Saturday, February 02, 2008

The Eureka secrets we all know.

If everyone in Eureka knows, Why is it…..

We all know prostitutes walk the street in front of the library in Eureka.

Maybe as many as 50% of the drivers in our city do not have car insurance. (In Los Angeles County 75% of drivers do not have insurance! Information from SB 60.)

We have a needle exchange program, but you can find discarded needles in front of Burger King and city parks.

People are illegally panhandling across the street from the Sheriff’s department.

People wander the 101 corridor crossing 4th and 5th disregarding crosswalks and without even looking out for cars.

Drugs are being used out in the open in Old Town.

There are hundreds of homeless people living behind the Bayshore Mall.

And yet Law enforcement and the public continue to ignore the reality of problems that seem to cross everyday people’s lives. This is not the Eureka I grew up in.

31 comments:

Greg said...

hundreds?

Anonymous said...

have any of you been to the boardwalk lately? its been overrun with junkies and alcoholics...

Anonymous said...

Eureka has been a joke for a very very long time now. But I agree, the slide has become worse over the last 6 years. The difference now is that Old Town has become a little better, forcing the shittiest of the city to go where they are less readily seen. The problem was just moved around. West Eureka has become worse. 6th and 7th quickly becoming a ghetto.

And it's funny you mention the car insurance thing, as Ive been hit twice in the last 3 years and BOTH times, no insurance and crappy help from the police! The town just physically looks ill. The only thing going for it are the arts alive nights, which are few and far between due to the weather.

I remember when they thought a cruise line would be Eureka's salvation... those were days of optimism! Now we have a boardwalk thats going on 9 years of just sitting there... ONE BUILDING in 9 years! And they can't even fill it!

samoasoftball said...

My son Jordan was hit by a non insured motorist that drove out of a one way street the wrong way and totaled my car. And I had to wait for a pay off (Luckily I had uninsured motorist coverage) because the lady who hit him filed a claim on my insurance for her cars damage! Good Grief! I was paid off in the end.

Jack Durham said...

You mean those women walking around near the library are hookers??? I always thought they were smiling and gesturing toward me because of my good looks.

Anonymous said...

"We all know prostitutes walk the street in front of the library in Eureka"

Well at least it gives you something to do when the library is closed.

Anonymous said...

I'll probably be moving away soon. Don't know if I can make enough money to live here through the summer much less go through another winter of hell here. It's like this place is 20 years behind the times.

Anonymous said...

It's not just uninsured, check out the people who don't even bother getting licenses!

Shane Brinton said...

Cars on the 101 corridor disregard crosswalks without even looking out for pedestrians.

Just the perspective of someone who doesn't drive.

Anonymous said...

Went to the Bayshore Mall for the first time in months yesterday (I hate that place). It is dying a slow death. Hardly any shoppers, more vacant storefronts than I have eever seen, and loads of trash in the bushes to the west. I have heard through the grapevine that many assults have taken place at the mall recently, and they don't get reported to the public because mall owners/management are trying to keep it quiet. Are they paying off the police or the local media? Pretty sad. Sequoia Park woods are full of poop, and I don't mean dog poop; it's of the human variety. Say goodbye to the middle callss, folks, beacause all I see now around here are a lot of poor people and a few rich ones.

Tapperass said...

For those of us who do try to stop for the pedestrians, the poor soul attempting to cross must be on the lookout. Just because I stop does not ensure the other cars will stop. I have witnessed countless near misses where the car in the adjacent lane makes no effort to stop, I know they see my car stopped at the crosswalk. When I approach a stopped car at a crosswalk, I always try to stop, better safe than sorry.

Shane, thank goodness you are not one of the unlucky souls to get hit.

-boy

Carol said...

I did not know there were hundreds of people behind Bayshore Mall. Are they camping there?

Kym said...

Driveby Shootings kinda knock my socks off, too.

Last spring my 4 year old and I parked in front of St Vincents on 2nd st. I let him out of his car seat from the street side (where the buckle is) and sent him around the back the back of the car to the sidewalk while I grabbed his coat. I stood up to see a lady saying, "Honey, drop that right now." He had picked up a syringe from the gutter.

Nice way to introduce "the world isn't always a nice place" concept.

Anonymous said...

Carol: Yes

Anonymous said...

Carol.... Honey.... There have been homeless behind the mall and behind the Les Schwabb area for decades. Every couple years the city used to send in the police and some community volunteers to go and tear down the tarps and boxes these people lived in. In fact they used high school students in the early 1990's to do that. I don't know if they still do that, as it caused some uproar back then.

There are homeless encampments along the tracks all the way from West Del Norte to Herrick. Thats where the hardcore homeless live.

Anonymous said...

It's not just Eureka though. It's the whole county. To give Eureka a little credit, it still has the most exciting goings on up here. Arts Alive. A decent inexpensive bar scene. The best restaurants in the county. Hey, I lived in Mckinleyville for two years and had my car broken into twice. In Eureka, during a two year period it may only get broken into once!

Ernie Branscomb said...

“I can('t) make enough money to live here through the summer much less go through another winter of hell here. It's like this place is 20 years behind the times.”

Actually, I think that Eureka is a few years ahead of the times. The job situation, and our manufacturing industry is in the death knells in the good old USA. As soon as the rest of the world figures out that they don’t need our “information” that our economy is based on, and China decides that we aren’t worth doing business with on a credit basis, and our dollar is worth about a dime on the world market, we are done for. Right now we are whistling through the graveyard until after the Presidential election. After that we will be looking back on these days as “The good old days”.

Am I sounding too optimistic???

samoasoftball said...

Andrew: I may have sounded like I thimk Eureka is a hell hole, but all I was trying to do is express my observations. Can you refute and of my comments?

Carol and Greg: Sad but true. At any given time frame there are hundreds living homeless on the Far West side of Eureka.

When the needles start hitting the fast food joints, hey, we have a problem that need to be addressed.

Cynical me. I was pulled over driving my 1998 "Tracer" by a female officer who followed me from Manila to Eureka. I was pulled over and ticketed for having slightly tinted windows! I see people in cars that you can not see the drivers at all! I told her she had just passed many Meth Labs in Manila to pull me over for my windows? And I am not supposed to complain. My goodness. And we donate to law enforcement causes!

Oh yes, I hate speed traps also! And having my civil rights messed with at check points! The questions they throw out there. "Hi, how much have you been drinking?" and "Been doing drugs today?" Don't get me started. Oh yeah, I already am.

mresquan said...

Check points are a dream come true for those preferring to drive drunk.

Joel Mielke said...

"Ernie you sound like a dumb sonofabitch"

Let's see an argument to the contrary from Anonymous, who probably imagines himself not to be a dumb sonofabitch.

I'll put my money on Ernie.

Anonymous said...

It sucks when your humor is misunderstood.

Ernie Branscomb said...

Gee, thanks C.P.R!

I'll put two dollars on "Dumb Sonofabitch".

But, even dumb S.O.B.’s have opinions. There’s an old saying about opinions, but I guess everybody already knows it. The only reason that I sign my name is that it keeps me from making statements like that about other people. I don’t like to be mean, unless it’s just too witty to resist.

Ernie Branscomb said...

I'm curious, if I don’t have a needle to turn in can I have one anyway?

Anonymous said...

I, too, am distressed at what has happened to Eureka- the poverty, the hard drugs, contentious politics, the lousy health care, poor infrastructure(that's the whole county.) Whenever I start feeling good about Eureka's future, alI I have to do is drive by the shuttered Eureka In for a reality check. I used to think I wanted to live here in my old age but I'm having a lot of second thoughts.

Anonymous said...

The lousy health care is everywhere. My brother has a prestigious, high-paying job in a big city, but the HMO is doing its best to kill him through incompetence and malign neglect.

If that's how the insurance-based system of health care treats the privileged, how are the rest of us going to fare in our time of need?

Anonymous said...

"This is not the Eureka I grew up in."

Oh yes it is. You just didn't realize that heroin and hookers were readily available to anyone on Two Street who had a hankering and a full wallet back in 1966. (I observed this when I was a lad, before "Two Street" had been re-worked by public relations experts into "Old Town.")

Prostitution and drugs are common in seaport towns. Always were, always will be.

Trouble is, here we are not keeping the lid on.

For the sake of the kids, we should do a better job of keeping the lid on.

Anonymous said...

I'd say you're reaping the rewards of your socialist political beliefs. Does anyone in Humboldt county have any standards anymore? I know there's a few hold outs but the vast majority has no standards whatsoever.

Joel Mielke said...

Socialism is responsible for our problems?

Anonymous needs to get out more.

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