From the Humboldt County Department of Heath and Human Services:

The Humboldt Housing & Homelessness Coalition (HHHC) will conduct a Point-in-Time count of people experiencing homelessness during the morning of Friday, Jan. 23, and volunteers are needed to assist. 

The biennial count, known by many as the PIT, is a U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development requirement. Numbers from the count are used by the State of California to allocate funding to counties to address homelessness and housing. 

Humboldt County Department of Health & Human Services PIT Count Coordinator Robert Ward said it’s important to get a count of how many people are experiencing homelessness in Humboldt County that is as accurate as possible. “The state uses PIT count results to determine how much homelessness funding will be allocated to each region,” he said. “We are counting on volunteers to ensure we have complete coverage of all the areas where people experiencing street homelessness may be found.” 

Volunteers will gather into teams early on the morning of Jan. 23, and start counting at 6 a.m. In addition to a head count, volunteers will ask people where they slept the night before and gather other general demographic information. 

For more information and to sign up to volunteer, visit https://humboldt.pointintime.info/.

The HHHC is also collecting information about locations where people are known to be residing. If you are able to contribute information on known locations, please register as a volunteer so that you can input that information, even if you do not plan to assist us on the morning of the count. Questions can be directed to HHHC@co.humboldt.ca.us.

The HHHC is a coalition of housing advocates, businesses, funders, elected officials, services and housing providers, faith-based organizations and other community stakeholders working together to identify and address local housing needs. In Humboldt County, the HHHC is the lead group for homelessness issues and the federally designated Continuum of Care. For more information about the HHHC, visit humboldtgov.org/HHHC.

A public hearing on a proposed increase to Arcata’s water rates has been pushed back until March. 

If you didn’t know: for a whole variety of reasons, Arcata’s city council voted several months ago to raise the price it charges to deliver water for 6,600 customers and remove wastewater from 5,600 customers. When a city does that, it has to hold a public hearing where people can lodge complaints and learn more about the process. 

Originally scheduled for this Wednesday, Jan. 7, it’s been rescheduled for March 18. An informational meeting that was supposed to follow the day after will now be held late this month or in early February. 

If more than 50% of people representing the affected parcels complain, Arcata can’t legally raise the water rates. Those complaints must be either made in-person or sent to city hall (with the address or an assessor’s parcel number and the name and signature of the customer; they also must be hard copies. Emails or faxes don’t count).

Various posts floating around online community nexuses like Nextdoor or Facebook claim that the rates will go up by 44% if approved. That’s partially true — the water charge, measured by the hundred cubic feet (HCF), will go up from $7.15 to $10.33 in April if the change is made. However, there will no longer be a wastewater fee if a customer uses more than four HCF in a month. Arcata will instead only charge flat fees for single-family homes. Users may pay less for their wastewater than they do now.

Arcata residents’ water bills are split roughly 35/65 between their water and wastewater charges, so the city predicts that the total cost of the average bill will only increase by about 14%. 

Commercial customers will still be subject to charges if they use more than 4 HCF of wastewater service.

The flat wastewater charge will be $86.24 monthly if the plan is approved. Both the variable water rate and the wastewater fee will rise again in 2028, 2029, and 2030. The last comparable increase was in 2021, when Arcata raised its water rates 37%.  

When the rates cease increasing in 2030, the water rate will be $13.50 per HCF and $104.17 for the wastewater fee every month for single-family homes, plus a $23.58 monthly charge for customers with ⅝ and ¾ inch meters. 

Right now the average single-family household in Arcata pays $136.93 monthly for all of their water usage. In 2030, they’ll pay an average of $155.94 if the rate increase goes into effect. The current rates are comparable with the area average, though the increase will make Arcata’s water services some of the most expensive in the North Coast. 

In California, cities can’t collect more revenue than they need to keep their services afloat. Arcata feels the increase is necessary because much of its water infrastructure is aging and needs to be replaced (the current steel waterline replacement project accounts for around $12 million of it); it’ll cost around $36 million over the next five years to repair it all, according to public finance advisors Bartle Wells Associates, who performed the water rate study that Arcata is basing the increase off of. Arcata will likely take on roughly $30 million in debt to pay for much of it, though the water rate increases will help cover some of the cost. Increasing the water rates will help the city stay on top of paying off the debt.

The city also wants to stay ahead of rising inflation and labor and materials costs. 

By 2030, Arcata expects to have $8.5 million in the water fund. Right now, it holds around $5.9 million.

Not everyone is thrilled about the plan. One Nextdoor post called the increase “absurd,” focusing on the 44% water rate increase, and encouraged people to lodge complaints with Arcata.

That’s not universally the case. 

“I thank my lucky stars that I am blessed enough to live in a place where all the fresh water I need comes right out of the tap on demand, and that all the waste goes away without having to think about it,” said another commenter. “The systems that allow all this to happen and the maintenance involved are massive, and if it’s not kept up with we wouldn’t be able to live the privileged first world luxury and miracle that it is.”

PREVIOUSLY

• The Public Defender’s Office is Overworked, Underfunded and Housed in a Truly Shitty Old Building, Civil Grand Jury Report Finds

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Press release from the County of Humboldt:

The Humboldt County Public Defender’s Office was recently awarded $743,864 from the Office of the State Public Defender’s Expanded Public Defense Grant to expand its holistic defense services. 

Holistic defense combines legal representation with social work, reentry support and community-based services to help the Public Defender’s clients stabilize their lives and avoid future involvement with the criminal legal system. 

Funding received will support additional staffing and program capacity to enhance coordination between attorneys, social workers, investigators and community partners. Expanding client-centered services that bring together multiple areas of support will help the Public Defender’s Office address the underlying social, behavioral health and economic challenges that often lead to their clients’ involvement with the justice system. 

“This funding allows our office to better serve clients by addressing the root causes that bring people into contact with the justice system,” said Humboldt County Chief Public Defender Luke Brownfield. “By expanding holistic defense services, we can improve case outcomes, promote public safety and connect clients to critical resources such as housing, treatment and benefits.”

The Humboldt County Public Defender’s Office has been a leader in implementing holistic defense practices in rural Humboldt County, recognizing that effective legal advocacy extends beyond the courtroom and into the broader context of clients’ lives.

Funds received from the Office of the State Public Defender reflects the state’s commitment to strengthening defense services for clients who cannot afford to hire a private attorney and promoting equitable access to justice across California.

For more information about the Humboldt County Public Defender’s Office, visit HumboldtGov.org/PublicDefender.

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Press release from Northtown Books:

Jan. 5, 2025 - Arcata, CA. We are heartbroken to share that on Friday, Jan. 2, 2026, a fire destroyed the Northtown Books building. The damage is a total loss. We are profoundly grateful that no one was injured.

First, thank you. The love, encouragement, and support we have received over the past few days has been overwhelming in the best possible way. So many people have thanked us for being here for more than 60 years, but the truth is this: without the incredible support of our community, we never would have been able to do what we love all these years. The thanks are for you.

Right now, we are in shock and working to navigate the many steps that come with a loss of this magnitude. Because of the extent of the damage, all inventory, records, equipment, and historical materials were lost. Access to the site remains restricted while fire officials and our insurance carrier complete their assessments. We ask for patience and understanding as this process unfolds.

Please forgive us if we are not able to respond personally to every message, call, or offer of help. Please know that we appreciate every kindness more than we can adequately express.

There are many factors to consider, but if it is at all feasible, we would love to rebuild Northtown Books. We expect to know more about that possibility within the next month or so. We are deeply thankful for the many offers to help with a rebuild, and when the time comes, we will gratefully take you up on them.

For now, if you would like to continue to support the store, you can do so through our website at northtownbooks.com. We do not currently have a way to receive books for in-store pickup. If you place an order, please select shipping directly to you. Our distributor will drop-ship the books, and Northtown Books will receive credit for those sales. We may not be able to provide everything listed on the site at this time, but we will do our best to get you what you need.

For customers with special orders, gift cards, store credit, or for consignors who had items with us, we are developing a clear, documented process to address each situation fairly. We will share specific instructions and timelines as soon as possible through our official channels.

Please share this message with friends and family. For now, please rely only on updates posted directly by us.

While the building is gone, the heart of Northtown Books—its stories, its relationships, and its purpose—remains. Thank you for standing with us as we take the first steps forward.

With gratitude,

Dante DiGenova, Northtown Books

From the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office:

Humboldt County Sheriff William F. Honsal has proclaimed a Local Emergency due to the significant impact of the five-alarm structure fire involving multiple commercial buildings located between Tenth and H Streets in Arcata, CA.

The structure fire occurred on Friday, Jan. 2, resulting in a heroic multi-agency fire suppression operation. Thanks to coordinated efforts, the fire was contained, and no injuries were reported, however, the fire resulted in catastrophic damage to private property, public property and infrastructure. 

Water runoff used to fight the fire, including runoff mixed with ash, debris, and potentially hazardous materials from building contents, now poses a threat to public health and safety. Runoff may cause impacts to environmental resources, including storm drains, nearby waterways, neighboring properties and water quality, with possible downstream impacts to aquaculture operations, fisheries and sensitive aquatic habitats.

Assessing, containing and mitigating the potential environmental impacts will require more resources than the County of Humboldt and the City of Arcata currently have available. The situation is significant enough that it requires additional response and recovery assistance from the State of California and its agencies.

A local emergency proclamation is a prerequisite to request state or federal assistance for response and recovery efforts related to this event.

Individuals who experienced fire damage to their home or business are strongly encouraged to work with their insurance provider(s) to file a claim for repairs. This emergency proclamation does not guarantee individual or financial assistance for damages incurred during the fire.

The County of Humboldt’s thoughts are with the those who have been affected by this event. If you have been displaced as a result of this event, please call the American Red Cross at 707-496-8278 for assistance and resources.

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

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Earlier this year, as the political battle over Congressional redistricting brought California into the national spotlight, Facebook users were shown a curious series of ads.

The ads, from a straightforward-looking news site called the California Courier, often felt a lot like campaign commercials, linking to articles hammering Democrats in the state, including Gov. Gavin Newsom. Few punched in the other direction, toward Republicans. One said “California Democrats just rewrote their gerrymandering plan so voters will see their partisan map on the ballot this November.” Another called Proposition 50, which passed in November, “a scheme critics say is meant to undermine voter-approved protections and entrench one party rule in California.”

A reader who clicked through to the Courier’s website would find stories that largely align with a conservative view of the news, like a video of a child “riding a scooter through San Fran’s drug-ravaged streets,” or an anonymous piece that cites “confidential sources” cautioning against a “left-wing educator” running for a position with an Orange County school district.

What a reader would not find is any disclosure of the Courier’s ownership or funding, including what appear to be ties to a network of conservative organizations in California that, according to one researcher, scaled up a series of right-leaning news sites in three other states just ahead of the 2024 election.

The Courier has money to spend. According to a review of the ad library maintained by Facebook’s owner, Meta, the outlet has spent more than $80,000 since 2021 promoting its stories on social issues and politics, potentially reaching tens of thousands of users on the platform each week.

Critics say the California outlet is part of a growing, nationwide ecosystem of innocuous-looking, cheaply-produced news publications that publish and advertise biased articles in an attempt to surreptitiously influence elections. They worry the practice could mislead voters and corrode trust in nonpartisan news providers.

“I think we are in an era where people are consuming so much content online without knowing the source of it,” said Max Read, who has studied the network apparently behind the Courier at the Institute for Strategic Dialogue, a nonprofit that works to counter political polarization. “And for well-funded organizations to contribute to that by disguising what they’re doing online just helps exacerbate that problem of people not trusting what they come across.”

Images via the California Courier website

At a glance, the Courier does not necessarily look right-leaning. A handful of stories seem like straight news echoing press releases, such as one announcing new affordable housing units. But even those that seem relatively neutral may have a right-leaning spin, like one describing speeding fines tied to income as a potential “woke penalty loophole.”

The outlet also shares a name with a 67-year-old California-based publication serving the Armenian diaspora. One of that Courier’s founders won acclaim from his peers for his tenure as dean of the University of Maryland’s journalism school.

When The Markup and CalMatters contacted the publisher of the Armenian Courier, he said he was unaware of the other site. He told a reporter he was opening it for the first time.

“I’m definitely not conservative,” said Harut Sassounian, who owns the Courier, where his regular editorials appear online and formerly in print. “The two publications have nothing in common. Neither politically nor ethnically nor anything like that.”

The Lincoln Media network

Although it lacks the pedigree of its Armenian twin, the right-leaning Courier has shown it is well-immersed in today’s social media. A video it made suggesting Newsom flip-flopped in his view of President Joe Biden’s mental acuity generated thousands of reactions.

The publication also shares some of the murky citation practices of contemporary social media. Almost all of the stories on the site are unattributed, or simply attributed to “the California Courier.”

A few, however, include author names. One of the named writers describes himself on social media as a “content creator” for the Lincoln Media Foundation, a conservative group, and links to Courier articles. Another shares a name with a Republican strategist based in Orange County, and a third lists a resume with conservative organizations in a short bio.

The Lincoln Media Foundation is tied to the Lincoln Club, a group based in Orange County that bills itself as “the oldest and largest conservative major donor organization in the state of California.” The club funnels anonymously-donated money to conservative candidates and causes.

The Lincoln Media Foundation’s Facebook page recently said it was “proud to present” a new documentary purporting to reveal “the untold truth about the Pacific Palisades fire,” the natural disaster that tore through the state this year and increased political pressure on Newsom.

One hour later, the Courier’s Facebook page promoted it as well, not mentioning the Lincoln Media Foundation but describing the documentary as “much anticipated.”

Images via the Lincoln Media Foundation and California Courier Facebook pages

Neither the Lincoln Club, Lincoln Media, the California Courier, or the Courier writers responded to multiple requests for comment about the origins of the site, either through email, phone, or social media messages.

That silence, and the lack of information about ownership on the Courier’s website, comes despite the outlet’s chief goal, as outlined on its Facebook page.

“California Courier offers statewide and local news,” the page’s description reads. “Our mission is transparency.”

The Lincoln Club has previously been linked to “local” websites around the country, spreading stories with a distinctly conservative tint.

Last year, Read’s Institute for Strategic Dialogue, which tracks disinformation and extremism online, found a handful of such sites that noted deep in their privacy policies that they were projects from Lincoln Media. Those outlets had names like The Angeleno and the Keystone Courier, and stretched from California to Pennsylvania, although a resulting report didn’t name the Courier.

Many of the sites used Facebook and other social media tools to press a conservative agenda, the report found. Meta has rules against “coordinated inauthentic behavior” but it’s not clear whether Lincoln Media’s websites would cross that line.

‘Pink slime’ news

Researchers have taken to calling sites like those operated by Lincoln Media “pink slime” news, a name coined after a meat-industry additive. These sites don’t produce outright false news, like others, but they do not meet basic journalistic standards. That often means low-quality content and failing to disclose associations with outside organizations.

The sites generally aren’t designed to generate revenue, but to sway public opinion. The majority, according to researchers, lean toward a conservative agenda, and if the site’s stories gain traction on social media, they can travel widely. “If they place an ad well or if they just get the right pickup from the right influencer, these things don’t really have a limit on how far they can go,” Read said.

While it’s not clear how many sites the Lincoln Club might fund, it isn’t the only group that has used the strategy.

In 2020, the New York Times reported on Metric Media, a group that created nearly 1,300 sites around the country with names like Maine Business Daily and the Ann Arbor Times. At a glance, these could pass for simple local news operations. But the Times report found they took money from public relations firms and Republican operatives to produce stories beneficial to those groups, a massive journalistic red flag.

Ethical or not, the strategy can be effective for lending credibility to a particular viewpoint. Kevin DeLuca, an assistant professor of political science at Yale University who has researched pink slime websites, conducted an experiment that showed subjects both real unbiased news sites and others produced by Metric Media.

Some subjects in the study were given a tip sheet that asked them to examine the sites closely, looking at whether they included information like credible mission pages and other details. But even with the tip sheet, the study subjects said in interviews that they didn’t strongly prefer the truly local over the manufactured sites.

DeLuca says these sites are now in place around the United States, and news consumers have little idea when they’re running into them. The problem may only get worse with the spread of generative AI, since that technology further reduces the cost of creating such sites.

Researchers who study these sites say it’s never been easier to produce them. Local news, for one, has faced a years-long financial crisis that’s wiped many once-robust operations off the map.

While it can’t be said whether any one publication uses AI-generated content, the wide availability of tools like ChatGPT, capable of producing at least a semblance of a passable news story, have also made it easier to build up such sites.

“It’s going to make these pink slime sites even harder for people to know that what they’re reading is not from a human source and not really local investigative journalism.” DeLuca said.

Sassounian, for his part, doesn’t think there’s any risk the two California Couriers would ever be confused with each other. He took over the paper in the 1980s, and his columns, which he describes as “hard-hitting editorials that defend the rights of the Armenian people worldwide,” have been translated into languages around the world.

“It’s not pleasant to have our name used by someone else,” Sassounian said. “I prefer that they don’t, but I don’t know what I can do about it.”

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

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The past few years, California has been all about the ABCs, 1-2-3s and the wheels on the bus, investing more than $5 billion in early childhood education.

But kindergarten, a staple of elementary schools for more than a century, remains optional. Despite nearly a half dozen legislative attempts to require it, California is one of 32 states that doesn’t mandate that all 5-year-olds attend school.

That might change next year. Legislators plan to introduce a new bill to require kindergarten and they’re confident that it will meet a better fate than its predecessors, which either died in committee or were vetoed, largely due to the cost.

“Kids need to be around other kids, they need to be learning. It matters,” said Patricia Lozano, executive director of Early Edge California, which advocates for early childhood education. “I don’t see why California can’t make this happen.”

The data, advocates say, is clear. Children who attend kindergarten have higher test scores in math and reading in third grade and beyond and higher high school graduation rates. They’re also less likely to be suspended or drop out later in their school careers.

Why some parents opt out

While California requires all school districts to offer kindergarten, it doesn’t require families to enroll their children. Most do, but about 5% a year opt out. The reasons vary: some families believe their children aren’t ready for the rigors of school, and others are happy with their children’s current arrangement, whether it’s a preschool, day care or staying home with family.

Latino families are the least likely to send their children to kindergarten, data shows. Lozano said there’s a variety of reasons for this: they either don’t know about it due to a language barrier; they’re afraid to register their children in school due to immigration concerns; parents are working so hard they’ve missed notices from the school district; or some combination of all three. Regardless, schools need to improve their outreach to that community, she said.

Cecelia Kiss, a bilingual kindergarten teacher in the Sacramento City Unified School District, said she recently had a student whose mother was deported, and the child was unable to attend school because there was no one available to drive her. Even though the child loved school and the family placed a high value on education, it was logistically impossible to get the child to school. It took several weeks for the school and family to make transportation arrangements.

“For Latinos, education is so important. We want to give our kids the best we can,” said Kiss, who is also the parent of a kindergartner. “But sometimes we can’t do everything. We rely on kind teachers to care for our children, to help them learn, to help them be prepared for first grade.”

State Sen. Susan Rubio said that the fact that kindergarten isn’t mandatory discourages already disadvantaged families from enrolling their children. In her experience, Latino families have tremendous respect for the public school system and if the system tells them kindergarten is optional, and therefore not a priority, “they listen to that.”

That’s why she’s proposed two previous bills to make kindergarten mandatory. The state should be unequivocal in its message to families that early childhood education is essential for students’ success in school and life, she said. The state’s already rolled out transitional kindergarten to all 4-year-olds, expanded state-funded preschool and added more slots to its subsidized child care program. Bolstering kindergarten should be next, she said.

State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond agrees. He said this month that making kindergarten mandatory is a legislative priority for 2026, and he pledged to support any bill that addresses it. Several legislators said they’d consider sponsoring one.

‘Not an urgent need’

Both of Rubio’s previous kindergarten bills died – one in the Senate Appropriations Committee and another when Gov. Gavin Newsom vetoed it. In his veto note, he said he supports early education generally but the state hadn’t budgeted the cost, estimated to be $268 million annually.

“While the author’s intent is laudable … it is important to remain disciplined when it comes to spending, particularly spending that is ongoing,” Newsom wrote.

Plenty of groups supported the bills, including the California Teachers Association — the state’s largest teachers union — and a slew of school districts. But it had a few opponents, namely the Homeschool Association of California. The group’s opposition was not based on the merits of kindergarten itself, but on the state’s ability to strip rights from parents.

“Most kids are already going to kindergarten. But some parents have good reasons for keeping their kids at home,” said Jamie Heston, a member of the group’s board. “Parents want the choice to decide what’s best for their individual child.”

The Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association hasn’t taken a position on the issue, but generally opposes new initiatives that cost money — including mandatory kindergarten. That stance isn’t likely to change if a kindergarten bill resurfaces, the group’s vice president Susan Shelley said this week.

“From a budgetary point of view, there’s a lot of pressure this year to keep spending under control,” Shelley said. “This would not be a one-time cost. It would be ongoing. And there’s not an urgent need to expand kindergarten, compared to other more pressing needs facing the state right now.”

Bruce Fuller, an education professor at UC Berkeley who studies early childhood education, said the Legislature should focus on more pressing needs facing the under-6 crowd. Those include how the rollout of transitional kindergarten has led to the closure of many preschools, leaving many 3-year-olds without a place to go. Also, Head Start is struggling with funding and other obstacles imposed by the Trump administration, including attempts to bar families who are not citizens. And even though California has expanded access to state-funded preschool, not enough families know they’re eligible.

“Not that many families opt out of kindergarten, so it’s not a huge need,” Fuller said. “There are more immediate concerns.”

Learning gaps among students

Still, Rubio is confident that a kindergarten bill has a good chance of passing this year, largely because the Legislature has seen a significant turnover since it last voted on a kindergarten bill in 2024. Twenty-seven new senators and Assembly members were elected last fall.

For Rubio, whose parents immigrated from Mexico, the issue is personal. Although she did well in school, her twin brother did not. At an early age, he was wrongly placed in special education, fell behind and struggled throughout his time in school, eventually dropping out. Rubio believes he would have fared better if he had a high-quality early childhood education.

She’s also an elementary school teacher who’s seen the gap between students who’ve been to preschool, TK and kindergarten, versus those who had never enrolled in school at all until first grade. Children who’ve been to kindergarten know how to hold a pencil, write their names, count to 20, take turns and maybe even read or do basic math, she said. Those who haven’t lag far behind their peers and some never catch up, she said.

“I have very vivid memories of my students just breaking down crying at the end of the year because they couldn’t do a test. They didn’t know the answers, and that’s so heartbreaking to see,” said Rubio, who’s on leave from her job teaching at Monrovia Unified in Los Angeles County. “It’s hard on them, and it’s hard on the teachers because those children need a lot of extra help.”

Lozano said she thinks the bill will pass eventually. The initiative would cost money, but the state would save money in the long run if more students succeeded in school and graduated.

“It took us 20 years to get TK. It takes time to change minds, change policies,” Lozano said. “There are so many benefits to kindergarten, especially for the kids who need it the most. We believe the benefits outweigh the costs.”