Northcoast Environmental Center Burns

A fire at the Northcoast Environmental Center (NEC) in Arcata completely destroyed the facility and all it's contents. According to Arcata Fire Chief Dave White, the fire was called into the Fire Department at 11:26 PM, Wednesday night. A staff member of the NEC, who was in the area, rushed into the building and attempted to extinguish the fire with a hand held fire extinguisher. The fire was burning through the ceiling into the office space and his attempts were futile. By the time firemen arrived at the scene the fire was out of control. It's believed the fire either started on the roof of the NEC or in the crawl space below the roof.

Connie Stewart, Mayor of Arcata and office manager of the NEC, during an interview on community radio station KMUD said, "The major loss is the 30 years of irreplaceable archival material on every environmental problem that's ever happened on the North Coast. We had an incredible library of 8500 volumes of books and data, slides, and newspaper clippings."

The center recently has been active in concert with other environmental groups in trying to stop salvage logging in the Six Rivers National Forest of 1,050 acres charred during the 1999 Megram fire. They also are plaintiffs in a lawsuit directed at the Bureau of Reclamation to limit the amount of water diverted to farmlands from rivers under the Klamath project, a federal reclamation project. At stake is the health of rivers, bald eagles, steelhead trout and coho salmon.

Also destroyed in the fire, fought by 65 fire fighters, was a 19th century historical building Marino's, and Arcata Paint. The cause of the fire has not been determined. Rumors abound around town about the possibility of arson, considering the amount of violence perpetrated toward environmentalist in the county over the years. When asked, Fire Chief White said that arson investigations are always done on fires of this nature but that he had no indication of arson prior to their investigation.

The staff of the NEC is energized to rebuild. For donations and information on how you can help, call 822-6918. For information about the NEC and more photos' of the fire see their website at http://www.necandeconews.to/.