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PREVIOUSLY: 

• The County is Set to Buy Most of This Eureka Block, Including Raliberto’s Taco Shop, and Turn It Into a Parking Lot
• Residents of the Eureka Block the County Would Like to Turn Into a Parking Lot File Suit Seeking Relocation Assistance
• The County Has Abandoned Its Attempt to Buy a City Block in Eureka and Turn It Into a Parking Lot

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Three years ago, the County of Humboldt was all set to pull the trigger on the purchase of three apartment buildings, two homes and a Raliberto’s Taco shop, all located on the 1000 block of Fourth Street in Eureka.

The immediate plan was to demolish the structures and replace them with a parking lot, though a longer-term Facilities Master Plan, which had been in the works for years, involved grouping county programs and services together at a series of “campuses” for the sake of convenience.

This block, which sits catty-corner to the county jail and courthouse, would have become part of the county’s “criminal justice center,” Humboldt County Supervisor Rex Bohn explained at the time, with the wood-shingled Public Defender’s Office remaining where it stands on the block’s southwest corner.

However, the deal fell through amid public criticism and a lawsuit brought by three tenants of the block, who had managed to temporarily block their eviction and were seeking financial relocation assistance from the county. The Board of Supervisors officially abandoned the county effort to buy this block in December 2019.

But on Friday, in a special meeting that lasted all of five minutes, the Humboldt County Board of Supervisors authorized Public Works staff to make an offer on one small piece of it: the three bedroom, one bath home located at 1017 Fourth Street, directly behind the Public Defender’s Office. 

In a brief presentation to the three county supervisors in attendance Friday, Sean Meehan, deputy director of facilities management for Public Works, described the parcel as a “strategically valuable” piece for the county’s abiding Facilities Master Plan, though he cautioned that the purchase is probably a long shot.

Meehan | Screenshot

“Frankly, this is kind of a Hail Mary,” Meehan said. “This is a last-ditch effort to try to get with the owner and with the owner’s agent to attempt to purchase it. We’ve heard that there are other interested parties, private sector parties, who would be able to move faster than we can.”

In a phone interview Monday afternoon, Meehan explained why real estate deals are so complex for the county. California government code prescribes certain documents and procedures that typically require five or six public meetings to work through. The City of Eureka would have to review the purchase to ensure conformance with its general plan; there’s a clearinghouse process to comply with the California Environmental Quality Act and more.

The owners of 1017 Fourth Street, Gerald and Belinda Rush, told county officials that they had several interested parties and would be entertaining offers over this past weekend, Meehan said.

“The special meeting was the last thing we could do,” he explained.

What will the county do with the property if the purchase winds up going through? 

Meehan said that’s a big “if,” though he added, “I think we’d be looking at redeveloping it along with the Public Defender building next door.”

Built in 1911, the house sits in what has long been one of Eureka’s roughest neighborhoods. Currently vacant, the 1,748-square-foot home sits on a tenth of an acre with three lanes of southbound Hwy. 101 traffic thundering past the front door. It carries an asking price of $212,000 — less than half the median for single-family homes in Eureka — and is being sold “as-is.” (County staff didn’t disclose what they plan to offer.)

The online listing describes the home as “fixer-upper,” a common real estate euphemism reserved for the most rundown of shit-holes, and photos reveal that this property is no exception to that rule. Plywood has been nailed to the exterior windows; mysterious black stains traverse the yellowed linoleum; and dangling flaps of overhead sheetrock reveal exposed ceiling beams.

Around noon on Monday, neighbor Tereasa Edeline was sitting on the stoop next door. She asked why I was taking photos and said she’d already run off three people who’d been trespassing at the house for sale. But she also said the block has improved immeasurably in recent years. There’s still one apartment in her building with problematic tenants, but they’re due to be evicted next month, she said. After that, the block should be even nicer.

“You’ll see a huge difference from what it has been in the last few decades because my friend, who is the director of the Women’s [Shelter] Rescue Mission, has placed all of the people that are on this block,” Edeline said. “They’re all mentally stable and financially stable people.”

The apartment building next door to hers has been remodeled since she moved in two and a half years ago, she said. Squatters had taken up residence in the house around back, but now a single mom lives there with her kids.

“We’re taking back the block!” she declared proudly. “I’m telling you right now, this whole neighborhood is completely different than it was two or three years ago. …I constantly go out here and I clean up garbage and I try to make it nice.” Earlier in the day, she said, she’d taken her watering can and some Dawn dish soap outside to mop up an oil stain, and she described her neighbors as equally conscientious.

“We were all homeless,” she said.

She was relieved to hear that the rest of the block is not currently up for sale and she’s not slated to be evicted. 

“That would traumatize me,” she said.

Edeline was excited to hear that the county government is interested in purchasing the house next door and maybe using the space to expand the Public Defender’s Office.

“You should tell ‘em it’s a lot nicer around here,” she said.