What Can You Do?
October 6 Alert!!!
At its Tuesday, Oct. 12, meeting, the Trinidad City Council will consider how to proceed in the face of continuing water woes brought on by drought and potential growth of Trinidad and the surrounding area.
Proponents of a water pipeline want the City to sign on to a major pipeline construction project from Humboldt Bay Municipal Water District to the Trinidad Rancheria and Trinidad. Opponents — including HARP — prefer other options, including the Luffenholtz watershed, storage ponds and other measures that would require Trinidad to develop its own resources and, in Mayor Steve Ladwig’s words, “live within its means.”
There is no doubt that water is an issue that Trinidad and its neighbors need to address, but HARP — a citizen Alliance for Responsible Planning — believes that the unlimited water available from a pipeline pumping uphill from McKinleyville could bring housing growth and development that would ruin the area north of the Little River.
Please urge the Trinidad City Council to reject — for a third time! — the pipeline, and to focus its attention, energy, resources and people on finding less drastic and more environmentally friendly solutions to its water supply problems.
Please email or call Trinidad’s elected leaders and tell them you vote NO on the pipeline. Send emails to cityclerk@trinidad.ca.gov. Or find individual Council members at https://trinidad.ca.gov/article/trinidad-city-council.
Please also let them know if you are a Trinidad resident, property owner or water customer. But even if you are not, and if you are neighbor who lives outside Trinidad’s city limits, let the Council know that you oppose the rampant development and growth that a water pipeline would inevitably bring, not to Trinidad itself perhaps, but to all the rest of the Greater Trinidad Area. This is your home, too.
Please also plan to attend the Tuesday, Oct. 12, virtual Council meeting and speak up against the pipeline (https://trinidad.ca.gov/city-council-regular-meeting-30).
August 5 Alert!!!
NO PIPELINE!
Dear Neighbors and Friends of Trinidad:
This is HARP’s CALL TO ACTION to let you know that the Trinidad City Council is being asked to reconsider (for a THIRD time!) the question of participating in a water pipeline project from Humboldt Bay Municipal Water District.
HARP urges you and others who care about the future of the Trinidad area to contact the City Council before its Aug. 10 meeting to urge them NOT to reopen the pipeline debate. It’s the wrong way to go for the city of Trinidad and all area residents.
Here is a sample letter to the Council that you can use, as well as a few talking points on the water and pipeline issues FYI.
It’s no news that we are in the midst of a drought. Pipeline supporters are using that to frighten residents into a rush supporting a pipeline project that would take years (and $millions) to build.
Obviously, rushing into expensive and environmentally destructive pipeline construction wouldn’t make any difference today. Or next year. But the prospect of 500,000 gallons/day of water would draw developers like flies, and open the unspoiled, forested area north of the Little River to construction that would destroy the qualities we cherish about this whole area.
Please review the sample letter and talking points and send a letter/email TODAY to urge the Trinidad City Council to reject reconsideration of a pipeline, and to redouble efforts to develop the various other options to plan for Trinidad’s water future.
Send your comments to Steve Ladwig, Mayor sladwig@trinidad.ca.gov; Jack West, Mayor Pro-Tem jwest@trinidad.ca.gov; Tom
Davies tdavies@trinidad.ca.gov; David Grover dgrover@trinidad.ca.gov; Richard Clompus rclompus@trinidad.ca.gov, sladwig@trinidad.ca.gov, jwest@trinidad.ca.gov, tdavies@trinidad.ca.gov, dgrover@trinidad.ca.gov, rclompus@trinidad.ca.gov, citymanager@trinidad.ca.gov, cityclerk@trinidad.ca.gov
AND TRY TO ATTEND THE AUGUST 10 ZOOM COUNCIL MEETING AND COMMENT IN PERSON!!
BY 6 PM Tuesday, February 09, 2021 - SEND email to Trinidad City Council and attend evening Zoom meeting
On January 26, 2021, the Trinidad City Council voted 3-2 in favor of a resolution NOT to participate in the Humboldt Bay Municipal Water District’s proposal to participate in a feasibility study to extend a pipeline from McKinleyville to the Trinidad Rancheria’s lands south of Trinidad. Trinidad City Councilman Richard Clompus has asked the Council to reconsider its Jan. 26 decision not to participate in this feasibility study.
The pipeline issue will get a “redo” at the Council’s Tuesday, Feb. 9, 6 p.m. meeting (https://trinidad.ca.gov/city-council-regular-meeting-23). Please email the Trinidad City Council expressing (again) your opposition to Trinidad’s participation in a water pipeline study or construction. Please also tune in to Tuesday’s virtual city council meeting, and make your voices heard.
Contact the Council, Clerk and Manager at: Steve Ladwig <smladwig@gmail.com>, Jack West <jwest@trinidad.ca.gov>, Tom Davies <tdavies@trinidad.ca.gov>, dgrover <dgrover@trinidad.ca.gov>, Richard Clompus <rclompus@trinidad.ca.gov>, Eli Naffah <citymanager@trinidad.ca.gov>, Trinidad City Clerk <cityclerk@trinidad.ca.gov>
BY 6 PM TUESDAY, January 26, 2021 - SEND email to Trinidad City Council and attend evening Zoom meeting
HARP is VERY concerned about the growth-inducing implications of a water line extension from Humboldt Bay Municipal Water District to the Trinidad area.
In June 2020, the Trinidad Rancheria asked the Humboldt Bay Municipal Water District (HBMWD) to extend a pipeline from McKinleyville to the Rancheria’s trust lands south of Trinidad. Drinking water is a growth-inducing magnet to developers, and many people are concerned that the rustic, rural nature of the greater Trinidad area will be lost forever if this happens. WATER SERVICE ALLOWS FOR SUBDIVISION OF LAND INTO SMALL PARCELS, AND THUS MUCH DENSER DEVELOPMENT.
Humboldt Bay Municipal Water District is a wholesaler that sells water to McKinleyville, Arcata, Eureka, and several other small communities (but not Westhaven or Trinidad, which have their own water supplies). HBMWD and the Rancheria are still in very preliminary negotiations, and no definite agreement has been reached, although in January 2021, they agreed upon a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) to do a feasibility study. The cost and the size of the water line would depend upon who else, in addition to the Rancheria, wants to chip in. Any entity that wants water will have to help pay for the development of the line, and most likely for the feasibility study as well.
In December, 2020, Humboldt Bay sent letters to the city of Trinidad, the Westhaven Community Services District, and the McKinleyville Community Services District asking if they were interested in being involved in the feasibility study, and eventually connecting to the proposed pipeline. Westhaven refused outright, because of the expense involved.
Trinidad will consider a response to HBMWD’s letter at a special City Council meeting to be held (virtually) on January 26 at 6 PM. If you are AGAINST UNLIMITED GROWTH NORTH OF THE LITTLE RIVER, please SEND AN E MAIL TO THE CITY COUNCIL AT cityclerk@trinidad.ca.gov and cc: to jwest@trinidad.ca.gov ; dgrover@trinidad.ca.gov; tdavies@trinidad.ca.gov; rclompus@trinidad.ca.gov and sladwig@trinidad.ca.gov. In the subject line, put “Mad River water” and ask the city council to not get involved with bringing water north of Little River. Show up at the Webex meeting! At the meeting, share your viewpoint with the city council by raising your hand and talking to them.
Meeting Access information (click on links below) (First, download Webex software):
Agenda and Meeting Packet located in the Documents Library.
Join Webex Meeting (Enter your name and email address)
Join By Phone: 1-844-531-0749
Enter Meeting Number (or Participant Code): 179 590 3236
If needed, enter password: x7gJ9UffVp5
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By 5 PM, Monday, October 19: CALL TO ACTION!
Public Comment on Trinidad Rancheria Hotel Due to CA Coastal Commission Oct. 19
It is time to tell the California Coastal Commission (again) how you feel about the Trinidad Rancheria’s plan to build a 5+-story Hyatt hotel on the bluff above beautiful Trinidad Bay.
Here’s what’s new: The hotel developers have asked the Coastal Commission for final permission to start construction, ignoring all the requests for a compromise design, and after threatening the City of Trinidad if the hotel is not permitted to use city water. The Coastal Commission is waiting for 30 days to collect public comment before deciding.
The Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) now claims that the Rancheria’s two wells will satisfy the hotel’s water demands, (the BIA says they’ll drill another one, and truck water in if they need more). But there has been no independent analysis of the wells’ capacity or water quality, or how they might affect their neighbors’ wells — conditions that the Coastal Commission imposed in August 2019.
PLEASE SPEAK UP! HARP urges all Trinidad-area residents and everyone who loves this unspoiled coastline to write the Coastal Commission to express opinions on this project, and to urge a new hearing on these water issues. You can find out (lots!) more about the proposed 100-guestroom Hyatt at www.humboldtalliance.org.
DEADLINE: Letters and emails must be received at the California Coastal Commission by 5 p.m. Monday, Oct. 19. Email comments to eorfc@coastal.ca.gov or via U.S. Postal Service to:
Mr. John Ainsworth, Executive Director, California Coastal Commission, 455 Market St., Suite 300, San Francisco, CA 94105
Please also cc. your letter to HARP@HumboldtAlliance.org.
You can read the latest BIA letter to the Coastal Commission and supporting materials at www.coastal.ca.gov (scroll down the front page to the “Highlights” section).
Help support HARP’s work to protect Trinidad and all of Humboldt. Go to www.humboldtalliance.org and click on the DONATE button.
For talking points on this issue, or for a template letter you can copy and paste, email HARP@HumboldtAlliance.org.
By 8:45 AM June 11, 2020: Water Pipeline to Trinidad?
The Humboldt Bay Municipal Water District (HBMWD) will consider a request at its Thursday, June 11, meeting in Eureka to deliver water to the Trinidad Rancheria. The HBMWD Mission: “Reliably deliver high quality drinking water to the communities and customers we serve in the greater Humboldt Bay Area at a reasonable cost.”
Such a project could make development attractive on large tracts of land north of McKinleyville that now have low or little water available, in addition to serving proposed hotel and other development at the Trinidad Rancheria.
GET INVOLVED!
SPEAK UP! Email the Water District Board and tell them what you think about the implications of extending Humboldt Bay municipal water to Trinidad. Emails are DUE THURSDAY, JUNE 11, by 8:45 A.M. to the Board Secretary at sobol@hbmwd.com. Reference Agenda Item 8.1a2 WRP-Local Sales in the email subject line.
SHOW UP! The public can attend Thursday's meeting in person at the HBMWD Board room at 828 7th St., Eureka (social distancing and wearing of face coverings will be enforced), or join the meeting online at https://zoom.us/j/88380005307. Enter password 212874 or participate by phone at 1-669-900-9128. Enter meeting ID 88380005307.
The agenda and full meeting packet, including the Trinidad Rancheria’s request for direct water service from Humboldt Bay Municipal Water District (page 55 in packet), are available here (https://hbmwd.communitybydiligent.com/Portal/MeetingInformation.aspx?Org=Cal&Id=67).
HARP believes that this project has the potential to change the fundamental character and nature of communities and neighborhoods from Little River to the City of Trinidad, and urges all stakeholders to engage diligently with the Humboldt Bay Municipal Water District in careful consideration of the proposal and its potential outcomes.
HBMWD Board:
Division 1 Neal Latt latt@hbwmd.com Division 2 Sheri Woo woo@hbwmd.com Division 3 David Lindberg lindberg@hbwmd.com
Division 4 Bruce Rupp rupp@hbwmd.com Division 5 Michelle Fuller fuller@hbwmd.com
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By April 21, 2020: Special Trinidad City Council Meeting to Consider Draft MOU with Rancheria Concerning Provision of Water.
The Trinidad City Council (TCC), in a videoconference session, will consider a draft MOU (intended to produce options for Trinidad to provide the proposed Hyatt Place Hotel with water) developed in apparent response to a letter submitted by Garth Sundberg, Rancheria Chairman. Sundberg’s letter states that the Rancheria states that it will cease cooperation on Trinidad’s Stormwater Project (designed to project water quality in Trinidad Bay) “until and unless the City provides a final and mutually-acceptable decision” to provide city water to the hotel. HARP opposes the MOU for a number of reasons, but especially because the current draft MOU would not be based on the draft water policies that have not yet been formally adopted by the city, and because assessment of water availability from the Trinidad system would be based only on 2019 reports prepared by GHD, a local engineering firm hired to evaluate Trinidad’s water system. For more information, go to Trinidad Water Supply.)
Read Garth Sunberg’s letter and the proposed MOU. Read HARP’s comments to the TCC. Submit a written comment (via email) to the Trinidad City Council by AM of 21 April, and try to attend the videoconference special meetings. Details for attending the meeting are at https://trinidad.ca.gov/calendar (click on cell for Special Meeting on 21 April) and comments may be sent to cityclerk@trinidad.ca.gov.
BY APRIL 14,2020: Rancheria Request for Water for Hotel to be Made at City Council Meeting
The Trinidad City Council, in a videoconference version of its regular 4/14 meeting, will discuss a draft city water policy (Agenda/Action Item 2), and thereafter hear “Discussion/Decision regarding Trinidad Rancheria’s Request/Proposal for Water Service for the Proposed Hotel Project” (Agenda/Action Item 3). The Rancheria has not yet submitted any supporting material for its request for water service and no formal request is included in the meeting agenda packet.
The City Council meeting will be held using WebEx videoconferencing software. To attend, you will need to (a) sign up with WebEx , and (b) enter the link and code for the meeting which will be available by AM of 14 April at http://trinidad.ca.gov/city-council-regular-meeting-13
You will recall that the Bureau of Indian Affairs recently released a “Finding of No Significant Impact,” green-lighting the 5+-story Hyatt hotel project on the bluff above Trinidad Bay. HARP and other evaluation of production from the Rancheria’s two wells (proposed to serve the hotel) indicate that these wells cannot satisfy the hotel’s full needs. The final EA/FONSI provided no information on water quality or water treatment for these wells, information critical for evaluating suitability as a hotel water source.
Please review the draft water policies, sign up with WebEx, attend the videoconference meeting, and comment as appropriate.
BY MARCH 19, 2020:
The City of Trinidad comments from the local community concerning the BIA’s FONSI (Finding of No Significant Impact) and associated supporting materials for the proposed 5+ story Trinidad Rancheria Hotel to be constructed on Trinidad Bay. Information concerning background materials and where to send comments are provided here.
BY MARCH 20, 2020:
Comments on the BIA’s FONSI (Finding of No Significant Impact) for the proposed 5+ story Trinidad Rancheria Hotel are due. A summary of the contents of the FONSI and associated documents as well as detailed background on the proposed hotel development can be found here. Of particular concern regrading the proposed hotel are wastewater disposal issues (has a reserve field been identified?), traffic consequences of the hotel (are these likely to be serious?), visual impacts (will a 5+ story hotel really “disappear into the tree”?), water supply (supply from the City of Trinidad seems unlikely; Will the Rancheria’s new wells provide an adequate and uncontaminated source of water?), and the long-term environmental implications of the associated interchange and other development on the Rancheria’s lands.
Your comments should be mailed directly to the BIA, postmarked by 5 p.m. Friday, March 20, to:
Ms. Amy Dutschke, Regional Director
Re: FINDING OF NO SIGNIFICANT IMPACT FOR THE PROPOSED TRINIDAD RANCHERIA ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT CORPORATION HOTEL PROJECT
Bureau of Indian Affairs, Pacific Regional Office
2800 Cottage Way
Sacramento, CA 95825
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BECOME INFORMED
The casino-hotel project will impact Trinidad water resources, the pristine beauty of the Trinidad Bay coastline, stability of the geologically fragile bluff above Scenic Drive and Trinidad Bay, traffic (to avoid causing traffic snarls at the Trinidad exit onto Scenic Drive, the Rancheria proposes a new interchange on Highway 101 that will affect neighboring property owners, but no decision is expected before 2022), biological resources and local noise and nighttime light levels. See our power point presentation for details.
Submit Comments to the Bureau of Indian Affairs
If you want to comment on the project, submissions must be made in writing via U.S. Postal Service.
Comments must be received by the BIA by Monday, Oct. 22. Send them to:
Amy Dutschke, Regional Director
Bureau of Indian Affairs
2800 Cottage Way, Sacramento, CA 95825
(916) 978-6000.
The lead officials are Chad Broussard (chad.broussard@bia.gov) and Harold "Dan" Hall (harold.hall@bia.gov).
For specifics, responders may wish refer to the Rancheria consultant’s Environmental Assessment report, available at https://trinidad-rancheria.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/TREDC-Hotel-EA_REV_Public-Release-Draft.pdf.
The lead BIA officials are Chad Broussard (chad.broussard@bia.gov) and Harold “Dan” Hall (harold.hall@bia.gov).
Points to Make on the Environmental Assessment
Here are some points you could make in your comments to the BIA
The HARP Steering Committee (Richard Johnson, Bryce Kenny, David Hankin, Ken Miller and Don Allan) have reviewed the Trinidad Rancheria's Environmental Assessment (EA) and put together this 42-page document commenting in detail and specifically on aspects of the EA.
Read HARP's comment letter to the Bureau of Indian Affairs.
You can see another sample letter here.
Share our Facebook Group page with your friends
Join our Group page and ask your friends to join, too. Spread the word and make connections through Facebook.
Attend A Special Meeting of the Trinidad City Council Monday, Oct. 15, 5:30-7 p.m. at Trinidad City Hall
This special meeting has been called to allow the Trinidad Rancheria to present information to the City regarding their Hotel Project. Project documents can be accessed via quick link on the City's home page, as well as through the Trinidad Rancheria's website.
Join HARP
The south end of Scenic Drive at Houda/Moonstone beaches, about 1-1/2 miles south of the Trinidad Rancheria Cher-ai Heights Casino and proposed 100-room, 5-story Hyatt Hotel.