John Theodore “JT” “Ted” Larson, a lawyer and longtime California resident, died on January 9, 2021 at age 73 at Saint Joseph’s Hospital in Eureka.

JT was born in Grand Forks, North Dakota on July 30, 1947 to Helen and Lowell Larson. His family lived in Morris, Minnesota, where he survived polio at age 8, until moving to Northridge, California at age 11. He attended California Lutheran University earning a degree in Philosophy and Theology in 1969, during which time he spent a year studying at the University of Tübingen, Germany. JT continued his education at the University of California, Berkeley and earned a Masters of Divinity and Masters of Philosophy of Religion in 1973. From 1973-1975 he worked as a chaplain at the University California San Francisco Hospital; there he comforted the sick, the dying, and their loved ones. A Rhodes Scholar candidate, JT received his Law Degree from the University of California Hastings’ College of Law in 1977. After passing the California Bar Exam he began his career as a civil litigation attorney at the Law Firm of Phinney, Caccia, and Larson in San Francisco, where he stayed from 1977-1989. After moving to Eureka with his previous wife and two young sons, JT began a private law practice in Old Town where he had an office for 30 years.

JT was a son, brother, husband, father, uncle, grandfather, and devoted outdoorsman. He loved Humboldt county’s rivers, oceans, and forests, which he knew well. As much as he loved the natural beauty of the area, he truly loved Eureka and the local community. Not only a hunter and fisherman, JT was also an avid gardener and amazing cook. He loved sharing food and drink with friends and was always up for a good time and adventure!

If you knew JT then you’ve certainly laughed with him. His remarkable ability to tell a joke was only surpassed by his ability to quote philosophers and songwriters; E.E. Cummings and Bob Dylan were among the many that brought him insight because his connection to poetry captured his love for life and spirit. For those who spent time around the Lost Coast Brewery, you couldn’t miss him in his red suspenders and blue jeans. JT always had time for people; his free legal counsel and good humor will be greatly missed. In true JT fashion, we share with you with a favorite piece by Wendell Berry:

The Peace of Wild Things

When despair grows in me
and I wake in the middle of the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
and I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting for their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.

Ted is survived by his wife, Patricia Fitzgerald; his children Jake and Mike Larson; his siblings Carol, Thom, Eric, and Evan; his grandsons Grayden and Landon. Other family members through marriage include Victoria, Keith, and grandson T. Maurice.

There will be a memorial celebration later in 2021 on a brighter day.

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

Humboldt County staff received notice Tuesday morning that the California Department of General Services had suspended its CAL-Card purchasing account because the bill was more than 90 days overdue. 

In a prepared statement, Auditor-Controller Karen Paz Dominguez took responsibility for the delay, which she attributed to a “breakdown” in her department, and she said the matter has since been dealt with.

However, a county spokesperson said this incident is just the latest in a pattern of overdue payments that threaten to cost the county millions of dollars.

“We appreciate the Auditor taking responsibility for this late payment and fees,” Deputy County Administrative Officer Sean Quincey said in an email to the Outpost. “Unfortunately, this is not the only time this has happened. We are still working with the Auditor-Controller to close the prior fiscal year and submit the Cost Allocation Plan, both of which are overdue. These delays may end up costing the county more than $15.6 million in state and federal revenue for one year alone. We stand ready to work with the Auditor to accomplish each of these tasks as well.”

More than 200 county employees carry CAL-Cards. These state-issued Visa cards are used by employees to purchase a wide variety of goods, including office supplies, electronics and, during the pandemic, personal protective equipment. The payments are covered by the state, which then bills participating local government agencies such as Humboldt County. 

First District Supervisor Rex Bohn told the Outpost that he started getting concerned phone calls from employees Tuesday morning. Shortly thereafter, the county’s purchasing personnel sent out an email to more than 200 county employees asking them not to use their CAL-Cards.

Paz Dominguez

Reached by phone, Paz Dominguez said she couldn’t go into details about the “breakdown” in her office because it was a personnel matter. In her statement, which is published below, the auditor-controller says her team rectified the issue over the phone and sent the overdue payment via FedEx on Tuesday.

Since taking office just over two years ago, Paz Dominguez has frequently clashed with other county leaders, including those in the County Administrative Office and on the Board of Supervisors. And she has regularly argued that her office has been understaffed.

The county recently granted her request for an outside attorney, on the county’s dime, to represent her during an investigation into the county’s fiscal management operations. And at last week’s Board of Supervisors meeting, the board approved the hiring of two full-time accountants for her office. 

Here’s Paz Dominguez’s full statement on the CAL-Card matter:

Yesterday, I learned that the County’s CalCard account was temporarily suspended pending receipt of payment. Upon investigation, I determined that the breakdown occurred in my department. Regardless of how it happened, I am the department head and I am ultimately responsible for this breakdown. 

My team called the bank yesterday and rectified the issue. We were able to issue an immediate payment and deliver it overnight via FedEx delivery. We spoke to the bank today and they confirmed their receipt of the payment. We received their assurance that the CalCard account’s temporary suspension would be lifted immediately upon their processing of our payment and we anticipate that the account will be on good terms by tomorrow, January 21st.

As payment for services using the CalCard is prohibited by County policy, no service vendors were affected by this temporary suspension. Any purchase of goods over $3,000 using the CalCard is also prohibited by County policy so we don’t anticipate any impacts to any mass purchase of goods.

Though this suspension will last for less than 72 hours, it has caused inconvenience to some users of the CalCard whose transactions were either put on hold or not processed. I am personally aware of only 1 user who experienced this but there may be more who have not communicated with my department.

To all users of the CalCard, I sincerely apologize for the confusion and inconvenience this caused. I am sure that this was not something you needed at a time like this. Please rest assured knowing that my department has addressed this situation and that we will mitigate the risk of it happening again.

To the public of Humboldt County, I sincerely apologize for this breakdown in operations. We are committed to providing services to the best of our abilities and to the standards expected for your County government. Regrettably, we fell short of this commitment and will continue to improve.

As I am fully responsible for this oversight, I will be paying any late fees that may result from this out of my own pocket. This is not a cost for the public to bear.

I look forward to improved operations in 2021 and wish you all well.

Thank you,

Karen Paz Domínguez
Auditor-Controller

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Esteban Gonzalez, an Arcata restaurant owner beloved by many, known in equal parts for his tireless work ethic, his good food and willingness to offer a hand up to anyone who needed it, died Jan. 12 of pneumonia. He was 55.

Amid an outpouring of support in the wake of his death, Gonzalez is being hailed in social media posts as a “local legend” and a “pillar” of the Arcata community, remembered as a ray of positivity who smiled easily and was quick to share what he had, whether it be a piece of wisdom or a burrito. Arcata Main Street set up a GoFundMe page Jan. 17 with the goal of raising $1,000 to benefit Gonzalez’s family. When this edition of the Journal went to press two days later, the page had collected more than $24,000, with donations continuing to pour in.

The Mad River Union reported Gonzalez’s death stemmed from complications related to COVID-19, though the Journal was unable to independently confirm that reporting.

That Gonzalez’s life saw him become a community fixture in Arcata is a testament to the power of a dream, having the courage to chase it relentlessly and what can be accomplished when hard work becomes a daily ritual.

Born one of five siblings in Mexico City, Gonzalez’s father died when he was 7 years old and he and his family grew up in poverty. He never attended school, “not even kindergarten,” he told the Journal in 2016, but his mom used to make him help cook beans and rice for the family, telling him that if he couldn’t work or go to school, he needed to contribute somehow. At 11, he said he started walking his neighborhood, knocking on doors and offering to take people’s garbage to the dump for a tip.

Newly married with a child at 18, Gonzalez told the Journal he realized that if he wanted to help lift his family out of poverty, he’d have to move north. He soon left his family, his mom, grandmother and siblings, and traveled to Tijuana, where he was homeless and worked odd jobs until he saved the $500 needed to pay a coyote to sneak across the border so he could get to Fortuna, where his uncle lived. Once Gonzalez saved enough to buy a car — a ratty old Volkswagen — he moved out in the mid-1980s and spent four months living out of his car on the Eel River Bar and bathing in the river while working three jobs. He’d get up in time to milk dairy cows at 3 a.m. before reporting to a local saw mill by 8 a.m. to work a full day, after which he’d wash dishes at a local restaurant until 10 p.m. or later.

Eventually, he saved up enough money to buy a home and, after becoming a U.S. citizen in 1993, he sent for his family, moving his daughter, wife and each of his siblings to the United States.

It was a debilitating back injury that led Gonzalez to change careers, putting $1,500 down for a $50,000 taco truck. He spent weeks calling his mom back in Mexico to learn her recipes handed down through generations of his family. He listened as she walked him through how to make pastor, mole and chile rellenos. After about six months of barely breaking even, his business clicked. Over time it expanded to two trucks and, in 2013, a small restaurant on Arcata’s I Street that went by La Chiquita for awhile before changing its name to Esteban’s, which is how most knew it anyway, as he was always there, darting between the kitchen and the register, seemingly always with a smile on his face.

In 2016, he told the Journal he arrived daily by 6 a.m. to start cooking and often didn’t leave until 10 p.m., after the kitchen had been cleaned and the next day’s food prepped.

Over the years, Esteban’s developed a fiercely loyal following, devoted as much to Gonzalez’s friendly face and positive attitude as to his mammoth burritos, which came stuffed with a unique blend of whole and refried beans wrapped in a spongy, homemade flour tortilla. Esteban’s — as well as Gonzalez’s trucks — became a favorite of college and high school students, who were looking to fill their stomachs on a budget and found themselves drawn to Gonzalez’s adoration of kids and young people.

“To my HSU friends, y’all know how much he supported us,” one longtime customer wrote on Facebook after learning of Gonzalez’s death, echoing the sentiments of many that Gonzalez never turned a hungry student away, even if they were a dollar or two short, and seemed to take a vested pride in seeing his fellow Latinx community members getting a college education. “RIP Esteban. ‘Si se puede.’”

William Brooke says he met Gonzalez 16 years ago when he was a 14 year old with an unstable home life drawn to taco trucks for a cheap meal.

“Things went downhill and I was homeless for a while,” Brooke recalls in a phone interview with the Journal. “He would feed me when I couldn’t afford anything. Every time he saw me panhandling, he’d give me some money or give me some food.”

Sometimes, Brooke says he’d show up drunk at Gonzalez’s truck and Gonzalez would give him a burrito, a cup of coffee and sometimes a place to sleep it off. Then, Brooke says Gonzalez would admonish him to “stop fucking up” with a smile before sending him on his way. After Brooke called Gonzalez’s truck once to see if it was open, he says Gonzalez took down his number and would use it to call from time to time to check in.

“He was a voice of reason in my life,” Brooke says. “He was super friendly and always wanted better for me, which was awesome because I didn’t have much of a father figure growing up.”

When Brooke told Gonzalez he’d gotten into college in Sacramento, he says Gonzalez was “hyped” and would continue to call him from time to time to check in while he was there.

When Brooke, who know runs an aerial mechanic shop, moved back to town, settled down and had kids, he said he’d bring them by Esteban’s to see Gonzalez, who adored them.

On social media, the stories of Gonzalez’s impact keep mounting. There’s the woman who recalled the time he chased her down the street to return a forgotten purse, the man who talked about how Gonzalez sat him down to share what he’d learned running the restaurant after the man mentioned he was thinking of starting his own small business and the many, many stories of Gonzalez never forgetting a customer’s order or always offering free tacos or burritos to celebrate a birthday. Many shared stories about how Gonzalez treated their children, noting the genuine joy he seemed to take in talking to them or helping them practice their Spanish.

Scott Greacen, who says he became a regular customer of Gonzalez’s while working at the old Environmental Protection Information Center office in downtown Arcata, recalls going to Esteban’s one evening with his son, Owen, while he was still trying to get his feet underneath him as a single dad. Gonzalez, who Greacen said always called him “Señor Scott,” seemed to understand the moment and radiated kindness and affection.

About six months later, Owen was killed in an accident in New Mexico, leaving Greacen shaken to the core, “just stumbling around” in darkness. When Gonzalez saw him, Greacen says he recognized immediately that something was terribly wrong and stopped to talk to him. After hearing of 10-year-old Owen’s death, Greacen says Gonzalez told him the story of how one of his brothers had died in his arms after being fatally stabbed. It was a moment of shared grief and understanding, Greacen says, that somehow left him feeling better.

“There’s something about sharing that kind of experience that those of us who have been through can do,” he says. “It’s truly horrific but as someone who’s now on the other side of it to some extent, it’s this little gift you can give people to help them understand.”

“He didn’t have to do any of that,” Greacen continues after a pause. “He didn’t owe me anything. He was for real.”

To many, the linking of Gonzalez’s death to COVID-19 is at once tragic and enraging, a reminder of the virus’ disproportionate toll on both Latinx people and frontline workers. In Humboldt County, the Latinx community makes up just 12.2 percent of the local population but has accounted for 28 percent of its COVID-19 cases.

“Policy fucking matters because it comes down to what happens to people,” Greacen says. “It really pisses me off that he’s dead. It’s so wrong. It’s such a loss to our community and our country to lose someone like him, and to think we have 400,000 stories like that. He was in so many ways the best of us.”

While many will remember Gonzalez for the good meals he prepared them, or maybe the time he made headlines for chasing a gun-toting robber out of his store with a kitchen knife (Brooke says Gonzalez had done the same years earlier with a broken Jarritos bottle but to much less fanfare), but Gonzalez’s death leaves a huge void for those who held him closest.

“There’s so much to say but there are so little words to say it with,” Brooke says. “He was just a selfless human being. That’s what he was. It’s honestly just heartbreaking.”

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Thadeus Greenson (he/him) is the Journal’s news editor. Reach him at 442-1400, extension 321, or thad@northcoastjournal.com. Follow him on Twitter @thadeusgreenson.

The Community Voices Coalition is a project funded by Humboldt Area Foundation and Wild Rivers Community Foundation to support local journalism. This story was produced by the North Coast Journal newsroom with full editorial independence and control.

The Eureka Police Department announced that it has arrested local resident Darin Ward for making “detailed and violent threats” directed at government staff and buildings in Eureka. 

In a press release sent out late Wednesday afternoon, EPD says the threats were made yesterday while Ward was inside of a restaurant in Weaverville. In an email following up the release, EPD provided a bit more detail stating “Ward specifically threatened to shoot up the government building, its staff, and anyone around wearing a mask.”

Local TV news fans may recognize Ward. Earlier this month he was featured in a North Coast News segment highlighting his cross-country journey in a bus emblazoned with the phrase “TRUMP WON - Follow Me to D.C.” You can watch that below and read EPD’s full release farther down.

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Eureka Police Department press release: 

On January 19, 2021, the Eureka Police Department was made aware of violent threats made towards a government building and its staff in Eureka. The threats were made earlier in the day by 49-year-old Eureka resident Darin Michael Ward, while he was at a restaurant in Weaverville, California.

The detailed and violent threats were initially reported to the Humboldt County Joint Information Center and then swiftly disseminated to the Trinity County Sheriff’s Office, Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office, and the Eureka Police Department. Through an extensive joint investigation, which also included participation from the FBI and Humboldt County District Attorney’s Office, Ward was quickly identified and confirmed to be in Eureka.

Just after midnight on January 20th, officers with the Eureka Police Department contacted Ward on Marina Way and he was taken into custody without incident. Ward was booked into the Humboldt County Correctional Facility for criminal threats. He is being held on $25,000.00 bail. A search warrant was authored and served on his vehicles and residence. No weapons were located, but electronic device and other items of evidence were seized at the scene.

The Eureka Police Department would like to thank the allied agencies that assisted in this investigation. Without their help, this situation may not have come to such a peaceful resolution.

Press release from the Federal Bureau of Investigation:

On Wednesday afternoon, even as President Joe Biden’s inauguration day festivities continue in Washington, a smattering of Humboldt’s undeterred Trump supporters donned their MAGA hats and took up their TRUMP flags and signs for a small rally in front of the county courthouse to let their community know that they’re still in the fight. 

The dozen-or-so Trump faithful swayed and sang along to Lee Greenwood’s “God Bless the U.S.A.” and other tunes you might expect, blasted through someone’s small Bluetooth speaker, stopping occasionally to react to each other on the passing motorists who hurled “Fuck you” and “Losers” out their car windows. 

“They bought into the lies,” one flag-waving woman sitting on one of the courthouse’s planters said to another attendee. “Wait until they see what’s coming.”

The Eureka Police Department had a handful of officers stationed around the courthouse in case anything got out of hand. Other than some light verbal sparring between the pro-Trump crowd and a lone counter protester, the scene LoCO witnessed remained chill. We spoke to one rally goer, Rebecca Dement of Eureka, who told us that she does not accept that Joe Biden is now the President of the United States, adding that the election results were fraudulent (they weren’t) and that China unleashed bio-warfare across the planet (they didn’t). We present her unedited thoughts here for posterity and to give you a sense of how MAGA is feeling on this historic day.

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During tonight’s meeting, the Arcata City Council will consider imposing stricter regulations on vacation rentals, including placing a cap the number of short-term rentals allowed in the city.

City staff developed a vacation rental ordinance in 2018 and it was brought before the council for discussion last year, but the council took no action on the item due to a couple of council members having a potential conflict of interest. Now, with three new members, the council will again discuss the topic and see if it gains any traction.

Arcata currently requires vacation rental owners to obtain a business license — usually around $50 annually — and collect and pay Transient Occupancy Tax to the city. But the city doesn’t have a rigorous enforcement process, Arcata Community Development Director David Loya told the Outpost, and the city estimates that there are at least 25 vacation rental units not in compliance.

The proposed ordinance would require that, in addition to a business license,  vacation rental owners obtain an operation permit, which would require applicants to pass a zoning clearance and a building inspection. The ordinance would also impose a 125-unit cap on vacation rentals in the city, though all of the specific requirements may be changed by the council.

Staff did some community outreach when drafting the ordinance and found that many local vacation rental owners were not supportive of the idea, some fearing that they would no longer be able to operate their rentals under the new regulations and many concerned about the potential costs of the inspections.

In an email to the city in 2018, Randy Klein — operator of  who used to operate a vacation rental near downtown Arcata called the Bayview Bungalow — said that, as a retired couple, he and his wife rely on the income from their vacation rental and that converting it into a long-term rental “would be less than our mortgage payment.”

With vacation rentals becoming a very popular form of lodging in recent years, several California cities and counties have crafted ordinances regulating short term rentals. “In some areas, vacation rentals have changed the character of neighborhoods, created neighborhood concerns, and affected housing affordability,” Loya wrote in the staff report. “These ordinances are developed to limit the impact vacation rentals have on the availability and affordability of housing.” 

Many cities have also established tighter restrictions or temporary bans on vacation rentals due to COVID-19, but Loya said that this is not the focus of tonight’s discussion. “If the state and or county closes vacation rentals or hotels, we’ll support those closures,” he told the Outpost.

If you have strong feelings about vacation rental regulation in Arcata, and are unable to attend tonight’s council meeting, Loya encourages you to email him at dloya@cityofarcata.org.

The Arcata City Council meets tonight at 6:00 p.m. You can view the full agenda and directions on how to participate here.

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CORRECTION: Randy Klein informed the Outpost that he no longer owns the Bayview Bungalow. The article has been changed to reflect this information and to clarify that his email to the City was from 2018.