News

4/3/14
Looks like the sewage has hit the proverbial fan on the long-delayed Martin Slough Interceptor project, a multi-million-dollar wastewater system upgrade co-financed by the City of Eureka and the Humboldt Community Services District.

Apex Directional Drilling, an Oregon-based company hired to install a pipeline under Pine Hill, near the Eureka Municipal Golf Course, just announced that it is abandoning the project. The company blames the city and the engineering firm it hired — SHN Consulting Engineers — for allegedly misrepresenting the type of soil it would find at the project site.

Expecting stable dirt, Apex instead found sand, according to a press release.

In a March 12 letter to the city, Apex outlined the troubles it had encountered. “We burned up mud motors, had multiple attempts to get back to the original bore profile … and basically tried every trick in the book,” the letter states. “Water and flow sand was all we got. The hole collapsed several times because it was only sand … .”

Apex claims that SHN Consulting Engineers “improperly designed the drill path” and violated “all accepted industry standards” in determining the soil profile at the site. And negotiations with the city have evidently failed. In a March 20 letter to the city, Apex accuses the city of defaulting on its project agreement.

The company says it is leaving drill steel equipment at the site in case the city wants to use another company to complete the project. Basically, Apex is claiming that Eureka officials forced the company’s hand.

This could spell big trouble for both the city and the Humboldt Community Services District. The Martin Slough Interceptor project has been planned for 35 years. It’s designed to alleviate stress and increase capacity by creating a more direct route to the wastewater treatment plant near the Elk River interchange.

We’ll update this story as we learn more. In the meantime, here’s the press release:

Due to an impasse with the city of Eureka, Apex Directional Drilling announced today its decision to cease work on the Martin Slough force main project, part of the overall effort to upgrade Eureka’s wastewater infrastructure.

The Oregon-based company was hired as the general contractor on a portion of the overall multiyear project, primarily to provide horizontal directional drilling services. Horizontal directional drilling, a method for installing utility pipe using underground horizontal drilling techniques and equipment, is an alternative to using traditional trenching methods.

According to company officials, the soils at the job site were very different than had been represented by the city and its engineering firm.

Apex President Mike Lachner said, “We accepted this job based on the understanding and assurances that the soil was stable and would support a bore of the length and diameter specified. However, shortly after beginning the project we discovered that the area consisted primarily of sand. Anyone who’s dug a hole at the beach understands the difficulty of digging and supporting a hole or a tunnel, especially one that would need to be 42 inches in diameter, in sand. It is not stable and therefore prone to collapse.”

After utilizing a range of tactics, including adjusting the drilling path and switching to the lightest tooling possible, and despite advising the city and its engineering firm multiple times of the conditions and problems encountered along the way, Apex subsequently completed a pilot bore – the first of many steps in horizontal directional drilling. After completing the guide hole, the company informed the city the original plan would not work and proposed alternate plans to complete the project. The company also offered to absorb a significant portion of the cost overruns associated with the unanticipated soil conditions. When the city declined the offers, Apex made the decision to cease its work on the project.

“This was a very hard decision for us because we have never failed to complete a project,” Lachner said. “While the city’s actions remain unclear and somewhat puzzling, we have nevertheless chosen to leave our drill steel equipment on site in the pilot hole – at an approximate cost to us of $150,000 – in the event the city chooses to attempt to complete this project with another company. We deeply regret the inconvenience and unnecessary expense incurred by the Eureka community on this project, but, given the circumstances, we believe this was the only viable option for our company.”

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CBS Outdoor, coastal commission attorneys make case before judge


4/3/14



A Humboldt County Superior Court judge heard attorneys’ arguments Wednesday on whether the California Coastal Commission vio­lated a advertising company’s property rights by requiring billboard removal as part of a U.S. Highway 101 safety project between Eureka and Arcata.



Representing the Delaware-based outdoor advertising company CBS Outdoor Inc., attorney Arthur Coon argued that his client was given “no notice (and) no due process” when the commis­sion approved a condition in which Caltrans would remove as many billboards as feasible along the 6-mile corridor as part of the Eureka-Arcata Route 101 Corridor Improvement Project.



Coon’s main argument was that the company — which owns 20 billboards along the corridor — was never informed of any of the hearings or discussions leading up to the condition’s approval on Nov. 14.



“This is a property rights and due process issue,” Coon said.“(CBS) was not informed when the condition was first discussed at the commis­sion’s Sept. 13 hearing. It only learned a week prior to its actual adoption in the form of revised findings.”



The condition was one of four that Caltrans agreed to under a conditional concurrence with the commission in order to obtain approval for coastal development under the California Coastal Act. The $46 million project aims to improve safety along the corridor by closing median cross­ings at several locations and building a raised interchange at the Indianola Cutoff.



The coastal commission, represented by David Alderson of the State Attorney General’s Office, said the case is “not right,” as the company is making a facial challenge — a challenge in which a plaintiff argues that existing legislation or statutes are unconstitutional — when the condition has not been approved by Caltrans yet.



“The petitioner is challenging a matter that is currently being reviewed and processed by the coastal commission and Caltrans,” Alderson said. “So it is premature for this court to review the matter.”

Alderson made a second argu­ment that CBS Outdoor’s petition was not filed within the required 60-day time limit under state public resources code section 30801.

Coon said this was misleading.

“We’re being told we’re suing too early and too late,” Coon said.

Coon said that there was no consti­tutional basis between the condition’s directive to remove all the billboards rather than those causing visual impacts, and the purpose of the proj­ect. Arguing the condition only necessitates billboard removal to maximize the view of Humboldt Bay from the Indianola Cutoff, Coon said removing all billboards oversteps the purpose of the safety project.

“This is specifically a visual miti­gation condition,” Coon said. “This is a relatively small portion of the highway that is affected by the inter­change. Yet they’ve issued a sweep­ing directive to remove all billboards within the 6-mile corridor.”

Arguing that Caltrans has yet to determine whether billboard removal is even possible, Alderson said Coon’s arguments are non-applicable.

“The condition does not require the removal of any billboards what­soever,” Alderson said. “It merely requires Caltrans to come up with a plan to remove the billboards to the extent feasible. Caltrans has not determined that it is entirely feasible.”

In response, Coon said that CBS Outdoor should be notified of the meetings when Caltrans will deter­mine the feasibility of the condition as “we’re entitled to by law.”

Caltrans’ attorney Jeff Wilcox was present at the hearing through a court call, and confirmed that the agency withdrew its scheduled April 11 demurrer hearing to challenge CBS Outdoor’s claims.

When asked why the department withdrew the hearing, Caltrans District 1 spokesman Scott Burger said that “it is Caltrans policy not to comment on pending litigation.”

The Humboldt County Associa­tion of Governments is also being targeted by CBS Outdoor’s petition for writ of mandate as a “real party of interest” due to it being “respon­sible … for programming and approving the financing of the proj­ect, including the financing of actions necessary to implement the (commission’s) condition.”

Judge Bruce Watson scheduled a case management hearing for June 4.

“I’ll look at it and get you a decision,” Watson said.

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Open space review may face delay, or housing grants may be at risk


4/1/14



The Humboldt County Board of Supervisors will consider at its meeting today whether it will rearrange its General Plan Update schedule in order for the county to meet the submission deadline for the state-mandated Housing Element.



In a March 24 memorandum, the county Planning and Building Department recommends that the board cancel its April 7 GPU meeting and have it change the topic of its April 21 and May 5 meetings from the Open Space and Conservation Elements to the Housing Element.



The board’s review of the Open and Space and Conservation Elements would be pushed back to September. The Housing Element, which requires approval by the State Department of Housing and Community Development every five years to be in compliance with state law, has a strict July 1 submission deadline.

If the deadline is missed, 3rd District Supervisor Mark Lovelace said it will impact the county’s grant opportunities.


“A consequence of not having it submitted on time is the inability of the county to seek certain grants or make it less competitive for other grants,” he said.



The element has been under review by the county Planning Commission since Feb. 6, but progress has not been going as quickly as planned.



“Based on the progress of the commission, it appears that they will not finish their review of the Housing Element by the end of their special meeting schedule, which ends in March,” the memo reads.



To make up for this, the commission has scheduled three more special meetings this month to complete its review and has referred certain sections of the element back to the county’s advanced planning staff to draft recommendations for policies or language that reflect the commission’s previous discussions.



Along with this, the letter states that some of the planning commission’s changes to the element are inconsistent with the element’s required draft environmental impact statement, which may potentially require the county to recirculate the statement. Lovelace expressed concern whether the commission’s changes were made to be “consistent with state law or driven by public input.”



The memo states that the combined workload from the commission, the potential review of the environmental impact statement and the board’s regularly scheduled GPU meeting would create a “perfect storm” and overwhelm the planning staff.



Second District Supervisor Estelle Fennell said she was “glad that it appears the planning commission will be able to get their draft of the element completed on time,” but said she had concerns on the Open Space and Conservation Elements being rescheduled.



“I would like to stick to the original schedule for us to go through the open space element,” she said. “I don’t see the benefit in switching things around.”



Humboldt Baykeeper Policy Director Jennifer Kalt — one of the many people who spoke out on the commission’s several recommended changes to the Open Space and Conservation Elements that are now before the board — said she hopes the board will not push the elements back any further than they need to be.



“I think it is an obvious attempt to kick the can down the road on some decisions that needed to be addressed,” Kalt said.“The open space and water resources sections are where a lot of the environmental protections are going to be. Pushing it off is just going to mean a longer time frame before we have those protections in place.”

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'A disaster that miraculously did not happen'

3/29/14

As a barrage of rain poured down on the Samoa pulp mill's corroding storage tanks, Environmental Protection Agency Regional Administrator Jared Blumenfeld took the opportunity to explain why the millions of gallons of hazardous liquids contained inside must be removed.

”When it rains, the tanks fill up because they are not properly covered,” Blumenfeld said. “Literally, with the rain today, if we weren't pumping it out, they could overflow.”

Blumenfeld was one of several government officials who gathered at the run-down mill to watch the start of the multi-agency effort to remove and transport nearly 4 million gallons of hazardous liquids and toxic sludge from the Samoa site to a pulp mill in Longview, Wash.

The hazardous state of the 72-acre site -- owned by the Humboldt Bay Harbor, Recreation and Conservation District since August -- was brought to the EPA's attention by the Wiyot Tribe, which urged the agency to investigate, Blumenfeld said. When EPA inspectors went to the site in September, Blumenfeld said they found “an enormous mess,” which initiated an emergency response.

The points of concern were the nearly 3 million gallons of caustic liquor -- chemical liquids used to break down wood chips into pulp material for paper products -- 10,000 gallons of sulfuric acid and 10,000 tons of “highly corrosive sludge” being stored in leaking, corroding storage tanks throughout the mill.

With the mill nestled between the Pacific Ocean and Humboldt Bay, Blumenfeld said it was “a disaster that miraculously did not happen.”

”When you add up the three factors -- the huge amount of poorly contained, hazardous materials located on a fault line between two incredibly important water bodies, that's why it's nationally significant,” he said.

With seismic events like the magnitude-6.8 earthquake that struck on March 9 increasing the likelihood of the chemicals spilling into the surrounding waters, EPA federal on-scene coordinator Steve Calanog said they “can't afford much more time.”

”If released into the environment, it would have an immediate effect on the bay and its ecosystems, and would effect the seafood and shellfish industry immediately,” Calanog said.

Cleanup workers from the EPA and the U.S. Coast Guard Pacific Strike Team began pumping the first batches of the caustic liquid from the tanks into two storage trucks on Friday morning. Calanog said that these will be the first of an estimated 800 trucks loads that will make the 460-mile drive to the pulp mill in Longview, Wash., where they will be reused. To ensure safety, Calanog said the trucks will only transport the materials out of the mill during daylight hours.

California 2nd District Congressman Jared Huffman attended the cleanup and thanked all of the county and federal agencies who “stepped up for this community and brought it to this point.”

”The fact that we made it through and got the EPA to come out here to secure the chemicals, that we made it through despite the government shutdown, it's nothing short of remarkable,” Huffman said.

Liquids located in areas inaccessible to trucks were pumped through a pipeline provided by the Pacific Strike Team into 10 temporary storage tanks, which will later be transported over to the trucks. Strike team workers elevated on cherry pickers held pipes that sucked in the liquors from holes cut into the top of the tanks. Calanog said this is “a slow and tedious process, and very dangerous.” Any contact with the liquors can cause severe chemical burns, he said.

Though the mill has changed hands several times since it was built about 50 years ago, Blumenfeld said one of its previous owners -- Evergreen Pulp Inc. -- is mainly responsible for the mess.

”This is the responsibility of the company that left in the middle of the night, and left this exactly as we found it a few months ago,” he said.

Blumenfeld said a good portion of the cleanup costs will be paid off by selling millions of dollars worth of scrap material from the mill, but “we will still go after the responsible parties.”

”We work to assign responsibility legally,” he said. “In some cases -- which partly applies to this one -- even if we wanted sue them, some of the people have no money.”

Huffman said the cleanup is “just the beginning” of an “exciting and ambitious vision” to turn the blighted mill into an economy opportunity that will create jobs.

”We're going to see it put to work for aquaculture, for sustainable, renewable energy research,” he said.

This vision came closer to reality after the Board of Supervisors approved a $100,000 community development block grant application from the county Administrative Office and the harbor district on Tuesday. The grant would pay for a feasibility and planning study that would “identify and analyze the highest and best uses for the site,” according to a county staff report.

Blumenfeld said that if all works according to plan, all of the liquor and sludge could be off the site in eight months. In the meantime, he said he's comfortable knowing that progress is being made.

”At least in the next week, as the levels go down and down, the risk diminishes accordingly,” Blumenfeld said.

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