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Local News 06 02 25 · KMUD News

• 0:00
  Speaker A: Foreign Good evening and welcome to the local news. Today is Monday, June 2nd. I'm Lauren Schmidt reporting for KMUD. In tonight's news, Highway 36 remains closed after worker killed, inactive landslide vocality merges with Community first, bringing digital upgrades and member frustrations and Supervisor Steve Madrone hosts county conversation with Hoopa High School Youth News Team. Stay tuned. News on those stories and more coming right up. Over 1900 Humboldt county residents are without power as of news time, with seven different outages countywide, the majority of which are north of McKinleyville in Trinidad to Big Lagoon. PG and D stated that this outage, which occurred just before 3pm this Monday afternoon, is unplanned and their team is evaluating the electrical system to identify damaged sections and make necessary repairs in order to safely turn the power back on. PG and D estimates restoration before 1am early Tuesday morning. You can check for Updates online@PGE.com outages just after sunrise on Saturday, May 31, deputies with the Humboldt County Sheriff's Office responded to a report of an accident in the 13,000 block of Highway 36 near Carlotta. The incident involved a large amount of debris falling from an active slide resulting in a tragic fatality. Highway 36 has remained closed since the incident, with no estimated time for reopening. Cayman News reached out to Caltrans District 1 for comment. Spokesperson Manny Machado responded via email, declining an interview, but provided the following statement. An employee of a contractor working on a Caltrans emergency project was killed during an active slide on Saturday morning along Route 36 east of Swimmer's Delight. We extend our sincere condolences to the worker's family, friends and all who knew and worked with him. This tragic incident occurring shortly after our workers memorial service serves as a sobering reminder of the risks associated with our work on state hospital highways. The safety of the traveling public, department employees and its contracting partners is always Caltran's top priority. Close Quote Cambod News also reached out with Humboldt's second District Supervisor Michelle Bushnell, who represents the areas surrounding Highway 36.
• 3:14
  Speaker B: Such a really sad and unfortunate thing that happened. That slide has not been stable. There's been a lot of closures that have happened. You know, spotters there and right now I just had an update with Caltrans about an hour ago and they are trying to finish up the investigation and then try to assess whether they can get that road back open one lane traffic.
• 3:41
  Speaker A: This stretch of Highway 36 has been closed on and off for approximately two years due to growing concerns about its stability and safety Kmart News previously shared footage on her Instagram showing large boulders falling while traffic was temporarily stopped. Caltrans workers narrowly avoided being struck as they worked to clear the roadway. This week, the worst case scenario became reality when a worker was killed by falling debris during an active slide.
• 4:14
  Speaker B: I've been in contact with Caltrans since the incident happened, and, you know, they're just so, you know, over distraught about this. Things happen. Slides are risky and scary. It was, you know, the contractors that were hired to do that that ultimately are, you know, kind of responsible for assessing what kind of condition that flight is in. You know, there was no rain, there was no nothing going on previous to this incident happening. I don't know what the, you know, the procedure will be going forward, but I know that, you know, it's definitely has been on a lot of people's minds. I go that route every day and, you know, when I go through there, I'm like, ah, hurry up. Get out of my way. Because you can see that that mountain is not stable. It's not safe where it's supposed to. And there were a lot of trees up on the top. And I just am very heartbroken for his family and his children, his wife and his friends and community. You know, this gentleman was a longtime community resident. You know, he lost his life in service, and it's just. It's just so heartbreaking.
• 5:35
  Speaker A: In May, Caltrans held a ceremony in Eureka to honor fallen highway workers, citing a troubling rise in work zone fatalities and serious injuries across California since 2010.
• 5:50
  Speaker B: A week ago, we did the memorial for Caltrans in Eureka. I spoke at that event. And they haven't lost Caltrans workers since 2017. And that was a workforce violence incident that happened in Rio del. But, you know, there was a hundred. There's 196 Caltrans workers lost in the line of service since 1921. And while this wasn't a Caltrans worker, it was doing Caltrans work. And it's just heartbreaking. And they take their jobs very seriously. They take safety very seriously. So does the contractor. And so, you know, I don't know what the outcome of the investigation is going to be, but I know that they are. That's one reason the road is still closed, to do the investigation, but also to ascertain if that is, if it's even safe to be open.
• 6:44
  Speaker A: Following notification of next of kin, the deceased has been identified as Rodrigo Reina Sanchez, age 58, who was working for a local contractor at the time of the incident. Reyna Sanchez was a former sergeant with the Eureka Police Department and had previously been the supervising officer involved in the 2021 texting scandal that impacted public public trust in the agency. He later retired from epd. In response, Supervisor Bushnell emphasized that regardless of past events, this was a tragic loss of life. She urged the public to approach the incident with respect and compassion for the family and loved ones affected.
• 7:29
  Speaker B: Ironic that he was a police officer and lost his life doing service as a construction worker still serving the public and it's just a really heartbreaking situation. You know, try to be kind on social media. Whatever happened beforehand, this man lost his life doing service, keeping this road open for people and it's just so important that we have empathy for his family at this time.
• 7:55
  Speaker A: Cayman News also extends its condolences to the family of Rodrigo Reina Sanchez. With the road closure, residents are now detouring through Eel Rock, Alder Point Road and Redwood House Road, routes that can add hours to their commutes. As of news time Monday at 6pm Highway 36 remains fully closed east of Swimmer's Delight between post markers 15.7 and 16.3. There is no estimated time of reopening. For the latest updates, you can go online to quickmap.ca.gov you can also download the Caltrans Quick Map app or follow Caltrans District 1 on social media. The long anticipated merger between Vocality Community Credit Union and Community first officially launched today, promising easier access to digital banking services. While CFCU's leadership highlighted new resources and expanded capabilities, some former Vocality members report confusion, long wait times and account access issues during the transition. Jordan Pangelinan reports today, the merger from.
• 9:15
  Speaker C: Vocality Community Credit Union to Community First Credit Union has gone live. The merger was to make accessing digital banking easier. During this merger, members of Ocality Community Credit Union need to set up a new digital account with CFCU in order to regain access to their account. Andy Dickhutt, the chief marketing officer at Community First Credit Union here at the Garberville location, had this to say about its new updates.
• 9:43
  Speaker D: Well, a lot of big benefits, especially for the Vocality members up there who are now new Community first members. Because we are, you know, a large organization. Some of the, some of the big things advantages that they're going to get is an expanded branch network. Vocality previously had two branches. We now have now they have access to 12 branches and we have branches all over the North Bay stretching all the way from as far down south as Nevada and Napa. All the Way up to Fort Bragg and of course now Garberville and everything in between. We're located in Santa Rosa, we have several branches there as well. So one of the biggest benefits is an expanded branch network. We also have a really fantastic digital banking platform. It's really state of the art, has all the features and conveniences and more that Locality members will need to conduct their banking digitally. So they're getting a great new access to digital banking services.
• 10:49
  Speaker C: There are new expansions and resources members can use that they've never had before. The CEO of Community First Credit Union, Scott Johnson, had this to say.
• 11:00
  Speaker E: This is a bigger organization, just more choices and more convenience. Andy covered the digital banking part, so I'm not going to elaborate on that, but we've already had hundreds of members today, first day of Go live register for digital banking. And just as an example, one of the things that we have a Community first, if your loan is in good standing and we allow you to skip a certain number of loan payments per year, as long as your loan is in good standing, and we've already had a couple of members very first day take advantage of that. So if you need a little extra cash that month and you'd like to skip a payment, you can do that digitally. You can come into the branch and do that. One of the other things that I would mention, which I think is going to be a really nice pickup for the Ex Focality members is our early pay program. And early pay, if you have a direct deposit with the credit union, as long as the originator of that direct deposit sends us the information early, and sometimes it could be up to two days early, we'll go ahead and we'll post that two days early in the advance of the effective date so that you have access to the cash a little bit faster, which I think is going to be a great pickup for the Ex Focality members who are now Community first members.
• 12:09
  Speaker C: With the launch of this new merger, both dicut and Johnson said they experienced minor issues on their end and most of the traffic was due to signups for the new digital banking.
• 12:19
  Speaker D: Well, the commotion really heard it was just a busy branch, which is a good thing. As I mentioned, today was really this Monday. The second was the first day of full open branches and full access to their new accounts. So yeah, you had a lot of new CFCU members that came into the branch wanting to get information about their new accounts, wanting to sign up for digital banking. Of course they can do all that themselves at home as well, but of course that's what the branches exactly are for, for us to support members and help them if there's, if they have any issues. So like anything, you know, there's some, you know, some members might have some difficulties maybe registering for digital banking. That's probably 90% of it that we've done discovered and that's exactly.
• 13:13
  Speaker F: We have.
• 13:16
  Speaker D: Expert subject matter experts for digital banking on staff at both the Garberville branch location and the Ukiah branch location to help members through those types of issues. And mostly it's stuff like you might imagine, resetting passwords, getting them access into digital banking. But that's been the lion's share of what we heard and we're getting all those, all those new members taken care.
• 13:42
  Speaker C: However, some members who didn't want to be recorded for the interview mentioned experiencing long wait times, confusion, loss of access to their accounts, and even a member's merge of two separate accounts. One community member noted that during the transfer, the member's identification got lost in the system, which resulted in not getting access to their funds. If you are experiencing issues, you can visit your nearest branch or visit calmfirst.org vocality that is C O M F I-R-T.org vocality for full details and helpful resources. Reporting for KMUD, I'm Jordan Pangelinan.
• 14:28
  Speaker A: In tonight's edition of County Conversations, we bring you the highlights from 5th District Supervisor Steve Madrone's recent visit with the Hoopa High School Youth News Team. While Supervisor Madrone typically joins us for a monthly check in, this month's segment comes straight from the classroom. Youth journalist Carmen Hossler began the interview.
• 14:51
  Speaker F: Hi, thank you for joining us today. To start, could you please introduce yourself to our audience? Yes, it's Stephen Madrone and I'm Humboldt County's fifth District supervisor, which includes the areas out here in Willow Creek, coupon, all the way up to Witchbeck and up to Orleans Solmes Bar. Basically, it's a huge district, goes all the way up the coast almost to Klamath and includes everything north and east of the Mad River. You represent an area that includes the Hupa Valley Tribe, a sovereign tribal nation. How does your role as a county supervisor overlap or intersect with tribal governance? Well, I come out here for office hours once a month. Month. I think I'm the first supervisor in the history of the county that's ever done that. And I do that because the Trinity Valley is isolated from the coast, especially in the wintertime. And it's important that people have access to their representatives, I believe. And so I do that Regularly. And in doing so, I have monthly meetings over at the neighborhood center where the tribal council meets. Usually, one or more council members will come and talk with me about issues here in the valley, on the reservation and off, for instance, roads. A lot of the roads in Hoopa Valley are actually county roads that we have a responsibility to maintain. And then, of course, There's State Highway 96, which is a state highway, but there's a lot of other issues.
• 16:26
  Speaker C: So salmon issues have been in the news lately, from commercial fishing closures to hatchery shutdowns and pollution in local waterways. Does the county have an official stance on these issues? Do you have a stance on these issues and what efforts might the county be taking to help with these?
• 16:43
  Speaker F: Yeah, well, yes, I do take a stand on these issues. I spent my entire professional career of over 50 years here in Humboldt county doing salmon watershed restoration, salmon habitat restoration and enhancement on just about every river in Humboldt, Del Norte, Trinity county, and even into Mendocino. So, you know, salmon is a totem species for our native tribes. And more than that, it was a major food source and in particular for our elders. I mean, with what's going on, even the elders aren't getting. Getting any allotments hardly lately, it seems like. So, yes, I do take a stand there, and I put my whole career behind all of that. Water law is more complicated than any law at all. It has more books and papers stacked up around water law than anything. And in general, in water law, one of the principles is that if you're the first in time, the first in place, that you have the water rights right. But then when the west got established and we were just doing horrible things to native peoples, especially like in Colorado with the big ranchers and the big miners, they established a water right in Colorado that was appropriated water rights. That's the only water right in Colorado. In California, we're a dual water rights state where we have appropriated water rights and what's called Republic water rights so you can collect the water off your roof here in California. In Colorado, you can't do that. It's against the law to collect the water off your roof because it belongs to somebody else. They own it. So super complicated stuff. These things are being played out on the Eel river with the Potter Valley dams and Mendocino county and Sonoma County. But the Trinity, you know, we thought we were getting pretty close to an agreement, but there have been differences of opinion. And so the three parties have not come to agreement on how to move forward with that. And meanwhile, the federal Government, I'm going to just put it bluntly, doesn't like Indians. At least that's what he says. Right. On many levels. Right. So it's not a great time for us, even if we're all in unison together, to go to the Bureau of Reclamation, a federal agency, and say, hey, we have a contract for no less than 50,000 acre feet. We want to call for it at these times of the year to enhance the fishery. And we have science behind that. We've done a study just completed last year that says, here's the things we could do to enhance the fishery with this water. Danny Jordan is working as a council member for the time being to put together an agricultural plan for Hupa Valley. At one time there was a lot of food being produced right here in this valley, kind of like up in Orleans Valley, produces a lot of food, but also a lot of grapes for wine and other kinds of things. But so part of that is to develop an irrigation plan, you know, and get big grants to put in a whole irrigation system. I think it's a fabulous idea, you know, to use that water to grow food for a while. Before the new store got built, it was a food desert when there was no market for a while. Right. That was pretty harsh and that's helped improve things. But the ability to grow food is just phenomenal and the water is there to do it. So that's another one of those things where the county and the tribe and downstream Yurok tribe are all working together, hopefully in collaboration with state agencies like Department of Fish and Wildlife, the California State Water Board and other agencies to effectively finally call for this water and get it coming into the communities for jobs, for food and for fish.
• 20:32
  Speaker A: As far as the executive order and other Trump era policies to clear cut the national forest in this region, especially considering there's a lot of sacred stuff sites and other critical tribal resources. How do you think the county should react to this? You know, knowing that this is federal lands, but also one of the kids on the chalkboard, would you put chain yourself to a bulldozer to protect sacred land here outside of Hupa?
• 21:04
  Speaker F: Yeah, good questions. Well, I got arrested for tree hugging, so I'm proud of it. Well, once again, I will say I think we're really lucky to live in Humble county because, you know, the tribes try to practice sustainable forestry here on the rez. The Mid Klamath Watershed Council up in Orleans, along with the Karuk tribe with the Forest Service have probably the most advanced collaborative forest health program anywhere in the United States. And they learned a long time ago that if the Forest Service learned that if you don't engage the community and you put forward these horrible timber harvest plans, especially after a fire, they want to come in and just clear strip the whole place with no consideration for anything like the Klamath National Forest does, frankly, Happy camping up in that area when they do that, when they put forward horrible plans, they ultimately were getting sued and losing. So everybody was wasting their time and their money, you know, and then the project never went forward. Whereas the Six Rivers National Forest realized that they sat down with the Karuk tribe, with Mid Klamath Watershed Council and others, they could actually come up with a plan to do really important work that everybody would agree to. And they started doing that 10, 15 years ago, and they were never getting sued. So great example of that. And at the county, we have a fire safe council that has fire safe councils from all over the county, like the Mattole, Southern Humboldt, Willow Creek, prescribed burn associations now that do, you know, bring good fire back on the landscape. So Humboldt county is very advanced in doing really good work. And so the Forest Service has adapted to that. But now you got this current administration with AI and Musk trying to figure out where the problems are in the government and then just get rid of them, fire them all, you know, know these ones that are trying to save the forest or something, you know, and do good work. And if they got DEI in their name anywhere in their mission or anything, oh, boy, chopping block, right? Bam. So I'm glad to live in Humboldt county. And frankly, it's really neat to see this work is kind of taking a full circle back to what's called traditional ecological knowledge. That is what the tribes have been doing for thousands of years. Tribes didn't have bulldogs and chainsaws, they had fire. And they would use it to landscape and to replenish their plants that were important for basketry or food or other things. And they had their prime villages by the river, which fires almost never burned to the river. They burn uphill. And so the uphill camps were summer camps, hunting and gathering camps and things like that. Pretty smart. I mean, and so it's neat to see, at least in this area or region and to some degree up and down the state, because of what happened here, there's task force who are adopting these practices, who talk about them. More and more people are trying them out. So I think we're lucky to have that here. Does that mean the Trump administration is going to honor all that? No. But are we going to stop doing what we do? No, we're going to keep doing it and, and keep trying to do good works, you know, and stuff. And so Humboldt's quite a leader on many, many levels tribally as well as I think with a lot of our forestry and watershed work, salmon work and things like that. Pretty amazing stuff. And we only have like a 50 year history of doing this really as white guys. But we've come a long way from where we were at not that long ago with clear cutting, herbicide spraying, all kinds of horrible stuff that was going on in timber company lands, which some of it's still happening, but it's nowhere near like what was happening in the 70s, the 80s, when people, you know, their deer were having all these tumors because they were spraying 2, 4, 5T and 2, 4D, these Agent Orange components from Vietnam on the forest. And bia, who kind of ran the forestry programs here in Hoopa, was very big on all that stuff. You were around to see all that era. Finally the tribe booted them out and took over, created their own forestry program and stuff. That was not easy. That was a big challenge. 25 years. How much? 25, 25 years. Yeah. Yeah. But it's changed, hasn't it? Yeah, for the better. Why has the county seemed slow to act on the missing and murdered indigenous people crisis? Yeah, that's a good one. I'm on the phone with Sheriff Hansel a lot on that particular issue. It has always amazed me how some white kid will go missing on the coast in Trinidad and they will pull out hundreds and hundreds of people. Two little girls went missing in southern Humboldt. Hundreds and hundreds of people pulled out and immediately to find these white people, you know, whereas like Emily Riesling and others never got that attention. And Sheriff Ansell will often put his reasons for not responding quickly and completely to Public Law 280. It's a really complicated law. It's something worth investigating and learning about if you live here on the rez because the county uses that a lot as why it doesn't do things, mostly the sheriff. There are times that the sheriff can absolutely get engaged in the reservation and I think it's when there's criminal activity versus civil. But I've never really quite fully understood the whole thing. All I know is it gets thrown in my face every time I say why aren't we doing more? I think the issue was conveniently hidden and the media never really wanted to grab onto it. I mean we're only 70 years past when the last boarding schools Closed. Right. So for your parents, your grandparents, that's very real. That's not like some ancient history. And I would just say it's just. It's horrible that it's that way. And I don't know quite how to fix it. I do think what the tribes are doing to raise the recognition around all this is really great. The county, we can pass resolutions, support. We did just a couple weeks ago. We had some nice presentations, but still, that's a drop in the bucket for what has to happen. And then I hear really, really weird stories about the last person that was with Emily happened to be a county deputy sheriff and dropped her off. And after quite a bout that she had over at the cemetery and other things that went on. And I don't know what to believe, but I don't believe what I hear from the police most of the time. And I think that's. That's kind of a bad situation to be in where you can't trust your own law enforcement. Right.
• 27:54
  Speaker A: All right, the last question, and I think that was a good segue.
• 27:57
  Speaker C: All right, so a New York Times report shows police killings have actually increased since George Floyd's murder, and native people are killed at a much higher rate. Should the Humboldt county shoot office implement a more proactive training to address this? And what does restorative justice mean to you? And how is that approach reflected in county law enforcement?
• 28:20
  Speaker F: Yes, I think that there's a lot more that needs to be done. And I don't. I believe that those stats that you just shared, you know, that it's a lot higher for missing and murdered, and yet the attention isn't. Is still barely growing. I don't think it's okay to kill anybody for any reason, frankly. I don't like guns because all they can do is pretty much kill people. They can kill animals, but that's rarely the case. Some tools are used for hunting and survival and food, but mostly they're used to harm and kill people. You know, it's just in this country, this state, it's so out of control. You look at the stats with the rest of the world, it's like nobody's even close to us in terms of all the horrible stuff that happens with guns and weapons all the time. So, yeah, we do have to do a whole lot better. One of the results since Floyd and other things is that more and more people don't want to get into law enforcement. It's kind of like the Vietnam vets when they came home from the war and they were treated like Scum, you know, whatever. And it was a bad war. We've had a lot of really bad wars. Not that any war is a good thing, frankly, but it's kind of like that. You know, law enforcement are by many people, considered scum until they need them, I guess. Who's the first person to call when they need them because somebody broke into their house or is threatening their family? They're going to call law enforcement. But we could do a lot better. You know, the amount of training that's required is pretty minimal, although it's significant. And if a police officer really screws up, it's really hard to let them go because of the unions and the coat of blue and all these things that make it almost impossible to let go of a police officer unless you can prove that they were outright lying or doing certain types of things. And frankly, we get sued all the time. Millions of dollars go out in lawsuits because of our escalation techniques. Before we wrap up, is there anything that we did not ask you that you want to share with us or the community? I will say that I have thoroughly enjoyed representing the fifth District. It's been a real honor. I feel like I've been able to get a lot done by working with people, tribal people. I mean, the fifth District has an eight out of nine of the tribes in the fifth District, So tribes are huge in this area in particular. I'm not running again for office. I have about one year, seven months, two days and 10 hours left, but who's counting, right? And so it's going to be hard to let go, but I'm going to be 74, and I feel like I spent 50 years doing work for the community, and. And I'm proud of that work, very engaged with the tribe wherever we can, and we're welcome. I was even invited to a couple of dances, which was a real honor just to be there and watch that process. And often when I'm sitting with the Tribal Council and they're having trouble with coming to agreement, I will say, you know, wouldn't it be neat, not just in tribal culture, but in white culture, whatever, if we took our practices from the dances or from Sunday mass or whatever, and we actually carried that forward every day in our lives, you know, not that we're going to succeed, Right. Because we all have our issues, but if we really went forward every. Every week with that intent of wanting to carry those prayers and lessons that we learn at dances and other cultures, whatever their belief system is. So that'll be my closing. Great. Thank you so much for your time today and for speaking with the Hupai media team. You're welcome. And you well represented. Good job. Thank you. Bravo.
• 32:15
  Speaker A: That's all for tonight's broadcast. Thank you for listening. Thanks to our engineer, Javier Rodriguez, and thanks to our reporter, Jordan Panjalinan. And a special thank you to Press Forward and the Humboldt Journalism Project for their support of the HOOPA High School Youth News Team. An effort made possible in part through the Humboldt Journalism Project, a dream maker project of the Ink people. Reporting for kmud, I'm Lauren Schmidt.