Wetland warrior $trike$ again

Bill Pierson finds another way to save the planet–and make a few bucks while he’s at it! Yay money!! Apparently even progs like it!

Looks like weeds to us.

How did we miss this?

What gives?

Arch-rival and fellow D-list blogger Carson Park Mofo slipped up and said something kinda-sorta nice about us. To wit:

Carson Park Ranger said…

Oh come on, Doggerelface. You simply must admit that the posts are funny at the Mirror. The Bonnie fixation is disturbing, and the comments are beyond the pale, but the talent behind the posts deserves recognition.

Oh well. He must have been drunk.

Anyway–here, friendly Mofo. Have three more hits.

Hugs!!

Updated: What’s wrong with this picture?

In the event that purchasing candidates and apocryphal environmental reports isn’t enough to tank a potential competitor’s development proposal–fret not, prog friends! Bill Pierson has a few more tricks up his oversized Hawaiian-shirt sleeves.

Consider, for example, his relationship with Peter Douglas, pictured below left with Pierson on Thursday at Hurricane Kate’s in Old Town. Douglas, of course, is the executive director of the California Coastal Commission, which is the agency ultimately responsible for evaluating the Marina Center project.

Bon appetit!!

"Say, Peter, let's have ourselves some dessert and a fat, sloppy laugh about how we're going to screw Rob Arkley--I mean protect the environment."

UPDATE: Greg Pierson confirms that neither he nor his father, Hank, is involved in any of his brother Bill’s dealings. In fact, he said, “Those who take the time to find facts would know that Hank and I tend to contribute to candidates that run against those supported by Bill. It is funny how a family can be so politically diverse.”

His complete comments are here and here. Thanks for the clarity, friend!!

Updated: Patron saint of economic protectionism gives back

At some point you'd think it would be cheaper for the hardware heir to just lower his prices and compete for business like everyone else.

That Bill Pierson is quite a guy.

He’s a successful businessman, a world traveler, photographer, arts patron–and, it turns out, a generous commissioner of wetland delineation reports.

Well, just one wetland delineation report, actually. But it’s a good ‘un, in part because the owner of Pierson Building Center is not the owner of the wetlands he unselfishly paid to delineate.

Those are located on a 38-acre site identified in the report as the Balloon Tract.

To Pierson’s credit, the fact that the property was and is the proposed site of the Marina Center development which would be anchored by a rival building supply store in no way deterred his outpouring of philanthropy.

By all accounts, Pierson simply wanted to make sure the city of Eureka and the California Coastal Commission were aware that portions of the property could be undevelopable due to the presence of wetlands.

Undoubtedly it was the same altruistic impulse that caused him to instruct his attorney to forward the report to those agencies, unsolicited and without reference to the fact that it was funded by a man with an overriding economic interest in obstructing the project.

Pierson’s high-mindedness was further demonstrated in his choice of environmental consultants–Zentner and Zentner, a firm that could probably use a little help given that its 15 minutes of fame were spent trying to explain away several stunningly flagrant violations of environmental law.

A U.S. Department of Justice brief summarized the 2001 case as follows:

John Zentner, an environmental consultant in Emeryville, California, and his corporation, Zentner & Zentner, were prosecuted under the Endangered Species Act for unlawfully taking threatened California Red-legged frogs at the site of a new housing project in Concord, California. Zentner and his company collected over 50 protected frogs and 500 tadpoles from the sole pond at the site, shrunk the pond by more than half in order to facilitate the development, and relocated the frogs into the remainder of the pond, which was no longer capable of sustaining them. The defendants failed to notify wildlife authorities of the existence of the frogs at the site despite the demonstrated concern of officials that the species were probably present.

But in John Zentner, Pierson found a man as charitable as himself. After the four federal convictions, Zentner generously donated $75,000 in fines and 200 hours of court-ordered community service. The three years of probation, however, were just for him.

UPDATE: Greg Pierson confirms that neither he nor his father, Hank, is involved in any of his brother Bill’s dealings. In fact, he said, “Those who take the time to find facts would know that Hank and I tend to contribute to candidates that run against those supported by Bill. It is funny how a family can be so politically diverse.”

His complete comments are here and here. Thanks for the clarity, friend!!

Newspaper war continues as Times-Standard fights to put itself out of business

A good overseas strip always stirs up some excitment.

Sanity Banking

Well, well, well. The Humboldt Mirror’s brand new GIS Department was tasked with designing a Eureka-Arcata Corridor Project even the progs would approve of. They forgot one important element–highway banking, in which the Highway 101 right-of-way would be preserved in case, you know, we ever return to our motherfucking senses–but otherwise, not a bad first effort.

Welcome, GIS geeks!!

Caltrans project hits political road block

Unsafe highways make excellent soapboxes.

After six years of studies, reports, environmental analyses, public input, modifications and multi-agency approvals, the Eureka-Arcata Corridor Project ran smack into a wall of silence Tuesday at the Board of Supervisors meeting.

Supervisor Jill Duffy proposed accepting the staff report and moving forward with the least environmentally damaging alternative for making necessary safety improvements–but couldn’t get a second for her motion.

Why not? Well that depends on who you ask.

Supervisor Bonnie Neely needed more analysis and findings.

Supervisor Mark Lovelace wasn’t “comfortable” making a decision.

Caltrans reps didn’t seem to know what to think, and asked the supervisors to identify specific concerns.

They couldn’t come up with anything, but fortunately Lovelace’s buddies over at Green Wheels have their talking points lubed up and ready to roll.

First–and who knew?–it turns out that cars produce greenhouse gases. Evidently Caltrans is supposed to do something about that if it wants its road repair projects to move forward.

Second, the preferred alternative calls for improvements to Indianola Road, which could lead to sprawl.

Finally, that alternative costs a lot of money and will reduce Caltrans’ ability to build trails for bikes and bums, which is what it really should be doing in the first place.

Brilliance!! We wonder how much it would have cost had the project not been cock-blocked every step of the way, and also how much more it will cost after another several years of studies and reports.

By now it’s probably irrelevant to recall that the impetus behind this project was to make a dangerous road safe. The only purpose it seems to serve now is to provide another platform for the lunatic left to spout its mad shit about the evils of rural living and the internal combustion engine.

Photo stolen from here.

Battle of the left-wing douchebags?

Alert Mirror readers report that two of Humboldt County’s biggest gasbags recently took a break from their assault on common sense to go a few rounds with each other.

Scott Greacen, skeevy executive director of the Environmental Protection Information Center, and Richard Salzman, gadfly and unrepentant forger, reportedly set the fur a-flying at a recent meeting.

So exciting!! Our preferences tend toward a little hot girl-on-girl action, but hey. This here bitch-fight may be the next best thing.

Remember, friends! No pulling hair!!

This unretouched photo shows Salzman, left, and Grecean getting amongst it.

Babydaddy Edwards to admit paternity?

Edwards, left, and Kerrigan share a passion for politics, personal integrity and hair design.

As a former aide prepares for publication of a tell-all book, national media outlets report perennial presidential candidate John Edwards has suddenly discovered a possible link between all that sex he had with former mistress Rielle Hunter and her previously baffling pregnancy.

Readers may recall Humboldt’s own Chris Kerrigan, himself no stranger to sexual intrigue, was so enamored of Edwards that he abandoned his position as a Eureka city councilman so he could assist the philanderer’s latest campaign.

After all that, Edwards, whose wife was and is dying of cancer, has finally succeeded in making a name for himself: Whether he acknowledges his paternity or not, he will long be remembered as one of the great schmucks in U.S. history.

Progs propose new venue for Marina Center project review

“Yo, dawg, so check it out. I don’t know if it’s me or whatever, but I just totally wasn’t in love with that Interim Remedial Action Plan, you feel me? I mean, I liked it, yo. You see where I’m at? But I didn’t love it. I tried, but you know it was just kind of okay for me.”

Just one more opportunity for the far left to act like it hasn't been included in the process.

Carson Park Mofo jumps on the publicity-whore bandwagon

Admittedly, though, he is a looker.

All right, all right, bro.

Here. Have some hits.

Feel better?

Hugs!!

(But a little PS, if we may? No one deserves to have condescending and derogatory “news” articles written about them by people who–kind of like you– seem to think disagreement with the writer’s beliefs is a sign of incurable stupidity. That’s what’s wrong with the cable news shows you seem to be so enamored of and why no one we know watches them. They’re arrogant, inaccurate and unfair. So was Bob Doran’s characterization of a group of people in Fortuna who oppose the current range of health reform options. But hey–thanks for giving us another opportunity to point that out.)

The North Coast Journal gets it right

Over the past week, numerous Humboldt Mirror readers have remarked on a North Coast Journal article in which reporter Bob Doran, covering a Tea Party meeting in Fortuna, quoted a woman he called Amy Wahlberg, who was reportedly booed and jeered for suggesting that health care is a right and not a privilege.

Discussion centered around the startling fact that many of us know Amy not as Wahlberg but Doran–Bob’s wife. That the quote in question appeared to reflect a bias manifested elsewhere in the story compounded the problem, and Bob’s clumsy attempt to conceal his wife’s identity obviously made things worse.

The good news? Publisher Judy Hodgson isn’t having any of it. From the current edition of the Journal comes this extraordinary–and appropriate–statement:

To Our Readers, an Apology

Two weeks ago a veteran member of our editorial staff made an error in judgment. He had offered to cover a controversial meeting in Fortuna–to take photos and report on the gathering he and his wife planned to attend anyway. It turned out his wife spoke at the meeting, the crowd reacted strongly and negatively, and he reported accurately on the exchange he considered pivotal to the coverage. Only he used her maiden name, one that she uses in her work as an artist and elsewhere.

Nevertheless, the intent was clear: to conceal or obscure her identity and to mislead readers. It was an ethical lapse we consider serious and we sincerely apologize.

The story, “Tea in Fortuna: Frightened patriots attempt to make sense of health care reform” by Bob Doran, is available on our Web site with an amended footnote. Doran has been the Journal’s arts and entertainment editor, covering all things cultural, since 1998.

Judy Hodgson

Tad sentenced to 30 days for utter lack of originality

Okay, so this isn't actually Tad, but don't act like you can't see the resemblance.

For those of you who’ve not had the pleasure of witnessing firsthand the enraged pedantry of Tad Robinson–no worries, friends!!

It turns out his timeworn routine of demanding attention from elected officials by taking a three-minute verbal shit during public comment periods is in fact completely derivative.

In the video below, Tad, meet Todd. And not to disparage or anything, but Todd’s a way bigger douchebag than even you are.

Anyway, have fun in the slammy. And to think that all you did was break the law, dare the cops to arrest you, resist arrest, demand that the case go to court, get convicted by a jury of your peers, and then refuse probation.

No justice, no peace, bro!!

Will the record be unbroken?

An ambitious project, a big pile of dough and Kirk Girard: Never a good combination.

Hits, shits, whatever.

Local man wins much-needed home makeover

Oh that's way better. Now if you could just scrub some of the gross off that piano and promise to never ever try to sing again.

Local blogger-turned-newscaster Ryan Hurley is making headlines again–this time for submitting the winning video entry in a nationwide search for the ugliest home decor.

His prize? A complete home makeover, courtesy of Home Depot.

Designer and contest judge Ernesto Fabri said Hurley’s submission was in a class all its own.

“Rarely does one see a room so lacking in style,” Fabri said. “It doesn’t even know what it is. It seems to ask, ‘Am I a living room? a hallway? a bathroom? a foyer?’ I mean, give us a hint, per favore, so we know whether to shit or wipe our feet.”

Fabri added, “And ugly–buon dio! When Ty Pennington saw it, he had a good cry and then hanged himself with an exquisite damask drapery. To the end his taste was impeccable.”

Hurley’s interior design was so uninviting that Eureka City Councilman Larry Glass drafted an ordinance that would force him to remove the inspirational wall hangings and update his color palette.

But competition in the contest was considerable. Hurley barely edged out fake homeless guy Arcata activist Tad Robinson and Eureka slumlord property manager Floyd Squiers.

“I’m the luckiest man alive,” Hurley said. “Not only did I win all this tits new furniture, I still have that dead-end job with the city and a video blog absolutely no one watches. It’s like one big dream come true.”