Screenshot from a Board of Supervisors meeting last month.

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Humboldt County’s First District supervisor Rex Bohn, says a formal complaint accusing him of being abusive and hostile toward staff was filed by his colleague, Fifth District Supervisor Steve Madrone.

If this is the first you’re hearing about a formal complaint against Bohn, that’s not surprising. There hasn’t been much media coverage of it. But Bohn himself brought it up, unprompted, during the Nov. 4 Board of Supervisors meeting. In the midst of deliberations about misconduct by Second District Supervisor Michelle Bushnell, Bohn remarked that he’d been accused of misconduct as well.

The Outpost promptly asked the county for a copy of the complaint and related documents, pursuant to the California Public Records Act. On Monday evening, the county released those documents to both the Outpost and blogger John Chiv. 

The documents include a partially redacted copy of the complaint, which says Bohn’s alleged misconduct occurred during a June 24 meeting to discuss the county’s Tobacco Retail Licensing (TRL) Ordinance, which was passed in 2023. From the complaint:

As soon as the meeting started it became obvious that this meeting was initiated by Supervisor Bohn to lobby for an acquaintance of his. This person was the owner of 30 or more Chevron Stations in Northern California who was selling his business, as a whole. The owner was upset that the new TRL Ordinance was going to cost him to lose his tobacco sale license for 3 stations in Humboldt County. One in McKinkleyville [sic], one in Garberville, and one in Willow Creek.

The ordinance in question was unanimously approved by the board in June. Among its many provisions is one saying a tobacco retail license can only be transferred to a “parent, child, spouse or domestic partner.”

The complaint says that during this June meeting, Bohn “aggressively pushed on staff to offer some sort of waiver for his friend,” and when they explained that they lacked the authority for such a move, he “continued his attack on staff.”

In a phone interview, Bohn disputed that characterization. 

“Was I animated? Yeah,” he said. But his insists that he didn’t yell, call anyone names or otherwise abuse staff. As for the underlying dispute, he’s still upset about the ordinance’s provision limiting license transfers.

“The bottom line is, our health department told people they had their cigarette licenses for 50 years, and now they’re being told that if they sell their stores [the new owners] couldn’t get that license unless they’re directly related,” Bohn said.

He said he was arguing on behalf of the owner of Redwood Oil Company, which owns nearly two dozen gas stations and mini markets across five counties, as well as the owner of Country Club Market on Humboldt Hill.

“I was raised in a corner grocery,” Bohn said. “We can’t keep putting small businesses out of business.”

Asked why he voted to approve the TRL ordinance given these misgivings, Bohn said staff failed to highlight this specific provision of the 40-page ordinance.

However, recordings of Board of Supervisors meetings show that staff did highlight that aspect of the ordinance. For example, video of a June 2023 staff presentation introducing the ordinance shows Elaine Hogan, then-program services coordinator for Tobacco-Free Humboldt, discussing that provision specifically. She says limiting transfers to family members is designed to reduce the total number of tobacco retail licenses in the county over time. (The link above is queued to that moment.) Video of the board’s June 3 2025 meeting shows Public Health Director Sofia Pereira addressing that provision again. 

At any rate, the complaint goes on to say staff tried to reason with Bohn, telling him they planned to come back to the board in a month or two with suggestions for changes to the ordinance. But Bohn would not be placated. From the complaint:

Supervisor Bohn continued his rants and I spoke up and asked him to calm down and [told him] how inappropriate it was to be pushing so hard for this waiver. He said “I know I am an asshole, I am just an asshole”. This is not the only incidence of this behavior on Bohns part.

“It’s Madrone making a complaint against me,” Bohn told the Outpost today. (Madrone has not yet responded to a voicemail left for him this afternoon.) 

In Bohn’s account of the incident, he said to staff at one point, “I’m sorry I’m an asshole, you guys. I’m sorry, but I’m pretty passionate about this.”

Bohn addressed his objections to the license-transfer portion of the tobacco ordinance at a Board of Supervisors meeting last month, and he reiterated his position in our interview. “There’s just no reason for us to dictate business like that,” he said. He added that, while staff with the Humboldt County Department of Health and Human Services say they notified tobacco retailers about the new rules, the ones he’s spoken to say they had no idea about the transfer restrictions.

Asked whether a third-party investigation into the complaint against him has been resolved, Bohn replied, “I have no idea; I’m not participating.” He later noted that he refused to talk to the investigator.

As readers might recall from the Bushnell misconduct incident, the Board of Supervisors Code of Conduct and Ethics spells out the process for investigating misconduct complaints against county supervisors. The complaints are initially reviewed by a committee consisting of the County Administrative Officer, Director of Human Resources and County Counsel.

On July 10, HR Director Zach O’Hanen emailed Bohn to say that the committee had met and determined that the allegations against him should be examined through an impartial third-party investigation. O’Hanen followed up in late September with an “investigation interview notice.” It said external investigator Kimberlie Revai had been retained and explained, “The purpose of the investigation is fact-finding, and no decisions will be made until all relevant facts are gathered and you are given an opportunity to explain your side of the story.”

The notice on to say, “Please cooperate fully with the investigator and answer questions in a complete and truthful manner. You are being requested to attend the interview and to answer the questions accurately, completely, and truthfully.”

Bohn replied a few days later: “I will not be participating to save the County Money, Thanks Rex.”

We’ll update this post if we hear anything back from Madrone.

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