The Vision Statement for Arcata's General Plan update is still a work in progress. At a hastily convened joint study session held on November 28, 2023, (after Thanksgiving weekend), the City Council and Planning Commission edited the previous version. They came up with a pretty good Vision Statement -- but still not complete.

Eureka is vastly different from Arcata, and their vision statements reflect this. Arcata's is by far more people-oriented. Much of Eureka's vision statement is about things, buildings, and infrastructure. Overall Arcata's is connected to human feelings and psychological needs. Eureka's seems to say:  If we build a great city, then people will come and enjoy their lives here. Arcata's seems to say: If people enjoy their lives here, then we will have a great city.

How will Arcata look 20 or 50 years from now? A vision statement presents the city council’s ambition for the future. The vision statement sets the bar high in terms of how the city wants to be perceived by the world in the future. This article explores the components of excellent vision statements from around the world. Reading time 8-10 minutes.

"I wanted to give a bit of lead time on the materials for next Monday’s meeting. These will be included in the packets that will come out on Friday. But I wanted you to have time to digest them. To that end, please provide me any Land Use Element policies or Vision Statement components you wish to change/discuss by Sunday Morning at 10 a.m. I will work on compiling them and get them back out to you Sunday by 5. We’ll post them on Monday to our webpage. Lastly, the Circulation Element is included, but you will not get to that material on Monday. The intent is for you to have the element with plenty of time to review it. We will be taking up the Circulation Element and the Mobility chapter of the Gateway, including the K/L couplet, on April 11."

Includes each Element, images of the Table of Contents for easy scanning, the full draft Gateway Area Plan Element. Also includes the full 2019-2027 Housing Element plus the description in the Housing Element of the Gateway Plan -- from 2019.

Everyone knows the Iceberg Theory. What you see is only 10% of the iceberg. The rest of it is hidden underwater. That would be 90% that's unknown. The same is true of the Gateway Area Plan. How can anyone make a decision if 90% of what's necessary to make that decision is unknown? The answer is: You can't.

Reading time: 3 to 6 minutes -- Many Arcatans today worry that our city is losing its identity. Yet the core of that identity is not based on who among us owns a home and which of us may never own a home, or our background or our ethnicity. It is the ideals we share, the good we hold in common. -- From an essay by Robert Reich.

Councilmembers and Commissioners: Please make it clear that there is absolutely no interest or wish for you to "develop a final draft of each of the General Plan Elements, the Gateway Area Plan, and the Form-Based Code by November 17, 2023" as is suggested in the draft for the framework for the August 22 meeting.

A suggested format to assist the Planning Commission with the Framework that is currently being used.

A special page for City Council and Planning Commission members -- and a great place for all readers to learn more about the Gateway Plan. This page will be updated regularly. Come back for more!

BROWN ACT VIOLATION --- This memo was submitted to the Planning Commission at the March 14 meeting of the PC. Printed copies were offered to people who were present, but nothing was available to persons who were watching on-line either at that time nor later. --At that meeting, a new Chair and Vice-Chair were elected. The wording of the 1st line "I support Scott Davies as Chair and Dan Tangney as Vice-Chair of the Commission." seems to imply that Commissioner Lehman had advance knowledge that Davies and Tangney would be nominated.

An open letter to Dr. Tom Jackson, president of Cal Poly Humboldt. Listed are some concrete actions that can be taken, for the benefit of all people in Arcata.

A special page for readers of the Mad River Union and the Northcoast Journal -- and a great place for all readers to learn more about the Gateway Plan. This page will be changed and updated regularly. Come back for more!

Contains 62 pages of information, collected from people's comments and viewpoints, that the City has not included in their engagement report about the Gateway Plan. Includes the comments on the Post-Its from the two-day January 2022 Open House meeting -- information that the City has been unwilling to assemble and published.

Sea Level Rise expert Aldaron Laird, Danco president Chris Dart, and the Arcata Fire District Board of Directors, Chief, and Staff all agree -- for three different reasons. ---------- “Gulliver’s Travels” map from 1726 depicts Arcata and the Brobdingnagian Gateway Plan. ---- The Gateway Plan was anticipated in 1943 as: “The can-do spirit of the times that led people to devise a number of illogical schemes that would purportedly solve social and economic ills.”

Is this really the Community Engagement Report? The one we've been waiting FIVE -- no make it SIX -- months for? It's supposed to be a summary of what Arcatans want. Oh well. There's no Summary, no compilation of what people have said. Do we want 8-Story apartment buildings in the Gateway area? It still might be a while before we find out -- from official sources -- what the community wants. Unless, that is, we already know.

A full transcription of the 1 hour introductory video presentation of the draft Gateway plan. With comments and opinions about misrepresentations and false information in the video.

WITH VIDEO -- A full transcription of the 1 hour introductory video presentation of the draft Gateway plan. With comments and opinions about misrepresentations and false information in the video.

This is a 14 minute section of the one-hour presentation by Ben Noble, from June 29, 2022. This section includes Ben's description of of the Ministerial Review permitting process.  A link to the full presentation is included.

To the City Council for the 1st public hearing at the Council on the General Plan, Gateway Area Plan, Gateway Code, and Program Environmental Impact Report. --- "As you must be aware, the Council is in a difficult situation here. You are being asked to approve a set of documents that are incomplete." With 5 very important topics suggested for review, and 5 other lesser but still very significant topics.

THIS NEWSLATTER WAS SENT OUT ON MONDAY, MAY 27, 2024. The two scheduled public hearings with the Arcata City Council take place on Wednesdays -- May 29 and June 5, 2024. If needed, the public hearing meetings will be continued. The City Council will consider, take public comment on, discuss, and perhaps vote to adopt the Gateway Area Plan, the Gateway Zoning Code, the Arcata General Plan 2045, and the Final Environmental Report.

The Arcata Fire District wrote a letter that they wanted the Planning Commissioners to see. The Community Development Director did not send them the letter. Instead, he wrote a watered-down summary -- leaving out what is important, and adding in a summary that is not what the AFD said.

This “May 14, 2024” version contains changes that the Planning Commission has never seen or discussed. It contains changes where the Commission said not to change. It contains inadequate changes for things that the Commission wanted changed. It's still missing many things that the Commission brought up and did not fully resolve. It has Inclusionary Zoning wrong. And still no planning for the L Street woonerf and linear park.

What was slated to be a “final” review of Arcata’s Gateway Area Code took place at the April 23, 2024, Planning Commission meeting. On May 14, 2024, is the Public hearing on the General Plan 2045, the Gateway Area Plan, and the Gateway Code. Also on May 14 is a Planning Commission review of the three documents and the Commission's recommendation to the City Council. *** The full-steam-ahead pedal-to-the-medal accelerated pace will result in a sub-standard Gateway Code.