Diemer.

After almost 10 years on the job — through a fairly eventful decade in the city of Arcata that included the transformation of Cal Poly Humboldt, the drafting of an ambitious new development plan for city’s Gateway Area, the removal of the McKinley statue, the still-unresolved killing of David Josiah Lawson and the city’s initiation of legal action against one of its own councilmembers — City Manager Karen Diemer is stepping down.

As first reported in the Mad River Union, Diemer delivered the news to the Arcata City Council at its meeting last night, and an all-staff memo has since been sent out announcing her decision.

Diemer plans to stay on the job until the city council can find a replacement, which will likely take a number of months.

Reached this afternoon, Diemer told the Outpost that after more than three decades in public service in Humboldt County — she started in 1989, with a part-time job at the city of Eureka — this just felt like the right time to take a breather.

“What’s encouraged me to go this year is that the city is on really solid footing,” Diemer said. Specifically, she said that the city’s finances are stable, that the city looks ready to wrap up its big general plan update in the next few months, and that the council and city staff are solid.

“It’s a good time to transition,” she said. “Not a lot of cities have the opportunity to transition in leadership when the sails are smooth.”

Diemer said she and her husband plan to stay in the area, post-retirement, but that since she has children living out of town now, there might be more travel in her immediate future.

In the next few weeks, Diemer said, the city will contract with a recruiting firm to put out a call for applications, and there’ll be a public announcement about a timeline and a public process for hiring someone to replace her.

In speaking with the Outpost, Diemer was full of praise for her colleagues, and for the city as a whole. She characterized Arcata as an “adventurous” city, from a local government perspective — it’s eager to take risks, to try new and innovative things, even if they have a chance of failing.

When she was a young professional starting at the city in 1996, Diemer said, she assumed that Arcata would have to be only one stop if she were to advance in her profession.

“I thought I’d have to move to all kinds of cities to get experience,” Diemer said. “But Arcata was so creative.”