jason Todd Garrett. According to a release, the 33 year old died of a gunshot wound. A suspect in Garrett’s shooting, Ryan Anthony Tanner, 32, was taken into…
North Coast Night Lights: Comet Hyakutake
Gradually, particle by particle, it grew in size. Through the eons its body filled out, increasing mass infinitesimally with each random mote and flake that settled onto its surface. In its youth it had prowled the blackness of space on the shadowy fringes of a huge vortex. With others of its kind, it had drifted…
Caution Urged After Mountain Lion Spotted at CR
College of the Redwoods is cautioning students and staff to “take care” near the Creative Arts Building and Botanical Gardens after a “large mountain lion” was spotted around 9:10 a.m. today, according to a Facebook post. In an alert sent out, those on campus were asked to be “observant and cautious while in the area”…
NCJ Preview with Access Humboldt
This week: Is Arcata ready to pay more taxes to keep the firefighters and stations it has, or make tough cuts to keep the costs down? It’s on the March 3 ballot and we’ll talk about emergency response and costs. Plus, Jesse Wiedel’s gritty Heroin Hilton street art installation on an infamous Eureka building and…
Coronavirus Case Treated at St. Joe’s on Sunday
St. Joseph Hospital treated the two individuals who were showing symptoms of a viral illness after traveling to mainland China — one of whom is Humboldt County’s first confirmed case of COVID-19, otherwise known as novel coronavirus. According to the hospital, the patients were evaluated at St. Joseph’s emergency room on Feb. 16. Read the…
Coronavirus Case Confirmed in Humboldt
According to a DHHS press release, Humboldt County has its first confirmed case of COVID-19, more commonly referred to as coronavirus. “It’s important to remember that the risk to the general public remains low at this time,” said Humboldt County Health Officer Dr. Teresa Frankovich. “Despite the fact that Humboldt County now has a confirmed…
Lawson Report: Lack of Training, Crime Scene Management Hindered Investigation
A long-delayed National Police Foundation report released today commended the initial officers’ response to the fatal stabbing of Humboldt State University student David “Josiah” Lawson nearly three years ago but found a systemic failure by the police department’s then leadership to provide adequate training on crime scene management and command skills, which severely hindered the…
Parasites all the Way Down
Even parasites have nightmares Some experts assert that the most common lifestyle in nature is that of parasitism. (Read Rachel Nuwer’s interview with ecologist Kevin Lafferty “Parasitism is the Most Popular Lifestyle on Earth” for more on this.) The world of arthropods is no exception. I’ve mentioned before that mankind’s deadliest opponent in nature is the synergistic combination…
Free Will Astrology
ARIES (March 21-April 19): Do you feel ready to change your mind about an idea or belief or theory that has been losing its usefulness? Would you consider changing your relationship with a once-powerful influence that is becoming less crucial to your life-long goals? Is it possible you have outgrown one of your heroes or…
R is for Rescue
When it comes to an emergency, response time is everything. When someone suffers a sudden cardiac arrest, their chance of survival drops 7 to 10 percent with each minute that passes without medical care, according to the National Center for Biotechnology Information. And, according to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, it only takes 30…
The Redemption and Fall of a Local Attorney
When the Humboldt County Drug Task Force served search warrants simultaneously on four Eureka addresses Feb. 4 and announced it had arrested local attorney Michael Acosta while seizing dozens of firearms and various narcotics, the news spread quickly throughout the Humboldt County Courthouse. Humboldt County District Attorney Maggie Fleming had not made a charging decision…
Iko, Iko
I mentioned in a recent tagline that I’ve been getting into the works of the Flemish Renaissance artist Pieter Bruegel the Elder. It’s a fitting coincidence I’m lately drawn to the comical and grotesque “The Fight Between Carnival and Lent,” which balances a wild pageant of characters from the lands of the sacred and the…
Pretty in Purple
The word broccoli conjures up the image of a dark green globe of close-knit florets but not all broccoli is created green. Some years ago, Janet Czarnecki of Redwood Roots Farm introduced me to purple sprouting broccoli as part of the farm’s winter CSA share and I will be forever grateful for that encounter. Many…
The Human Stain
Heroin Hilton, Jesse Wiedel’s guerrilla public artwork, hit Eureka’s streets in the early afternoon hours of Dec. 7. Five oil paintings materialized in Old Town with no advance publicity, just as crowds gathered for the monthly Arts Alive! event. Bolted onto plywood sheets boarding up the windows and door of a condemned building near the…
Love and Disaster
Reviews THE PHOTOGRAPH. The story is based on love and romance, as its Feb. 14 release date might suggest, but The Photograph, written and directed by Stella Meghie, takes a typical love story and helps it grow into so many more meaningful ideas about love and relationships than just romance or lust. The film illustrates…
Ready, California?
It came in my mailbox the day of the Iowa caucuses: the ballot for March 3. It seemed flimsy and insignificant. I’ll only be making four choices and four marks total since Fifth District supervisor is not up this year. Yet this ballot seems heavier, maybe because it’s one of the more important ones I’ve…
The Pot that Poked the Bear
One of California’s most powerful cannabis trade groups began backtracking this week after poking one of state politics’ biggest bears: organized labor. The fallout started when the California Cannabis Industry Association issued a “white paper” to its members — which include industry giants like Poseidon Asset Management, Arcview Group, Weedmaps and Harborside Health Center, as…
‘Keep the Politics Out’
Editor: Politics are a hot topic. I like to shoot the stuff with my friends and give my uneducated opinion on what is wrong with the world as much as the next person. However, as Mr. Cortez summarized in his letter to the editor last week (Mailbox, Feb. 13), the Journal has gone off the deep…
Vote!
Editor: Rex Bohn is a positive, honest upstanding member of our community. He works tirelessly for our county and has every day and night for many years. In 1992, he backed and did everything he could to get the Redwood Fields in Cutten built. Let’s remember the California wildfires. Rex collected donations and volunteers and…
