Pictured: A couple of hazards for low-flying aircraft in vicinity of SeaTac. Nothing we can’t overcome. Photo by Thom Milkovic on Unsplash.
From the County of Humboldt:
Congressman Jared Huffman has helped the Humboldt County Department of Aviation secure $850,000 in grant funds from the US Department of Transportation’s Small Community Air Service Development Program (SCASDP) to be used to attract additional air service for a northbound route.
The SCASDP grant program is designed to help small communities address air service and airfare challenges, and Humboldt County was last awarded SCASDP funding in 2012. After many extensions, the county utilized these funds to attract and launch flight service with United Airlines between the California Redwood Coast Humboldt County Airport (ACV) and Denver International Airport (DEN) in 2019. Service to DEN has consistently been one of ACV’s highest performing markets in terms of the average seats sold. The success of the DEN route in particular placed the county in a strong position to obtain additional funds to help attract new air service to northern states.
“This time we will focus on attracting service to either Seattle International Airport (SEA) or Portland International Airport (PDX),” said Cody Roggatz, Director of Aviation for the County of Humboldt. “With current challenges the airlines are facing in the marketplace, including pilot shortages and high fuel prices, this grant will provide vital assistance to help us leverage our recruitment efforts.”
SCASDP funds will be used to create a Minimum Revenue Guarantee (MRG), which is used to help an airline mitigate financial risks of undertaking a new route, in addition to marketing efforts for a new route once one is determined. There is a local community match required for this grant of up to $400,000, of which $175,000 has been secured by the Redwood Region Economic Development Commission (RREDC). Additional funds must be raised for the remaining $225,000 to utilize the full $850,000 SCASDP grant. The Department of Aviation anticipates those fundraising efforts will commence later this year.
“Investments in a lifeline airport like ACV are essential for the safety of the travelling public and to the economies of rural areas,” said Rep. Jared Huffman, who serves on the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee. “I’m glad to have delivered this funding, which will help fuel our local economy and boost safety, commerce, and tourism in air travel.”
The additional funding for an MRG comes on the heels of a July announcement regarding significant funding that Congressman Huffman helped secure to improve the runways, electrical and lighting systems at ACV.
“Congressman Huffman recently secured over $13 million in federal funds to make infrastructure improvements to ACV. With this additional $850,000 in SCASDP funding, he has put us in a better position to expand air travel service and bolster economic growth,” said Virginia Bass, Fourth District Supervisor and Chair of the Board. “The Congressman’s many efforts to improve our airports and boost our economy are so appreciated, and I would like to thank him for his ongoing support.”
For more information and updates on the California Redwood Coast Humboldt County Airport, please visit the Humboldt County Aviation web page.
Artist Justin Suarez’s mural in progress as it appeared when LoCO visited earlier this week. He’s done now.
As you may have noticed if you’ve driven through downtown or along the waterfront this week, we are well into the 2022 edition of the Eureka Street Art Festival. The Outpost has plans for more comprehensive coverage later this week, but event organizer Jenna Catsos reached out to us with a time-sensitive request.
If you’ve followed the festival through the years you may have picked up on the trend that artists who work with aerosol paint tend to finish their pieces well-ahead of the rest of the pack. Such is the case again this year. Rochester, New York-based artist Justin Suarez has already put the finishing touches on the forest critters that now adorn the 101-facing wall of Pacific Outfitters and he’s looking for another wall to beautify.
“He’d love to paint an owl,” Catsos told us via email.
Do you have an owl-less wall you’d like remedied? Justin is your man, Humboldt! Reach out to Catsos here to maybe get that ball rolling.
This man has an owl inside him he’d like to let out.
The Lithia dealership on South Broadway in Eureka. | Photos by Andrew Goff.
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After more than a century of selling cars and trucks in Eureka, the Harper family is expanding its already impressive line of vehicle brands with the purchase of one of the region’s largest dealerships: the Lithia Chrysler, Dodge, Jeep, Ram, FIAT franchise on South Broadway in Eureka.
The Harpers, as most long-time locals can tell you, already own Harper Motors, a Ford, Lincoln and Kia dealership founded in 1912, as well as Mid-City Motor World, the Toyota and Honda dealership that shares the sprawling asphalt lot along Hwy. 101 north of downtown Eureka.
Trevor Harper, general manager of Harper Motors, said his family wasn’t necessarily looking to expand its business, but someone from Lithia Motors made the first move.
“They called out of the blue a while ago and mentioned to us that the store was for sale, and that started the talks,” Harper said in a phone interview.
While the Harpers are certainly a big fish in the small pond that is Humboldt County, Lithia is one of the largest new vehicle dealership groups in North America, boasting 277 dealerships in the U.S. and another 14 locations in Canada. The publicly traded company, which, improbably, is based in Medford, Ore., has actually been acquiring new dealerships as it climbs the Fortune 500 list. (It jumped 73 spots this year to land at No. 158 on the list of the country’s biggest corporations.)
But the Eureka dealership, which Lithia purchased from Gary Barker in 2005, doesn’t really fit with the company’s current growth model, Harper said.
Lithia is one of a handful of companies “racing to dominate the fragmented auto dealership industry,” as a recent CNBC story observed, and Harper said they’re focused on volume sales. (A message seeking comment from Lithia was not returned by publication time, and Tim Call, the sales manager at Lithia’s Eureka dealership, referred all questions to Harper.)
“If you have a location in a metropolitan or suburban area, you can sell 200 to 400 vehicles a month,” Harper said. “It’s probably more worth their while than places like Eureka, where they sell probably 20 to 40 a month.”
Granted, Eureka is just a few hours from Medford, but access to the coast can be sketchy, given the frequent slides and construction work on Last Chance Grade. And when the auto delivery truck arrives, there’s just this one dealership here, “whereas if they’re going to the Bay Area or Portland they have access to multiple stores,” Harper said.
So, did the Harper family jump at this opportunity?
“We thought real hard about doing it,” Harper said. They quickly came to the decision that it makes sense.
“It fits our business very, very well,” Harper said. “Eureka is kind of its own market. You have to understand the local culture and the business climate.”
With this acquisition, the Harper family will own three of the five biggest dealerships in the region. While sales figures aren’t publicly available, Mid-City Motor World, Harper Motors and the Lithia dealership regularly land in the City of Eureka’s list of top 25 sales tax generators, along with Northwood Chevrolet and McCrea Nissan/Subaru. All three dealerships employ about 50 people, according to Harper.
He said one of the motivating factors in the purchase was keeping the ownership local.
“If it wasn’t us [buying it], it’s overwhelmingly likely that it would have been somebody from out of town,” Harper said. “It just makes sense for it to have local ownership.”
The Harpers plan to make the transition in ownership as seamless as possible, he added, keeping the structure of the business about the same. The sale is scheduled to close on Aug. 31, with the Harpers taking over the following day. The new name of the dealership will be Eureka Chrysler Dodge Jeep Ram.
Before hanging up, Harper mentioned one more perk of this deal, one that ties in with a bit of family history. The Harpers became authorized Jeep dealers back in 1979, but after Chrysler and General Motors declared bankruptcy in 2009, the automakers began dramatically consolidating as part of their reorganization. Chrysler announced the removal of 789 franchises on a single day in May.
“And we were one,” Harper said, referring to their Jeep contract. Eventually, Lithia acquired the right to sell Jeeps on its own lot. Harper sounded amused by the latest turn.
“In a weird twist of fate, we’re gonna get our Jeep franchise back,” he said.
Left: Arcata strategic infill, from a YouTube video. Right: Elevation of the proposed Nordic Aquafarms facility, from the company.
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Just a quick heads-up for people interested in the future of Humboldt County — most of you, right?
There are two important public meetings happening tonight on two separate big, county-altering projects: The proposed Nordic Aquafarms indoor fish farm in Samoa, and Arcata’s Gateway Area Plan.
At 4 p.m., Arcata’s Planning Commission will kick off a second week of hearings about design considerations in the Gateway Area Plan, which aims to encourage big development around the largely industrial or post-industrial K Street corridor. We previewed the first of those meetings here.
If you’re an Arcatan who hasn’t gotten up to speed on the Gateway Area Plan yet, now is definitely the time. There’ll be a big joint meeting of the Planning Commission and the City Council on Aug. 23, and that’s when many of the big-picture decisions about the plan will be made. You’ll want to get your thoughts on record well before that.
The city’s website for the Gateway and related efforts is at this link. There are tons of resources available. If you’d like to read the thoughts of a Gateway skeptic, Fred Weis’ arcata1.com website has loads and loads of articles.
Here’s the agenda for tonight’s meeting. It takes place at Arcata City Hall starting at 4 p.m., and instructions for remote attendance are in the agenda packet, there.
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Meanwhile, the Humboldt County Planning Commission, meeting at 6 p.m. in the Humboldt County Board of Supervisor’s Chambers, is scheduled to make its final determination on the great big Nordic Aquafarms land-based fish factory proposed for the Samoa Peninsula.
The Outpost’s Ryan Burns wrote about last week’s meeting of the Planning Commission on the same topic here at this link. That meeting went on so long that that the commission put off a decision on the topic until this week.
Whichever way it goes, this will be far from the the final thumbs-up or -down on the project: Apart from a potential or even likely appeal to the Humboldt County Board of Supervisors, Nordic Aquafarms still has to run the gauntlet to get various permits from the state of California.
Tune in for the hearing and the decision, if you like, but fair warning: The Planning Commission likely won’t be taking public comment on the project. That’s because tonight’s item is technically a continuation of last week’s, and the commission took hours of comment at that time.
Full agenda for tonight’s Humboldt County Planning Commission meeting at this link.
One-way traffic on Eureka’s Dolbeer Street approaches the intersection with Chester Street, near Cutten. | Submitted.
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Some residents of Eureka and Cutten have been flummoxed this week to find a pair of two-way thoroughfares reduced to one-way traffic, with cones and detour signs blocking half the lanes.
From August 1 through August 8, the City of Eureka is conducting a “couplet demonstration” on W and Dolbeer streets. The two-lane roads run parallel to each other, one block apart, with traffic rolling past Sequoia Park, the zoo and Washington Elementary School on its way to and from Cutten.
For the duration of this week, however, W Street has been reduced to one lane, heading southbound, while Dolbeer is limited to a one lane, heading northbound. Hemlock Street, which forms the bottom of the horseshoe connecting the two, has also been cut down to one lane, with vehicles going west-to-east.
The temporary new orientation works like this:
Why do this, you ask? Well, according to the City of Eureka’s August newsletter, this configuration would allow for installation of bicycle facilities that wouldn’t fit in the current layout. Staff also notes that one-way streets tend to have lower collision rates and allow for easier pedestrian crossings.
Here’s a cross-section showing what how the proposed layout would work, with W and Dolbeer converted to include one lane for cars, plus a dedicated bike lane, with parking available on either side of the streets:
Image via City of Eureka newsletter.
Not everyone is thrilled by this proposition. One Outpost reader, who asked to remain anonymous, pointed out that this configuration could increase congestion on nearby cross streets, such as Chester, which runs past Washington Elementary. Locals use these back roads to avoid heavy traffic on Harris, our reader points out, and the one-way traffic would reduce route options, funneling traffic to just a few cross streets.
Plus, school is out for summer, so current traffic levels aren’t necessarily representative of the norm.
Another area resident took his objections to a nearby chain-link fence:
Submitted.
The City of Eureka acknowledges, in its latest newsletter, that the one-way configuration could very well increase travel time and traffic congestion. Is it worth it for increased bike and pedestrian safety?
Staff is looking for feedback. Area residents are invited to fill out a short survey, which you can access here, and to email engineering@ci.eureka.ca.gov if you have further comments or questions. Maybe don’t call Humboldt County Supervisor Rex Bohn, as the sign above suggests. This isn’t in the county’s jurisdiction.
Traffic heading south on W Street from Chester. | Submitted.
Press release from the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office:
On Aug. 3, 2022, at about 6:44 a.m., Humboldt County Sheriff’s deputies were dispatched to the area of Forson Road in McKinleyville for the report of a suspicious person possibly casing homes in the neighborhood.
Deputies arrived in the area and contacted the individual, 31-year-old Jordan Ray Steele. Steele was found to be on probation and had an out of county warrant for his arrest. During a search of Steele and his belongings incident to arrest, deputies located pepper spray, prescription opioid strips, various keys and other items.
Later that morning, a McKinleyville resident contacted the Sheriff’s Office to report a vehicle burglary. The resident was able to provide residential security footage depicting Steele and another suspect making unauthorized entry into her vehicle. Among the items reported stolen from the vehicle were items located by deputies during their search of Steele.
Steele was booked into the Humboldt County Correctional Facility on charges of grand theft (PC 487(a)), possession of stolen property (PC 496(a)), possession of pepper spray by a prohibited person (PC 22810) and violation of probation (PC 1203.2(a)).
The Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office would like to thank the alert community member for reporting suspicious activity in their neighborhood. Together we can make our community safer. If you see something suspicious or out of place in your neighborhood, say something – contact law enforcement right away.
Anyone with information about this case or related criminal activity is encouraged to call the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office at (707) 445-7251 or the Sheriff’s Office Crime Tip line at (707) 268-2539.
Sheep graze near solar panels at the Kettleman City Power solar farm, built in Kings County in 2013. The sheep are allowed to graze on dry grass that could pose a fire hazard. Photo by Larry Valenzuela, CalMatters/CatchLight Local
Kings County Supervisor Joe Neves guided his pickup to a stop next to a long line of chain-link fencing. On one side of a gravel road stood row after row of glinting solar panels. The automated mirrors pivot and turn, following the sun in its daily path across the Central Valley sky.
Neves, a big man with a wispy Santa Claus beard, was showing off the county’s newest mega solar power project, still under construction on 1,600 acres. A state-of-the-art facility, it includes powerful batteries to store and deliver power after the sun sets.
This solar plant in King County is one of the scores of new renewable energy puzzle pieces across the state considered vital to California’s transition to cleaner electricity and its pursuit of climate change solutions.
Rural California counties like Kings — with lots of land, sunshine and wind — are the focal point for many of these projects. Now they are at the epicenter of a statewide controversy, too.
Last month, Gov. Gavin Newsom pressured lawmakers to approve an energy plan that aimed to expedite and streamline construction of new clean energy facilities. Included is a controversial clause that lets developers bypass local permitting and instead turn to the California Energy Commission for fast-track approval.
The new strategy is an end run around local authorities who sometimes balk at allowing wind and solar facilities in their own backyards.
But if Newsom sees small, rural counties as impediments, Kings County begs to differ. Neves and other local officials have been busily opening up their county to solar projects for more than a dozen years.
Far from scoffing at the idea of renewable energy, some Kings County farmers have embraced solar generation as a profitable problem solver – they get paid for the use of their barren land and can transfer the water to higher-value crops.
Whatever the intent of the new law, Kings County doesn’t think it’s the problem: Most projects in the county’s 40,000-acre solar zone receive approval in less than six months — in some cases in six weeks, county officials say.
“We are not unsophisticated, we know what we are doing,” Neves said. “We planned for this. We can see the future.”
Kings County District 1 Supervisor Joe Neves says his county expedites renewable energy projects in a special solar zone. Photo by Larry Valenzuela, CalMatters/CatchLight Local
Across the state, local officials were miffed at state officials for being excluded from the discussion as the law was being crafted behind closed doors in late June, then piqued again after it passed the Legislature and was signed by Newsom, meaning they no longer had the final say-so for projects in their counties.
“Local governments are viewed as an impediment, another layer you have to go through to get your project across the finish line. But we permit these facilities all the time. It’s one of the core functions we perform as local government,” said John Kennedy, a lobbyist for Rural County Representatives of California, which advocates for 39 small counties.
“To have that authority taken out of our hands and given to the Energy Commission — that much farther from the people, that much removed from local sensitivity — to have that authority clawed back is really painful,” he said. “We’re in the crosshairs, but we don’t think we are the right target here.”
While a few projects have been stalled by local officials, some energy developers said Newsom’s initiative is a solution in search of a problem.
“What is this proposal solving for?” said Alex Jackson, director of California state affairs for American Clean Power, an association of renewable energy companies.
“In general we work really well with local government. We have invested a lot in those relationships. We prefer to work with them rather than strong-arm them. Overall we don’t see this as unlocking the path to accelerating clean energy.”
“We prefer to work with (local officials) rather than strong-arm them. Overall we don’t see this as unlocking the path to accelerating clean energy.” — Alex Jackson, American Clean Power
In his signing statement attached to the new bill, Newsom said the unprecedented pace of climate change means California must move faster to reduce its dependence on fossil fuels. The state must begin producing 50% more clean power in the next decade in order to meet its goals.
The new law, Newsom wrote, will “support and expedite the State’s transition to clean energy projects and help maintain energy reliability in the face of climate change.” The fast-track option through the Energy Commission promises developers a decision within 270 days and bypasses local approval.
The new strategy, Newsom wrote, will help keep the lights on when demand peaks from extreme heat and drought, which are putting “unprecedented stress” on the state’s power grid. “Action is needed now,” he said.
Kings County: A prime place for generating energy
Kings County, population 152,486 and home to Hanford and Kettleman City, is well-situated to host renewable energy projects: It’s at the nexus of major north-south and east-west transmission lines and its power plants can readily dispatch electricity to the grid.
Solar projects already built on Kings County’s fallowed farmland are helping power Disneyland, and the newest development, called Slate Solar and Storage, will supply about 900 megawatts of electricity when it’s finished. Some will go to two Bay Area powerhouses: The BART transportation network and Stanford University.
The small Kettleman City Power solar farm provides 21 megawatts of electricity. Photo by Larry Valenzuela, CalMatters/CatchLight Local
Occupying former watermelon, cotton and corn fields fallowed by drought, developers are building solar farms in Kings County as fast as the world’s crippled supply chain will allow. To expedite the process, local planning officials created solar energy zones that have already been fully vetted and undergone comprehensive environmental analysis.
The county has more than 21,000 acres of solar development, and the land, mostly private property, is leased or sold outright to companies.
Faced with rapidly rising energy costs, school districts and towns are investing in their own small-scale solar projects, Neves said, as have farmers looking for cheap ways to pump water and run equipment.
“A humongous task”
Whether funneled through the Energy Commission’s new process or approved by local authorities, new renewable energy development will have to come fast.
Although California is well ahead of its interim goals for clean power – about 34% of its generation last year – getting to carbon-free by 2045 will be a challenge of the highest order.
With worsening climate models, electrification of transportation and buildings, the drought-driven crash in hydroelectric power, and the scheduled closure of fossil-fuel power plants, the sobering reality in California is this: At current rates the state will produce 40 gigawatts of clean power annually over the next decade, while preliminary projections show it needs 60 gigawatts a year — at a minimum.
The need, given how rapidly demand is growing, is likely to increase.
“It’s a humongous task,” said Siva Gunda, vice chair of the California Energy Commission. “We’ve had 100 years to build the grid the way it is today and we’re redoing it in the next 20 years. At least we have a plan. We are digging ourselves out of a hole.”
The scope of what’s required means California will need to greatly expand its renewable footprint. With the most obvious and cheapest sites already developed, the way forward will be achieved one sunny, windy acre at a time.
Experts say residents can expect to see energy development in parts of California where solar panels and wind turbines have not yet sprouted. That expansion is likely to challenge the hospitality of rural communities and their elected leaders, especially when they feel excluded from the process.
Such pushback is not unexpected. Research published in June found that when local groups believe they are not consulted on renewable energy projects in their communities, they push back hard. The researchers concluded that the best way to get local buy-in is to listen to local voices.
“We’ve had 100 years to build the grid the way it is today and we’re redoing it in the next 20 years…We are digging ourselves out of a hole.” — Siva Gunda, California Energy Commission
Although the state law is new and its implications not yet fully understood, Jackson said the early message is “loud and clear from my developers: They want to continue with the local process. The (Energy Commission) route is not that attractive. When you unpack the proposal, it seems to fall short.”
Some local representatives predicted a cascade of lawsuits from local authoritieswill follow. The law “created an enemy of local government and may unhelpfully exacerbate existing (anti-Sacramento) sentiment,” Jackson said.
Local pockets of resistance
A few California counties are firmly against some renewable projects: In 2015 Los Angeles County banned wind turbines in unincorporated areas such as the Antelope Valley and Santa Monica Mountains.
And three years ago, San Bernardino, the state’s largest county, outlawed solar and wind farms on more than a million acres in unincorporated communities where industrialization is deemed incompatible.
Residents feared construction disturbance and dust, and expressed more aesthetic concerns, said David Wert, spokesman for the San Bernardino County Board of Supervisors.
“Folks that live in these small communities don’t want to wake up and look at a large solar farm out their window,” he said.
Kings County is home to several solar farms in its 40,000-acre solar zone. Photo by Larry Valenzuela, CalMatters/CatchLight Local
Mark Lawler, vice president for development at ConnectGEN, a Texas-based renewable energy developer, said not-in-my-backyard sentiment led to the rejection of his company’s projects in Humboldt and Lake counties.
With wind turbines, he said, “there’s a visibility issue. ‘If I can see it, I don’t want it.’ It’s not unique to California or any of these rural counties.”
The issue also drove the recent denial of ConnectGEN’s Fountain Wind project in Shasta County, which was proposed to go in on a high ridge adjacent to an existing wind project. Local opposition ran the gamut, from concerns about the views to fears that tall turbines would make it impossible for air tankers to fight fires on surrounding mountains.
Lawler said project managers made 76 changes to the plan, including reducing the turbines’ height and moving them from the most visible locations. He said the project would enhance fire safety by clearing vegetation around roads and the turbines. It had the potential to power more than 86,000 homes, according to the company.
“The benefits to the county would be overwhelming, millions of dollars infused to the economy, police, jobs and property tax,” Lawler said. The company donated $3 million to local organizations, a common strategy among renewable developers to gain favor in communities.
“We would hire local labor, we did everything I could come up with. We are literally building Phase 2 of an existing wind project that’s been there operating safely for 10 years,” he said.
“Folks that live in these small communities don’t want to wake up and look at a large solar farm out their window.” — David Wert, San Bernardino County Board of Supervisors
Still, the development ran into fierce opposition, including from environmental groups. The wind farm would have been in the district of Shasta County Supervisor Mary Rickert, who called it “unsightly” and said it was foolish for the developer to try to site its turbines on the ridge. “I don’t know what they were thinking,” she said.
After denying the permit, the supervisors considered imposing a moratorium on wind energy systems in some parts of the county. The board sent the proposal back to the planning commission “to put more meat on its bones,” Rickert said. She said if the moratorium proposal returns to the board, it will be passed.
Rickert said the pushback in the region has nothing to do with opposition to renewable energy. And as for doing its part to help the state achieve its clean-energy goals, she noted the county’s contribution to hydroelectric power: “We’ve got Shasta Dam.”
Nancy Radar, executive director of the California Wind Energy Association, said she understands the concerns of local groups but said they need to be balanced against the imperative to build clean-energy projects.
“There’s a mismatch between statewide goals and leaving those decisions to local communities,” she said. “Some people are being left behind. Disadvantaged communities are suffering greatly from fossil fuel impacts, and then we have other people who can’t handle a wind turbine in their viewshed. We have to keep the relative impacts in mind.”
The idea that opposition to renewables follows a political, red-blue divide doesn’t play out across the state. Conservative Kern and Riverside counties are “built-out” Rader said. Kern, for a century the state’s provider of fossil fuels, has extensive renewable energy projects.
An electrical substation is under construction in Kings County as part of a solar project. Photo by Larry Valenzuela, CalMatters/CatchLight Local
What Kern County officials and others balk at, though, is a statewide law that exempts solar projects from property taxes, denying local governments operational cash. Neves, from Kings County, estimates the solar tax break costs his region some $3 million a year. The law is set to sunset in 2025 but a similar measure is making its way through the Legislature. (Wind projects are not offered similar tax breaks.)
But rather than providing an advantage for solar projects, the tax exemption establishes a disincentive for local jurisdictions to approve the projects, said
Catherine Freeman, legislative staffer for the California State Association of Counties. “Those property taxes pay for basic county government,” she said.
Gunda of the Energy Commission said the state established a task force last year to better understand the broad obstacles to ramping up renewable projects. Its work is still underway but Gunda said there have been significant construction delays from COVID-19 and supply chain breakdowns.
However the new law plays out, the urgency is obvious, said Shannon Eddy, executive director of the Large Scale Solar Association. She said county and state officials and energy developers should build a statewide model to help smooth the process of siting new energy plants.
“It’s neither fair nor correct to point to the counties and say therein lies the problem,” she said. “Everyone needs to help. Everyone needs to come together to make this happen. We’re building the airplane as it’s running down the runway.”
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CalMatters.org is a nonprofit, nonpartisan media venture explaining California policies and politics.
