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The City of Eureka is making headway on dozens of projects identified during last year’s strategic visioning sessions, a process that sets two- to three-year goals and priorities across four categories: economic development and communications, effective governance, community pride and health and safety.

At last night’s meeting, City Manager Miles Slattery updated the council on progress made since the plan was adopted last September. Each item on the list was marked as complete, in-progress, ongoing, pending or on hold.

Here are a few of the standouts:

Grocery Store in Henderson Center —  Complete

Last November, city staff, inspired by New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, started looking into the possibility of setting up a municipal-owned grocery store in the former Rite Aid building in Henderson Center. But when the city reached out to the property owner, staff learned that the site had a deed restriction on it, imposed by Safeway, that prevented another grocery store from moving in for decades. 

“We thought it was done,” Slattery said.

But a few months ago, Development Services Director Cristin Kenyon discovered AB 1857: Unlawfully Restrictive Covenants: Grocery Stores and Supermarkets, a new state law that would effectively nullify the deed restriction on the Rite Aid site. 

“The property owners need to file something with the county to get [the deed restriction] taken off,” Slattery said. “I found out about this two weeks ago, and I called the property owner of the Rite Aid and … they were happy to hear what I told them, but they still need to speak with their attorney.”

At the end of his rundown, Slattery noted the item should probably be considered “pending” rather than “complete” given that the matter hasn’t been settled. 

Education on Ranked Choice Voting — On Hold

It’s been six years since Eureka voters approved ranked-choice voting by way of Measure C, but the system still hasn’t been implemented. What gives?

The new system was ready to go for the 2024 General Election, but, given that there were only two candidates competing in two races, city staff and elections officials decided not to implement ranked-choice voting til 2026 when more candidates would be running for three seats on the council. 

“We tried to work with the county on bringing that forward during this election cycle, but we were not successful,” Slattery said. “We didn’t want to bring out that education when people aren’t going to be utilizing it until two years from now. Whether it makes strategic visioning or not, we’ll definitely work with the elections office to put on education for that once it comes forward.”

Old Town Parking Management Program — Ongoing

The city is working on a plan to implement new downtown and Old Town parking zones as a part of the city’s transition to the app-based Passport Parking Program.

Slattery | Screenshot

Slattery acknowledged that there were “a lot of hiccups and issues” that came up when the program rolled out earlier this year, but said most of the kinks have been worked out. 

“The next step in the process is to officially establish those two zones [in downtown and Old Town],” Slattery said. “Right now, when you’re in a two-hour zone, there’s no clear [designation] that there’s a zone in Old Town, and if you park on Second and A, and you move it over to Second and B, and you’re still in the same zone, you’re going to get a ticket.”

“We haven’t made a definitive choice about putting in paid parking on the streets,” he added. “But that is the plan, and that was the intent from the beginning.”

Broadway Pedestrian Lighting — Pending 

Staff is working with the Humboldt Lodging Alliance to track down funding to install more street lights along the Broadway corridor, something the city thought Caltrans was going to do as a part of its South Broadway Complete Streets Project. 

“We had expectations that Caltrans would be including pedestrian lighting in the South Broadway project. Unfortunately, that did not happen,” Slattery said. “We’ll continue to talk to Caltrans about adding more pedestrian lighting. Our goal with the lodging alliance was to add pedestrian lighting into that very dark area of Broadway, which is basically between Henderson/Harris all the way up to Wabash on the east side of the road. I think some of that will be addressed with the new car wash that’s going in … but there’s definitely a need for more lighting.”

Continue/Expand Beautification Streetscape Efforts — Ongoing

Over the past year or so, Slattery said staff has improved coordination between several city departments to establish specific days for cleaning certain areas of the city. 

“We have one day a week of cleaning in Old Town. … We have one day a week of cleaning up along the trail in certain areas,” he said. “Once we get our staffing levels up in [the] Harbor [Division], we’ll have somebody for the trail as well, but right now we have three different days designated for the trail and one for Old Town.”

Expand CARE to Full Coverage — Ongoing 

Since its launch in 2023, the city has been working to expand its Crisis Alternative Response Eureka (CARE) team, which provides both co-response (with law enforcement) and alternative response (in place of law enforcement) to community members experiencing a mental health-related crises. Slattery said the CARE team is “very close” to expanding to full coverage.

“We are now up and running seven days a week, [but] we haven’t quite got to 24/7,” he said. “That is our intention.”

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The council also received a glowing annual report from the Open Space, Parks and Recreation Commission that praised staff’s continued efforts to beautify the city’s parks. 

The report highlighted Grace Marton Memorial Park, the new sea-themed park next to the Sacco Amphitheater. The park is dedicated to Grace Marton and her husband, Lance Hardie, who often lunched at the Eureka Waterfront. The couple bequeathed $400,000 to the city to create a community park, which prominently features daylilies, one of Marton’s favorite flowers.