This year’s Humboldt County Fair horse racing season took off from the starting gates Aug. 18, one week after emergency repairs were completed to prevent one of the annual event’s major draws from being scratched, which potentially could have put Ferndale’s spot on the racing circuit in jeopardy. But the repairs — including the installation […]
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Supes Decide Not to Censure Bushnell
The Humboldt County Board of Supervisors on Tuesday decided not to censure Supervisor Michelle Bushnell after an outside investigation found she mistreated an employee during a meeting last December, with several of her fellow board members citing the Second District representative’s efforts to address the situation, including attending trainings. In a 4-0 vote, with Bushnell […]
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Supes to Consider Bushnell Censure
The Humboldt County Board of Supervisors is set Tuesday to consider the public censure of Supervisor Michelle Bushnell after an investigation sustained an allegation that the Second District representative mistreated a Planning Department staff member during a December of 2021 meeting. The staff report states the “board action is limited to public censure,” which would […]
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Supes to Consider Censure of Bongio
The Humboldt County Board of Supervisors is slated to consider censuring Planning Commission Chair Alan Bongio tomorrow, a month after he made incendiary and offensive comments about local Native tribes, referring to them as “Indians” while intoning they had lied and negotiated in bad faith with a local developer. The agenda item will also see […]
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Fishing Association, Environmental Groups Appeal Fish Farm EIR Certification
The Humboldt Fishermen’s Marketing Association, the Redwood Region Audubon Society and 350 Humboldt have appealed the Humboldt County Planning Commission’s recent approval of an environmental review of a large fish farm on the Samoa Peninsula to the Board of Supervisors. In an Aug. 17 letter , the three agencies listed numerous issues with the review […]
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Where’s the CAP?
If an irresistible force meets an immovable object, one possible outcome is a stalled Climate Action Plan. Caught between the realities of an ever-warming climate and a culture that is embedded in fossil fuels, city, state and county planners have been trying for years to come up with some acceptable and realistic ways of staving […]
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State Threatens Auditor-Controller with $5K Fine for Delinquent Fiscal Report
Facing a threat from the State Controller’s Office sent through the California Department of Justice that it intends to exercise all of its authority under the law — including pursuing a $5,000 against her personally — if Humboldt County fails to turn over a statutorily mandated financial statement that’s more than a year overdue, embattled […]
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Humboldt to Lift Mask Mandate, Following State’s Lead
When the state of California rolls back its COVID-19 mask mandate next week, Humboldt County will follow suit, Health Officer Ian Hoffman told the Board of Supervisors this morning. Hoffman said the county plans to rely on testing, ventilation and vaccination efforts moving forward, adding that with the Omicron surge easing, county public health will […]
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NCJ Preview: Vaccines and County Staff, Police Shooting Footage and Restoring the Eureka Theater
This week we’re looking at why the board of supervisors declined to require vaccines for county employees, going for weekly testing for the unvaccinated instead. We’re also going into what’s on newly released footage from last month’s police shooting of a suspect on Mad River Road, as well as how law affects what’s made public […]
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Humboldt Residents Could See a Change in Representation Under Draft Redistricting Maps
Humboldt County residents’ representation on the board of supervisors, in Congress and in the state Legislature is on the line as two commissions look at redrawing boundaries of those districts. The process happens ever 10 years after the federal government publishes census data to ensure the populations of the districts are evenly distributed. The last […]
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Supes Decline Employee Vaccine Mandate, Push Forward With Testing Policy
The Humboldt County Board of Supervisors voted unanimously this afternoon to move forward with a policy requiring all county employees who are unvaccinated for COVID-19 to undergo weekly testing for the virus. After hours of discussion and public comment, the board stopped short of passing a vaccine mandate for county employees and instead directed staff […]
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Tapering Off of Current COVID Surge Could Extend ‘Well into Next Year’
While Humboldt County’s latest — and most deadly — COIVD-19 surge appears to be on the downward slope, the descent is likely to be a slow one that could extend “well into next year,” with occasional mini-surges, according to county Health Officer Ian Hoffman. “Today’s COVID-19 case rates have dropped to the lowest rate they’ve […]