Billboard owner sues Humboldt County to keep Elk River sign up

A long fight over the Elk River billboard south of Eureka has moved from county hearings to the courthouse, where Allpoints Outdoor Inc. is trying to keep the sign standing along U.S. Highway 101. The company is seeking either compensation for the ordered removal of the billboard or an extension of its permit, and owner Geoff Wills separately asked a judge in May to quickly halt county enforcement action.

The dispute turns on a structure that has sat in the same spot since 1959 and was long treated as a legal nonconforming use, meaning it could remain even though a new billboard would not be allowed there today. That status changed after a November 26, 2019 winter windstorm snapped the sign’s supporting posts and brought it down. When the billboard was rebuilt in 2021, Humboldt County allowed it back only under a special permit that ran for five years.

That limited permit set up the deadline that now hangs over the site. The Humboldt County Planning Commission first denied reconstruction in a 4-2 vote on May 7, 2020, before the Board of Supervisors later approved the five-year permit. When the issue came back before supervisors in 2026, the board voted 3-2 on February 10 to deny a request to let the billboard remain indefinitely. Supervisors Rex Bohn and Michelle Bushnell dissented.

Environmental advocates have argued throughout that the sign sits in coastal wetlands and environmentally sensitive habitat where new billboards are prohibited. Humboldt Waterkeeper has said the county admits the property is entirely within coastal wetlands held in trust by the state, and the group has described its billboard campaign as part of a 15-year push to remove billboard blight from the Humboldt Bay wetlands and restore scenic views along Highway 101.

The legal fight now asks whether Humboldt can enforce that policy after storm damage and a rebuilt structure changed the billboard’s status, or whether the owner can rely on the earlier grandfathered use and the temporary permit to keep it up. For county residents, the case goes beyond one sign near Elk River: it could influence how firmly Humboldt applies its coastal and wetlands rules, how much weight older land-use approvals still carry after damage or reconstruction, and how far the county is willing to go to clear roadside signs from one of its most sensitive stretches of highway.