Thumbnail image: Conceptual art shows the fish and canoe node that will be part of the Tolowa Cultural Trail at Beachfront Park. | Image courtesy of Crescent City
Among the items discussed at Monday’s Crescent City Council meeting:
Tolowa Cultural Trail Milestone: Councilors recognized the completion of the first initial contract associated with the Tolowa Cultural Trail in Beachfront Park.
City Manager Eric Wier pointed out that despite unanimously approving a notice of completion associated with the project, it’s work that Tidewater Contractors did to lay the foundation for the trail that councilors are recognizing.
“This particular portion of the Beachfront Park improvements is actually eight different grants that are all combined together to make what will be the completed Tolowa Cultural Trail,” Wier said, adding that a tight deadline associated with a $300,000 California Arts in the Park grant required that the foundation for the trail be set before the city could start improvements to the Cultural Center. “We have met those obligations. The interpretive panels have basically been fabricated, we are waiting to install them until the rest of these pieces of the trail can come into completion.”
The Tolowa Cultural Trail project began when Crescent City received about $8 million in Proposition 68 grant dollars in 2021 and 2022, enlisting the help of local tribal representatives and members of the Del Norte County Historical Society. The welcome plaza, redwood tree, burden basket and fish and canoe nodes are awaiting installation, according to Wier.
The eight different grants Crescent City is using will allow it to expand the Tolowa Interpretive Area to include seven nodes along the California Coastal Trail. The trail will start at the Cultural Center and end at Battery Point with each node including a QR code linked to videos of Tolowa people talking about their history, life and culture.
According to Wier, the excavation, gravel and grading work Tidewater Contractors did to prepare for the interpretive displays cost about $213,163. The displays will be installed some time in the fall, he said.
Surge Tank Change Order: Councilors approved a $16,500 change order with AECOM associated with the design of a surge tank that would keep the water system functioning in the event of a power outage and a generator malfunction.
According to Wier, Crescent City entered into a contract with AECOM to install the surge tank near the water pumps at the city’s Ranney Collector near its source at the Smith River. The city determined this was necessary after a power outage and a loss in the system’s ability to communicate with the various sites in 2019 led to a ruptured a water main near the facility, according to a staff report prepared by Public Works Director David Yeager.
Wier noted that telemetry is important for the system’s Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition system to control the pumps near the Ranney Collector.
“The surge tank has a pneumatic setting so you have a certain amount of air pressure that helps with surges that come back, that gives (them) a place to absorb,” Wier said. “It’s installed. We’re coming closer to the end of the project and we’ll take the next step with control strategy and getting the pumps to align. The hope is we’ll be able to develop a strategy that the Ranney Collector itself will (use) to be able to operate autonomously without needing the telemetry of the other systems.”
The city is partnering with Elk Valley Rancheria, which received a $200,000 grant from the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, and is using $712,000 from its water fund to pay for the project. The total project cost is $837,067 with an additional $75,000 set aside for contingency.
North Coast Rape Crisis Team grant: Councilors agreed to provide a letter of support for a grant North Coast Rape Crisis Team Executive Director Amanda LeBlanc says will enable her organization and its partners to continue to build a robust sexual assault response team.
The nonprofit is working with the Crescent City Police Department, the Del Norte County Sheriff’s Office and the Del Norte County District Attorney to obtain a $1 million federal grant. The grant comes from the U.S. Department of Justice’s Office On Violence Against Women’s program to Improve the Criminal Justice Response (ICJR) to Domestic Violence, Dating Violence, Sexual Assault and Stalking, also known as the ICRJ program. Le Blanc said the grant will enable her to build on a $500,000 Office On Violence Against Women grant the nonprofit received in 2024.
“We now have a best practice interview site for kids to come in and tell their truth one time,” she told councilors. “We have SART nurses now and we hired our most experienced sexual assault nurse examiner to be a forensic services coordinator for the county. Her (goal) will be making sure we get nurses mentored and trained and all of that.”
According to CCPD Chief Richard Griffin, part of the grant — about $15,000 a year for three years — will go toward his department’s efforts to investigate sexual assault. Another $200,000 will also be used to hire additional advocates as well as a deputy director.
“For the 20 years I’ve been in this community, it has been a problem for day one for survivors and what we have to do with survivors in order to get a sexual assault exam done,” he said. “To tell a person who’d just been assaulted and had one of the worst things in their life happen to them, ‘OK, I need you to wait a day or two and you’ll get driven down by somebody to Humboldt so we can get an exam done and then you can take a shower’ — that’s a horrible thing to say let alone imagine if that was my wife or child.”
The North Coast Rape Crisis Team and its partners are pursuing the ICJR grant and six others at a time when it’s preparing to move its Del Norte office to a new location, LeBlanc said. She thanked Griffin and her organization’s other law enforcement partners, including the Del Norte County Victim Witness Program, for its collaborative effort to ensure survivors’ needs are being met.
National Night Out Donations: Councilors unanimously accepted a $1,000 donation from the Crescent City McDonald’s and a $2,500 donation from the Wild Rivers Community Foundation in connection with CCPD’s National Night Out event on Aug. 4. The donations covered bounce houses, raffle prizes and food, Griffin said.
The donations will replenish CCPD’s fund for its Explorer Program, the chief said. He also thanked Lisa McKeown’s State Farm office, Del Norte Office Supply, the Del Norte County Sheriff’s Office, the Crescent City Police Department Association and Cal-Ore Life Flight, which provided a helicopter. Black GTO provided the music. Griffin also gave kudos to Officer Magnolia Valero who organized the event.
