“Put Christ back into Christmas!”

“Jesus is the reason for the season!”

And other seasonal phrases stitched onto throw pillows!

I grew up with these proverbial idioms, often melodically sung with a confident swagger or a passive-aggressive bite. Being religious from birth and raised without a TV influencing every moment of my life, Christmas always had Christ in it without any need to put him back. But like honey butter on hot cornbread, it wasn’t long before I was seeped in a consumerist culture of American materialism, eating a steady diet of glossy advertisements, loud commercials and scarcity fear-mongering.

And here I am, the day before Christmas, frustrated at how easily I got swept into that manic frenzy throughout December. Our American consumerist culture is a fizzy Red Bull, giving you wings and hype and diabetes. It might keep you going but it’s depleting you, stripping nutrients from your body and filling you with lies. We believe Christmas is about a ton of awesome gifts under the tree. We ask our kids what they want, spooning entitlement into their open mouths, and then get frustrated when gratitude isn’t their response. We fret we didn’t get the right things or we weren’t thoughtful enough or we could have done better. We spend money we don’t have on things we don’t need all for a day. For one day. One day of “joy” for months of debt, bank accounts and bodies anemic and starved.

I’m not wanting to cause you guilt — I truly believe most of us are doing our best under the circumstances of our lives. Many of us are barely hanging on in our families that we’ll gladly go into debt for a brief moment of “joy” and “peace” in our homes. But what if there was more to your life than brief moments? What if joy and peace became the steady diet you consumed, not based on your circumstances or the Red Bull swirling chaos around you, but on the simple truth that you’re not alone — God is with us.

When every third photo on Instagram and Facebook shouts the story of what I’m missing and lack and need, if I’m not careful I will believe the noise. The way I see myself and others subtly shifts, convincing me of something I never thought I would believe: I’m not enough, I’m alone, I don’t matter without This Amazing Product. I think Christmas takes the everyday onslaught of consuming materialism and, using a candy cane, shovels it over us until we can’t get another breath. And instead of stepping away from this chaos and gaining a bit of perspective, we put our hands out like a linebacker, put our heads down and pummel our way just trying to make it through this season.

But Christmas isn’t something we’re meant to get through. It’s something we’re invited to fully experience. Instead of high-fiving your spouse at the end of the day, like you just completed a marathon, what if you slowed down, like to an awkward and uncomfortable pace? What if you made your kids slow down (to their raging horror)? What if you invited a friend over for breakfast or, with your family, brought hot cocoa and a bagel to someone hungry? What if you read the Christmas Story out of Luke 2 and sang a carol together? What if presents were only opened after breakfast or just one gift per person per hour? What if you made out with your partner and rubbed their feet and brought them coffee while the baby screamed and the kids said they hate you — certainly not perfect, but maybe a little more present?

What if you became present to the gift that is your life and the lives of those around you this Christmas morning, breathing deeply and slowly? Might you begin to notice the reason for this season, the holiness of this day, the moment when God came near — as close as your very breath. Might you see this Happy Holy-day, this Merry Christ-mass, as an opportunity to rebelliously reorient your perspective away from consuming materialism and into real joy and peace?

It’s not something that can be stitched onto a throw pillow, but it’s definitely something that can be sewn into your heart.

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Bethany Cseh is a pastor at Arcata United Methodist Church and Catalyst Church. 

Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra was in prison when he created the character of the impoverished aristocrat Don Quixote. Ten years earlier, he’d fought — bravely, apparently — in the crucial Battle of Lepanto, the 1575 clash between the Ottoman Turks and the Christian “Holy League.” Hundreds of galleys and tens of thousands of sailors and troops had fought a bloody sea battle off the western coast of Greece. The result — the Turks lost — put a permanent stop to Islamic expansion into Europe, which had begun with the fall of Constantinople in 1453.

On his way home to Spain, while carrying a letter of commendation from the Holy League’s leader Don John of Austria, Cervantes and his brother were captured by Algerian pirates and ransomed. After years of captivity, including three failed escape attempts, Miguel returned home to Spain — only to be imprisoned again, this time accused of defrauding the state while working as a tax collector. His second incarceration turned out to be the western world’s gain, for it was during this time that he wrote what’s generally acknowledged as the first modern novel. (The Tale of Gengji, Murasaki Shikibu’s epic tale of shenanigans in the Japanese imperial court, “The Tale of Genji,” predates “Quixote” by 600 years.)

Cervantes’ genius was to recognize that the popular reading matter of his day, so-called “romance” literature, was getting hackneyed. Typical romances involved characters from (idealized) medieval chivalry, such as Arthur, Lancelot and Guinevere, or Roland and King Charlemagne’s other knights. Monsters were slain and damsels saved while courtly love reigned. Thanks to Gutenberg’s printing press, the romance market was saturated by 1600. So, instead of writing romances in the popular fashion, Cervantes spoofed them, coming up with the brilliant idea of showing how reading too many of them could lead to madness.

His mad protagonist was El ingenioso hidalgo don Quixote de la Mancha, to give his first (of two) set of tales its full title. Alonso Quijano was an hidalgo, the lowest class of nobleman. In his dotage, Alonso had immersed himself in every romance book in his library and started to believe he was an old-time knight-errant (caballero andante), “Don Quixote.” The rest is history: Quixote sets out on his old nag of a horse Rocinante (thinking she was a noble steed), persuades a farm worker, Sancho Pancho, to be his “squire,” tilts at a windmill (believing it to be an evil giant), and designates a slaughterhouse worker as his “lady,” renaming her Dulcinea. And much, much more as Quixote lives out “The Impossible Dream.”

Cervantes’ new (hence our word “novel”) style of writing was an immediate hit. It still is! It was voted “the greatest work of fiction ever written” 20 years ago in a 55-country survey. Don Quixote also enhanced our language: The pot calling the kettle black, Thou hast seen nothing yet, No limits but the sky, Tilting at windmills…and, of course, our word “quixotic.” If you’re reading it for the first time, start with Edith Grossman’s terrific translation.

I like to think that if Cervantes, who turned his own hardships into rollicking adventures, could see how his novels led to today’s madcap world of literary fiction, he’d be muy encantado.

The origin of Christmas is really a long story in itself. I don’t mean the event it is supposed to commemorate, I mean the journey from the event to the holiday in December as we know it. But in the Humboldt area early on, none of that was known and the day ! no such significance to anyone. It was only with the coming of the white settlers — with their traditions — that Christmas was noted on the local calendar. The first year that naming occurred was in 1849, or so we are told by L.K. Wood.

L.K. Wood. Photos via the Humboldt Historian.

Wood was part of the Josiah Gregg party, a group of more determined than prudent explorers who sought a quicker way to supply the miners inland. Wood told his story in a narrative to the Humboldt Times almost six years after he made it back to Sonoma. The group leader, Gregg, had died before he and his extensive notes could make it back to the Sacramento Valley and white assistance. He and presumably his notes were left somewhere ‘ in Lake County, so we only have Wood’s story of Christmas 1849. The men in the Gregg party had taken much longer than they anticipated to reach the ocean from the inland mining area. Rather than the eight days they expected, it took around five to six weeks. When they reached the ocean, they went north and then worked their way south along the beaches until they reached the opening to Humboldt Bay. It couldn’t be crossed, so they headed north again, this time keeping their route to the Bay side of the peninsula to map the shape and size of it.

They ended on a plateau above the marshy area north of Humboldt Bay, close to what is today the location of the Arcata Plaza. Tired, hungry and with dark coming, some set up camp while others went to hunt food. Elk were sighted and shots were fired, but the men came back to camp empty-handed for their Christmas Eve dinner. On Christmas Day, with the morning light, a dead elk was found in the brush. Wood said they roasted the head in the ashes for their Christmas feast. They were so hungry that the simple fare was enjoyed, Wood wrote.

It was not, however, the Christmas he had been used to enjoying back home in Kentucky. A year later, the Humboldt Bay area had established the towns of Trinidad, Union, Eureka, Bucksport and Humboldt City. Streets were surveyed and some structures erected. The giant trees posed a problem. They could be cut down, but not milled with the equipment available, so lumber had to be imported from San Francisco. Housing was still at a premium then. The 1850 housing of early pioneer Frank S. Duff was in the burned out base of a redwood tree near what is now Ryan’s Slough. He shared that space with Mose Lucas. In an interview in a local newspaper, Duff remembered that Christmas dinner that year consisted of three wild geese killed with boat paddles in the slough, plus bread and coffee. He said he missed the vegetables, the sound of Christmas bells, letters from home, and entertainments of the past.

It seems that Christmas as a season or a day is when memories and expectations come up against reality. Wood and Duff found the reality lacking when stacked up against the memories, but acceptable to the expectations they had.

Towns quickly became more settled and populated in Humboldt County. The army arrived and built at Fort Humboldt in 1853. Mail service had not improved much from how Frank Duff found it in 1850. Travel was still more easily accomplished by water.

Josiah Simpson, a surgeon with the U S. Army, was stationed at Fort Humboldt. He brought with him his wife, Harriett St. John Simpson, their son, Johnnie, and a servant named Bridget. We find a pleasant perception of Humboldt from Harriett, in a series of letters. The Simpsons had the next best quarters on the fort — a story-and-a-half house, two rooms below and two above, with a kitchen at the side.

Harriett found prices high in Humboldt County. Eggs were $1.25 a dozen, butter 75 cents to $1 a pound, chickens $3 a piece, for example. To cope with the high prices, Harriett planned on keeping chickens and a cow herself, though the cow would set her and her husband back initially $150. She, too, was vexed by the irregularity of the mail. Her expectation, though, was to travel to remote places with her husband and she knew how to make the most of wherever she might be stationed.

For the holiday season of 1856, Harriett intended to have company. She decided upon New Year’s Eve, though she does not say why in her letters. A supper rather than a dinner party seemed best. She invited all in the garrison, making a party of eleven including the Simpsons. Since the fort had more than eleven people stationed there, it is more likely that only the officers and any family with them were invited. In her small house, eleven was the largest number of people Harriett could sit down at the two narrow tables she put together in the shape of a “T.” She listed the items she served: a nicely roasted and cold turkey, oyster soup made with canned oysters, an iced fruitcake, a Charlotte russe, molded jelly, molded blanc mange, a jelly cake, a plate of macaroons, a plate of figs and raisins, and a decanter of wine. She did say that there wasn’t enough wine to cause any problems.

Move ahead two years to 1858 and move to the other end of the Bay for another hospitable party on Christmas night. This one was at the mansion of Augustus Jacoby. His table was loaded with all of the delicacies this country afforded. He served wines, domestic and foreign, which added to the gaiety of the celebrants. His parlor had a Christmas tree illuminated by candies and loaded with various “fruits peculiar to its species.” The party-goers danced until the wee hours as rain poured outside.

For those not privileged to an invitation to a lavish private home party, public parties were offered. Arcata had the first advertised subscription ball at Murdock’s Hall on Christmas night in 1855. Seth Kinman provided the music and supper tickets were sold at the door. The next year, 1856, Eureka followed suit with a Christmas Eve ball at the Pioneer Saloon. They, too, offered a good supper and contracted with Hulme’s Cotillion Band for music for the occasion.

Today, we are surrounded by Christmas advertising, catalogs in the mailbox, and store displays well before Halloween. In 1854 when the Humboldt Times commenced publishing, Christmas was the least of its advertising. Necessity was the reality of early Christmases and any gifts expected would probably be something practical. Availability was an issue as the Times carried three columns of advertising for San Francisco stores to one for those in the Humboldt region. Oceangoing mail was not fast, but if all went very well an item ordered from San Francisco could reach Humboldt Bay in a little over two weeks. Winter oceans being what they are, it was wise to allow much more time. Overland mail orders could take three months.

On December 12, 1857, the Humboldt Times advertised Christmas gifts from Spencer, Manheim & Stern in Union (Arcata). The December 1856 Humboldt Times wrote about a Christmas Eve Ball at the Pioneer Saloon.

Finally by 1857, the coming holidays and gifts for the same were advertised in the newspaper. The ship Santa Cruz arrived with a consignment for J. Callberg in Eureka and Spencer, Manheim & Stem in Union. The advertisements touted “a splendid assortment of Ladies and Gentlemen’s Goods for the Hollidays, also suitable for Christmas Presents.” Gift suggestions included books, flower vases, chandeliers, toilet tables, furnished reticules, and toys (thirty-two dozen of endless variety) among other things. The ads, however, did not appear until the December 12 edition of the paper.

Life then was not just a struggle to make a living —to provide food and shelter in an area isolated from supplies and amenities offered by cities. The settling of the West and the politics of the East caused struggles of another sort. The proximity in the newspaper of the information about a bill passed to allow the organization of local companies of men into military units to protect the frontier to the editorial decrying the lack of interest in the holidays may help to explain the editorial comment. The December 24, 1859 Humboldt Times editorial said:

We do not remember, at any time of our life, to have seen so little interest manifested at the approach of Christmas as at present. In fact, people, both old and young, don’t appear to regard tomorrow as commemorative of any great event. We don’t believe that one half the children in town know that tomorrow will be Christmas. We haven’t seen a bunch of firecrackers, a makebelieve cannon or wooden-sword exhibited in a show window yet. We haven’t heard Santa Claus mentioned by “little posterity,” and unless his advent is announced soon we fear the shopkeepers will find dull sale for peanuts, candies and tin whistles. Why don’t you tell the little people Christmas is coming?

Should the readers heed the editorial they still could attend a Christmas ball given at Pine’s Hotel in Hydesville on December 26. “Managers” were listed for this event from Eureka, Fort Humboldt, Table Bluff, Centre Station, Hydesville, Yager Creek, Bear River and Mattole. Maybe they were selling tickets for the ball to which the public was invited.

On December 27, St. John’s Day, a Grand Ball was to be held for the installation of officers of the Arcata Lodge, No. 106, F. and A. M. (Masonic lodge). This one would be at Murdock’s Hall, with supper at the American Hotel. They had good music, but were sending out no personal invitations to this holiday party. The public was invited to this one, too.

A year later, a writer at the Weekly Times was more optimistic. The December 15, 1860 newspaper outlined the several entertainments around the Bay, including a Calico Party in Eureka, the Festival of the Ladies Sewing Circle in Arcata, and the Christmas Eve ball at Tompkins. After Christmas, members of the Masonic fraternity were giving a ball at Brett’s Hall in Eureka.

A Calico Party was the equivalent of one of our Christmas bazaars, or maybe better. The women dressed in calicos and sold items they had made. They served a good home-cooked meal and provided entertainment, all for a reasonable price of admission. Sewing circles consisted of women who brought their sewing to work on while they visited with each other. As they plied their needles, they hatched plans for the betterment of their communities. Their holiday festivals would raise funds to aid churches and provide charity to those without. They sent money to help the Civil War soldiers, as well as those closer to home.

People also brought their memories of Christmas to the new settlements with the expectation of passing on traditions they had enjoyed to others less able to provide these experiences for themselves. The Christmas tree and Santa Claus were available to the privileged, but those with less had these public festivals. Single men and women, families, and especially children, found something to enjoy at each event. Every festival tree had candy, cookies, fruit, and presents decorating it. Families were invited to provide presents to be placed on the tree, but children who didn’t have those presents got bags of candy and nuts. Music, amateur performances, food cooked by the ladies and homemade items or flowers for sale gave the festivals the homey feel missed by those far from the sites of Christmases past.

Amid stories of Civil War battles in the East and Indian attacks locally, the Times reported on two festivals that were held in 1861. One, in Eureka, was at Brett’s Hall. The hall was decorated with evergreens and a large Christmas tree loaded with presents to be distributed. Anticipation was heightened by the program of declamations, dialogues, and tableaux presented first. The gift distribution took an hour or so amid the noisy excitement of the children. The Eureka Brass Band was there to play for the crowd of almost 500 people. The Times article about the other, in Arcata (no longer called Union by then), lacked all of the details of the evening, except the proceeds. Those ladies raised total receipts of $545 and a profit of $260.

As the popularity of and the profits from the events grew, those benefiting from them became more focused. In 1862, the Grand Festival in Eureka was to aid the Catholic Church. Arcata’s was held to benefit the Presbyterian Church. In 1863, a Christmas Festival sought to raise enough money for a bell for the Congregational Church. A Grand Ball was held on December 22, 1863, to aid the completion of the Catholic Church. The 1864 Christmas Festival, sponsored by the Ladies Sewing Circle of Arcata, featured a large National Cake at the end of the supper, with proceeds going to the Civil War Sanitary Fund. The festivals typically charged men one dollar and women fifty cents.

By 1865, festivals were sponsored by the Methodist Sewing Circle of Arcata, the Ladies Sewing Circle of the Presbyterian Church, and the Ladies Social Circle. The Methodist and Congregational churches began the tradition of a Christmas tree and program at their own facilities. A Christmas Day shooting match was organized in Eureka at the marsh at the foot of Second Street, near the old Humboldt Brewery. Those who made the forty best shots that day would win a turkey.

The community Christmas trees and festivals continued through the 1860s and 1870s. A few prosperous homes had their own tree and parties. For these citizens, the festivals were part of the season’s duties or entertainment, much as our school or church programs are today.

Advertising in the newspapers for food and other holiday items indicate that in just twenty years the expectations for the Christmas season had risen. And the reality was that for many, their expectations could be met. The Humboldt County communities had grown into more urban status though they were still isolated from the larger cities of California and the rest of the country. Social life included theater and music and parties.

Kate McFarlan was the daughter of George and Catherine McFarlan. George had come with William Carson’s group from New Brunswick and like Carson, prospered in the lumber business. His home was on the bluff overlooking Humboldt Bay, just east of the current Humboldt County Library building. He had extensive redwood holdings, including an area from the edge of Myrtle Grove Cemetery past Sequoia Park, and a mill down the hill from his house. Kate kept a diary and we have excerpts from 1873 and 1874. She wrote in 1873:

Kate (McFarlan) Gregor.

December 20: Mr. Alex Gregor took Millie and I to the Old Folk’s Concert in Pratt’s Opera House.

December 21: Sunday. It rained all day.

December 23: Mr. Gregor and I went to the theatre. The play was “Lost in London.” Played by the Fannie Morgan Phelps’ Troupe.

December 24: Alex took Millie and I to the Festival in Buhne’s Hall.

December 25: Maria Carson and Alex Gregor took Christmas dinner with us. Captain Howell gave a grand champagne supper on the steamer Pelican.

December 29: Mr. Gregor took Mrs. Sam McFarlan and I to the theatre. The play was “East Lynne” and we all shed tears.

December 30: Excie Connick, Mercy Graham, Fannie Corbett, and Mrs, George Knight (Fannie Wyman) were here and spent the evening.

Alex Gregor would become Kate McFarlan’s husband, but not for a year and a half. Her holiday activities of 1874 began on Thanksgiving Day:

November 26: Thursday. Thanksgiving. Captain Wentworth came over and brought us a box of honey. In the evening we went to the theatre. The play was “Caste,” played by Vivian’s Dramatic Troupe. It was very good. After the theatre we went down to Buhne’s Hall to the Episcopal Festival and had a lunch. Then we came home.

December 14: Monday. Mrs. Duff was buried. Mrs. Richard Duff, formerly of St. John, New Brunswick—78 yrs., 5 months.

December 21: Monday. The Catholic Fair began at Ryan’s Hall.

December 24: Thursday. I was down to the Hall (Buhne’s) all day helping get ready for the evening. I got a handsome set of jewelry and two rings on the Christmas tree besides little presents. I also got a ring out of the (Christmas) cake. The fair was a complete success (and) made over 600 dollars.

December 25: Christmas Day. A very beautiful day. In the afternoon Ellen, Millie, and I went out to Mrs. Vanderlicks to see their Christmas tree.

December 27: Sunday. Mr. Connick, Aunty, Excie, and Mr. John Connick and wife were here to dinner. In the evening went to church to hear Mr. McDonald preach his farewell sermon.

December 31: Thursday. Mr. Acheson took Ellen and I to Fireman’s Ball. We had a splendid time. Danced till 4 o’clock in the morning.

That bounteous tree at Buhne’s Hall was sponsored by the Congregational Church. Two others in Eureka were at Ryan’s Hall, sponsored by the Catholic Church, and at the White House, sponsored by Christ Church. The announcement in the Daily Humboldt Times for December 24, 1874, said that the ladies requested that all articles intended for these trees be turned in prior to 6 o’clock.

The festivals of the 1870s were spread over several days culminating in the Christmas tree on Christmas Eve. Plays, a different one each night, and vocal and instrumental concerts served to draw customers in to see and to make purchases from the displays of needlework, fancy goods, and holiday gifts. Each festival had supporters from within the congregation sponsoring the event, but competed for those with other or no church affiliation.

From the first Christmases, when memories outdid both expectations and reality, it was only twenty-five years to the time when a new generation made their memories in Humboldt County and their expectations were based on their experiences of a Humboldt County Christmas.

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The story above was originally printed in the Winter 2001 issue of the Humboldt Historian, a journal of the Humboldt County Historical Society. It is reprinted here with permission. The Humboldt County Historical Society is a nonprofit organization devoted to archiving, preserving and sharing Humboldt County’s rich history. You can become a member and receive a year’s worth of new issues of The Humboldt Historian at this link.

Press release from the Humboldt County Department of Health and Human Services:

The Humboldt Housing & Homelessness Coalition (HHHC) will conduct a Point-in-Time count of people experiencing homelessness during the morning of Tuesday, Jan. 23, and volunteers are needed to assist.

The biennial count, known by many as the PIT, is a U. S. Department of Housing and Urban Development requirement. Numbers from the count are used by the State of California to allocate funding to counties to address homelessness and housing. The last PIT count conducted in Humboldt County took place in 2022. 

Humboldt County Department of Health & Human Services PIT Count Coordinator Robert Ward said, “The data collected during the count are the only estimate we have of how many people are unsheltered in Humboldt County on a given night. There is no other data source that can help us answer that question, and the state uses PIT count results to determine how much homelessness funding will be allocated to each region. We are counting on volunteers to ensure we have complete coverage of all the areas where people experiencing street homelessness may be found.” 

Volunteers will gather into teams early on the morning of Jan. 23, and start counting at 6 a.m. In addition to a head count, volunteers will ask people where they slept the night before and gather other general demographic information. 

For more information and to sign up to volunteer, visit humboldt.pointintime.info.

The HHHC is also collecting information about locations where people are known to be residing. If you are able to contribute information on known locations, please register as a volunteer so that you can input that information, even if you do not plan to assist us on the morning of the count. Questions can be directed to: HHHC@co.humboldt.ca.us.

The HHHC is a coalition of housing advocates, businesses, funders, elected officials, services and housing providers, faith-based organizations and other community stakeholders working together to identify and address local housing needs. In Humboldt County, the HHHC is the lead group for homelessness issues and the federally designated Continuum of Care. For more information about the HHHC, visit humboldtgov.org/hhhc.

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Sequoia Park Zoo staff took to Facebook on Thursday morning to announce the “sudden passing” of Cinni, one of the zoo’s dear red pandas.

“This past Sunday, Cinni was found deceased by animal care staff during a routine, early morning check,” zoo staff wrote in a Facebook post. “Cinni’s sudden passing came as a shock, as nothing had seemed amiss with her behavior or health, and she had been eating well and participating in enrichment and training opportunities. An initial necropsy revealed that an aggressive cancer had rooted in her pancreas and spread to other areas.”

Cinni, along with her sister Masala, was born at the Sequoia Park Zoo in 2014. The sisters’ birth “created a stir of excitement” at the zoo and among conservation groups, like the Red Panda Network. “[S]he helped spread the story of red pandas and their need for conservation,” according to zoo staff. 

“As Cinni grew, her caretakers would describe her as ‘the best of both her parents - all the eagerness and enthusiasm of Sumo with the laid-back attitude of her mom, Stella Luna’,” the Facebook post continues. “Cinni was the bamboo connoisseur of the group, often going to each bundle to sample before deciding which to tackle first, and she had a bit of a sweet tooth for pears, apples, and grapes.”

If you’ve got any pictures of Cinni, zoo staff would love to see ‘em. You can share your memories here on this Facebook thread.

Rest in peace, sweet Cinni. 

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Last week the Eureka City Schools board of trustees made what many people consider a pretty big decision, when it unanimously voted to exchange the long-disused Jacobs Campus to a private developer for another small property, plus $5.35 million. 

Why is this decision significant? Well, the Jacobs Campus – located at 674 Allard Avenue, in Eureka’s Highland Park neighborhood – has been a source of contention for years. More than a decade after the school’s closure, the abandoned building on the site had become a public nuisance and some residents of the neighborhood formed the South Eureka Neighborhood Alliance (SENA) to pressure the school district to do something with the long-blighted property. About four and a half years ago the school board voted to sell the campus, and, though the dilapidated buildings have since been demolished, the campus has continued to sit unused. 

There have been a few parties interested in the property. The City of Eureka made an offer of $2.8 million, which the school board declined. The California Highway Patrol made a much more tantalizing offer of $4 million for the site, hoping to build its new headquarters there. On top of that, the property has also been at the center of Eureka housing and parking disputes, with a citizens group pushing the “Housing for All and Downtown Vitality” initiative, which asks the City to designate the Jacobs Campus for housing in the attempt to prevent the City from developing housing on downtown parking lots. 

Prior to last week, the last the public had heard the school district was in negotiations with the CHP. And many people in the neighborhood seemed pretty excited about the prospect of CHP being there. So, many were surprised when the school board put out the agenda for last week’s meeting with two items that pertained to the Jacobs Campus – a closed session item entitled “Conference with Real Property Negotiator Superintendent Van Vleck Regarding Jacobs Building Property Concerning Price and/or Terms of Payment (GC § 54956.8) (Negotiating Parties: California Highway Patrol and AMG Communities-Jacobs, LLC)” and a discussion/action item that asked the board to adopt a resolution approving a “property exchange” of the Jacobs Campus for another property. 

“Did the school board’s closed session discussion connected to Resolution 23-24-023 go beyond ‘price and terms of payment’?” Snyder said. “It’s not clear based on what I know. But if so, there is a good argument that the discussion should not have been held outside public view.”

Just in time for Christmas, the Newsom administration is preparing to dole out more than $500 million to build affordable housing, playing Santa to projects that promise to shelter low-wage school employees, veterans, farmworkers, people living on the street and other poor and middle-income Californians.

Like sleepless children on Christmas Eve, nonprofit developers across California are impatiently waiting to find out who will receive a cut. But everyone already knows that most will be left with empty stockings.

This is the second year the state’s housing department has bundled the applications for four of its low-cost loan or grant programs for affordable housing development into a “one-stop shop” application process culminating in a single nine-digit funding blast around the New Year.

Competition is even more fierce this year. In July, more than 100 developers backing 240 projects with a total of more than 20,000 proposed units applied to the Housing and Community Development department’s second annual Multifamily Finance Super Notice of Funding Availability — more commonly known by its cutesy shorthand, the “Super NOFA.”

The total amount requested by these near-ready projects: More than $3.5 billion. The state only has $576 million to award.

The funding mismatch is even more severe for the state’s premier loan program for affordable rental construction and rehabilitation and the biggest pot of cash up for grab in this funding cycle. For every dollar available from the Multifamily Housing Program more than eleven have been requested.

For nearly half a decade, the crux of the housing debate in California has centered on whether and how to remove barriers to the construction of new homes. This year state lawmakers churned out dozens of bills reining in “not in my backyard” activists, environmental litigants, local government regulations and other barriers to development in the face of a chronic housing shortage. Affordable housing development has been a particular beneficiary of that streamlining campaign.

Developers and housing advocates say the chasm between state funding available and the sums being requested point to a crucial fact about affordable housing: It’s expensive to build, it doesn’t pay for itself and that financial gap has to be plugged somehow. This fact is likely to shape the housing debate around California’s capitol in 2024.

“You cannot streamline your way out of this crisis,” said Ben Winters, vice president at Linc Housing in Long Beach. Linc applied for more than $75 million in low-cost loans for four projects, of which three are still under consideration, according to pre-qualification letters the housing department sent them.

“There’s a lot of opportunities out there for me to build affordable housing — a lot — because of all these new bills,” he said. “They’ll never get built if we don’t have the funding to back them.”

A calendar on the housing department’s website has the payout scheduled for December 2023 and January 2024. A department spokesperson said they did not have a more specific date.

‘Hoping to win the lottery’

If a developer wants to have any chance of winning the end-of-year funding bonanza, their project has to be pretty far along in the development. In most cases, according to housing developers with projects in the running who spoke to CalMatters, the land has already been secured, zoning issues have been ironed out and the building designs and much of the financing have been assembled. State funding is one of the final pieces of a lengthy and expensive puzzle.

“They’re just waiting to go, they just don’t have the resources,” said Mark Stivers, a lobbyist with the nonprofit California Housing Partnership, which advocates for affordable housing.

State low-cost loans and grants play an especially important role since securing some of that public support vastly improves a project’s chances of securing another: The Low Income Housing Tax Credit, the federal government’s workhorse affordable housing program.

Projects that don’t make the cut in this year’s funding round may be able to turn to other state or federal programs, but there aren’t many of those and all of them are also intensely competitive. In most cases, a project that misses out this round will have to be put on hold.

“You mothball it…you’re gonna wait until next year,” said Linda Mandolini, president of Eden Housing, an affordable housing development nonprofit that applied for $135 million to support ten projects.

That wait comes with a price tag — another year of payroll costs, of watching cost estimates tick up and of making interest payments on existing loans. It also gives other funders more time and more reason to reconsider their investment and pull out, delaying the project further.

“I like to say that my business model is that I hope to win the lottery. And I have to pay like a million and a half dollars for the ticket.”
— Rebecca Louie, president, Wakeland Housing and Development Corp

“We end up with maybe 9, 10 or 11 different sources of funding that we’ve patched together over the course of anywhere from three to nine years,” said Rebecca Louie, president of San Diego-based Wakeland Housing and Development Corp, which requested nearly $45 million for five projects, though only two are still in the running.

A project only pencils out if every one of those funding sources come together at the right time, Louie explained. That’s what makes the state funding so important, even if it doesn’t always make up a huge share of a single project’s funding.

“I like to say that my business model is that I hope to win the lottery,” said Louie. “And I have to pay like a million and a half dollars for the ticket.”

Delay also means waiting another year before an otherwise ready-to-go home for priced-out Californians can break ground.

More funding incoming?

The prospect of missing out on the state funding award is particularly concerning for affordable developers this year. California is facing a cash crunch, meaning housing programs won’t be able to rely as much on budget windfalls as they have in prior years. Though bond measures are likely headed for the ballot in November, the political prospects of voter-sanctioned borrowing are far from certain.

This will-they-won’t-they approach to funding is no way to tackle twin housing and homelessness crises that California survey respondents regularly name as a top priority, said Louie with Wakeland Housing. “It should be considered infrastructure and a really important part of a healthy economy and we treat it each year as if it’s a surprise that we still need it,” she said.

Since 2012, when state lawmakers and the courts nixed California’s “redevelopment” agencies, locally-funded entities tasked with funding infrastructure, public spending on affordable housing has come in fits and starts, one state bond measure or flush budget season at a time.

The last time the cause of affordable housing went before state voters was in 2018. Nearly half of the $4 billion in borrowing authorized by Proposition 1 went to the Multifamily Housing Program. That fund is now running low, which prompted state lawmakers last year to begin mulling a new bond for 2024.

That discussion was left on hold when the legislative session ended in September, but is sure to pick back up in January. Meanwhile, housing advocates in the San Francisco Bay Area and San Diego are planning to launch their own regional borrowing efforts, while a statewide measure is likely to make it easier to pass such campaigns.

The other side of the equation: Cost

Spending more public money on affordable housing is one way to produce more units. Another is to make it cheaper to build them in the first place. Lee Ohanian, a UCLA economics professor and right-of-center policy commentator, said the state isn’t focusing nearly enough on the second option.

“There’s only so many units, we can build at a million dollars a unit,” he said. “Just dumping more subsidies into a grossly inefficient system is just going to lead to more waste of tax dollars.”

Particularly budget-busting affordable housing projects often make headlines, but industry-wide cost data is hard to come by. That makes it difficult to diagnose where developers and policymakers should focus their cost-trimming efforts.

In 2020, the UC Berkeley’s Terner Center for Housing Innovation analyzed project applications to one of the state’s main subsidy programs. The key takeaway: Between 2008 and 2019, total costs increased 55% per square unit. The biggest cost drivers, labor and material costs, weren’t specific to affordable housing construction, but costs that affect the entire building industry.

Things have likely only gotten worse in the years since. The industry has been hammered with supply chain snarls and resulting material price hikes, soaring insurance premiums and, most recently, sharply higher interest rates.

Ohanian said more data gathering is needed, but the state can and should still focus on “​​low- hanging fruit regulatory reforms.” Those include continuing to make it harder for project opponents to use environmental laws and historic preservation designations to obstruct new construction.

Easier said than done, said Rob Wiener, executive director of the California Coalition for Rural Housing. The “bells and whistles” that add to the cost of building affordable housing in California — be it higher construction wages, enhanced energy efficiency requirements or fees to local governments — all benefit someone. Many of those beneficiaries have lobbyists on their payroll.

“There isn’t one interest group that wants to give up its share,” he said. “So who’s gonna take a haircut?”

Affordable developers can soon dispense with many of these regulatory concerns. Among the bills that state lawmakers passed this year and which are set to go into effect on Jan. 1 is one that would shield many urban projects set aside for lower-income housing from environmental challenge. Another would make it easier for courts to toss such legal challenges out of court. A third re-upped a prior state law that clears the way for all manner of new construction in parts of the state that haven’t kept up with their housing goals set by the Newsom administration’s housing department.

Those will all add to a broad trend that has made it easier for housing — especially affordable housing — to move forward across California in recent years.

“The good news is that we have been pushing all of the local jurisdictions to identify and move projects forward and that’s actually happening,” said Mandolini with Eden Housing. “Now we just have to figure out how to pay for them all.”

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