Michelle Blackwell

At a meeting hosted by the Grass Roots Institute on March 14th, Mendocino County Planning and Building Services Director, Julia Krog and Fort Bragg, Special Projects Manager, Sarah McCormick provided updates on the municipality's Local Coastal Planning for Sea Level Rise. Point Arena, which received its funding before the county and Fort Bragg, announced their findings in September of last year.

The Mendocino Railway, locally called the Skunk Train received a federal loan to repair Noyo Tunnel 1. The Tunnel was initially closed in 2013, reopened briefly, and closed again in 2015. Mendocino Railway shares the 31.4-million-dollar loan with the Sierra Northern Railway. Due to a pending lawsuit between Mendocino Railway vs The City of Fort Bragg and the California Coastal Commission, we were unable to get interviews with the Railway or other local groups. This piece pulls from a June 2021 interview with Robert Pinoli, the president of Mendocino Railway to explain what happened to the tunnel and his plans, at that time, to reopen it.

Fort Bragg Public Works Director John Smith, provides an overview of current projects and talks about the reopening of Wiggly Giggly Park on February 10th at 10:00 AM.

Gray whales swim by Mendocino twice a year as they migrate from Mexico to the Arctic. Scott and Theresa Mercer have been counting and documenting them from a bluff near Point Arena since 2014. The Mercers recently gave a science talk at the Noyo Center that focused on the issues whales face and provided an update on the status of the Gray Whale.

Sarah Grimes, Stranding Coordinator for Southern Mendocino County at the Noyo Center for Marine Science gives her annual report on how many dead marine animals were collected on the beaches and how many were rescued by the Marine Mammal Center.

The first cases of osteofluorosis in free-ranging California Sea Lions were identified in a study done by the Marine Mammal Center, Sealife Response, Rehabilitation, and Research UC Davis and the Noyo Center. Osteofluorosis is a disease caused by the excess consumption of fluoride that affects the bone and teeth structures. In the past, herbivores such as cows and kangaroos have been identified with this issue, but this is the first known incident for sea lions. Sarah Grimes, the stranding coordinator with the Noyo Center for Marine Science in Fort Bragg, describes her role in the study and discusses the importance of sea lions as sentinels of the sea.

The Fort Bragg Planning Commission recommended the City Council approve two resolutions that could alter the face of housing in low-density residential areas of the City. The resolutions are in response to SB9 which was signed into law by Governor Newsom in 2021. Similar to the law that allows second units called alternative dwelling units, SB 9 encourages property owners to build additional housing by allowing lot splits. The resolutions are controversial because they would allow a homeowner to add three additional houses on a single-family lot. The Fort Bragg City Council will take up the resolutions at a future meeting.

In May, we provided an overview of Local Coastal Plans and the over 3 million in Coastal Commission grants awarded to Point Arena, Fort Bragg and Mendocino County to study the impacts of Sea Level Rise in the coastal zone. Point Arena received their grant funding of 100,000 dollars in August of 2022 to study Arena Cove. Last week at a Grass Roots Institute meeting, Louis White, an engineer hired by the city presented the findings of their vulnerability assessment.White explained the goals of the draft study detailed sea level rise expectations from Ocean Pacific Council and State of California and showed where flooding and other damage is expected to occur.Mendocino County received over 2 million in grants in April of 2023. They are still in the planning process but have issued requests for proposals for visual and archeological impacts, Highway 1 traffic impacts and groundwater impacts. The deadline for the proposals is late October.The City of Fort Bragg which received $900,000 in grants released a communication engagement plan with the Noyo Harbor District which can be accessed at www.NoyoOceanCollective.org.The entire presentation is available on the Grass Roots Institute's website. The Institute is also seeking volunteers to adopt a portion of the coast to monitor and document changes. For more information contact Peter McNamee through their website.

The 34th annual Mendocino Coast Writers Conference was held the first weekend of August in the town of Mendocino. Executive Director Lisa Locascio Nighthawk talks about how the conference has changed, how it kept going during the pandemic and her efforts to diversify the faculty and to create opportunities for the writing community.

The Noyo Center for Marine Science’s Slack Tide Café is closing after just 1 year in operation. It was hoped it would help fund research at the science center, but instead ended up never breaking even. Sheila Semans, Executive Director of The Noyo Center for Marine Science, talks about the café, the fate of its existing after-school and adult education classes, and plans for the Noyo Center’s presence in the harbor as well as research and economic development programs in a repurposed facility.