Humboldt County Department of Health and Human Services:

Public and Environmental Health officials are working to contain local cases of the gastrointestinal illness Shigella bacteria, after three lab-confirmed cases and two more suspected cases infected Eureka residents during the past month.

The cases span multiple households, infecting school-age children and adults, including a person experiencing homelessness.

Officials believe the virus bacterial infection may have been spread through one or more Eureka laundromats, after an infected person washed contaminated clothing at the facility.

Environmental Health officials are working closely with the operators of the two laundromats, the Self-Serve Laundromat on Summer Street and Eureka Laundromat on Little Fairfield Street, to make sure their facilities are cleaned and disinfected properly. 

Shigella germs are found in stool, and infection is spread by eating food or drinking liquids contaminated by an infected person, or when a person touches a contaminated surface or object and then touches their mouth or puts the object into their mouth. People infected with shigellosis typically experience a fever, abdominal cramps and diarrhea which may be bloody.

Onset of shigellosis symptoms usually occurs one to two days after exposure—but may take longer—and lasts around a week. Infected people can remain contagious up to six weeks after symptoms resolve. 

Most people with shigellosis recover completely without severe complications. In rare cases Shigella may cause bloodstream infections, seizures, kidney failure or arthritis.

The best way to prevent the spread of shigellosis is to wash hands:

• Before, during and after preparing food
• Before eating
• Before and after caring for someone who is sick
• After using the toilet
• After blowing your nose, coughing or sneezing
• After touching garbage
• After changing diapers or cleaning up a child who has used the toilet
• After touching an animal, animal feed or animal waste
• After handling pet food or pet treats.

People with shigellosis should:

• Stay home from school or from health care, food service or childcare jobs while sick
• Abstain from sharing food
• Abstain from swimming and hot tubs
• Abstain from having sex for at least two weeks after symptoms resolve. 

If you are experiencing symptoms, contact your primary care provider or call Public Health at 707-445-6200. 

Anthony Pritchett, a senior at Nevada Union High, sat nervously at a school board meeting on Tuesday night as angry crowds yelled at each other over a vote to violate state law and lift the mask mandate for its students.

“There was just a lot of yelling,” he said. “It was very hostile. When the resolution was passed at the end, there was a roar of applause and yelling that lasted for at least a minute.”

As debates over mask and vaccine mandates heat up, the polarization is extending into student life in California. Students on both sides are being harassed for their beliefs, while education officials caught in the crossfire have to reconcile how to enforce COVID-19 protocols and provide an education to all students. Meanwhile, a Feb. 28 update from state officials about school masking policy looms.

“Friend groups have fractured over this,” said 18-year-old Pritchett, who serves as a student member on the board at Nevada Joint Union High School District, about 60 miles northeast of Sacramento.

“There’s a lot of tension on campus,” he said. “There are frequent protests and walkouts mainly in opposition to vaccines and masks.”

On Thursday, the 2,600-student district shut down schools because so many teachers called in sick in response to the vote. Making masks optional violated an agreement between the district and the teachers union, which states that any changes to safety protocols must be negotiated.

“The overwhelming message is that teachers don’t feel supported,” said teachers’ union president Eric Mayer. “They’re given an impossible decision to defy the board or defy state law.”

Nevada Joint Union High School District isn’t the first in California to make masking indoors at school optional. Leaders at several other districts made the decision in recent weeks in response to growing anger from parents and community members, especially as the state lifted other mask mandates for vaccinated individuals.

Research has been clear that face coverings reduce the risk of spread and vaccines reduce transmission and help prevent serious illness. And, according to a new poll, most California voters support mask and vaccine mandates for schools.

Students and educators say their school communities are already beyond the breaking point.

“The state said we’re going to keep masks on in schools, but we have no effective mechanisms to enforce it,” said Brett McFadden, superintendent of Nevada Joint Union High, before Tuesday’s vote. “If we have any disruption right now, we can’t call the police. We have no one to call.”

Students enter the fray

One day a week, 16-year-old Kinsey Hage refuses to wear a mask to school. She calls it “Freedom Fridays.” Hage, a junior at Bella Vista High School in the San Juan Unified School District near Sacramento, started the protest alone in January. Now, over 100 of her peers participate.

“It’s really frustrating to know that celebrities and adults can go to the Super Bowl unmasked,” she said. “I honestly think it’s so ridiculous and unfair.”

While some friends and teachers support her, Hage said her beliefs and activism has ended friendships and hurt relationships with other teachers.

“All these friends I’ve known since middle school won’t acknowledge me any more,” she said. “I started eating with some new friends.”

Then there’s the more unpleasant encounters both at school and on social media.

“I’ve had kids at school literally tell me to kill myself,” she said. “They’ll say ‘wear your mask,’ or they’ll just cuss me out.”

Jaxson Barrett, a 17-year-old at Carlsbad High School near San Diego, says he’s been denied entry into his classroom for two weeks for refusing to wear a mask.

“I was just tired of wearing them,” he said. “I wanted to see what happened. I went into class, and I got kicked out immediately.”

He said he’s been sitting outside for the entire school day trying to keep up with his assignments, despite the cold and rainy weather. About 10 students eventually joined him.

Other students across California have been calling for stricter enforcement of masking and more access to vaccinations and high-quality masks.

Michael Lee-Chang, a senior at Redondo Union High School in Los Angeles County, has been vocal on social media about maintaining safety protocols on campuses. He joined hundreds of students in a January walkout to urge school leaders to reinforce masking and physical distancing in classrooms.

Lee-Chang’s activism has led others to bully him, he says. The 18-year-old has become a target of harassment from conservative parents on social media. Students have dropped cartons of milk on his head, he said, adding that he now walks a different path to his classes to avoid certain groups of students.

“Every time I pass them, they yell, ‘unmask the kids!’” he said. “In a perfect world, everyone would be vaccinated, and we would be testing on a daily basis, but we don’t live in that world.”

Educators have their hands tied

Teachers and school district officials are trapped in a bind between public health and education laws.

If a student refuses to wear a mask, teachers have to remove that student from the classroom or risk losing their credentials for violating state law. But at the same time, school districts are required to provide instruction to all students.

And while at-home, independent study is an option for these students, parents must opt in. When parents refuse, state education laws require that the student be placed in a classroom. Education officials like Gayle Garbolino-Mojica, superintendent at the Placer County Office of Education, feel there’s no way out of this loop.

“We’re caught in a Catch-22,” Garbolino-Mojica said. “In reality, nobody wants to physically remove children.”

Ultimately, some teachers are keeping students outside, while others are just letting them into class. Apart from the legal and logistical challenges, the damage to relationships between educators and their students might be irreparable. Educators statewide worry about whether public education can recover.

“I will say that the fabric of our schools are deteriorating minute by minute,” Garbolino-Mojica said. “I’m personally worried and concerned about what our communities will look like once this is over.”

Parents across the state are sharing online instructions about how students can defy masking rules. Let Them Breathe, an anti-mask mandate advocacy group, posted some of these resources on its website. Younger students are memorizing scripts at Saugus Union School District, a K-6 district in Los Angeles County, according to Superintendent Colleen Hawkins.

“Today, across the district there’s probably about 85 students who refused to wear masks,” Hawkins said on Tuesday. “They say, ‘it’s my First Amendment right.’”

Because her district serves mostly younger children, Hawkins said teachers and administrators are careful not to scold or punish these students.

“We just can’t have them in the room with their peers,” she said.

Hawkins and several other district leaders across California say they’ve written to the governor and other lawmakers to ask that they lift the indoor mask mandate for schools and to keep a personal belief exemption for the COVID-19 vaccination requirement.

Two years into the pandemic, local education officials are more willing to risk sacrificing safety protocols to maintain order in their communities.

“I’m worried about the frustration that everybody’s feeling, and what that will mean for public education,” said Hawkins. “I don’t know how communities will continue to trust their local school districts.”

Local leaders defying the state

A handful of school districts haven’t waited for state officials to loosen regulations.

“For me, it started with the governor’s press conference, when he said that he’s going to lift the mandate for everyone, except for school children and teachers,” said Jee Manghani, board president at Rancho Santa Fe School District in San Diego County.

His school board voted Monday to make masks optional for students. Manghani and other district leaders said the benefits outweigh the risks.

“I already felt confident that even if the state didn’t agree, we were making the right decision,” said board vice president Annette Ross.

At Nevada Joint Union High School, it remains unclear when teachers will start returning to school. Teachers union president Mayer said the teacher absences are not an organized effort.

For some board members, giving into the anti-mask crowd not only breaks state law but also sets a precedent for the looming vaccine mandate. The California Department of Public Health will require students to be vaccinated once the FDA fully approves the vaccine for their age groups. Students may need to be immunized by as early as July 1.

Jamie Reeves, a board member at Nevada Joint Union, voted to keep the masking requirement to honor the district’s agreement with its teachers. She said it’s an unfortunate precedent to set, but she concedes that trying to enforce statewide COVID-19 mandates is taking too much time and energy away from educators.

“I left that meeting feeling heartbroken,” she said. “But how much time do we spend dealing with this, and how much time do we spend getting kids educated?”

Pritchett, who’s had more than half of his high school career disrupted by the pandemic, said that compromising safety might be the only way to have peace.

“I do wish this culture war could have been fought somewhere else,” he said. “It’s a huge distraction to education.”

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

Deondray Moore sat in a plastic folding chair, rolled up his sleeve and got his first COVID-19 shot in the parking lot of Center of Hope Community Church in Oakland a week ago. He was the last in his family to get vaccinated after putting it off for more than a year, and only acquiesced because he wants to be in the delivery room when his son is born this summer.

“My mom has been trying to get me vaccinated forever, since the (vaccines) came out,” Moore said. “My partner got it quick, and her kids got it as fast as they could. She wasn’t playing around. She was like ‘Don’t miss out on the baby.’”

The 35-year-old Oakland native, an African American, knows multiple people who have contracted COVID-19 and died. Moore wears a mask and doesn’t go out much. But he’s suspicious of the vaccine and the way it was developed. “I just don’t trust the government,” he said.

African Americans, who have a litany of historical reasons to mistrust public health officials and doctors, have the lowest vaccination rate in the state, at 55%.

COVID-19 has become deadlier for Black Californians since the widespread availability of vaccinations, and vaccine hesitancy could be among the reasons why. Other races, which have higher vaccination rates, have seen death rates rise, but not as dramatically.

A CalMatters analysis shows since last summer, the rate of Black Californians dying from COVID-19 has increased tenfold — from one death per 100,000 people last July to 10.4 deaths this week. That surpasses Latinos and all races except Pacific Islanders, who are dying at the rate of 14.7 per 100,000, according to state data.

And while statewide deaths from COVID have declined in the past week, they have continued to rise for African Americans.

So far, 5,544 Black people have died from the virus in California.

Dr. Kim Rhoads, an associate professor of epidemiology at University of California, San Francisco, said she isn’t surprised by the growing death rate among African Americans. “Disparities aren’t new. They aren’t new to COVID,” said Rhoads, who helped organize the community clinic where Moore got his shot.

For some Black residents, the disparity grew worse after vaccines became widely available last summer, according to a study from UC Santa Cruz and UC San Francisco researchers.

Middle-aged Blacks make up a growing, disproportionate share of the Californians who died, while the proportion shrank for Latinos and others: In March 2021, Black people aged 40-64, who make up roughly 5% of all middle-aged Californians, accounted for 6% of COVID-19 deaths in that age group. But a few months later, their numbers skyrocketed, accounting for 21% by last July, according to the study.

In contrast, middle-aged Latinos accounted for 66% of all COVID-19 deaths at the beginning of March 2021, but then last July shrank to 30%, mirroring their proportion of all middle-aged Californians.

Lead researcher Alicia Riley said preliminary data through November shows continuing disparities.

So why did the vaccines apparently help Latinos but not Black Californians? It’s possible that those who are most at risk of dying from the disease aren’t getting vaccinated. Younger African Americans also may not have been included in early vaccination campaigns or may have felt they weren’t at risk of severe illness or death.

“What’s puzzling to me is that they have a really different story in terms of who’s dying,” said Riley, a UCSC assistant professor of global and community health. “Are the people who were at risk of dying in the Latino community actually being reached with vaccination, whereas somehow that’s not happening for Black Californians as effectively?”

Experts say myriad other factors could also be driving the trend, including poverty, lack of insurance, distrust of the health care system and higher rates of health complications like diabetes or heart disease.

The increased share of deaths for Black Californians is a powerful sign of “who was left behind when everyone else was kind of moving on out of the pandemic,” Riley said.

The study did not find significant differences for other age groups, although state data suggests Black children fare worse than other races, too.

Black children in California are the second most likely to die from the virus among Californians younger than 18, with 1.2 deaths per 100,000 Black children. Pacific Islanders are twice as likely to die from COVID as Black children, while all other races have less than one COVID-19 death per 100,000 children.

The drivers for African American deaths are likely deeper than vaccination disparities.

Dr. Kim Rhoads has helped set up the Umoja Health pop-up clinic in Oakland to vaccinate Black residents. Photo by Marissa Leshnov for CalMatters

Rhoads, who studies death disparities in Black cancer patients, said pre-existing health complications also aren’t entirely to blame. Structural factors like poor quality health care also likely contribute to higher death rates, she said. For instance, medical devices like the pulse oximeter, which is used to determine whether a patient needs supplemental oxygen, don’t work well on dark skin.

“If we just say comorbidities, then we’re blaming the victim number one and we’re washing our hands of any responsibility,” Rhoads said.

Vaccine campaigns successful for some

Substantial gains have been made among Latinos, according to Riley’s study. After bearing the brunt in the early stages, Latinos’ death rate dropped from nearly 25 deaths per 100,000 people in January 2021 to 1 death per 100,000 in July. Over the last month, the California Department of Public Health estimates 7.2 Latinos died of COVID per 100,000 people, lower than the statewide rate of 8 per 100,000.

Around June 2021 the percentage of fully vaccinated Latinos outstripped Blacks and Native Americans, leaving Blacks in last place. Only 57% of Latinos are fully vaccinated, but some hard hit agricultural areas like Imperial County were quick to accept the vaccine — and it has made a difference.

Eduardo Garcia, senior policy manager for the Latino Community Foundation, said high death rates among Latinos early in the pandemic galvanized local groups and clinics to dole out vaccines and combat misinformation.

“Over 34,000 California Latinos have died since the beginning of the pandemic,” Garcia said. “It touched people close to home. I think that also created an impulse for people to get information from reliable sources and get the vaccine.”

COVID-19 “touched people close to home. I think that also created an impulse for people to get information from reliable sources and get the vaccine.”

Eduardo Garcia, Latino Community Foundation

Rhoads said refocusing COVID-19 vaccination messaging on preventing deaths rather than infections is important for equity, particularly since getting her community to trust the vaccine has been harder.

“It’s about a historical relationship between Black people and public health and health care,” Rhoads said. “Instead of saying lack of trust, I’m saying there’s no relationship there, so there should be no expectation of trust.”

That trust was further shaken last spring when the Food and Drug Administration warned of rare but severe side effects associated with the Johnson and Johnson vaccine. Rhoads said the number of people seeking vaccinations at her clinic dropped precipitously.

To help bridge the gap, Rhoads founded Umoja Health, a collective of community and faith-based organizations in the Bay Area, to make COVID-19 testing and vaccination easy and accessible for African Americans. They bring pop-up clinic supplies to churches, schools and neighborhoods where they know vaccination rates are low. It takes patience and continued effort, Rhoads said.

With mask restrictions loosening, the Umoja Health clinic in Oakland has seen less demand for vaccines and COVID-19 testing. Photo by Marissa Leshnov for CalMatters

At Castlemont High School in Oakland, where the clinic frequently sets up shop, it was several weeks before many Black students trusted them enough to get the vaccine.

“The Latino students came immediately,” she said. “But as we’ve been there over time, we’re starting to see more and more of the African American students come through, and then we started to see people bringing their parents.”

‘Back to normal’ threatens Blacks and Pacific Islanders

Gov. Gavin Newsom’s recent announcement that California would be moving into a new phase of the pandemic worries advocates and community health organizers like Rhoads.

The new state action plan acknowledges continuing disparities when it comes to COVID-19 deaths and highlights money in Newsom’s budget that includes $819 million to expand Medi-Cal to undocumented individuals next year, $1.7 billion to invest in a more diverse health care workforce over five years and $65 million to fund the creation of an office of community partnerships and strategic communication.

But the plan offers little in terms of immediate action to fix disparities, and includes no specific programs to help Black communities.

The state health department on Thursday announced new $27 million contracts would be awarded to more than 100 community-based health organizations to shore up vaccination efforts in underserved communities, including African American ones.

However, community advocates worry that rhetoric used by Newsom like “turning the page” on the pandemic will ultimately prevent groups that have never caught up from moving forward.

“We still have growing death rates and case rates. How can we move forward in the pandemic when we’re still suffering?” said Karla Thomas, policy director for the UCLA Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander COVID-19 Data Policy Lab.

Throughout the pandemic, Pacific Islanders have been hit the hardest by COVID-19. Their mortality rate is nearly twice that of the statewide rate and nearly six times higher than the lowest rate of 2.5 deaths per 100,000 people among those who identify as multi-racial.

While data suggests that Pacific Islanders are nearly 100% vaccinated, Thomas said there is reason to believe that the state’s numbers are inaccurate. At times that number has creeped above 100%. From a personal experience, Thomas said she is one of only two people in her 50-person Samoan church in San Bernardino that she knows is vaccinated. It’s not uncommon for there to be more than two funerals a month in her community.

“I’m really concerned that we’re not taking an equitable approach to mitigate the pandemic among (Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander) communities and other communities of color,” Thomas said. She criticized the lifting of the state’s mask mandate on Feb. 15 and the governor’s endemic plan.

Rhoads echoed Thomas’ sentiments.

The pandemic “is not over. It’s not for people who aren’t vaccinated, who don’t have regular health care,” she said.

Last week Rhoads and more than 35 organizations sent a letter to the state health department in part criticizing the state’s inconsistent and confusing messaging on masking. The health department’s initial criteria for lifting the indoor mask mandate included vaccination and infection rates that were unmet when the mandate expired.

Rhoads said instances like this erode public trust in government and scientific organizations, particularly among groups that placed little faith in the institutions to begin with.

In response, the department agreed to schedule a meeting between Rhoads and State Public Health Officer Dr. Tomas Aragon.

In a separate response to CalMatters, the state health department said vaccine equity was the “north star” of its efforts to reach marginalized communities, and that it would continue to partner with community organizations, ethnic media, translators and faith-based groups.

“This work is ongoing, and closing the equity gap across all California communities remains a priority to the state’s vaccination efforts,” the department said in a statement.

‘Nothing to be afraid of’

In Oakland at the Umoja clinic last week, George Dowell, a 40-year-old African American, said he was getting his second vaccination dose because he didn’t “want to be left behind” as more and more businesses require proof of vaccination for entry.

Dowell is among the age group experiencing higher death rates in Riley’s study. He spent the past year watching vaccinated friends and family carefully for side effects before deciding to get the shot himself.

Deondray Moore, 35, receives the COVID-19 vaccine at Umoja Health pop-up clinic in Oakland. Moore said he decided to get vaccinated so that he could join his partner in the delivery room when their first child is born in June. He takes the virus seriously — “it’s serious man. People do need to take precautions” — but he waited to be vaccinated because he was skeptical about the safety of the vaccines. Photo by Marissa Leshnov for CalMatters

Social media and misinformation played a role in Dowell’s hesitation. “I was listening to certain people, social media, instead of listening to myself and doing what’s right,” Dowell said.

Three weeks ago, he decided it was time. He found the Umoja clinic while driving around the neighborhood and got his first Pfizer shot. Dowell wanted to show his school-aged nieces and nephews that “there was nothing to be afraid of” as they became eligible for the vaccine.

Dowell’s 27-year-old son is also unvaccinated, and Dowell said he promised he would call to let him know how he feels after this second shot.

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

Tom Gerald Evans was born in the Methodist Hospital in Los Angeles on March 19, 1940 to Murrell and Lilyan Evans. He died on Jan. 2, 2022

Tom was born adventurous. When he was 10 years old, he was written in the Reseda newspaper on August 10, 1950…“He found a rifle shell in a motion picture lot nearby…He took the shell home and attempted to hammer it into his toy gun…it exploded. He was treated for powder burns.” His mom told me that she heard the explosion, her knees went out from under her, so she kept on, crawling to the back door. Tom was coming in, saw her and asked “Why are you crawling on the floor?”

Tom was a member of the Sea Explorers in 1955, along with two of his good friends, Kim Pepperell and Jon Tribur. He graduated from Reseda High School on January 30, 1958. After graduation, he worked at Rocketdyne with another two of his good friends, Wayne Woodhall and Alvin Farless.

Tom’s dad was a firefighter in the Los Angeles City Fire Department. His dad loved the fire service and it inspired Tom to apply. On June 18, 1961, Tom graduated from an eight-week intensive training at the Los Angeles City Fire Department Drill Tower in North Hollywood and received his appointment as a fireman. He became an Inspector three years later, working from Headquarters in Los Angeles.

Tom was in the Air Force Reserve during the same period of time, working as an airplane mechanic. He was also an expert car mechanic; he could fix anything with an engine.

After marrying in September 4, 1965, having three children and having moved seven times in 10 years to different cities in Southern California – from Canoga Park to Sylmar to Pasadena where we lived in 2 different rental homes before buying one in Altadena. Tom worked for the Pasadena Fire Department as an Inspector. Then he applied for a job with the State Fire Marshals office as a Deputy State Fire Marshal. We moved to Hemet for a year, then Livermore for six months, then bought a house on an acre in Brentwood.

Tom liked to do everything himself in all the places we lived. In Brentwood, he fenced and cross-fenced our one-acre farm. He milked the cow, rode our angus bull and horse, fed the animals (goats, sheep, chickens, turkeys), planted and picked the vegetables from our garden, kept the acre, house and animals in top condition all the while he was a full-time fire inspector.

In 1985, we bought a house in Eureka, where we settled permanently. Tom tore up the carpet, installed wood flooring, took out windows and glass doors to put in double-pane, painted the house-inside and out, fenced the yard and outdoor deck, and built a tree-house. He put in an electric garage door opener; got a concrete mixer to put a concrete floor outside to house an outdoor generator which he installed. The kids gave him a shed from Costco; he made a concrete floor and put the shed together. Whatever needed doing, he would do. The only thing he didn’t do but wanted to - was put a new roof on the house - overruled on that dangerous venture!

He was amazingly adept and a perfectionist at everything he did. If he had not done a particular task before, he would read up on how to do it, and did it! He continually amazed all of us at the knowledge he had.

Tom was a well-rounded individual; he was a hiker, a runner, water skiier, cave explorer, mountain/rock climber, 4-wheeler enthusiast, motorcyclist. He liked zip- lining, camping, and enjoyed driving to vacations in California, Oregon, Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico, Washington State, Kentucky… He was a family man, enjoyed life and made it fun and exciting for us all.

Family comments below:

My dad was the strong silent type but we always knew he loved us. There wasn’t a thing he couldn’t do, not a car he couldn’t fix, a house he couldn’t repair, a deck he couldn’t build, a person he wouldn’t love. He was a wonderful example of a loving and loyal husband, a doting and caring father, a fun and adventurous friend. We are thankful for him having lived a long and full life and for him fighting so hard to continue to be with his family in this physical life. Dad was one of a kind.

Dad passed away from end-stage congestive heart failure. We mourn the loss of such an outstanding husband, father, grandfather, uncle and friend. Such a great legacy he left. He was always one of the first people to be there for those around him in need. Over the 57 years of my parent’s marriage, their house was always full because it was a welcoming & loving place of refuge for many in need - from family members & friends, to foster children. He was a man of faith and truly lived his faith actively which made such a positive impact on so many lives. I was blessed to have had the honor of being his ‘Lightning’. (He used to call me & my sister, “Lightning & Thunder”.)

Tom was a saint: loving, forgiving, patient, kind, generous, helpful to all who asked. He was the best husband a woman could ever dream of, or ask for; the best example of a Christian to his children & grandchildren & all who knew him. When he made friends, they were friends forever. He was the love of my life – Almighty God brought us together and kept us together. I will forever be thankful for having had Tom in my life, for his peaceful death and that our family was together when his spirit went back to the God who gave it (Eccl 12:7).

There will be a Celebration of Life at the Wharfinger, 1 Marina Way, Eureka on Sunday March 20 at 11 a.m. to 2 p.m.

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With incumbent Kelly Sanders opting not to seek a third term in office, Humboldt County voters will elect a brand new county clerk-recorder/registrar of voters this year.

To date, three candidates have filed paperwork with the Humboldt County Elections Office in hopes of winning that seat. All three work in either the Clerk-Recorders office or the Humboldt County Elections Office. They are as follows (listed alphabetically by last name): Juan Pablo Cervantes, Benjamin Hershberger and Tiffany Hunt Nielsen.

(A fourth candidate, Samanthia Carns, filed paperwork but quickly dropped out. She told the Outpost in an email that she will be supporting Hershberger, whom she called “the perfect candidate for the position.”)

Some of you may be wondering: What exactly is a county clerk-recorder/registrar of voters? I mean, besides “most cumbersome elected official title in Humboldt.”

It’s really two jobs in one. The clerk-recorder maintains records of vital statistics — birth certificates, death certificates and marriage licenses — and files more mundane documents like fictitious business name statements and notary bonds. 

Incidentally, the clerk-recorder’s staff may have the nicest digs of any county employees. The office, on the fifth floor of the county courthouse, has a row of windows offering a panoramic view of Humboldt Bay and the Samoa Peninsula.

The registrar of voters, meanwhile, is responsible for managing elections, which entails everything from creating ballots to registering voters, recruiting and training poll workers, reserving polling place locations, educating the public, managing candidate filings and ensuring the security of voting systems, including ballot processing and vote tallying.

The importance of that last bit has never been more apparent, given the ongoing traction of Big Lie (that Trump actually won the 2020 election) and subsequent attempts to intimidate election workers and install partisan officials who may be willing to undermine the integrity of the process.

Here’s a brief introduction to each candidate:

Juan Pablo Cervantes

The first candidate to announce, Cervantes is an elections specialist in the county Elections Office, and in a December press release he said he’s running because he’s “passionate about transparent, accessible and efficient government.”

He praised both Sanders and previous clerk-recorder/registrar Carolyn Crnich as “paragons” in fulfilling those values.

On his campaign website Cervantes says he’s worked as a poll worker since high school. As an employee in the Elections Office, he’s played a role in expanding voter security and combating misinformation.

“I’ve developed chain-of-custody protocols for our voting systems, broadcasted the accuracy testing of our voting equipment on livestream and TV, and I continue to serve as Humboldt County’s liaison to the Election Transparency Project,” he said. “I’m excited to build upon our community partnerships and look forward to leveraging my experience to provide Humboldt County with increased transparency, efficiency, and accessibility when it comes to records management and elections administration.”

You can learn more about Cervantes at his campaign website.

Benjamin Hershberger

Having worked for the county since 1996 — and at the clerk-recorder/registrar’s office since 2006 — Hershberger said he thinks he’s the candidate with the most institutional knowledge about the office’s two divisions.

As the office’s fiscal officer, he’s responsible for all the financial components, including purchasing and the budget. He has also served on committees to select voting software and an election management system.

Born and raised in Humboldt County, Hershberger attended McKinleyville High School and Humboldt State University, where he earned his bachelor’s in business administration, with a focus on accounting and a minor in computer information systems.

Reached by phone, he said he’s been mulling a run for the office’s top job for years and believes now’s the right time. 

“I have the experience with both Kelly Sanders and Carolyn Crnich, so I understand where we’re headed with the department,” he said. 

If you’re the kind of voter who likes mud-slinging, don’t expect it from Hershberger. Asked about his competition he said, “I think all of the candidates are going to be good clerk-recorders and registrars of voters, so whether I win or lose it will still be my job to help them moving forward.”

Tiffany Hunt Nielsen

Also born and raised in Humboldt (on a cattle ranch), Hunt Nielsen said the Hunt side of her family arrived here in the early 1900s. 

She holds a land surveying certificate and worked for a local engineering firm until the owner retired. From there, Hunt Nielsen went to work for Humboldt Land Title.

“I started as a receptionist for the first four hours,” she said, adding that she quickly passed a test and moved immediately over to the title department, where she worked for the next 17 years.

The company was employee owned until 2018, and she left the following year. Crnich was her neighbor in Loleta, and Hunt Nielsen’s job at the title company entailed taking title documents to the clerk-recorder’s office to be filed. 

Hunt Nielsen said she was intrigued by Crnich’s job, “and I really liked the view from her office.” She also liked the way staff handled things, so after leaving Humboldt Land Title, the clerk-recorder’s office seemed like a natural fit. “I was creating the documents they recorded, so I understood how the laws worked,” she said.

She’s now a senior recordable document examiner in the clerk-recorder’s office, and she has worked the last three elections, alternately checking ballots for clarity and voter intent and working the office’s phone bank.

Going door-to-door to collect nomination signatures, she encountered a number of people with concerns about the integrity of the voting process. “I tried to reassure everyone that everything’s run up to par at the Elections Office,” she said, adding that she’s been impressed by how diligently poll workers check voters’ signatures.

You can learn more about Hunt Nielsen at her campaign’s Facebook page.

Folks roaming about Old Town Eureka Thursday afternoon may be wondering what’s going on with the building being demolished at the corner of Second and E Streets. Well, we made a couple of phone calls and found out the former home of Here & There Vintage (among other businesses) is slated to become a four-story mixed-use building with a tantalizing rooftop terrace.

The new building will provide space for retail storefronts on the ground floor, one- and two-bedroom apartments on the second and third floors, and a restaurant and bar on the rooftop.

“There will be a really cool rooftop deck with what we’re currently calling a banquet room, which we think will be a bar and restaurant,” Will Adams, CEO of Adams Commercial General Contracting, Inc., told the Outpost. ”… My office is down the street from this building and I’ve kind of had my eye on it for the last several years thinking, ‘What an ugly, out-of-place building in Old Town’ and thought it could certainly be improved upon.”

Such projects usually cause quite a stir in Humboldt County, such as the recently approved EaRTH Center in Eureka, but Eureka City Manager Miles Slattery said he isn’t aware of any objections to the new project.

“All of the property owners within a 300-foot radius of the property were noticed and then it went through the planning division, then it went through design review and it’s all been approved,” Slattery told the Outpost. “It’s an outstanding project. There’s going to be this incredible rooftop terrace. I’d love to go have a cocktail up there.”

While the prospect of a rooftop bar with a picturesque view of Humboldt Bay is quite enticing, Adams emphasized the need for more housing in the city.

“The need for local housing is overwhelming,” he said. “We do a lot of apartments in Humboldt County, mainly in Fortuna, Arcata and Eureka. I certainly see the need for it.”

Slattery added that the new building will enhance economic development as well.

“I think it’s great to see this type of development down there in Old Town,” he said. “I think it’s gonna be a great benefit for not only housing but also for economic development, which is really what we need in Eureka and this is a perfect example. It’s great to see that these private developers are helping us out with our economic development.

The building is slated for completion next spring. 

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A new bill introduced into the state legislature this week would give a leg up to small-scale cannabis farmers looking to sell their product at statewide cannabis events.

AB 2691, introduced by North Coast Assemblymember Jim Wood (D-Santa Rosa), would authorize the Department of Cannabis Control to issue temporary event retail licenses that would open the door for cannabis cultivators to sell their product directly to consumers at cannabis events like the Emerald Cup. As it stands, small-scale cultivators can participate in such events, but they cannot sell directly to the buyer.

Ross Gordon, policy director at the Humboldt County Growers Alliance (HCGA) and policy chair at the Origins Council, said the bill would give small producers “who don’t have access to sales teams and large advertising” the ability to connect directly with consumers, an essential component in building “a real market for craft cannabis.”

“The human element is a large part of what allows people to choose cannabis based on quality, values and sustainable cultivation practices, rather than flashy packaging or billboard advertising,” Gordon wrote in an email to the Outpost. “… Commodity cannabis can be produced anywhere –  what differentiates us is our quality, craft, history and culture.”

Having the opportunity to connect directly with consumers will give growers the chance to share their stories and put a face to the name.

“This bill could patch up a really needed missing piece to the puzzle for us as cultivators of high-end cannabis,” Drew Barber, owner-operator of East Mill Creek Farms and co-founder of Uplift Co-op, told the Outpost. “The ability to connect with our consumers in this day and age seems like one of the major assets that could and should come along with regulation, right? The consumer should know who is growing their weed. We feel like our stories say a lot about both the quality of the product as well as the types of farming that we do.”

The fact that cultivators can’t sell directly to consumers is “absurd,” he added.

“We go through all this effort right now to make it to Santa Rosa or to San Francisco or to Los Angeles and the consumers talk with us and they get excited about our products, but when they say I’d love to buy it’s like, ‘Oh yeah, go wait in that line over there so you can purchase my weed,’” he said. “The point of sale is this important contract and when it can happen between the farmer and the consumer, it’s a different kind of bond that you don’t get when it goes through this circuitous route.”

Gordon noted that AB 2691 brings cannabis farmers one step closer to being treated like other farmers.

“For us, this bill is a major step forward in recognizing that cannabis farmers are farmers, and we need access to the same types of sales opportunities that allow other small farmers to sustain a livelihood,” he said. “Every step towards normalization, whether it’s the conversation around cultivation taxes or farmer’s markets, brings us closer to a point where cannabis is treated at parity with other agriculture.”

More information on the bill can be found here.

Here’s the press release from Wood’s office:

SACRAMENTO–Assemblymember Jim Wood (D-Santa Rosa) has introduced AB 2691, legislation authorizing the Department of Cannabis Control to issue temporary cultivator event retail licenses that would allow small-scale growers to sell their cannabis products at cannabis events in the state.

“This license will allow so many growers who cultivate cannabis on one acre or less to really showcase their products at these special cannabis events,” said Wood. “The opportunity to share their unique strains directly with consumers and allow them to reach markets previously unattainable.”

Current law allows small-scale growers to participate in cannabis events, such as the Emerald Cup, but does not allow them to sell their product limiting potential buyers’ ability to determine a product’s qualities.

“Assemblymember Wood’s bill is a lifeline for thousands of small family cannabis farms across California struggling to bring their products to market and achieve profitability,” said Genine Coleman, Executive Director of Origins Council. “This legislation will also advance destination tourism for heritage cannabis producing regions and expand consumer access to regulated craft cannabis products.”
This legislation would specify that the temporary cultivator event retail license would be valid only for the specific cannabis event for which it was issued, and would limit the number of temporary cultivator event retail licenses issued to each licensee to 12 per calendar year. 

“As a small farmer of both cannabis and vegetables I understand the importance of bringing products directly to customers as a small producer,” said Blaire AuClair, a small cannabis and produce farmer at Radicle Herbs and Folk Life Farm in Mendocino County. “It is imperative that small cannabis producers be able to get our products directly into consumers’ hands, to educate them about our products, to share our story and to learn about the needs of consumers. The survival of our small cannabis farms relies on the passage of this legislation.”

“The Emerald Triangle is located in the district I represent and we need to do what we can to ensure that licensed cultivators, especially small-scale growers that are competing with larger cultivators, have an opportunity to fully participate in marketing their products,” said Wood.