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2/14/15



Harbor commissioners voted at a packed Thursday night meeting to allow a mining corporation three months to further pursue leasing a location at the Samoa pulp mill site.



The US Mine Corporation originally proposed a six-month exclusive right to negotiate with the Humboldt Bay Harbor, Recreation and Conservation District for some of the facilities at the pulp mill site, but after a rush of responses and concerns raised by a maximum-capacity crowd at the meeting the commissioners decided on a compromise.



“We thought it would be more appropriate to do three months, and then we could either move forward or move on,” Commissioner Richard Marks said.



Commissioners Aaron Newman, Mike Wilson, Patrick Higgins and Marks voted 4-0 in favor of giving US Mine a three-month exclusive negotiation period in exchange for $5,000. Commissioner Greg Dale was absent.



The period will be an opportunity for US Mine to put together more specific details when it comes to the corporation’s potential plan for an ore extraction facility and the process, Marks said. 


The corporation hopes to lease buildings and some yard space at the old pulp mill site, ship ore from mines up and down the West Coast, extract the precious metals inside the buildings and make precast cement products with what’s left of the ore combined with other aggregate, US Mine Corp general manager Guy Reed said at the meeting.

The proposal stirred community concerns, with those present inquiring about the chemicals used during the process, the potential for air, land and water pollution, as well as compatibility with other industries who already are or could potentially lease the site instead of or along with the mining corporation.

“It really concerns me to have this type of corporation come in,” Brenna Schlagenhauf of Hog Island Oyster Company said. “I just really question what the compatibility is with growing food and a very strong fishing industry in an area ... to have a company that is looking at using chemicals and using toxins.”

Schlagenhauf is also concerned about the $5,000 investment, which several speakers referred to as “a drop in the bucket” tying up the right to negotiate.

Many members of the public also questioned the logic of bringing industrial gold processing to a peninsula that the harbor district just spent the past two years cleaning up.

Reed and US Mine Corp President and CEO Scott Docktor said they were unable to answer all of the specific questions with the resources at hand.

Many of the concerns raised Thursday stemmed from a lack of information, Reed said in an interview after the meeting. For example, a common concern raised by community members was that cyanide would be brought to the bayside site. However, while cyanide is one way to extract gold from ore, it’s not the only option.

“We haven’t decide on that particular process,” Reed said. “Let’s just say that if that ends up being a deal-breaker, there are other options for us.”

While the US Mine Corporation “believes that the cyanide process that we are proposing is quite safe,” because of the modern equipment and methods used, the corporation could avoid using cyanide at the pulp mill site, he said.

Instead, they could process the ore to the point where the gold is contained in concentrate and then transport it to a different location to finish the process, Reed said.

This would allow them to reduce the weight of the ore to one percent to five percent of the total tonnage brought into Eureka by ship, he said.

The amount of ore that the company hopes to bring into the harbor each year is about 100,000 tons, Reed said. It’s also estimated that the mining operation would bring 30 to 50 jobs to the area.

The three-month period will be sufficient time for US Mine Corp officials to weigh their options and enter negotiations with the California Coastal Commission and the many other agencies that they will have to work with during the process, Reed said.

Three months from now the harbor district will also know a lot more and be better suited to make a decision, district Executive Director Jack Crider said.

“They have lots of different options and I think that the three-month period will give them a chance to vet out some of those options and see if we can craft it into some sort of lease,” Crider said.

In the meantime, Crider plans to do additional research and visit a similar facility so he can see the plan in action.

“We need to understand the type of chemicals they would bring on site, the volumes of the chemical they would bring on site — how the process actually works,” Crider said.

Local consulting attorney Ralph Faust said that while he sympathized with the harbor district in regard to the need for tenants and the economic benefit that the applicants would provide, he doubted that the project would be able to overcome many hurdles, including the California Coastal Act.

“The question you have to face, and the sooner the better, is ‘Is there any likelihood at the end of the day that this an approvable project?’” he said.

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Southern Humboldt company researching potential uses, feasibility for converting location into cannabis central

2/3/15

After a decision by the Humboldt Bay Harbor, Recreation and Conservation District Board of Commissioners last week, a Southern Humboldt company and cannabis nursery will begin looking into whether property at the Samoa pulp mill site could become a center for all things cannabis.

“Is it possible? That’s really the question,” said Kevin Jodrey, CEO of VEK Industries Inc. and owner of the Wonderland Nursery in Garberville. “You have to ask the question, with legality coming up so quickly, how do we as a region compete? ... The scope of the operations that are going to increase in the state around us is going to be ungodly and hard to compete with if we’re not intelligent.”

Last Friday at a special meeting, the harbor district voted 3-0 — with Commissioner Richard Marks abstaining due to a conflict of interest and Commissioner Greg Dale absent — to approve a request from law firm Nossaman LLP that would allow it to work with VEK Industries to assess the feasibility of acquiring pulp mill property for cannabisrelated uses. Due to Nossaman LLP also representing the harbor district for its own feasibility research for the pulp mill, it created a conflict of interest. The law firm requested in a Jan. 22 letter for the district to waive the conflict of interest, which the commission approved on Jan. 29.

“This means that if the harbor district waives the conflict we will, of course, represent VEK Industries zealously in the matter for which it seeks to retain us,” the letter reads. “At the same time, you can rest assured that we will not compromise our representation of the harbor district in order to preserve our relationship with VEK Industries which would be in violation of our ethical duty to represent the harbor district with ‘total loyalty.’” Harbor district Chief Executive Officer Jack Crider said the district is also working with the law firm for a similar function — to determine whether its own interests for the mill property fall under the historical and allowable uses under the area’s Local Coastal Plan, as approved by the California Coastal Commission.

“It’s really hard for us to market the facility without really knowing that for sure,” he said. “So that’s the whole purpose, ... we’re tired of that whole question continually coming up.”

The harbor district has owned 72 acres of the pulp mill site since August 2013, seeking to restore the existing infrastructure and draw in new businesses to utilize it. Along with a massive federal emergency cleanup of the leftover pulp-creating liquors, the harbor district has received $12 million in federal new market tax credits, which can be used to improve the facilities at the site.

The abandoned machine shops and warehouses have already drawn interest from two companies — Taylor Shellfish Farms Inc. and Coast Seafoods Company — but Crider said they will need more tenants in the 130,000-square-foot area in order to receive the amount required to do renovations and possibly acquire more pulp mill land still owned by Freshwater Tissue Co. In order to obtain the credits, Crider said the district needs to “leverage” the feds by having funds to cover a debt service. The more tenants the district has in the mill, the more money it can use from the leases to cover that debt service and obtain more tax credits, Crider said.

The district’s current goal is to get $6 million worth of credits to buy 80 acres of mill property from Freshwater Tissue Co. and do infrastructure repairs on the facilities. This would require $3 million in lease payments to cover the debt service. With its two tenants, the district only has yet to reach the $1 million mark, which would leverage $3 million in tax credits.

“This is a federal program that is overseen by the IRS. They have to follow IRS rules,” Crider said. “The last thing they want to do is invest into a project and not get their tax credits. That’s why it’s expensive to go through this process. All the t’s have to be crossed and the i’s dotted. It takes seven years for these companies to get their tax credits fully realized.”

Crider said the district spent about $100,000 gathering the necessary information to obtain the credits, and will need to pay more if it does not have enough money to acquire the credits by July.

The harbor district has been reaching out to prospective businesses that could use the mill site, with Jodrey receiving an offer last year to look at the area. After touring the site, Jodrey said it could not only serve as a place to put more greenhouses, but as a cannabis hub to serve other functions such as housing laboratory facilities for Humboldt State University’s Institute for Interdisciplinary Marijuana Research.

“The project at the mill could be many things,” he said.

With aquaculture and aquaponics also proposed for the mill, Jodrey said that the project is a way to find new environmental and agricultural opportunities in buildings where opportunity had long since faded.

“It’s whatever you can use it for that allows it not be just a waste,” he said. “That’s the whole problem with our region. The only money coming into Humboldt is cannabis money. What do you do with the infrastructure that remains from the fishing and logging era? You have all these resources designed to do agricultural work. Why not use the mills?”

Six years earlier, Jodrey had attempted to do a similar type of project in Arcata while he was still with the Humboldt Patient Resources Center by leasing the Britt Lumber Co. mill from Figas Construction.

“What happened was the feds came in because the scope of the project was 20,000 square feet,” he said. “They hammered on the city, saying, ‘If you permit this we’ll arrest you.’” Jodrey said they backed off the project afterward to keep good relations with the city. With a potential recreational cannabis legalization ballot measure poised for 2016, Jodrey said it is important to think ahead before larger companies take over what will be a large economic opportunity for the local community.

“I’m not trying to become a monopoly, I just want to participate at the same level,” he said.

As to whether Jodrey’s vision would fall under the coastal commission’s scope of historic or allowed uses for the site is up to the commission and the county.

“I don’t think I ever saw that on the principally permitted uses,” Crider said about the cannabis option.

With offers falling through and time ticking toward a July deadline, Crider said it would not be an issue if cannabis greenhouses joined the two seafood companies in the warehouses.

“I’m looking for tenants,” Crider said.

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1/30/15

Federal regulators have ruled Oregon's plan for reducing coastal pollution due to runoff from logging, agriculture, stormwater runoff and other sources insufficient.

The decision announced Friday by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency could include financial sanctions of $1.2 million for Oregon's failure to comply with the Coastal Nonpoint Pollution Program.

Federal law calls for noncompliant states to lose 30 percent of federal dollars they receive under section 306 of the Coastal Zone Management Act and section 319 of the Clean Water Act - money used to address coastal pollution.

Oregon receives about $4 million from those pots.

Federal officials hope Oregon can avoid the financial hit by working with them to improve its coastal pollution controls in the coming months. At earliest, the sanctions could begin in July.

"What the state and the agencies are really focused on right now is a path forward on progress to address the forestry gaps," said Joelle Gore, an acting division chief with NOAA. "Focusing on the penalties is not at our forefront right now."

Friday's decision makes Oregon the first state to be penalized for failing to meet federal standards for reducing so-called "non-point pollution," a term used to describe pollution from sources such as logging and agriculture, which are not restricted by the Clean Water Act.

Congress mandated in 1990 that the nation's 34 coastal states needed to address indirect causes of pollution, with a 1996 deadline for compliance.

Friday's decision comes after an Oregon environmental group sued NOAA and the EPA for failing to approve or reject Oregon's plan by the deadline.

Nina Bell, whose Northwest Environmental Advocates filed the lawsuit that led to Friday's decision, noted the counterintuitive nature of addressing inadequate pollution controls by withholding money to control pollution. However, she said, financial sanctions could induce action after years of delay.

"They have refused to play their role for this whole two decade period," she said. "We hope that now that they're been jolted to the reality of the situation, they will take it seriously and put in place the remedies."

To date - 19 years past the approval deadline - 22 states' plans have received final approval. Only Oregon's has been rejected.

NOAA and EPA first notified Oregon state leaders that their program was too weak back in 1998. Oregon spent years tweaking the program and the federal agencies held off on imposing sanctions. As part of the settlement in Northwest Environmental Advocates' lawsuit, the feds agreed to rule on Oregon's program.

Friday's ruling notes the program has improved, but measures to prevent pollution runoff from logging are still too weak.

Specifically, the agencies found Oregon too weak in four forest management areas:
    •    Riparian protection for medium and small fish-bearing streams and non fish-bearing streams
    •    Practices that reduce runoff from old, unused forest roads
    •    Practices to reduce runoff from landslide-prone areas
    •    Assurances that herbicides are properly applied to reduce impact on waterways.

Dennis McLerran, region 10 administrator for the EPA, said the agencies are working with Oregon to create a timeline for the state to address its shortcomings.

"They're all achievable," McLerran said. "What they will require is some commitment and work by the state."

The feds deemed that Oregon had fixed other shortcomings by improving its measures to reduce stormwater runoff and other urban sources of pollution and minimizing pollution from sewage disposal systems. The agencies have not yet decided whether Oregon's agricultural anti-pollution measures are sufficient, but officials said they will.

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1/30/15

Roses are blooming in Central and Northern California tide pools, leaving scientists scratching their heads.

Warmer ocean temperatures have triggered a population explosion of the Hopkins' rose nudibranch beyond its normal Southern California range.

The brilliant pink sea slug is uncommon north of San Luis Obispo and even rarer north of San Francisco. However, scientists in Santa Cruz, San Francisco and Bodega Bay have spotted the tiny puffs concentrating in tide pools as far north as Humboldt County.

Unexplainable rare wind patterns in the past year have heated West Coast oceans, luring schools of warm-water species like the nudibranch.

There's been many unusual visitors. In September, a fisherman near San Francisco caught a sea turtle normally found off the coast of Mexico and the Galapagos. Humpback whales and dolphins are lingering in the Monterey Bay.

Ocean temperatures off the coast remained about 5 degrees higher than normal for much of last year.

"It never really cooled off and gradually got warmer and warmer," said Logan Johnson, a forecaster with the National Weather Service in Monterey. "It's still running about 58 degrees right now in the Monterey Bay, and it hasn't cooled off to the lower 50s."

These high temperatures harken El Niño years, but what's causing the uptick in temperature is the absence of a normal process called upwelling.

"Northwesterly winds will basically blow away water at the surface, and deeper, colder waters will rise up and replace it," Johnson said. "We just didn't see those winds."

A team of researchers from UC Santa Cruz's Institute of Marine Sciences, UC Santa Barbara's Marine Science Institute, the California Academy of Sciences and University of Zadar, Croatia, published a 2011 paper that predicated these rare oceanographic conditions would lead to a bloom of the nudibranchs.

"At first, we were worried the nudibranchs were being killed off by something, but it turns out it's more of a natural fluctuation," said John Pearse, ecology and evolutionary biology professor at UC Santa Cruz. "We're now entering again another warm phase. We have no idea whether this is part of the ongoing oscillation back and forth or if it's perturbed by global warming; probably both."

Researchers believe colder currents likely are limiting the southern sea slug's range because their prey lives abundantly along the Pacific Coast up to British Columbia. The Hopkins' rose nudibranch gets its pink pigmentation by eating a rose-colored encrusting bryozoan, a moss-like species.

But now, northward and onshore currents are carrying the slug's larvae to tide pools -- they aren't being washed away by upwelling.

"The nudibranch can just crawl short differences and don't live very long," said Jeff Goddard, a scientist at UC Santa Barbara's Marine Science Institute, so they're useful in monitoring quick changes in ocean conditions.

Northbound southern species is just one effect of warmer water.

"There are some detrimental impacts to the ecosystem," Goddard said. "Higher temperature often means the water is less productive."

Fewer plankton and thinner kelp forests reverberate up the food chain and, for example, affect salmon and sea birds.

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