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This story — by reporters Carolyn Jones, Megan Tagami and Sharon Lurye — was originally published by CalMatters. Sign up for their newsletters.

CalMatters is collaborating with The Associated Press, Honolulu Civil Beat, Blue Ridge Public Radio, and Centro de Periodismo Investigativo in Puerto Rico to examine how school communities are recovering from the disruption of natural disasters.

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Nearly seven years after Paradise was ravaged by wildfire, the foothill town smells like pine trees again. New homes are sprouting up on once-scorched lots. Construction trucks rumble through neighborhoods. An ice cream shop recently opened around the corner from the newly rebuilt high school.

But in the town’s classrooms, recovery has been more complicated — and much slower. Even as Paradise gradually rebuilds schools lost to California’s 2018 Camp Fire, officials have found getting kids on track academically — and recreating a tight-knit, thriving school community — is a lot tougher than just flipping on the lights at a new campus.

“We’ll get there, but we have not yet recovered,” said Superintendent Tom Taylor before he retired in May. “We’re not yet where we want to be.”

One of the deadliest wildfires in U.S. history, the Camp Fire is among the many natural disasters that have upended student learning over the past decade. Damaged schools, lost homes and layers of trauma have left a mark on thousands of children — a scenario sure to continue as climate change makes these events more frequent and more intense.

The challenges that persist in Paradise are a reminder of how long learning recovery can take — and a lesson on how schools can give traumatized kids a better chance of thriving long term.

It’s also a lesson on how to balance mental health and academics in the years following a disaster — and a glimpse into the challenges facing schools in Los Angeles after last year’s fires. For most students, the Camp Fire and its aftermath made it almost impossible to focus on schoolwork. Schools pushed academics aside in favor of mental health, a move that most agreed was necessary but set students back months if not years academically.

“People think, natural disaster — mental health. They don’t think about the academic component to it,” said Carrie Dawes, health and wellness coordinator for Paradise Unified. “You put that aside when you have a little kiddo crying because they don’t have a house to live in. You’re not going to say, ‘OK, snap out of it. We’ve got math to do.’”

Camp Fire left students in a lingering academic malaise

In the Paradise disaster’s wake, students found themselves moving frequently. Schools were temporarily housed in unusual places — hardware stores, warehouses, churches. Nearly everyone was consumed by anxiety and grief. Learning fell to the wayside.

Kenny Michael, a high school senior, was in fifth grade when the fire erupted. Although her immediate family was safe, some beloved neighbors died. Michael spent months grappling with family strife, loss and stress, including over her grandmother’s missing cats.

“It wasn’t just a matter of the fire hitting,” Michael said. “It was all this other stuff, too.”

Once an enthusiastic learner, Michael failed fifth grade and lost interest in school, saying she was too distracted and exhausted to concentrate on classroom lessons. She’s now living with her grandmother in Magalia, a small community adjacent to Paradise, and attends an online school. She takes solace in talking to friends and writing horror and fantasy stories — about fire.

But she has no immediate plans to attend college after she graduates this year.

Kenny Michael outside of the Boys & Girls Club of Paradise Teen Center in Paradise on May 21, 2025. Photo by Miguel Gutierrez Jr., CalMatters

This is typical for Paradise teens. Last year, only 13% of graduating seniors in Paradise Unified met the entrance requirements for California’s public universities or completed a career training program, compared with 45% statewide. Last year, not one student from Paradise Unified enrolled as a freshman at the University of California.

Test scores reflect the academic malaise, prolonged by the pandemic. Among eighth graders, only 11% met the state’s standard for math. Just 18% of sixth graders were reading at grade level. The numbers were even worse for low-income students.

The statistics show that, even once the immediate effects of the fire subsided, academics continued their downward spiral.

Disaster-related absences take a steep toll on learning

Before the Camp Fire roared through Butte County in November 2018, Paradise was a quiet, woodsy town filled with families and retirees. There was a movie theater, a bowling alley, a pet store and a Foster’s Freeze. Everyone loved the beer brittle at Joy Lyn’s candy shop. In April, residents celebrated Gold Nugget Days with a parade, chili cook-off and a Miss Gold Nugget contest.

Within a few hours, all of that was gone. The Gold Rush-era town was almost entirely wiped out in the fire. Eighty-five people died, including some in their cars as they tried to escape. More than 18,000 buildings burned, including most of the town’s dozen schools. At least 26,000 people were displaced.

Schools began the long process of recovery as the chaos began to settle: locating students, finding new facilities, assessing the damage and getting academics back on track after nearly a month of canceled classes.

It’s been a protracted process.

An illustrated map of Paradise at Achieve Charter School of Paradise in Paradise on May 21, 2025. Photo by Miguel Gutierrez Jr., CalMatters

First: Students play on the playground at Achieve Charter School of Paradise. Last: An empty lot in Paradise on May 21, 2025. Photos by Miguel Gutierrez Jr., CalMatters

During the 2018-19 school year, the Paradise Unified School District reported 154 closure days across its dozen schools as a result of the Camp Fire, impacting about 4,200 students, according to data analysis by CalMatters. But the impacts of the Camp Fire were far reaching, impacting nearly 1 million students across the state — 15% of all students that year — as drifting smoke prompted more than 1,600 schools to close.

In the following five years, Paradise schools reported up to 10 closure days a year, mostly from winter storms and shutting off the power to lower fire risks on dry and windy days.

Since 2022-23, kids in California have lost more than 3.5 million days of learning because of disasters, according to UndauntedK12, a policy and research group. And that learning loss is magnified because of the stress associated with such catastrophes.

It’s not uncommon for students to miss school after a natural disaster, either because they’ve suddenly become homeless or due to mental health struggles, or both. But disaster-related absenteeism can take an especially steep toll on students’ learning, according to research from the NWEA, a not-for-profit education research firm. Middle schoolers who lose a week of school due to extreme weather actually miss three weeks of progress in reading and almost four weeks in math, researchers found, most likely due to trouble concentrating.

It’s a concern facing a growing number of schools nationwide.

In North Carolina, some students lost two months’ worth of class this past academic year because of both Hurricane Helene last September and other extreme weather events. The historic Category 4 storm damaged tens of thousands of homes and numerous school buildings, causing mass displacement and academic setbacks.

In Hawaii, the deadly August 2023 Lahaina wildfires resulted in students at four schools losing at least five weeks of learning days. At King Kamehameha III Elementary, a historic elementary school that burned down in the fires, kids lost more than 50 days of instruction.

The compound effects of missed class time are evident in Lahaina. Students’ test scores took a sharp dip in the school year after the disaster as kids transitioned between online classes, learning hubs and schools outside of West Maui. Only 29% of King Kamehameha III’s students tested proficient in math in spring 2024, for example, compared with 46% the year before.

Even at the three Lahaina public schools that remained standing after the fires, students weren’t able to return to the campuses until mid-October because of debris cleanup and environmental testing.

Students struggled to find motivation in school or attended class sporadically before the fires, according to Lahainaluna High School teacher Jarrett Chapin, and the disaster made matters worse. In the 2023-24 school year, 28% of Lahainaluna students were proficient in English, compared with nearly 50% the year before the fire. Only 5% of kids tested proficient in math.

Finding normalcy can be a struggle after a disaster

In Paradise, even as the town’s schools set about rebuilding damaged campuses and tending to students and families, the community faced another reality: It would never be the same.

Casey Taylor, Achieve Charter School superintendent, described the first few months after the fire as the “hero phase,” where the community pulled together and vowed to resurrect their town. “Paradise Strong” and “We Will Rebuild” signs proliferated.

But then a more difficult period ensued, rife with disillusionment. Fire survivors got tired of living out of suitcases, and many were daunted by the hassle and expense of rebuilding. Old friends and neighbors started moving away, bringing further layers of loss, Taylor said.

“It hurts,” said Taylor, a Paradise native whose own home was destroyed in the fire. “Your community just starts spiraling.”

A hopeful sign at the Paradise Cinemas in Paradise on May 21, 2025. Photo by Miguel Gutierrez Jr., CalMatters

Enrollment in Paradise Unified has been increasing, but is still less than half what it was before the fire — 1,657 last year, compared with 3,441 in 2017. And the student body is a bit different from before the fire: lower-income, more diverse, more students with disabilities. At least a quarter of the students are new to Paradise entirely and didn’t experience the fire.

In retrospect, it’s clear teachers — and not just kids — needed more support to deal with these changes. Taylor and other Paradise school officials now advise other districts that have experienced a natural disaster, and their top suggestion is to make sure the adults are cared for, too.

“We found that initially, the adults needed attention the most. You think it’s going to be the kids, but they’re so much more resilient in the moment,” said Michelle Zevely, Butte County Office of Education’s deputy superintendent of student programs and education support.

In Paradise, the community relied on teachers to serve as a backbone amid the chaos. But many teachers also lost their homes, which meant they were haggling with insurance companies while finding new places to live and commuting long distances — in some cases, more than 100 miles — to be with their students every day.

“Teachers just needed to talk, or to cry, but they couldn’t because they’re in the classroom and the students were their top priority,” said Tamara Conry, a former math teacher at Paradise Intermediate School who now works for the state teachers union.

When academics fall by the wayside

Another lesson from Paradise is the importance of prioritizing academics even when the impulse is to drop everything in favor of mental health. The first few years after the fire, school days were dedicated almost entirely to social-emotional activities as therapists and counselors were dispatched to campuses.

“In the beginning, we did a lot of art and singing. Taking daily walks. We had baby goats and therapy dogs,” said Taylor. “We spent a lot of time talking about emotions, because that’s what we needed.”

The mental-health focus was indeed necessary. Aryah Berkowitz, who was in sixth grade at Achieve charter school when the fire took her home, two of her dogs and her family’s business, said the therapy and teachers’ social-emotional offerings were instrumental in helping her through those difficult years after the fire.

But those activities shouldn’t come at the expense of algebra and reading, Taylor said.

Once an ambitious student, Berkowitz was suspended twice for acting out after the 2018 disaster. It took her four years, she said, to focus on academics again. But she credits her teachers and counselors in Paradise for helping her through that difficult time, and getting her back on track: She graduated from high school in June and plans to join the Army, pursuing her goal of becoming a K-9 handler.

Striking a balance between mental health and academics is essential for recovery efforts to be sustainable, Paradise educators and students say, given how long those efforts take, “People see disasters on the news and they think, ‘Oh, that happened, it’ll be over after a year,” said Myah Poe, a recent graduate of HomeTech charter school in Paradise. She lost her home in the fire and bounced around motels and rentals with her family before they were finally able to rebuild and return to Paradise two years ago. “It’s not. It stays with you for a long, long time.”

Poe is now planning to enroll in community college and transfer to a four-year university. Her intended major: engineering, inspired in part by the builders resurrecting her hometown.

First: Students in a classroom at Achieve Charter School of Paradise. Last: Myah Poe, a senior at HomeTech Charter in Paradise, at the Boys & Girls Club of Paradise Teen Center in Paradise on May 21, 2025. Photos by Miguel Gutierrez Jr., CalMatters

Taylor remembers the first signs of renewal in Paradise, when the town became something more than an ashy moonscape. First a gas station opened, then a grocery was rebuilt, and eventually the Gold Nugget celebration returned. Even Joy Lyn’s candy shop reopened.

For Taylor, the pivotal moment came when her school was able to move back to its original campus after operating out of a church in Chico for three years. Families sobbed when they saw the new playground and the freshly painted school buildings.

The next milestone, she and others said, must be academic. Teachers need to set higher expectations, and schools need to provide tutoring and other support to help students catch up. Emotional wellness and academic rigor should not be mutually exclusive, Taylor said.

It’s a lesson recovering schools are applying in other disaster-torn parts of the country.

Just two years after Maui’s devastating fires, for example, Lahainaluna High has doubled down on college preparation for students, introducing an Advanced Placement seminar class last fall that challenged students with intense research projects and writing assignments. The school has also increased enforcement of students’ attendance, contacting parents when their kids don’t show up to class.

While the rigor and heightened accountability have been daunting for some students, many rose to the challenge and are proud of what they’ve achieved in school, according to Chapin, the local high school teacher. “I think our successes this year have crowded out a lot of stuff that could have paralyzed us,” he said.

Paradise Unified broke ground in June on rebuilding its main elementary school. The 46,000-square-foot campus will include a STEM lab, soccer field and outdoor stage.

“It took almost five years before we could see the light at the end of the tunnel,” Taylor said. “But now the light is shining very bright.”

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Statistical journalist Natasha Uzcátegui-Liggett of CalMatters contributed to this story.

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Suddenly, the Trump administration has opinions on PG&E’s dam removal plans on the Eel River.

On Sunday evening, U.S. Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins published a broadside on social media platform X in which she accused the investor-owned utility of “cutting water flows and pushing to tear down the Scott and Cape Horn Dams which have been lifelines for farmers and over 600,000 residents for more than a century.”

Of course, we already knew that various Russian River-adjacent farm bureaus and the Lake County government had made direct appeals to the Trump administration in hopes of salvaging the Potter Valley Project, an antiquated and expensive hydroelectric project that diverts water from the Eel to the Russian River. What we didn’t know was whether the administration would take the bait.

Now it has. Rollins’s tweet (or whatever X posts are called these days) blamed California Governor Gavin Newsom and the state legislature for “putting fish over people, destroying century old farms and leaving families vulnerable to more drought and wildfire.”

Reached via phone in Washington, D.C., this morning, Rep. Jared Huffman — who, unlike Newsom, was extensively involved in multi-agency negotiations to find a “two-basin solution” that satisfies competing regional interests — said Rollins’s take is misguided.

“If she’s truly concerned with what she says she cares about, which is the water supply to 600,000 people, [then] the worst thing you could possibly do is stand in the way of this [dam-removal project] moving forward,” Huffman said.

In July, PG&E filed an application with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) to surrender its hydropower license and decommission the Potter Valley Project. In a statement emailed to the Outpost, PG&E spokesperson Paul Moreno said the motives for this were purely financial.

“The reason PG&E is seeking to decommission the Potter Valley Project is because it is non-economic and investing in dam upgrades [would] only add to the cost of operating it and would not make the project economic,” he said. 

Noting the utility’s long history of working with agricultural interests, Moreno’s statement went on to say that no one else was willing to take on the financial burden of maintaining the aging infrastructure, despite nearly a decade of searching.

“Ultimately no entity, through discussions with PG&E nor through the FERC regulatory process, came forward to own and operate Scott Dam,” the utility spokesperson said.

Huffman explained that the reason the water supply in Potter Valley has been “throttled down to virtually nothing” is because PG&E is not generating power at the plant,  so only a fraction of the normal diversions are moving through the Potter Valley Project.

“And the dam is so dilapidated that it can’t operate in the normal way,” Huffman added. “So the answer to water supply reliability is the new fish-friendly diversion that our coalition has supported and that PG&E is including in its decommissioning plan.”

The latest water diversion agreement, reached in July, is designed to meet the needs of communities in both the Eel and Russian River basins. It calls for PG&E’s water rights to be transferred to the Round Valley Indian Tribes, who will lease those rights back to a newly formed agency called the Eel-Russian Project Authority (ERPA). The agreement sets seasonal water diversion rules based on the natural flows and historic fish runs, with the bulk of diversions occurring in the winter and early spring.

PG&E’s decommissioning application includes a proposal from ERPA to construct a future water delivery system that uses existing PG&E facilities while the utility is decommissioning the Potter Valley Project. This proposal will allow for continued water delivery to the East Branch Russian River, according to PG&E’s spokesperson.

Huffman said the notion that farmers would be better off if the dams are somehow kept in place is nonsense.

“PG&E is never going to make power in that project again,” he said. “It’s over.”

He reiterated that the smartest way to ensure a reliable water supply to Potter Valley and the rest of the Russian River basin is to support the current plan, which involves construction of a fish-friendly diversion and investments in local storage and pump-back facilities.

“And if you try to blow all of this up, you’re just stuck in the status quo, which is not working for them,” Huffman said.

Alicia Hamann, executive director of the environmental nonprofit Friends of the Eel River, agreed with Huffman’s take and suggested that Rollins’s message was politically motivated.

“The Trump administration may be eager to hurt California environmentalists, but halting Eel River dam removal threatens the reliability of the Russian River’s future water supply as much as Eel River salmon and steelhead,” she said in an emailed statement.

Hamann rejected the assertion that dam removal puts fish over people, noting that people benefit from healthy ecosystems, relying on fish for healthy cultures, diets and economies.

“This is not a story of fish versus people but rather a hard-earned agreement between people representing diverse interests,” she said. “The federal government’s attempts to intervene in this deal that water users and other stakeholders have spent years negotiating will harm farmers when Scott Dam inevitably fails.”

In her tweet, Rollins said she and her department are working with Interior Secretary Doug Burgum and others “to deliver real solutions to secure Potter Valley’s water supply.”

“I hope what she means by that is supporting the raising of Coyote Dam at Lake Mendocino, which is something I’ve been pushing,” Huffman said. 

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is currently working with the Mendocino County Inland Water and Power Commission and the Lytton Rancheria to explore the prospect of raising Coyote Dam as a means of boosting the water supply that supports regional agriculture and recreation.

If those are the “real solutions” that Rollins is referring to, then Huffman is all for it.

“If they’re serious … that would enable us to use the new fish-friendly diversion optimally,” he said. “That would help everyone.”

With major structural problems and seismic risks at Scott Dam, the price tag of resurrecting the Potter Valley Project would be well over a billion dollars, according to Huffman, who agreed that the Trump administration seems intent on “sticking it to California” at every turn.

“No one, even in the most ideological MAGA fever dream, is stupid enough to take on a project that loses that kind of money and has that kind of massive liability,” he said.

Federal interference in this long-negotiated multi-party agreement can certainly gum up the works and cause delays in bringing the dams down, but Huffman doesn’t believe that the Trump administration can stop it altogether.

“In fact, I’m very confident they cannot,” he said. “When you have the ability to order federal agencies to do things for purely political reasons, you can definitely slow things down. That’s my sense of what this means. And, you know, who’s hurt the most by that? Ironically, it’s the people in Potter Valley and in the Russian River Basin, because it delays the water supply solution that is the only way their needs are going to be met.”

The Outpost reached out to the U.S. Department of Agriculture seeking more details on Rollins’s statement and the agency’s plans but did not hear back by publication time. We also emailed both the Sonoma County Water Agency and the Mendocino County government to get their takes but likewise did not hear back by this afternoon.

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PREVIOUSLY

• Lake County May Try to Derail Eel River Dam Deal With Direct Appeal to President Trump
• Farm Bureaus in Russian River Counties Issue Plea to President Trump to Keep the Potter Valley Dams in Place
• Humboldt Supervisors OK Potter Valley Water Diversion Plan, Paving the Way for Eel River Dam Removal
• PG&E Files Its Application to Surrender its Hydropower License, Paving the Way for the Removal of the Potter Valley Dams on the Eel River
• At Virtual Public Meeting Last Night, PG&E Officials Outline Next Steps for Eel River Dam Removal

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PREVIOUSLY:

• Cal Fish and Wildlife Investigating Alleged Shooting Death of a Mama Bear and Cub Near Eureka

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Press release from the Department of Fish and Wildlife:

The California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW) has resolved public concern regarding reports of a poached bear in Eureka. Following a thorough investigation, officers determined the bear was not the victim of poaching but was instead humanely euthanized by law enforcement after sustaining severe injuries, likely from a vehicle strike.

On Sept. 3, CDFW received a CALTIP report alleging two bears had been shot near Ridgewood Drive, south of Eureka. Neighbors reported hearing multiple gunshots during the overnight hours of Aug. 30, and suspicions circulated about potential poaching. A responding CDFW wildlife officer interviewed witnesses and canvassed the area but found no bear carcasses or physical evidence.

Further investigation revealed that, in the early morning of Aug. 31, law enforcement partners from the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office (HCSO) and California Highway Patrol (CHP) jointly responded to reports of an injured bear repeatedly entering the roadway on Ridgewood Drive. The animal displayed severe head trauma, walked in circles, and was unable to escape traffic. To relieve the animal’s suffering and to ensure public safety, CHP officers humanely euthanized the single adult male bear at approximately 4:30 a.m. Witness reports of three gunshots matched the number of rounds fired.

Interviews with multiple residents and officials confirmed that only one bear was involved. The carcass was removed on Sept. 2 by Humboldt County Road Services. No evidence supports claims of a second bear or illegal poaching. CDFW thanks community members who report suspected poaching and polluting incidents, which play a vital role in protecting California’s natural resources.

CALTIP (Californians Turn In Poachers and Polluters) is a confidential program for reporting wildlife crimes. Anyone with information about potential violations is urged to call 1-888-334-CALTIP (888-334-2258), available 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

A Northstate News report on last year’s stair climb.

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Press release from Humboldt Bay Fire below. Note: The Outpost did confirm that the general public is welcome to come observe the opening ceremonies of this event, and to watch the firefighters do the climb, though the climb itself is restricted to first responders.

The Humboldt Bay Fire Training Tower is located at 2401 Hilfiker Lane, Eureka.

On Thursday, September 11, 2025, Humboldt Bay Fire, in partnership with local law enforcement and fire agencies, will host the First Annual 9/11 Memorial Stair Climb Fundraiser, a solemn tribute to the lives lost during the attacks of September 11, 2001. The event will be held at the Humboldt Bay Fire Training Tower, beginning with an opening ceremony at 9:00 a.m. Following the ceremony, first responders from across the region will ascend 22 rounds on the 5-story tower, symbolizing the 110 stories of the World Trade Center’s Twin Towers.

Each participant will climb in honor of the 343 firefighters, 60 police officers, and 8 paramedics who made the ultimate sacrifice while saving others that day. While the challenge is physically demanding, its true weight lies in the tribute it pays to their bravery, selflessness, and enduring legacy.

Proceeds from the fundraiser will benefit the First Responders Children’s Foundation, which provides vital support to the families of first responders who have been killed or injured in the line of duty. The foundation’s programs include scholarships, emergency financial aid, and resources for children navigating the hardships that come with their loved ones’ service.

This Stair Climb is not only a remembrance of history, but also a reminder of the strength of community, the courage of those who serve, and the lasting legacy they leave behind.

Coast Central Credit Union release:

Coast Central Credit Union is proud to announce its 75th anniversary, unveiling a refreshed brand identity that reflects both its rich legacy and bright future. The celebration will culminate in a special event on Tuesday, September 9, from 10am – 12pm at the Harrison Avenue Member Services Branch, featuring the official unveiling of the new logo and exterior signage. 

The event will also include:

• A $7,500 check presentation to Cal Poly Humboldt in support of student success

• A time capsule ceremony, preserving Coast Central’s history for future generations

• Remarks from President and CEO Fred J. Moore and Board Chair Ron Rudebock, reflecting on the past 75 years and sharing a vision for the next 75.

Across all Member Services Branches (MSBs), members can enjoy:

• Branded giveaways including mugs, pens, notepads, custom cookies, and more

• Entry into a $75 gift card opportunity drawing at each branch

• A refreshed coastccu.org website featuring a sleek new look with the same trusted functionality

“This new brand honors where we’ve been and points to where we’re headed,” said President and CEO Fred Moore. “It represents our unwavering commitment to our members and speaks to our mission of being the values driven partner uniquely rooted in uplifting our members and community.”

Join us September 9 as we celebrate 75 years of commitment to our community! For media inquiries or questions, please reach out to Christian Hill at (707) 499-2928 or chill@coastccu.org.

About Coast Central Credit Union Coast Central Credit Union is the largest member-owned financial institution in the area, with over $2.2 billion in assets and operating 11 Member Services Branches throughout Humboldt, Del Norte and Trinity counties, including McKinleyville, open six days a week and Bayshore Mall, open seven days a week. Additionally, members have access to a
network of 30,000 free CO-OP ATMs nationwide. Individuals and businesses in the three counties may bank at Coast Central by visiting coastccu.org/join. With a strong emphasis on personalized service, community involvement, and financial integrity, Coast Central Credit Union provides exceptional financial services to its more than 79,000 members. More information is available at coastccu.org, facebook.com/coastcentral, @coastccu on Instagram, and by calling (707) 445-8801.

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This story was originally published by CalMatters. Sign up for their newsletters.

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California lawmakers are scrambling to finalize a last-minute deal that would extend the state’s landmark greenhouse gas reduction program – known as cap and trade – through 2045.

At the center of this year’s reauthorization fight are a number of controversial concessions that former Gov. Jerry Brown gave to various industries – including oil and gas – when the Legislature last renewed the program in 2017. Those include giveaways that allow fossil fuel companies and others to emit greenhouse gases free of charge, as well as permission for some market participants to purchase questionably effective carbon offsets to meet emissions targets.

To the chagrin of environmental advocates, Gov. Gavin Newsom earlier this summer proposed reupping the program as-is, an early sign of his blossoming friendliness with the fuel industry as he eyes a presidential bid in 2028.

The twist? There’s no bill. And even if the text of legislation comes out by the Wednesday deadline to introduce it, opponents argue that such a critical policy should not be rushed through at the last minute.

“We are in the last week of session, and no one has seen the language of what a program would look like,” read a pamphlet that lobbyists from the business community were circulating to members in the Capitol Monday. “Rushing a bad deal to determine the next 20 years of climate policy is the wrong approach.”

Even some environmental advocates who want to see the program renewed have griped about the opacity of the negotiations, which have primarily unfolded behind closed doors. While the Assembly has circulated draft language that closely resembles Newsom’s proposal, the Senate has kept its language under lock and key. According to two people familiar with the negotiations, Senate President Pro Tem’s Mike McGuire’s staff has only allowed members to view the proposed legislative text in person and prohibited them from bringing copies – printed, digital or photos – back to their staff.

Environmental justice advocates have long criticized the cap-and-trade program for failing to reduce pollution at refineries and other industrial sources, which are often located in low-income and minority communities. Because cap and trade allows companies to comply with greenhouse gas limits by buying credits, large polluters can continue operating in low-income neighborhoods without improving air quality or reducing emissions

Proponents of swift reauthorization say the carbon market needs certainty that the program will continue to exist in order to keep pulling in revenues. Over the past 11 years, almost $13 billion from cap-and-trade auctions has paid for electric vehicles, public transit, clean energy and other projects to reduce greenhouse gases and adapt to climate change.

A flurry of appeals to lawmakers

As lawmakers entered the Capitol on Monday, a welcoming committee of lobbyists and advocates descended on them, armed with pamphlets urging the members to halt negotiations over cap and trade and kick the conversation to next year.

The opponents included representatives from the fossil fuels industry, business groups and even the state’s influential trade unions, who often have the ear of Democrats in Sacramento but many of whose members are employed by the oil and gas industry and other major polluters.

They argued that a rushed plan to reauthorize cap and trade would unnecessarily raise costs on industries ranging from cement production to oil and gas and manufacturing and push them out of California. That, the groups argue, would result in job losses as well as higher prices as companies pass their increased costs along to consumers.

“No deal is better than a bad deal,” read a notice sent to members from the State Building and Construction Trades Council of California and obtained by CalMatters. “Negotiations on this complex and essential policy should be halted and picked back up in the earliest days of 2026 when the Legislature reconvenes.”

The union argued that the Legislature’s proposals would lead to “massive industrial job losses” and “skyrocketing fuel and retail costs” that would harm California families.

“We are disappointed that the Legislature has not been able to work with the Building Trades and the energy industry to advance a clean extension of cap and trade that prioritizes affordability,” the pamphlet read.

The California Chamber of Commerce, a business advocacy group that often finds itself on the opposite side of the trades union, agreed that the shortened timeline wasn’t sufficient to produce a “robust and responsible” piece of legislation.

“For months, we have heard promises that issues affecting California’s affordability were at the top of the list,” said Jennifer Barrera, group’s president and CEO. “But this vital issue will have to wait.”

While mainstream environmental groups like Environmental Defense Fund generally support reauthorizing the program, they’re irked about the obscure nature of the negotiations. Meanwhile, environmental justice advocates say that the flood of last-minute lobbying to delay the reauthorization came because they were finally making progress at the negotiating table.

“They’re saying that because they’re losing ground,” said Katie Valenzuela, a lobbyist for environmental justice groups. “These folks have unprecedented access to members in the building, and so for them to argue that there needs to be more public process is just comical.”

“Everyone is still at the table and working towards a negotiated proposal,” said Santa Barbara Democrat Sen. Monique Limón, the incoming Senate president. “So long as everyone is still working collaboratively, the possibility to get this done remains.”

Steve Newman died on August 21, 2025 at the age of 82. He died at his home in McKinleyville, where he’d lived the previous 48 years. He died peacefully, in his sleep, near Carol, his wife of 44 years.

Steve was born in Evansville, Indiana on November 13, 1942. Son of Morton, a lawyer and later judge, and Babette, whose family lived across the Ohio River in Henderson, Kentucky, Steve would spend his life near rivers, oceans, creeks and other bodies of water, often most content simply sitting near them. He and his sister Nancy (“the only person I’ve known my entire life”) had, in many ways, a typical 1950s midwestern childhood, but they would each find their way out of Indiana, separately moving around the country and world, but were never far from one another, both eventually landing in California in the 1970s and remaining a major part of each other’s lives till the end. A lifelong science enthusiast, Steve often joked that as a kid he dreamed of becoming a nuclear physicist, but because of pronunciation issues due to a lisp, he decided to pursue a career in law like his father instead.

Graduating high school in 1960, Steve then attended Indiana University. In Bloomington, Indiana in the early ’60s, he found a countercultural scene that included many friends that he would remain close to for the rest of his life. He discovered much of the music and literature that he was so passionate about during these years. Still, he graduated with a degree in economics and left for Cornell to attend law school.

It turned out, the law wasn’t his thing. After a couple attempts at law school, he spent much of the 1960s trying to figure out what was. He moved to Washington D.C. and got a job in the Labor Department. He went back to Indiana and got his master’s degree in media studies, a relatively new field. (He would claim his thesis on Marshall McCluhan was the shortest in university history, a legacy of brevity and mystery of which he was very proud.) He worked at ABC news in New York during the moon landing, taking a weekend off to attend Woodstock, which he left after a few hours. He never liked crowds.

In the early 1970s he found his way to California, attending UCLA in pursuit of a Ph.D and joining the Coast Guard. After his honorable discharge from the Coast Guard he traveled up the coast for a summer to escape the crowds of LA and visit a friend from his Bloomington days who was now a professor at Humboldt State University. He never left. Finding a small house on the Pacific Ocean in the town of Trinidad (“An incredible beach, a real dream spot… 55 dollars a month!” he’d write to his parents), he got a job at HSU in the media department. He remained in the department for more than 30 years. In the media department he found his thing: he loved being a detached observer behind the lens of the camera and the editing process, during which one’s choices of inclusion and omission are vital in telling the larger story. In Humboldt is also where the long story of his early life ends and the simple, more important one begins.

In 1977, at a university function, he met Carol Bany, who’d attended college at HSU. They began dating. She knew it was serious when he took her to look at a house he was thinking of buying. He bought it. On Bartow Road in McKinleyville, it would be the house he remained in for the rest of his life. He and Carol were married under the apple tree in that backyard in 1981. In 1985 their son Nick, now a chef in New Orleans, was born. In 1987, they had a daughter, Tara, a special education consultant in Sonoma. He was an excellent husband and father. Carol and his kids (and later grandkids) were everything to him. The ‘80s were spent picking apples and blackberries in the backyard, playing catch with the kids, collecting rocks and feathers on the beach, and writing little poems and songs for his family (although he could never carry a tune or play an instrument, he never let it stop him.) Train trips back to Evansville to visit his mother (his father passed away just before he became a father himself) were another highlight, Babette remained a very important part of his and his family’s life until she too passed in 2011. He would videotape every trip, holiday, or school function and edit them with as much care (and more love) as any professional project he was working on.

In 1995 he was diagnosed with cancer. He only hoped to live long enough to see his kids graduate from high school. He did, and then lived more than 20 years longer. In 2004, he retired from HSU, as the head of the media department. In retirement he got to spend a couple quality years with Tara, who was still in high school. Their lunches of clam chowder at the Marina or breakfast at the Seascape formed a bond that carried over to a game of words with friends that lasted the rest of his life. He remained a constant presence in both of his kids’ lives till the very end. He also got to spend quality time in his beloved backyard with his dog Stewie, who, like Brownie in Evansville, Mutlett in Trinidad, and Molly before him, was a major part of his life.

But, most importantly, he got to spend his later years with Carol, who also retired from her career as a nurse. They would walk around McKinleyville hand-in-hand. They took trips to Ireland, to visit her family’s roots, and often spent Christmas with Nick in New Orleans. They were inseparable. By far, the highlight of these twilight years were visits with the grandkids. Tara and her husband Justin had Grace in 2017, and Jack in 2018. His third act as PopPop may have been his favorite one of all.

After 2020, he spent much of his last five years at home. In (mostly) good health and (always) good spirits, he spent much of these years in the backyard, photographing the birds and deer who would wander in. He continued to edit short videos (his “video doodles”) that he would share with friends and family till the day before he died. Although most of his time was spent at home, he remained very social till the end, with each day of the week devoted to a Zoom call with people from different phases of his life, from high school in Evansville, to college in Bloomington, to friends from the late ’60s and early ’70s, to his son and grandkids. He would regularly meet with friends from HSU, and occasionally host a Friday beer group in the backyard.

Writing home in 1971, he told his parents: “Nancy says you’re kinda worried and I should tell you more things. I really can’t though because I’m pretty much just taking things as they come. I’m happier and more relaxed than I have been in years, tho which is something.”

He would have been proud of what followed. Steve died quietly at home, having lived a full life.