Press release from the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office:

On Sept. 29, 2021, at about 1:27 a.m., Humboldt County Sheriff’s deputies were dispatched to a residence on Haven Lane in McKinleyville for the report of an armed robbery and sexual assault.

At the residence, deputies located an adult female victim. The victim was transported to a local hospital for medical attention. Through their investigation, deputies learned that the suspect, 22-year-old Elijah Isaiah Eugene Killebrew of McKinleyville, and the victim had known each other for several years. On the evening of the assault, Killebrew arrived at the residence uninvited and asked to use the victim’s restroom. Once inside the residence, Killebrew reportedly withdrew a firearm, threatened to kill the victim and sexually assaulted her. Killebrew then stole a large amount of cash from the victim prior to fleeing the residence in a vehicle.

Deputies on patrol in the area of U.S. Highway 101 and School Road located Killebrew’s vehicle traveling on Highway 101. Deputies conducted a felony traffic stop on the vehicle and took Killebrew into custody without incident. During a search of the vehicle, deputies located a loaded, unregistered firearm.

Killebrew was arrested and booked into the Humboldt County Correctional Facility on charges of rape (PC 261(a)(6)), robbery (PC 211), false imprisonment (PC 236), sexual assault (PC 287(c)(3)), kidnapping (PC 209 (B)(1)), assault with a firearm on a person (PC 245(a)(2)), exhibiting a firearm (PC 417(a)(2)), criminal threats (PC 422), carrying a loaded firearm in a public place (PC 25850(a)), possession of an undetectable firearm (PC 24610) and driving on a suspended license (VC 14601.1(a)).                    

This case is still under investigation.

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.

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Following a string of high school protests in Fortuna, Eureka and McKinleyville, students from Academy of the Redwoods walked out and marched yesterday afternoon to call attention to sexual assault. 

First reported by Kym Kemp for Redheaded Blackbelt, the walkouts were organized in support of a student enrolled at Fortuna High School who was allegedly sexually assaulted by a fellow student and football player at a party last month, and another student at a high school in Eureka who was also allegedly sexually assaulted by a peer. Both students felt they were not supported by their schools once staff was made aware of the alleged assaults, and the Fortuna High student said she faced backlash from some students once the story started spreading. 

“[We are marching] so their voices are not silenced like they are trying to be,” Academy of the Redwoods student and walkout organizer Mina Morris told the Outpost. (Academy of the Redwoods is a part of the same school district as Fortuna High School — Fortuna Union High School District.) “No matter what the school has to say, we stand with the victims.”

Dressed in white and carrying signs that read “Sorry doesn’t fix it,” or “Stop silencing victims,” students marched through College of the Redwoods, which shares its campus with Academy of the Redwoods. Afterward, the students gathered together and, facing Fortuna Union High School District Superintendent Glen Senestraro and AR Principal Arnold King, took turns speaking for about half an hour. 

“Things like this is not taken seriously, and it needs to be, because that girl’s life is changed forever. We’re asking you to take [the alleged assailant] off the [football] team,” one student said.

“People can’t keep getting away with this. We’re tired of seeing it. It’s so normalized, and it’s not okay at all. We need to be here for victims and support them and let them know that it’s not normal what they went through, and for them to stand up and talk about it is incredibly brave. And we just want to see some justice. We want to see change.”

Several students recounted their own stories of being sexually assaulted, sometimes on school campuses. A few students were moved to tears. 

One student, Anna Klobucar, spoke of a friend who was raped by her boyfriend, another football player. After the protest, Klobucar told the Outpost that her friend has also faced what she felt is a lacking response from the school district once staff was made aware.

“They need to at least do something as simple as taking them off the football team,” Klobucar told the Outpost after the protest. “I understand when there is not proof, but they can at least take these kinds of actions against it.”

During the protest, speaking to her superintendent and principal, Klobucar said: “I want you all to know that we’re going to keep fighting for justice until we get it. This isn’t just gonna be a walkout that happens one time. Rgardless of how we do it, we’re going to get justice.” 

The students repeatedly asked for the two students who allegedly sexually assaulted their peers to be removed from the football team, and asked Senestraro to respond. 

“I appreciate you guys being peaceful and keeping it not vulgar,” Senestraro said. “I appreciate that there’s not a lot of angst in what’s going on. I’m not saying anything, not because I’m being rude, I’m just listening. That’s my job, is to listen. Alright, so I’m trying to listen to you guys so everybody gets heard. I would also say your signs — I appreciate most of your signs — they didn’t get off track, the message is there, and I appreciate that. So I wanted you guys to know that I appreciate that.” 

“Do you plan on taking any actions, though?” the students asked.

“I’m here as a listening session, like I said. I can’t comment on that.” 

After more pressing from the students, Senestraro said: “There’s nothing I can share at this point. I’m not asking you to agree with it or like it, I’m just saying, I’ve sat here and I’ve respected you guys, I’ve listened to what you say, I can’t say anything other than what I’ve said. 

“When I get to a point that I can answer, I certainly will.” 

When a student reports a sexual assault, Fortuna Union High School District’s policy is to pass the case along to law enforcement. The Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office is investigating and the district does not know any details, Senestraro told Redheaded Blackbelt Monday. 

In an email to Academy of the Redwoods families, AR Principal King wrote that the district has offered the student victim with “opportunities for support and counseling.”

In an interview during the walkout, King told the Outpost that plans are in motion to bring more resources on campus. 

“I know one of our teachers was working on the North Coast Rape Crisis Team to come speak. I can’t confirm that that’s happening at this point, that’s still in the planning phases,” King said. “And we’ll have some follow-up discussions in their various classes regarding civil disobedience.” 

Though King said he does “not support the disruption of instructional time in this manner,” he is pleased and impressed with the student organizers.

“What’s most important to me is the safety of all students,” he said. “I will say that I have been concerned about some of the experiences that students are having outside of school and off at college when it comes to sexual violence. And so I want to see this conversation continue productively.”

See photos and video of the walkout below.

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Kaiser Permanente, Dignity Health, Keck Medicine and other major hospital systems in California say they are well on their way to meeting Thursday’s deadline for the state’s COVID-19 vaccination mandate, with several citing vaccination rates of 90% or higher.

California was the first state in the nation to announce that all health care workers must be fully vaccinated. The order, which includes physicians, nurses, technicians, janitors and other workers in hospitals, dialysis centers, doctor’s offices, nursing homes, substance abuse centers and other facilities remains one of the most stringent in the country. Only limited medical and religious exemptions are allowed.

On Tuesday, state health officials issued a new order that extended the mandate to in-home, hospice, disability center and senior center health care workers, but gave them an extra two months to comply, until Nov. 30.

Despite predictions that the mandate would cause severe staffing shortages, many major hospitals told CalMatters that they were confident Thursday’s deadline would not disrupt daily operations. Several large hospitals — with the exception of a major provider in San Diego — said they had only small numbers of requests for medical and religious exemptions.

Hospitals and other health facilities, however, are not required to routinely report their employee vaccination or exemption data to the state or the public. They only need to report it “upon request” from the California Department of Public Health. That data — if it exists — has not been made public. At the federal level, disclosure of employee vaccination rates remains optional.

“We anticipate it will be a relatively small number of employees that choose to end their employment as a result of not being vaccinated.”
— Dr. Jeff Smith, CEDARS-Sinai Medical Center

Kaiser, which issued a company-wide vaccination requirement three days before California’s order was announced in early August, increased employee vaccination 12% in the subsequent six weeks, said spokesperson Marc Brown. About 90% of Kaiser employees were fully vaccinated as of two weeks ago, he said.

“As a health care provider responsible for the care of more than 12.4 million people, we have a moral obligation to do everything we can to stop this virus,” Brown said. “One of the steps we can take as a health care provider is to ensure our employees and physicians are vaccinated.”

Stanford Health Care in Palo Alto, UC Davis Medical Center in Sacramento and Keck Medicine and Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles reported fewer than 6% of staff remain unvaccinated.

“We anticipate it will be a relatively small number of employees that choose to end their employment as a result of not being vaccinated,” said Dr. Jeff Smith, Cedars Sinai’s executive vice president of hospital operations. He said 97% are vaccinated and less than 2% have requested waivers.

Lack of compliance data

A lack of state data, however, makes it difficult to determine exactly how health facilities are faring, how many exemptions were granted or whether certain regions or sectors of workers are lagging behind.

Kaiser Permanente, the largest health provider in the state, said there were “small, regional differences” in employee vaccination rates at its hospitals but declined to specify where.

Dignity Health, which operates facilities throughout the Central Valley and in many rural areas of the state, did not specify how many employees were vaccinated, only that the “vast majority” are already vaccinated or plan to be before Thursday.

At Keck Medicine of USC, 92% of employees are fully vaccinated and only five people have not been vaccinated or sought a religious or medical exemption, according to Felipe Osorno, executive administrator of operations.

Sutter Health — one of the largest providers in Northern California — and UCLA Health in Southern California did not respond to inquiries about meeting the mandate.

Some health facilities said the state order, which triggered internal education campaigns, made a big difference in encouraging hesitant employees to get their shots.

In February, only 75% of California nurses had been vaccinated and 22% did not plan to get vaccinated, according to a survey conducted by the American Nursing Foundation. The California Nurses Association has supported vaccination but has stopped short of endorsing the mandate, stating “all eligible people should be vaccinated, while respecting the need for medical and religious accommodations.”

Nurses are among the most highly vaccinated groups at Stanford Health, according to David Jones, chief human resources officer. “We have not seen this issue among our nurses. Our nurses are one of our highest vaccinated groups at around 97%” compared to the 95% all-staff rate.

Nurses’ opposition to vaccine mandates has become a lightning rod throughout the pandemic, with some people staging protests in California and across the country. In New York, nearly 3,000 workers rushed to get vaccinated one week ahead of the state’s Monday deadline, but lawsuits and worker demonstrations have roiled health systems, forcing state officials to prepare to bring in the National Guard and other emergency staff should too many remain non-compliant.

“Earlier we saw lower vaccination rates in cleaning and cafeteria staff, which overlaps with Latino and Black populations significantly.”
— Felipe Osorno, Keck Medicine

State and federal vaccine mandates have helped close the gap on vaccination disparities among Keck’s health workers, which mirror those in the general population, Osorno said. About 99% of Keck’s physicians are vaccinated but other employee groups are less likely to be fully compliant.

“Earlier we saw lower vaccination rates in cleaning and cafeteria staff, which overlaps with Latino and Black populations significantly,” Osorno said.

Statewide 29.7% of Latinos are vaccinated despite making up 39.4% of the eligible population. Among African Americans, 5.7% are vaccine eligible but only 4.2% have been vaccinated, according to state data.

“That to me is one of the saddest statistics coming out of the pandemic — the continued disparity of vaccination among Blacks and Latinos,” Osorno said. “Being Latino myself, it’s horrendously painful.”

Education campaigns and individual conversations with Keck employees who were concerned about side effects and other issues helped raise the vaccination rate for cleaning staff from 25% to 80%.

The state order does not apply to dental offices, although they must comply with a previous order that allows employees to undergo regular COVID-19 testing in lieu of vaccination, the California Dental Association said.

Booster shots unlikely to affect mandate — for now

The state deadline comes one week after the federal government authorized Pfizer booster shots for those who work in high risk settings, including health care.

Although the CDC indicated it would not yet change its definition of “fully vaccinated” to include three shots instead of two, California agencies are monitoring federal recommendations and have released a statewide vaccination plan, Health and Human Services Secretary Dr. Mark Ghaly said last week.

“We are preparing and considering what it will mean for the 2.5 million health care workers in California and looking at how it impacts the requirements for so many of those individuals to be vaccinated,” Ghaly said.

For the moment, there are no plans to adjust the statewide vaccination order, according to the California Department of Public Health, especially since those who received the Moderna or Johnson and Johnson shots are not eligible for a booster.

“Everything we’ve heard so far is that boosters would probably be optional,” Osorno said.

Pockets of opposition remain

In some areas of the state where masking and vaccination protests are widespread, hundreds of employees have submitted exemption requests. In San Diego, 700 employees at Sharp HealthCare requested religious waivers and 100 requested medical waivers, according to Chief Operating Officer Brett McClain. As of two weeks ago, about 88% of Sharp’s staff were fully vaccinated. Down the road at Scripps Health, 571 employees requested waivers, and 93% are fully or partially vaccinated, a spokesperson told CalMatters.

“Close to 90% of (requests) right now are generally in the sense of somebody who identifies as Christian…stated around ‘my religion tells me my body is my body, and I control what goes into it,’” McClain said. Waiver requests have also stated religious opposition to the use of stem cells in the creation of vaccines, although the COVID-19 vaccine does not contain stem cells.

There are enough holdouts to worry Sharp administrators faced with escalating patient numbers and dwindling staff due to pandemic-related burnout. Turnover among some nursing departments has doubled in the past six months, McClain said.

“My concern is we’ve got about 20,000 employees and we still have about 1,000 employees who have not been vaccinated and have not applied for an exemption,” McClain said. “We’re getting to crunch time for sure.”

Those employees have stated they are going to leave the state or leave health care, he said, but President Joe Biden’s sweeping vaccine mandate for large employers and federal contractors will make it increasingly difficult for the unvaccinated to find alternate employment.

“This is going to be almost every employer in the country,” Osorno with Keck Medicine said. “This is not just us. We believe very heavily in vaccination, but this is something that (workers) are going to face everywhere.”

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Our health care reporting is supported by the California Health Care Foundation, Blue Shield of California Foundation and the California Endowment.

CALmatters.org is a nonprofit, nonpartisan media venture explaining California policies and politics.

Mabel Hatch was born December 7, 1928 in Goshen, New Hampshire to Louis J. Gladue and Edith (Lewis) Gladue. Mabel died September 6, 2021. She passed away at home with family by her side. She was predeceased by her husband, Harold October 6, 2004.

Mabel was a wonderful wife, mother and mother-in-law. She was a great cook and homemaker. She was a stay-at-home mom and took care of her four children. She later enjoyed babysitting her grandchildren.

Mabel is survived by her four children, Hazel (Larry) Todd, Sharon Hatch (Alvin), James (Aline) Hatch, and Steven (Cindy) Hatch, and former son-in-law and friend Mike (Sue) Cushman; eight grandchildren, Jason (Christine) Todd, Jamie Todd, Arthur (Sanja) Cushman, James (Alejandra) Cushman, Joseph Hatch, Christina Riddle, Wesley (Hollie) Hatch, Brandon (Cora) Hatch; 12 great-grandchildren, Kaylee Todd, Jacob Todd, Amber Todd, Alauna Todd, Michael Cushman, Nicholas Cushman, Emily Cushman, April Suguitan-Cushman, Nathan Potter, Alyssa Riddle, Patience Riddle, Donovan Atkinson-Hatch, Kelsey Hatch, Elijah Hatch, nephew Stanley (Linda) Hatch and their children Amy and Lori and their families.

She will be greatly missed by family and friends.

In accordance with Mabel’s wishes there will be no services held.

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The obituary above was submitted on behalf of Mabel Hatch’s loved ones. The Lost Coast Outpost runs obituaries of Humboldt County residents at no charge. See guidelines here.

Theodore (Ted) Immanuel Madsen
March 4, 1939 – Sept. 24, 2021

Ted was born in Cotesfield, Nebraska to Theodore Hansen and Victoria Amelia Madsen. He left this world and into the presences of his savior, Jesus Christ. Ted served his country through service in the U.S. Navy followed by a lengthy career with the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection. Ted married the love of his life, Gladys Ruth Hartman in 1971 and would eventually adopt two boys, Brian and Gregg.

Ted was a devoted family man, cherished friend, and faithful member of the Seventh Day Adventist Church in Fortuna.

He is survived by his sons, Brian Madsen and two granddaughters of Sacramento, Gregg and Patricia Madsen with three grandchildren of Texas; stepdaughter Robin Bibby of Redway; nephew Leon and Alice Wright of Sacramento; niece JoElla Hall of Grants Pass, Oregon; along with many other cousins.

He was preceded in death by his wife of 37 years, Gladys, his parents and half-brother Ralph (Etta) Wright of Sacramento.

Friends and family are welcome to attend a Memorial Service Saturday, October 2, 2021 at the Fortuna Seventh Day Adventist Church, 2301 Rohnerville Road, Fortuna at 3 p.m.

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The obituary above was submitted on behalf of Ted Madsen’s loved ones. The Lost Coast Outpost runs obituaries of Humboldt County residents at no charge. See guidelines here.

UPDATE, Sept. 29: The day after this story was published, executives from the Wiyot Tribe sent statements regarding the issues discussed in this story. Those statements can be found here. 

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Original post:

PREVIOUSLY: Aiming to Ship Coal Out of Humboldt Bay, Shadowy Corporation Makes Bid to Take Over NCRA Line

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Justin Wight, an independent consultant working for the recently formed North Coast Railroad Company, LLC, says the corporation’s plans have been misrepresented.

“It’s not as it has been made to appear to most people,” he told the Outpost in a phone interview Monday.

Wight suggested that the company, whose agents and officers remain entirely unknown, may not necessarily intend to ship coal along the long-dilapidated rail line between Humboldt Bay and San Francisco Bay, though neither would he rule out coal as the planned cargo. He said a non-disclosure agreement prevents him from revealing the particulars.

“The reality is that the final business plan hasn’t been struck and there are active discussions with literally dozens and dozens of shippers from throughout the western United States,” he said. “I’m not at liberty to disclose any more than that.”

As previously reported, North Coast Railroad Co., LLC, has filed an Offer of Financial Assistance (OFA) with the Surface Transportation Board in an unexpected bid to take over the 320-mile right-of-way. If successful, the company’s gambit would effectively torpedo ongoing plans to develop The Great Redwood Trail along that route by railbanking the public throughway.

Our conversation with Wight came on the heels of a story in the Salt Lake Tribune that reveals details of a March conference call between government officials in Utah, Wiyot Tribal Administrator Michelle Vassel, two representatives of the coal industry and Wight himself. 

An email obtained by the Tribune provides a rundown of “key highlights” from that conversation. The message, sent by Chris Mitton, strategic projects manager for the Utah Inland Port Authority to Jill Flygare, that agency’s chief operating officer, says Wight was seeking up to $1 billion in loans from the U.S. Department of Transportation in order to rehabilitate the rail line and employ terminals on Humboldt Bay “for the export of minerals.”

Atop the email’s list of key highlights is this: “The Wiyot Nation is ‘fully committed to this project… .’”

Vassel previously denied to the Outpost that the tribe had received or accepted any proposals related to coal, and U.S. Rep. Jared Huffman said she’d told him the same thing, “unequivocally” denying that the tribe would support this rail line takeover effort. 

The email suggests otherwise. “Both Justin [Wight] and Michelle [Vassel] stated there is strong local support for revitalizing the harbor and port operations,” it says. “Michelle mentioned she would expect some, but not overwhelming opposition to the project.”

Numerous calls and emails to Vassel over the past few weeks have not been returned. 

Humboldt County Supervisor Rex Bohn previously told the Outpost that several Wiyot Tribal representatives attended a meeting at Shamus T Bones roughly six months ago. The meeting involved project representatives and government officials, including Wight and pro-coal Utah State Senator David Hinkins, Bohn said.

While Vassel has not confirmed the tribe’s participation in that meeting, former Wiyot Tribal Chair Cheryl Seidner did so, saying she and other Wiyot members met with Wight and his business partners more than once. 

“They were looking for someone with access to a harbor because they were landlocked,” Seidner said. “They were also Native American, and of course we’d like to help other individuals, so we said we’d meet.”

One of the coal industry representatives who participated in the March conference call was Conrad “CJ” Stewart, energy director for the Crow Nation, a southern Montana tribe that has collaborated with the Navajo Transitional Energy Company, Inc. on efforts to mine more than a billion tons of coal from the Powder River Basin. The other was Brian Somers, president of the Utah Mining Association.

Hinkins, the Utah senator, told the Outpost that representatives of the Crow Tribe invited him to come to Humboldt County to meet with members of the Wiyot Tribe, which was working with the Crow and Navajo interests.

The Utah Inland Port Authority email says, “The Crow tribe is looking for any new export channel or new use for their mineral resources.” The Crow Reservation has estimated coal deposits of 17.1 billion tons. While domestic coal demand has shrunk in recent years, U.S. coal exports reached a two-year high in June, fueled largely by an explosion in demand from China, India and Japan.

The main impediment standing between these massive domestic coal supplies and massive demand overseas is pushback in West Coast port communities where residents and politicians have taken a stand against enabling more burning of the climate-warming mineral. This resistance has frustrated both Stewart and Somers, who have spoken out against such efforts.

Somers, for example, told the L.A. Times last year, “We believe that these coastal states are using their local authorities for land-use planning to essentially block interstate commerce.” 

Despite this context and the direct involvement of both Stewart and Somers, Wight maintained that coal may not be the motivating factor for NCRCo.

“As is often the case in business development … you talk to everyone and you try to see what’s going to make the most sense for the most places,” he said. “There have also been discussions around everything from aggregate [gravel] that could help build the Bay Area to waste [garbage] removal. There have been literally dozens of conversations with dozens of companies for hauling at least 25 different things.”

Wight said the interests behind North Coast Railroad Co., LLC, will be made “abundantly” clear sometime in the next week or two. Asked what’s happening at that point he said it concerns proceedings with the Surface Transportation Board.

An Aug. 16 filing with that agency, submitted by a pair of Chicago lawyers on behalf of NCRCo., said the company is “capitalized to the tune of $1.2 billion.” Is that money from federal loans, as suggested by the Utah Inland Port Authority email? Wight said he’s not at liberty to disclose the funding sources but they are “numerous.”

The Utah port authority, for its part, appears to have backed out. Flygare told the Tribune that after agency officials looked into it they determined the project was not viable, and the UIPA “has no current or future plans to export coal from Humboldt Bay.”

Alicia Hamann, executive director of Friends of the Eel River, has spoken out against the environmental destruction she says would result from attempting to rebuild the North Coast Railroad through the geologically unstable Eel River canyon, especially for the purpose of shipping coal, and she’s not convinced by Wight’s claim of there being a wide variety of potential cargoes. 

“Rebuilding the rail line through the fragile Eel River canyon would cost billions,” she said. “Only coal could possibly generate the volume of shipping you’d need to finance that bill, and only then in really high-volume scenarios.”

The North Coast Railroad Authority (NCRA), the public agency that currently owns the right-of-way in question, estimates the cost of restoring the line at $2.4 billion, with hundreds of millions more needed for maintenance of what has been described as the most expensive stretch of railway in the United States to maintain. Billions more would be required to upgrade Humboldt Bay Harbor infrastructure, according to NCRA Executive Director Mitch Stogner.

The email obtained by the Tribune says Wight assured Utah officials that shipping wouldn’t be a problem:

There are existing federal navigation channels that can be utilized for the export of minerals and Justin [Wight] is not concerned about that piece for exporting. The terminals identified for use are on the north side of the bay and are “well away from the environmentally sensitive areas.” Justin did not view this as an area of concern.

Jennifer Kalt, executive director of Humboldt Baykeeper, scoffed at that quote.

“There’s no such thing as anywhere on the shoreline of Humboldt Bay that’s away from environmentally sensitive areas,” she said. “The devastation that a project like this would bring to the bay is just mind-boggling to even consider.”

Wight said he was misquoted. “Let me be very clear about one thing: that quote is misattributed,” he said. “That may have been something that was discussed by someone; it’s definitely not something I ever said.”

He also argued that the project has been misrepresented in media reports to date.

“I think it’s unfortunate that the narrative has kind of been shaped the way it has thus far because some of the people involved in this project have won literally international as well as national environmental and sustainability awards.” he said. “In fact, one of the goals of this project is actually to facilitate the cleanup of the Eel River and its restoration, so it’s rather ironic that there are people who think this is going to be a nightmare for the river … .”

Hamann isn’t buying Wight’s statement about river restoration. “Claiming that [this project] would somehow benefit the Eel River is as obvious and absurd a lie as the claim that we can burn that coal without cooking the planet,” she said.

The NCRA board of directors spent two decades trying to drum up financial backing and commercial shipping interests willing to restore the crumbled railway through the Eel River canyon, and the agency’s attorney, Charles Montagne, is skeptical of this new venture.

“It would be extraordinarily unusual for a company engaged in as much discussion as [Wight] claims to have engaged in without talking at any point with anyone associated with NCRA,” Montagne said. “No one from the NCRCo. camp has been in touch with my client or given any information to the STB to corroborate anything that this man is saying.”

State Senator Mike McGuire, who has led the effort to develop the Great Redwood Trail, last week introduced legislation explicitly designed to thwart this rail takeover effort. Senate Bill 307 would block any state funding from going to rebuilding the rail line or building an export coal terminal at the Port of Humboldt Bay.

“The evidence is overwhelming — this secretive company is trying to be clever by hiding behind an anonymous LLC,” McGuire said in comments provided to the Outpost. “It’s obvious they are tied to Big Coal, and it’s obvious they are trying to pull a fast one over on the North Coast. Let me be clear: It’s not going to work. No way, no how.”

McGuire called the company’s efforts to date “incredibly offensive” and challenged backers to reveal themselves.

“If their proposal is so good, come forward and talk directly to the community,” he said. “Stop lurking in the shadows. Show us your plan. Face the people you propose to do business with.”

Those people would need to include the board of commissioners of the Humboldt Bay Harbor District, which is already preparing to take action to block their plan. Harbor Commissioner Stephen Kullmann said he’s not sure if the board will pass an ordinance or take some other approach, but he’s working on something that will have “as much teeth as possible,” he said.

Kullmann said the mysterious project backers “seem to have the idea that they can do it without any local buy-in, that they can force their will through. I highly doubt they’ll be able to do that.”

McGuire reiterated his determination to block the project. “We will fight this at every level and make damn sure this ridiculous idea goes away,” he said.

PREVIOUSLY: Fallen Firefighter Memorial in Old Town Vandalized

Eureka Police Department release:

A local businessperson has offered a $1,000 reward for information leading to the identification and arrest of the suspect in the vandalism of the Fallen Firefighter Memorial in Clarke Plaza, Eureka. The incident occurred sometime around September 13, 2021.

If you have information that could lead to the identification and arrest of the involved suspect(s), please contact Suzie Owsley with the Eureka Police Department at sowsley@ci.eureka.ca.gov or (707) 441-4373.