Bill Barnum Returns to 100% Humboldt with a Lot to Say About the County’s Future

Bill Barnum is back on the 100% Humboldt podcast, and he’s got a lot on his mind.

Barnum, a Eureka-born attorney who practiced law for nearly four decades before stepping back in 2019, joins host Scott Hammond for a conversation that covers a lot of ground — from the collapse of the redwood lumber market to why Humboldt County has built so few houses in the past 30 years, and what that says about the community’s relationship with growth and change.

The two dig into downtown Eureka’s parking situation, the waterfront’s long-stalled potential, and what Barnum calls the “Humboldt hermit” factor — a strain of local resistance to development that he argues has cost the county real opportunity over generations. They also talk about Cal Poly Humboldt’s rebranding, the Amazon warehouse controversy in McKinleyville, and why Barnum thinks the way people show up to oppose projects matters as much as the opposition itself.

But the conversation isn’t all economics. Barnum, who turns 72 this week and recently lost his mother, talks about faith, identity, what he learned getting fired at 17, and what it means to pass the baton to the next generation.

It’s episode 119 of the podcast and one of the more candid hours Hammond has put together. Find it on YouTube, all major podcast platforms, and Access Humboldt TV.