Category Archives: CC Harbor

Articles, CC Harbor, Community News, Emergencies, Infrastructure, Local Government

Del Norte OES Manager Says Gasquet Neighbors Group Stepped Up During Tsunami Emergency; Scientists Start Collecting, Analyzing Data

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Thumbnail photo: Wednesday’s tsunamis lifted H Dock off its pilings, temporarily submerging it, resulting in separation of its segments. | Photo courtesy of the Crescent City Harbor District

Two days after a magnitude 8.8 earthquake near the Russian Far East sent tsunami surges into the Crescent City Harbor, Del Norte County’s emergency services manager posted a big thank you on Facebook.

Deborah Otenburg praised first responders, local law enforcement, the city, school district and tribal partners as well as the county health and human services and building maintenance departments, which set up a temporary evacuation point at the Veterans Memorial Hall in Crescent City.

Otenburg also lauded the Gasquet Neighbors Helping Neighbors group and the Gasquet American Legion Hall — unusual recipients of her thanks when the only areas in immediate danger for most of Wednesday were the harbor, beaches and the Elk Creek, Klamath and Smith River mouths.

Continue reading Del Norte OES Manager Says Gasquet Neighbors Group Stepped Up During Tsunami Emergency; Scientists Start Collecting, Analyzing Data →
Articles, CC Harbor, Local Government

Local Activist Raises Concerns Over Inappropriate Language in CCHD Patrol Logs

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Thumbnail photo by Gavin Van Alstine

Updated at 1:32 p.m. Saturday to include more information about how Linda Sutter and Redwood Voice obtained the patrol logs and to remove the names of the individual patrolmen named in the logs from the article. To view the Harbor District Patrol logs for December 2024 2025, click here.

Linda Sutter says she was acting on a tip when she requested copies of the Crescent City Harbor patrol logs under the California Public Records Act. 

What she found prompted her to not only inform harbor commissioners, it was enough to take her before the Del Norte County Board of Supervisors.

“I pulled a random log for the month of December,” said Sutter, a community activist, frequent public commenter before both governing bodies as well as a 2024 candidate for the Harbor District Board. “I wanted to read how they write their reports.”

For three minutes on June 22, Sutter, naming names, told supervisors that CCHD patrolmen regularly call a Bayside RV Park tenant “shower nazi” in their reports with one employee saying he told her that he was “checking for skin walkers.”

Sutter recounted the patrolmen’s disgust with the sea lions on the old U.S. Coast Guard dock, with one member in the logs saying they should be arrested for “malicious fecal distribution.” She also took issue with other language patrol staff used in the logs, including “tweakie—twack” and “noisy hoe.”

Continue reading Local Activist Raises Concerns Over Inappropriate Language in CCHD Patrol Logs →
Articles, CC Harbor, Crescent City, Emergencies, Regional News

Kamchatka Tsunami May Have Caused More Damage to Crescent City Harbor Than Thought, Assessment Continues

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Thumbnail photo: Crescent City Harbor and Pacific Power staff assess damage done to H Dock from a series of tsunami surges spawned by an 8.8 earthquake near the Kamchatka Peninsula. | Photo by Heather Polen.

Crescent City Harbormaster Mike Rademaker said a series of tsunami surges that swept into the inner boat basin may have caused “closer to $1 million” in damage on Wednesday.

H Dock bore the brunt of the energy, Rademaker said, but the concrete structure of the docks are “mostly still in good shape.”

“The metal connecting plates are sheared all over,” he said via text message just after noon on Wednesday, “and the 1.5 inch electric cabling will have to be completely replaced.”

Continue reading Kamchatka Tsunami May Have Caused More Damage to Crescent City Harbor Than Thought, Assessment Continues →
Articles, CC Harbor, Crescent City, Emergencies, Regional News

Del Norte County Weathers Tsunami With Minimal Damage; CCHD’s H Dock Did Its Job, Harbormaster Says

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Thumbnail photo: The National Weather Service noted surge of 3.6 feet at about 4 a.m. Wednesday, enough to generate minor coastal flooding and inundation. | Image courtesy of the National Weather Service

The Crescent City Harbor District’s sacrificial dock did its job, taking the brunt of the energy spawned by a series of tsunami surges that arrived early Wednesday morning.

No injuries were reported from the tsunami, which occurred following a magnitude 8.8 earthquake off the east coast of Russia’s Kamchatka Peninsula, Harbormaster Mike Rademaker said during a community briefing at about 8 a.m. Wednesday. But H Dock sustained significant damage.

“At approximately 2:40 a.m. we noticed a surge of water several feet in height,” he said. “That caused the decking of H Dock to lift along its pilings. As the water level rose, the decking lodged on the pilings and was eventually submerged, [which] resulted in major structural failure and the complete separation of the dock.” 

Continue reading Del Norte County Weathers Tsunami With Minimal Damage; CCHD’s H Dock Did Its Job, Harbormaster Says →
Articles, CC Harbor, Local Government

Crescent City Harbor Board Approves Months-Old Meeting Minutes Amid Debate Over Their Accuracy

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Thumbnail photo by Paul Critz

Despite appearing on a portion of the agenda dedicated to routine items, the approval of minutes from seven Crescent City Harbor District meetings on Wednesday drew debate from a handful of public commenters.

One member of the public, Del Norte Triplicate Editor Roger Gitlin, a former Del Norte County supervisor, cited Rosenberg’s Rules of Order and said that even if a commissioner was absent from a meeting, if they had read the minutes and could attest to reading them, they could approve the minutes.

Another member of the public, Stephanie Abrams, argued that the minutes should be read aloud at a following meeting so those who weren’t able to attend could get up to speed on what was discussed.

A third commenter, Joe “Hank” Akin, president of the Big Rock Community Services District, pointed out that one set of minutes was from Jan. 22.

“They’re up to seven months old, who knows if they’re accurate?” Akin said. “And you’re going to vote on them. That in itself is troubling to me.”

Continue reading Crescent City Harbor Board Approves Months-Old Meeting Minutes Amid Debate Over Their Accuracy →
Articles, CC Harbor, Local Government

Davis-Based Attorney Accuses Triplicate Editor of Bias, Says Roger Gitlin Published ‘False Statements of Fact’ About CCHD Commissioner Annie Nehmer

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Thumbnail photo: Roger Gitlin, editor of the Del Norte Triplicate, comments at a June 2 Crescent City Council meeting. | Screenshot

Annie Nehmer

Editor’s note: The author of this article worked for the Del Norte Triplicate from 2012 to 2019. Her employment with the Triplicate ended when Country Media became the newspaper’s owners.

Paul Nicholas Boylan says his job is to make sure his client, Crescent City Harbor Commissioner Annie Nehmer, gets a fair shake in the local press and, up until last week, the Davis-based attorney thought that would be achieved.

Those hopes were dashed, however, after Del Norte Triplicate editor Roger Gitlin published an article July 9 under the headline “Harbor Commissioner Sues Herself.” The article came after Boylan raised concerns about the appearance of bias in Gitlin’s questions to his client.

Boylan says he had also received assurances from Joe Warren, chief executive of Country Media Inc., which owns the Triplicate, that Gitlin would submit questions to Nehmer, providing her with a chance to comment before publishing further pieces. This never happened, the attorney said.

Continue reading Davis-Based Attorney Accuses Triplicate Editor of Bias, Says Roger Gitlin Published ‘False Statements of Fact’ About CCHD Commissioner Annie Nehmer →
Articles, CC Harbor, Economy

OC Developers Unveil Grand Plan For Harbor District RV Parks Amid Lingering Skepticism Over Previous Efforts That Failed

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Thumbnail photo: A few RVs linger in a nearly-deserted Bayside RV Park in this photo from June 2023. | By Jessica Cejnar Andrews

After hearing a pitch from two Orange County-based developers who want to revitalize the Crescent City Harbor’s RV parks, public commenters resurrected memories of a previous investor whose grand design never materialized.

Many are still bitter over the Harbor District’s experience with Alex Lemus, Henry Geiger told the new developers, Sean McGraw and Scott Lawhon following their proposal on June 25. 

Geiger said he liked their proposal, which includes improving deteriorated pavement, broken electrical outlets and outdated restrooms at Bayside and Redwood Harbor Village RV parks, but wished they had made their pitch to the Harbor District seven or eight years ago.

“The problem is you’re coming in behind an individual who made promises in the past,” Geiger told McGraw and Lawhon. “I have no doubt you’re committed, but I also heard the same commitment from the previous individual who promised the world and stuck [the Harbor District] with some big bills.”

Continue reading OC Developers Unveil Grand Plan For Harbor District RV Parks Amid Lingering Skepticism Over Previous Efforts That Failed →
Articles, CC Harbor, Infrastructure, Local Government

Harbor District Board Drops Property Insurance On Marina Docks To Save $181,500

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Thumbnail photo by Gavin Van Alstine

Crescent City Harbor commissioners took Sandy Moreno’s advice and decided not to renew property insurance that covers damage to the docks in the marina from fire and collision.

Moreno, who became the Harbor District’s financial advisor in April, urged commissioners to hold off on renewing the Commercial Property — Inner Boat Basin Docks portion of their coverage with Redwood Leavitt Insurance Agency. She proposed taking the $181,500 premium it would have cost, putting $50,000 of it toward maintenance and using the remainder to keep the Harbor District solvent through the fiscal year.

“I’m giving you guys a year to get your shit together and if we do this one thing it does that,” she said Wednesday. “We will get through a year and if revenue generation and our cost savings and all the things we’re looking at doing — you will be in a really good place come July 1 of next year.”

Continue reading Harbor District Board Drops Property Insurance On Marina Docks To Save $181,500 →
Articles, CC Harbor, Community News, Local Government

Following 3-2 Vote, Rademaker Keeps Harbormaster Job Despite Concerns Over His Contract

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Rademaker

Thumbnail photo by Paul Critz

Three Crescent City Harbor commissioners let a five-year employment contract with Mike Rademaker stand despite concerns from two of their colleagues that someone had tweaked it after the fact.

During a meeting that lasted more than five hours Wednesday, commissioners Annie Nehmer and Dan Schmidt said the final version of the contract included terms that had been deleted during negotiations the Board held with Rademaker in May.

Nehmer said that paragraphs she and her colleagues had changed when negotiating Rademaker’s contract with the help of attorney Michael Travis, of Best Best & Krieger, had been added back in after it had been sent to the district’s current legal counsel, Ryan Plotz, of the Mitchell Law Firm, for review.

Continue reading Following 3-2 Vote, Rademaker Keeps Harbormaster Job Despite Concerns Over His Contract →
Articles, CC Harbor, Local Government

Schmidt Urges His Colleagues To Resume Crescent City Harbormaster Search; Rademaker Says His Appointment in April Stands

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Dan Schmidt

Thumbnail photo by Paul Critz

One of the four commissioners who approved Mike Rademaker’s contract as Crescent City harbormaster late last month is walking back on his decision, saying he questions Rademaker’s judgment on at least two issues.

Dan Schmidt, who was elected to the Crescent City Harbor District Board in November, says his suggestion to negotiate with Rademaker over his contract during a May 28 closed session meeting violated the Ralph M. Brown Act, California’s open meetings law. Though he was one of four who agreed to approve the contract, Schmidt says the Harbor District Board will again be soliciting applicants for the harbormaster position.

“Mike Rademaker has on too many occasions exhibited what I consider to be poor judgment in two distinct hemispheres,” Schmidt told Redwood Voice Community News on Friday.

Continue reading Schmidt Urges His Colleagues To Resume Crescent City Harbormaster Search; Rademaker Says His Appointment in April Stands →