A gentle genius who remembered everything about everything: history, trains, computers, you name it.

He was born Nov. 7, 1952 and raised in Santa Paula, Calif. After serving in the Army, he became an airplane mechanic, then a trainer of mechanics at American Eagle in San Luis Obispo. When that job was moved to Texas, he transferred to his other favorite subject, computer technician. He worked for Humboldt Superior Court in the IT department from 1999 until his retirement in 2014.

Ken and I met in 1970 at YMCA camp. He was horsey-man and I was the storekeeper. We have been together since, married in 1972. He loved trains; believing the world would be better off with more use of trains – hauling goods and people. He was computer tech to many friends – there just wasn’t anything he couldn’t figure out.

He was also an avid reader, especially enjoying Neal Stephenson, Jack McDevitt and William Gibson. Their fascinating stories really made him think – he would refer to their stories many times, relating them to current issues.

Ken was recently diagnosed with renal cancer that had metastasized to other organs. He was about to start medical treatment when he suffered a pulmonary embolism on Sunday November 28, passing away on December 1.

He leaves behind his wife Jackie and loving sister, Charlene. He also leaves three beloved cats: Robin, Emy, and Smudge. They cuddled on him constantly, enjoying that soft, sweet warmth.

How can you sum up a person in a short little obituary? He was my comfort and calm, my other half in every way possible.

He would appreciate any donation to any worthy cause, but a couple of his favorites were Farmer Veteran Coalition and North Valley Animal Disaster Group in Chico, Calif.

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The obituary above was submitted on behalf of Ken Parks’ loved ones. The Lost Coast Outpost runs obituaries of Humboldt County residents at no charge. See guidelines here.

PREVIOUSLY:

• Sheriff’s Deputies Allegedly Find Meth, Heroin, Weed and a Loaded Revolver During Probation Check
• Search of Eureka Probationer’s Apartment Nets Loads of Weed, Hidden Room Containing Meth and Hash Lab, Say Eureka Police

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Holdridge in a 2017 Sheriff’s Office booking photo.

Brent Holdridge, a 56-year-old Eureka man, has been arrested on federal charges connected with the Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol Building in Washington, D.C.

According to a returned arrest warrant — find it here — the suspect surrendered to federal authorities in Alameda County yesterday.

Holdridge was previously arrested on several drug-related crimes here in Humboldt County, and had been scheduled to be in jail at the time of the Capitol insurrection.

According to an affidavit from Special Agent Randall Watts of the FBI’s Fortuna field office, Holdridge was initially tied to the riot via cell phone records gathered in its wake. The records showed a device connected with Holdridge’s number entering the building on that day, and traveling up and over a terrace and into the main building.

Afterward, the FBI secured a picture of Holdridge from the local booking system searched through footage from the day and found several images of a person agents suspected to be him.

Agent Watts says he then interviewed the suspect’s probation officer, who told him that Holdridge had been scheduled to go to Humboldt County Jail on a drugs charge out of Arcata on Dec. 5, 2020, but had earlier been given permission to travel to Louisiana to visit his ailing mother. Holdridge didn’t show up for his booking date, and was eventually arrested by the APD in February.

The probation officer identified the person in the Capitol surveillance footage that the FBI had searched as Holdridge, Watts writes, and said that Holdridge had previously admitted to traveling to the District of Columbia for Jan. 6.

According to the affadavit:

During one of his in-person visits with HOLDRIDGE, which occurred on or about July 28, 2021 outside the probation office in Eureka, HOLDRIDGE admitted to being present at the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021. HOLDRIDGE told [the probation officer] he traveled to Washington, D.C. with a friend and was present that day at the U.S. Capitol. HOLDRIDGE stated he was outside the U.S. Capitol and watched the activities from there but did not participate in any illegal activity. During that same conversation, HOLDRIDGE showed Medley multiple photographs (from his cell phone) of his trip to the U.S. Capitol.

Later, Watts met with Holdridge himself at the county probation office. According to the affadavit, the interview went like this:

HOLDRIDGE confirmed that on January 6, 2021, he arrived at the U.S. Capitol from the west side and observed the plastic fencing and barricades set up outside on the Capitol grounds, as well as law enforcement dressed in full riot gear. He stated that when he arrived law enforcement had begun deploying “tear gas” as people were making their way up the Capitol stairs and into the building. He refused to answer whether or not he entered the Capitol building, and stated that he did not steal anything, touch or assault anyone, or damage any property while he was at the Capitol that day.

I showed him an image, taken from U.S. Capitol surveillance video on January 6, 2021, of a man standing on the railing of the staircase to the Upper West Terrace of the Capitol with a flag in his hand. HOLDRIDGE refused to identify anyone in the photo, but stated that he purchased the flag shown in the photo from a vender who was at the “Stop the Steal” rally.

The U.S. Attorney’s Office in San Francisco has charged Holdridge with the following crimes:

• 18 U.S.C. § 1752(a)(1)- Entering and Remaining in a Restricted Building or Grounds;
• 18 U.S.C. § 1752(a)(2)- Disorderly and Disruptive Conduct in a Restricted Building or Grounds;
• 40 U.S.C. § 5104(e)(2)(D)- Disorderly Conduct in a Capitol Building;
• 40 U.S.C. § 5104(e)(2)(G)- Parading, Demonstrating, or Picketing in a Capitol Building.

The first two charges each carry a maximum sentence of a year in prison, a $100,000 fine and a year of probation, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office. The latter two carry maximum sentences of six months in prison and a fine of $5,000.

Comes now a YouTuber who goes by the handle of “Bay Area Transparency,” with 147k subscribers, who travels around Northern California getting into arguments with the police, dancing up to the very line of what is legal in order to demonstrate, with his body, that the line exists.

The other day he dropped in on Arcata to conduct what he calls a “First Amendment audit” and to see what kind of fun he could gin up for his loyal fans.

Jackpot! As he films in the Arcata Police Department parking lot, an officer walks out and asks Bay Area Transparency to step to the side while he gets into his patrol vehicle. Our man refuses, on the grounds that he has the right to be there, and to film, and that he is not obstructing the officer’s entry into the car. Several minutes of stupid ensue, during which backup is summoned and both sides try and fail to reach across their rhetorical divide.

Bay Area Transparency seems like not such a bad sort — a little doofy, but earnest. Is he correct about the law? Yes, he is correct. Is the officer being ridiculous? He’s being at least a little bit ridiculous. Are some cops bluff and imperious, sometimes, when they probably have no need or right to be? News flash: Yes.

But is our YouTuber making things better? Is he contributing to peace and amity and the overall happiness level of everyone involved, and of the world at large? Despite his absolutely correct illustration of various laws governing police-civilian interaction, it’s difficult to see the case.

Look at it this way. If a homeless person said, politely, that they’d feel more comfortable if you were to move three steps to the left and you had no reason not to, would you do it? Of course you would. You’re not an asshole. You wouldn’t refuse that small request simply to agitate the homeless person, and then to film the homeless person getting worked up to make some content for the YouTube channel you pretend not to have.

For me, it seems obvious that the unspoken actor in this silly drama is: Guns. The officer doesn’t want his hands occupied with door handles, nor his body in an awkward getting-in-the-car position, while a person acts oddly in front of him. Is this unreasonable? Not completely, especially when you consider that an odd-acting person muttering about cleaning the Mexicans out of McKinleyville opened fire on Arcata police officers only a couple of months ago. (You’ll say that it’s easy for you to tell the one type of odd-acting person from the other. Good for you.)

So this video is a little parable of America in 2021. You have a righteous kid traveling the state to provoke cops for YouTube content — and to teach them lessons about the law, and life! — and you have a cop irrationally (but maybe not completely irrationally?) fearing for his physical safety in small moments as he tries to go about his day. The good guy with the gun must constantly be at the ready to draw, lest the other guy get the drop. Great job, everyone.

For his part, Arcata Police Chief Brian Ahearn put on the hair shirt when the Times-Standard contacted him for the story. “The culture that I’m trying to instill here within the organization is such that we would have managed that contact differently,” Ahearn said, promising a complete and thorough investigation of the incident. “And because we didn’t, it clearly tells me that I have failed.” 

PREVIOUSLY: EUREKA’S PRECIOUS: Did You Know that the One Ring to Rule Them All — One of ‘Em, Anyway — Lives at Eureka City Hall?

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As further evidenced by the release just issued by the City of Eureka, we truly can’t have nice things. Read the bummer news below:

On November 29, 2021, around 6:20 a.m., officers with the Eureka Police Department responded to a report of a commercial burglary at City Hall.

After a full review, it was determined that the suspects were not able to access financial data, the City’s IT network, historical documents or personnel records during their time in the building. Several small items were missing however many of these items were recovered elsewhere in the building. City staff have been working on compiling a list of missing items for the investigation and reviewing video camera footage.

One of the suspects removed the replica “Lord of the Ring” ring that was gifted to the City by Nelson, New Zealand, the City’s sister city in 2004. The maker of the ring, Jens Hansen, a New Zealand based jewelry maker made a limited number of the rings for the Lord of the Ring trilogy and Eureka’s ring is number 2 of 100.

36-year-old Kenneth Amin Mohamed, of Eureka, was found inside of the facility and arrested on felony burglary charges.

Eureka Police is actively investigating the burglary and has questioned additional suspects. A $1,000 reward is being offered to anyone who provides information leading to the recovery of “The Ring”. Anyone with information is asked to contact Detective Sergeant Terry Liles at 441-4010 or tliles@ci.eureka.ca.gov.

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An Arcata motorist somehow managed to completely mis-navigate a bend in the road that wends through the Arcata Marsh, sending their vehicle up and over a levy and then ass over teakettle into McDaniel Slough.

Emily Sinkhorn, Arcata’s environmental services director, said the semi-submerged VW hatchback was reported to authorities this morning as the sun rose and the fog lifted. The Arcata Police Department called out a tow truck, and the vehicle had been pulled back onto the roadway by the time Sinkhorn arrived.

“We called the [Environmental Protection Agency’s] National Response Center, which is a network that anybody can call if they observe an oil spill,” she said. (You can also notify local agencies, Sinkhorn suggested.)

An environmental services crew from the city responded quickly, placing booms along the edge of the levy to prevent oil or other contaminants from sliding into the slough as the vehicle was pulled from the mud.

A member of Coast Guard Sector Humboldt Bay’s Marine Environment Protection unit came to the scene to assess the situation, as did personnel from Humboldt County Environmental Health and the California Natural Resources Agency’s Office of Spill Prevention and Response.

“We definitely have environmental concerns as the marsh is such an important habitat and sensitive area,” Sinkhorn said. “But both the Coast Guard and state and local spill response [teams] said the city did all we could do and it likely was only gasoline that leaked [into the water]. They said the most prudent response is to let the marsh break down those materials [because] active recovery of that level of spill would do more harm than letting the ecosystem recover on its own.”

Arcata Police Officer Luke Scown said there was nobody inside the vehicle. The owner has not yet been identified.

For reader reference, you can contact the National Response Center at: 800-424-8802.

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News comes to us this Friday morning that a challenger has arisen for the office of Humboldt County Clerk-Recorder/Registrar of Voters. Juan Pablo Cervantes will challenge incumbent Kelly Sanders in next year’s election.

CORRECTION: Turns out Sanders will not seek re-election. She told the Outpost this morning that she originally planned on sticking around for a third term in office (she’s about a year away from wrapping up her second) but decided she’s ready to move on to other chapters.

“You can buy a lot of things in life but you can’t buy more time,” she said.

Sanders has worked in the county Elections Office since 2005. She was elected in 2014 and her second term will end in January 2023.

Here’s a press release from the Cervantes campaign:

Today, Elections Specialist for the Humboldt County Office of Elections, Juan Pablo Cervantes, announced his candidacy for the office of the Clerk, Recorder & Registrar of Voters. On December 4th, the public is cordially invited to come by the campaign booth at the December Arts Alive! event in Eureka to get to know the candidate.

“I’m running for County Clerk, Recorder and Registrar of Voters because I’m passionate about transparent, accessible and efficient government. The previous two recorders have been paragons in fulfilling those same values and I believe that I can build on the foundation that they’ve set.

The past few years have highlighted the importance of transparency, accessibility, and efficiency in local governance. Whether that’s in combating misinformation with increased transparency, furthering access through online services, or finding efficiencies in how we do business that allow for more staff time to provide person-to-person help navigating bureaucratic processes.

I’m committed to ensuring that this office continues functioning with the public at the forefront of our policy making.” Cervantes said.
This is one of several offices that will be on the ballot for the June 7th, 2022 Gubernatorial Primary Election.

The office is comprised of two main roles:

The Clerk-Recorder is responsible for the maintenance and accuracy of vital records of the residents of Humboldt County; records that establish the facts of birth, death, property, ownership, contractual agreements, and wills.

The Registrar of Voters is responsible for the operation, administration, and direction of the Elections Office, with primary responsibility for the registration of voters, the holding of elections, and all matters pertaining to elections for the people of Humboldt County.

In these two capacities, Juan Pablo looks forward to continuing the tradition of democracy and accessibility in Humboldt County. Please direct all inquiries and comments to electjuancervantes@gmail.com.

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Though California’s impending COVID-19 vaccine requirement for all in-person students comes as a relief to many parents, it’s no secret that others are appalled with the mandate. Humboldt has its fair share of such folks. 

Three local parents are building their own “Learning Center,” called Novae Terrae Alliance, for the children of parents who oppose current mask mandates and impending vaccine mandates for California students. A since-deleted Nov. 20 public Facebook post by parent Sara Autumn-Breeze Smith detailed plans for the center. 

“Novae Terrae Alliance is a Private Member Association, where all of our members constitutional & birth rights are put first. Medical Freedom and Sovereignty are a priority at Novae Terrae!” the post read.

According to the post and subsequent comments, Novae Terrae’s founders recently signed a lease and received keys to the center’s location, a former church in Eureka. They’ve hired two credentialed teachers and plan to start offering a mandate-free “K-5th grade education program” Monday-Thursday in January. “Planning recreational classes for Friday Fundays and Parent Night Out events on weekends/evenings!” the post said. 

According to a GoFundMe page for the center, launched this week with a goal of $50,000, the space will accommodate 30 children. Comments from the original Facebook post said that the founders are considering expanding the grade range to preschool through 12th grade, and intend to open more Novae Terrae Alliance locations around Humboldt County. 

In October, California became the first state to announce that the COVID-19 vaccine will be added to the list of required shots for all students attending public or private schools in-person. The mandate will likely take effect on July 1, 2022, depending on how soon a vaccine is fully approved by the Food and Drug Administration; right now, the Pfizer vaccine is under emergency use authorization for people aged 5 to 15. Once in effect, regular testing will no longer be an alternative option to vaccination in schools. 

Novae Terrae Alliance cannot legally be a school — in part because even private schools are subject to the state’s vaccine mandate. Instead, the center is a private membership association, faith-based organization and a nonprofit, its founders say. The organization is not currently registered in California as a 501(c)(3) (but getting nonprofit status can take a while).

Because the center is not technically a school, it is unclear how enrollment will legally work. All students in California must be enrolled in public or private school, or be homeschooled. 

We reached out to Smith to ask that question and others, like whether the center will have a COVID-19 outbreak protocol. Smith declined an interview, but did say: “Novae Terrae Alliance is a Private Membership Association & our private business is for the purpose of conducting all manners of private business with the association or its members & not disclosed to the general public. Anyone who is interested can contact us directly @ Novae.Terrae.Alliance@gmail.com.”

Alexandria Madrid, who, with Smith, is an admin of a Novae Terrae Alliance Facebook Group, didn’t respond to an interview request.

Humboldt County Superintendent of Schools Michael Davies-Hughes hadn’t yet heard of the center when the Outpost reached out. 

“I can’t speak to the specifics of how such a learning center would be set up, but I can say that any indoor classroom-type setting where students are in close contact for extended periods of time unmasked is not in alignment with current mandates from CDPH and Humboldt County Public Health,” Davies-Hughes said. “One of our primary responsibilities as a county office of education is to support Humboldt County school districts in providing a safe and healthy learning environment for all students.”

“I wonder if this new learning center will require students to be tested regularly for COVID-19.”

Public Health continues to urge vaccination for all eligible age groups, and maintains that the vaccine is the best protection against a serious case of COVID-19. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention continues to recommend that unvaccinated folks older than 2 mask in public or crowded indoor spaces.