Outdoor advertising giant Outfront Media, Inc., has abandoned its efforts to resurrect a fallen billboard on the Hwy. 101 safety corridor between Arcata and Eureka. The company’s decision means the permanent elimination of a sign that was erected in Humboldt Bay’s tidelands more than 60 years ago.
As previously reported, the company had been seeking permits from various local and state agencies in hopes of rebuilding the billboard, which collapsed into the bay during windstorms this past January. The sign was located directly across from the Indianola cutoff.
Late last month, the Humboldt Bay Harbor District’s Board of Commissioners voted 3-0, with Commissioners Craig Benson and Patrick Higgins absent, to require an environmental study before determining whether the project is exempt from the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA).
The rebuild project would also have required a building permit from the county, which owns the property and was in a position to collect rent from the billboard, as well as a Coastal Development Permit from the California Coastal Commission — neither of which were foregone conclusions.
But unbeknownst to the Harbor District commissioners, by the time they’d made their decision, Outfront Media had already asked Caltrans’ Outdoor Advertising Branch to cancel its permit for the billboard.
Harbor District Development Director Rob Holmlund told the Outpost earlier this week that the applicant — local Allpoints Signs owner Geoff Wills — called the district on Aug. 29 and “indicated that he would like to withdraw his application” to reconstruct the billboard.
Holmlund said in an email that the Harbor District had requested written confirmation of the request but had not received it. “However,” he added, “based on the phone call and the verbal request, we are considering the application withdrawn.”
The Outpost emailed personnel at Outfront Media to ask why the company asked for the permit to be canceled but has not heard back. We also emailed Humboldt County Public Works Director Tom Mattson to see if he knew why they’d done so.
“No I don’t,” he replied.
Regardless, the view of Humboldt Bay from Hwy. 101 will remain a bit clearer.
On Sept. 19 in the afternoon, Humboldt County Sheriff’s deputies served a search warrant and an arrest warrant on the 2900 block of Essex St., Eureka.
Darin Michael Ward, age 53, of Eureka, was taken into custody following a search of the residence. Evidence of the criminal activity was seized at the residence.
Ward was booked into the Humboldt County Correctional Facility on the following charges:
2 counts of lewd or lascivious acts with a minor—PC 288(a)
Contact with minor intent to commit specified offense—PC 288.3(a)
Promoting/using/persuading or inducing underage-obscene matter—PC 311.4(b)
Human trafficking—PC 236.1(c)(2)
Ward’s bail amount is set at $1,035,000.
This case is still under investigation.
Anyone with information about this case or related criminal activity is encouraged to call the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office at (707) 445-7251 or the Sheriff’s Office Crime Tip line at (707) 268-2539.
UPDATE, 4 p.m.: A few moments ago, the Outpost received a very apologetic voicemail from Gail Rymer, the person who does public relations for the Yes on F campaign.
Rymer said that she was not responsible for the Facebook post described below and said that she hoped we knew that “this is not the way I do things.” Rymer said that she was talking to the people responsible for the Facebook page, and promised that the post would be removed.
And indeed it has been.
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Desperate times call for stupid measures!
Yesterday morning the Yes on F campaign sent us a guest opinion piece that called out how unfair the LoCO has been by not breathlessly pointing out all the wonderful things it will accomplish, most of which have been conclusively shown to be fantasy.
We shared their thoughts with the LoCO Faithful in a GUEST OPINION column, which we do sometimes, and gave that GUEST OPINION column a title that faithfully summarized the crux of their argument.
Well, friends, today — gasp! — the Yes on F campaign shares with its 136 Facebook fans a misleading blurb, one which suggests that the Outpost has endorsed their efforts!
You could say that this is on us. You could say: You, LoCO, you knew damn well they were a snake before you let them in. And maybe that’s fair. We wanted, too much, to believe in a world where people on opposing sides of an issue make their best-faith case for their position, and then let the public decide.
And you know what? We’ll extend the deadline on the benefit of the doubt in this instance and give Yes on F a chance to change their Facebook post. You know why? Because they know cheaters always lose. They know we can’t let a small group of sore losers undermine our democracy.
Press release from the Mattole Restoration Council:
The Mattole Restoration
Council (MRC), in partnership with the Humboldt County Resource
Conservation District (HCRCD) will be conducting helicopter
operations in the Petrolia area between Monday, September 23rd
and Wednesday, September 25th
(7:00AM and
7:00PM).
The
work being completed between includes removing over 400 Douglas-fir
trees that have encroached into historic grasslands and flying them
into McGinnis Creek for in-stream habitat. This project is the result
of a collaborative effort between CalFire, HCRCD, MRC, Mattole Salmon
Group, 3030 Ranch, 7B Ranch, Humboldt Redwood Company, Colombia
Helicopters, and William J. Etter Construction. The project will
result in reduction of hazardous fuels, grasslands restoration,
biomass utilization, and instream habitat restoration.
These
operations are part of the Mattole and Salmon Creek Forest Health and
Wildfire Resilience Project, funded by CalFire.
The Mattole
and Salmon Creek Forest Health and Wildfire Resilience Project, is
part of California Climate Investments, a statewide program that puts
billions of Cap-and- Trade dollars to work reducing GHG emissions,
strengthening the economy, and improving public health and the
environment– particularly in disadvantaged communities. The
Cap-and-Trade program also creates a financial incentive for
industries to invest in clean technologies and develop innovative
ways to reduce pollution. California Climate Investments projects
include affordable housing, renewable energy, public transportation,
zero-emission vehicles, environmental restoration, more sustainable
agriculture, recycling, and much more. At least 35 percent of these
investments are located within and benefiting residents of
disadvantaged communities, low-income communities, and low-income
households across California. For more information, visit the
California Climate Investments website at:
www.caclimateinvestments.ca.gov.
There
will be controlled traffic and brief road closures at the end of
Conklin Creek Road on Monday September 23rd
and Tuesday September 24th.
For
more information about the project please contact hugh@mattole.org
or call 707.629.3514.
Protests at Cal Poly Humboldt this spring. Photo: Andrew Goff.
Cops clad in all-black riot gear. Dozens of demonstrators stacking
desks, tables and anything dense into beaver-dam barricades. Halls
and walkways decked out in endless graffiti. That was what Cal Poly
Humboldt’s campus looked like last spring, and the California State
University is trying to avoid more incidents like it by revising
their Time, Place, and Manner (TPM) restrictions on free speech.
It’s
proving controversial with professors and students, and many are
furious about the changes.
TPM
restrictions are limits on free speech imposed by the government that
apply to everyone, regardless of the message. Examples include
banning the use of bullhorns during protests, or capping the number
of protestors at an event.
They’re
not new to CSU campuses. However, the updated restrictions are more
heavy-handed than in years past, banning things such as signs with
sticks on them, using chalk for protest messaging, and wearing masks
or scarfs that could obscure faces at protests. Protestors also have
to identify themselves to university officials if asked.
The
changes come the semester after a series of pro-Palestine protests
rocked many CSU campuses, especially Humboldt’s, where activists
barricaded themselves inside an administrative building and occupied
the main quad for a week. Camping and demonstrating overnight are
also now banned, as is barrier-making.
Cal
Poly Humboldt has its own set of TPM rules that have been updated for
the Fall 2024 semester. Campus will be closed to anyone who doesn’t
live on campus between 11 p.m. and 7 a.m., unless they have written
permission, are on university business or are attending an event.
Humboldt has also classified every building and room on campus as to
whether or not protesting is allowed there and if it’s open to
members of the public.
Students
and members of the public alike can be punished for breaking these
rules. Students could be subject to suspension, expulsion and loss of
financial aid, or be barred from entering campus. Non-students who
violate the policy will be “held accountable to the full extent of
the University’s authority under existing laws, regulations and
University policies.”
The
new TPM restrictions do not yet apply to faculty, as negotiations
with the California Faculty Association union haven’t been completed.
The
California Faculty Association plans to take a hard line against the
new policies during the negotiation process. The field representative
for the Cal Poly Humboldt chapter of the CFA, Maureen Loughran, told
the Outpost that the CFA wasn’t consulted before the new
policies were put into place.
Like
Loughran, many CFA members find the new policies Orwellian and worry
about how they’ll be enforced.
“There
already were Time, Place, and Manner policies in place, and they
seemed to be working just fine,” Loughran said. “These new
draconian measures really weren’t necessary.”
“We
really fear that it’s not going to be equitably enforced,” Loughran
said. “Basically, they’re going to come down on those they don’t
like, whose speech they don’t like, and they’re going to permit it
for those whose speech they do condone. We went on strike in January,
right? ‘Oh, we don’t want the faculty to go on strike. Then we can
just enact our Time, Place, and Manner thing and say, oh, but they
have placards on sticks. Now we’re going to come down on them with
the full force of enforcement and police control.’ But, the
sorority is tabling in the quad, and they have cute little placards
on sticks that have their sorority letters — no problem whatsoever,
right?”
Tony
Silvaggio, the president of the Humboldt CFA chapter and a sociology
professor, agreed.
“It’s
really more restrictive and more oppressive than other policy
iterations,” Silvaggio said. “When it comes to this policy, a lot
of our union activities, [such as] the strike in January, could
certainly be limited. So we really want to make sure that we’re
going to challenge this.”
As
part of the new policies, the California State University system is
dividing $2 million among its campuses. Cal Poly Humboldt is getting
$75,000.
“The
one-time funds are required to be used for educational programs and
activities that support the balance among free speech activities, the
educational purpose of the University, and campus safety,” Humboldt
said in a statement to the Outpost. “Funds should be
utilized with a focus on campus-wide learning and professional
development opportunities that address campus climate, enhancing a
culture of care, and other areas that support student development,
co-curricular engagement, or teaching and learning within the context
of the Time, Place, and Manner policy.”
Part
of that allocation is going towards a “community engagement team,”
a volunteer squad meant to de-escalate situations that might cause
“large-scale interruption of campus operations”, according to
Humboldt. Every CSU campus has formed one this semester.
The
fact that there may not be any professors on a team whose purpose is
to pacify students is something that enrages Silvaggio.
“There
are no faculty on that protest response team, just administration,”
Silvaggio said. “No one who was involved in the de-escalation of
the protests last spring is on this team…it’s infuriating…I
can’t see this as anything other than a snitch team or a narc
team.”
For
its part, Cal Poly Humboldt says that if anyone hears about an event
that violates the TPM policy, they are encouraged to talk with them
about it and inform them of the rules. They are welcome to inform the
university, but Humboldt says it’s only for monitoring purposes.
Any punishment would come later.
“Enforcement
and consequences to policy violation will depend on the situation,”
Humboldt said in the statement. “The first priority is to educate
about the policy and de-escalate any tense situations in the moment
to bring immediate situations to a calm resolution.”
Why
are so many faculty opposed to these measures, if all they’re meant
to do is keep campus livable?
“No
faculty member wants to be in our classroom not being able to teach
their class,” Loughran said. “But I would say that there’s plenty
of things that aren’t protests that are very loud happening on the
campuses that prevent them from teaching, such as leaf blowers,
people doing groundskeeping or construction. So there’s already
things that don’t fit into the templates. It’s a short-term fix.
There’s no real problem. This one moment in time, there was something
that happened. We shouldn’t create restrictions and policies in place
that will last long-term that really aren’t necessary and really
could damage academic freedoms and liberties on campus.”
###
The
CSU TPM policy is here.
Humboldt’s free speech policies are here.
Whose fault is the California homelessness crisis?
According to Gov. Gavin Newsom, cities and counties are to blame for failing to get people off the street — despite all the money he’s given them to do so.
That was the message the governor pushed yesterday as he signed a package of housing and homelessness bills at an event in San Francisco with legislators, carpenters’ union members and members of the press.
“There’s never been more support to address all of those concerns than in the last four or five years,” Newsom said. “So what gives? Time to do your job. Time to address the crisis of encampments on the streets in this state. And yes, I’m not going to back off from that. And you will see that reflected in my January budget. I’m going to fund success and I’m not going to fund the rhetoric of failure anymore.”
When asked by a reporter how the state will make sure cities such as San Francisco meet their housing goals, Newsom said: “(It’s) not the state’s job to figure out how to do that.” Instead, Newsom said his office is focused on enforcing housing laws; It threatened the city of Norwalk with legal action earlier this week.
“No local government, no local jurisdiction, no local entity needs to do everything,” said Attorney General Rob Bonta, also at Thursday’s press conference. “But every jurisdiction, every local government needs to do something. They need to participate. They need to build housing in their jurisdiction.”
Speaking at an affordable housing development in San Francisco, Newsom also gave an update on the $6.4 billion mental health and housing bond passed earlier this year. The state will use $2.2 billion to extend Homekey, which helps cities and counties turn hotels and other buildings into homeless housing. The new program, dubbed Homekey+, will start doling out funds in May 2025 for housing for people with mental health and/or substance use disorders.
The 32 housing and homelessness bills Newsom signed Thursday include:
SB 1395 by Sen. Josh Becker: makes it easier for cities and counties to use tiny homes as temporary housing for homeless residents
A row of students work on engine lathes during class at the Industrial Technology Building at Reedley College on Sept. 11, 2024. Photo by Larry Valenzuela, CalMatters/CatchLight Local
The town of Reedley has about 25,000 people — and five different public institutions that offer career education to its residents. There’s the high school, the adult school, the community college, the job center and the regional occupational program. In some cases, they work together to teach skills, such as welding.
Other times, they compete for the same students.
In a hearing last month, California Assemblymember Al Muratsuchi, a Democrat from Torrance, said that he worries some workforce programs are becoming increasingly “Balkanized,” despite numerous efforts to promote collaboration. Gov. Gavin Newsom said he’ll help unify these programs by creating a Master Plan for Career Education. State agencies are required to create the plan by Oct. 1, though Newsom hasn’t said when he’ll release it.
At Reedley College in rural Fresno County, Dean of Instruction David Clark acknowledged that some programs compete — in other parts of the state — but said that in this small town, that issue is less relevant. “In Fresno, you might flip someone off and never see them again, but here, that’s your neighbor,” said Clark. Instead, he said, local workforce leaders in Reedley have close personal relationships with one another and collaborate frequently.
What’s more, he said that each institution serves a different population: Historically, community colleges focused on high school graduates, providing them with vocational training or a pathway to a four-year university. Adult schools offered short-term courses, such as English as a second language, often to immigrants and older adults. Regional occupational programs arose as a way to help high schools consolidate and coordinate expensive career training classes. Job centers were a place for adults to get help finding work.
To some extent, that’s all still true, but over the past few decades, the lines have blurred. High school students are taking college-level classes at growing rates. More than 40% of community college students in California are 25 and older, according to data from the Community Colleges Chancellor’s Office, and the system is investing in short-term classes that rival the courses at many adult schools. While job centers once placed people directly in jobs, they’re now facing a push from state and federal leaders to send jobseekers back to school so they can earn better wages in the long-term.
The state’s existing higher education plan is from 1960 and “was designed to serve a very different California,” wrote Elana Ross, a spokesperson for the governor, in an emailed statement. She said the “current budgetary conditions” — namely, two years of multi-billion dollar deficits — “call us to work together more effectively.” The office refused to speak to CalMatters in an on-the-record interview.
In the hearing, Muratsuchi said he’s skeptical that the governor’s new plan will yield substantive changes to this convoluted system. “These are the same agencies that have failed to collaborate,” he said. “Why do we expect different results?”
‘Redundancy’ in Reedley
Clark has lived in Reedley for 35 years, and as he walks around the community college campus, he shares the town lore with pride. In 2002, the town voted against the construction of a Walmart. The town doesn’t have a movie theater or a mall either, he said. “People have tried to maintain that Norman Rockwell lifestyle.”
It doesn’t always reflect reality — Walmart, for instance, built a location just five miles away, in the town next door — but Clark said that Reedley is still more vibrant than some of the other rural towns in the Central Valley.
The reason is agriculture: It’s the “world’s fruit basket,” according to the town’s chamber of commerce. Reedley specializes in growing and shipping stone fruit such as peaches, plums and nectarines.
First: Students measure part of a tractor engine in their agricultural mechanics class at Reedley College. Last: Instructor David Tikkanen shows student Francisco Fernandez how to work on an engine lathe when shaving a metal rod. Photos by Larry Valenzuela, CalMatters/CatchLight Local
For the roughly 7,500 Reedley College students taking a career technical education class, the most popular programs are in agriculture and manufacturing, which overlap considerably, said Clark. Classes in health care, such as those for nursing assistants, are another common path, especially for women.
In a series of large classrooms, each one as big as a warehouse, college students learn how to repair tractor engines, how to weld the pieces of a truck bed, and how to create the metal pieces used in food packaging machines. Some equipment, such as machines for metal cutting, can cost the school over a million dollars per device. Most of the training for nursing assistants takes place at a retirement home.
On certain days, the college shares these classrooms with the Valley Regional Occupational Program so it can run its own manufacturing courses for high school students. By using some of the same facilities, the high school saves money and helps introduce students to college, said Fabrizio Lofaro, superintendent of the occupational program.
But for welding courses, which are more popular, the high school has its own facilities and offers less advanced courses.
The workstations for a welding class at Reedley High School. Photo by Larry Valenzuela, CalMatters/CatchLight Local
At night, and on weekends, the regional occupational program works with a different institution, Kings Canyon Adult School, to offer another set of welding classes focused on working adults.
Noe Mendoza, the learning director of the adult school, acknowledged some “redundancy,” especially with the community college. What makes adult schools different, he said, is that they’re accessible for adults who lack a high school degree or who need short-term, career-oriented training.
“They’re field workers or they’re working in the warehouses, the cold storages, and they want something different,” said Mendoza. “If it’s given here, it seems more attainable, even though it’s the same class.”
Community college leaders, however, insist that their courses are accessible too. In June, state leaders announced a policy change meant to draw adults without high school degrees toward college. Since the start of the pandemic, community colleges have spent millions of dollars recruiting older adults by offering shorter classes and career-oriented programs — sometimes reaching out directly to farmworkers.
Five different entities competing for students and money
Community colleges and adult schools have long competed for students. In the 1990s, the issue came to the fore when six Southern California school districts sued their local community colleges, saying that the colleges had overstepped their boundaries by teaching certain classes, such as high school equivalency courses or English as a second language. The judge found that both systems had a right to teach these classes.
The lawsuit is emblematic of long-standing duplication and conflict in adult education: A 2012 report by California’s Legislative Analyst’s Office found “inconsistent state-level policies” and a “widespread lack of coordination.”
“These are the same agencies that have failed to collaborate. Why do we expect different results?” — Assemblymember Al Muratsuchi, Democrat from Torrence
Similar competition exists between K-12 schools districts and regional occupational programs. California created the regional occupational programs in the 1970s as a way to consolidate career training across school districts. But the school districts aren’t required to collaborate with the occupational programs, and in some cases, districts launch their own career technical classes instead.
The federal government also invests in career education. Some of the money goes directly to community colleges and K-12 school districts, but the largest allocation goes toward California’s 45 workforce development boards, which operate the state’s nearly 180 job centers. For years, these centers helped low-income adults, unemployed adults, and certain youth find jobs, but research shows that sending a person back to school can yield better long-term results.
Now, job centers provide many students with tuition subsidies or cash to help cover daily expenses, such as rent and transportation, during school. Last month, a CalMatters investigation of job centers across the state found that roughly half of those subsidies went to for-profit trade schools, even when community colleges offered free or low-cost courses nearby. In some cases, graduates of these trade schools earned less than $30,000 a year.
In the eastern half of Fresno County, which includes Reedley, 16 students received a tuition subsidy in the past year to study agriculture, either through a welding or heavy equipment program, according to the Fresno Regional Workforce Development Board. Some attended Lofaro’s regional occupational programs, while others attended Advanced Career Institute and the Institute of Technology, two local for-profit institutions.
Student Felix Nevarez welding a piece of metal during a class. Photo by Larry Valenzuela, CalMatters/CatchLight Local
Fernanda Mendoza, a program coordinator at the job center closest to Reedley, said she recommends the private programs over the public ones because the for-profit schools provide students with “more of that one-on-one interaction.”
A hodgepodge of job training options create barriers for students
Over the past decade, state leaders have tried to revamp the career training system to foster collaboration. But critics say the interventions have created more bureaucracy and made few real changes.
In 2015, California created the Adult Education Program, which today sends out over $650 million a year on the condition that each region administers the money through a consortium of local adult schools, community colleges, and regional occupational programs.
The following year, the state created the Strong Workforce Program, which sends over $100 million a year to 72 community college districts.
Then, in 2018, California launched the K-12 Strong Workforce Program, but to ensure that high schools and colleges work together, the money flows through another regional network — which is different from the adult education consortia.
These three programs are just a fraction of the billions California taxpayers spent on career education in the past five years. Many agencies — including the state’s Education Department, Community Colleges Chancellor’s Office, Labor and Workforce Development Agency, and Rehabilitation Department — all have additional pots of money for similar programs.
A medical dummy lies on a bed for a nursing assistant class at Reedley High School. Photo by Larry Valenzuela, CalMatters/CatchLight Local
In Reedley, Lofaro said he applies for many of these grants. One of his competitors is another regional occupational program, which works with a different set of K-12 school districts in Fresno County.
Last year, Assemblymember Muratsuchi unsuccessfully proposed a bill that would merge the K-12 Strong Workforce Program with another, existing program run by the state’s Education Department.
The governor’s office hasn’t made any of its recommendations public, but it’s led forums across the state about the new plan. Kathy Booth is the director of the Center for Economic Mobility at WestEd, a nonprofit organization, and she helped the governor’s office engage with the public. In the hearing with Muratsuchi, she shared feedback from local leaders, who said the state’s workforce systems have created barriers for students.
“If you are a person who gets a partial training in one area, and then you need to get to a different area, it’s almost impossible to make that jump,” she told lawmakers. “And that is really underscored by this incredible lack of coordination between funding and underlying data.”
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Adam Echelman covers California’s community colleges in partnership with Open Campus, a nonprofit newsroom focused on higher education.
Financial support for this story was provided by the Smidt and Irvine foundations.
