PREVIOUSLY: Pressured by Upcoming Ballot Measure, County Supervisors Look to Improve Existing Cannabis Regs

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The Humboldt County Board of Supervisors unanimously voted Tuesday to scrap its plans to place a county-backed alternative to the controversial Humboldt Cannabis Reform Initiative (HCRI), also known as Measure A, on the March 2024 ballot, opting instead to “wait and see” how the election unfolds before amending existing county rules.

The county’s proposed ballot measure would have served as a less extreme alternative to Measure A, which seeks to restrict commercial cannabis cultivation across the county through a host of stringent new rules.

At the beginning of this month, the Board of Supervisors asked staff to come up with a competing referendum that would limit the acreage and number of legal cannabis permits in the county by amending the county’s Commercial Cannabis Land Use Ordinance (CCLUO). The decision was sort of a last-ditch effort to address some public concerns about the county’s existing cannabis permitting rules ahead of the upcoming election. 

The proposed ballot initiative, “Humboldt County Limitations on Cannabis Permitting,” sought to lower the cap on the total number of cultivation permits by 60 percent, from 3,500 to 1,400, and reduce allowed acreage from 1,205 to 617. The proposal would have also set a one-acre maximum cultivation area and required additional public noticing for permits over 2,000 square feet.

Speaking during Tuesday’s meeting, Humboldt County Planning and Building Director John Ford noted that there are currently 1,578 permits and applications in the county’s database. A 50 percent reduction in cultivation permits would allow for roughly 1,736 permits and/or applications, he said.

Second District Supervisor Michelle Bushnell asked if the proposed changes to the CCLUO could be made without a ballot measure. Ford said, “Yes.”

Fourth District Supervisor Natalie Arroyo said she was appreciative of Planning and Building Department staff who put the proposed ballot measure together, but said the majority of the constituents she had spoken with “don’t feel like it is addressing their needs.”

“This was sort of an 11th-hour attempt to put something together that could be an alternative that addresses many folks’ concerns, but I also wanted to acknowledge that up until a month and a half ago, my expectation … was that we were going to see how it went in March and then adjust accordingly,” she said. “We’re all here kind of trying to cobble something together from the input we’ve received, which is all over the map, and it’s not the ideal way to do things.”

First District Supervisor Rex Bohn suggested that the board should do “everything in our power to make sure Measure A doesn’t pass.” 

“My issue with it – and I’m just gonna go ahead and say it – I’m not getting any correspondence from anybody saying it’s the greatest thing since buttered popcorn except for Mark [Thurmond] and Betsy [Watson],” Bohn said, referring to primary proponents of the HCRI. He acknowledged some of the shortcomings of the county’s ordinance but said, “We are trying to fix what we did, and I know that a ballot measure is not the way to do it.”

Speaking during the public comment portion of Tuesday’s meeting, John Casali, co-owner of Huckleberry Hill Farms, said he would oppose an alternative cannabis initiative, in part, because it could send a “conflicting message to voters” and imply that the county’s existing ordinance is flawed. 

Casali | Screenshot

“Putting any kind of restrictions on our small farms right now is really a death sentence, and I’d rather roll the dice on Measure A,” he said. “I believe the voters will do the right thing, and if they don’t it’s really going to be devastating to the whole industry.”

Dylan Mattole, owner of Mattole Valley Sungrown, also felt the proposed ballot measure was a “reactionary response” to Measure A.

“I think that Measure A is an example of when somebody has a personal problem – in this case, two individuals [that have] a problem with an individual, specific neighbor – that they then throw this big response at that affects the entire community,” he continued. “That’s not a good way to enact policy. … I would like to propose that we have a rule that we make no more rules restricting cannabis right now. … We don’t need new rules, we just need to start dealing with what we already have.”

Natalynne DeLapp, executive director of the Humboldt County Growers Alliance (HCGA), thanked the Board of Supervisors and county staff for responding to the cannabis community’s concerns but felt the proposal was too complex.

DeLapp | Screenshot

“Measure A is a gun pointed to everyone’s head and we should not be forced to make decisions under duress,” she said. “If you want to give voters a choice, keep it simple. … It feels a little like we’re going off the rails.”

Similarly, Ross Gordon, policy director of the HCGA, said the county had “some good ideas on the table” but felt the proposed ballot measure, as written, would have numerous unintended consequences.

Following public comment, Bushnell thanked staff for their time spent on the referendum but agreed that the whole process felt “a little rushed.” 

“I would also like to thank Director Ford because he pivoted very fast … and I just really want to say thank you for addressing [these] concerns so quickly, I know it’s been a heavy lift for you,” she continued. “I think the issue throughout the communities – and what that initiative was based on signature-wise – now has grown to something a lot larger.”

Bushnell made a motion to withdraw the proposal for the time being. Arroyo seconded the action. 

The motion passed 5-0.

Barring a breakthrough in negotiations, the California State University faculty will go on one-day strikes at four campuses next week as they fight for 12% wage hikes this academic year plus other key concessions — increases that the system of nearly 460,000 students says it cannot afford.

The action would dash hopes of a labor peace between the union of 29,000 professors, lecturers, librarians, counselors, and coaches on one end and management of the nation’s largest public four-year university system on the other. And it would only be the beginning: If Cal State leadership doesn’t meet faculty demands, union leadership is promising more labor unrest in 2024.

“The decision was made to start on the smaller side…to allow us to give some space to escalate,” said Kevin Wehr, bargaining team chair for the California Faculty Association and a professor at Sacramento State. “We don’t feel the need necessarily to go from zero to 60.”

The planned dates and campuses are:

• Dec. 4, Cal Poly Pomona
• Dec. 5, San Francisco State
• Dec. 6, CSU Los Angeles
• Dec. 7, Sacramento State

The four schools are among the largest in the system and combined enroll around 105,000 students. The labor walkouts are meant to signal to Cal State leadership that the union is capable of quickly organizing its members.

“We’re going to demonstrate to them that we can shut down any campus we want with only a couple of weeks’ notice,” Wehr said, who added the union doesn’t plan to stage any other work stoppages in December.

Cal State officials will hold a virtual press conference Friday to discuss the state of play between the system and the California Faculty Association. Friday will also mark the end of a state labor mediation process that began in August. By then a fact-finding report, written by a third-party labor negotiator, should become public, shedding more light on why the two sides are at loggerheads.

Last month 95% of faculty members who voted approved a resolution granting union leaders the ability to call for a strike. The union refused to say what percentage of its membership took part in that vote. In response, a Cal State spokesperson told CalMatters then that it “remains committed to the collective bargaining process and reaching a negotiated agreement with the (faculty union) as we have done with five of our other employee unions in recent weeks.”

In the past month, Cal State has come to agreements with five other unions representing around 30,000 non-academic staff. The labor deals ensured that Cal State wouldn’t contend with all its unionized workers striking, which would have been calamitous for the system. A smaller union of about 1,100 workers in the trades went on strike for one day this month.

Cal State lacks revenue

Cal State has grappled with what it says are insufficient revenues to properly educate its students. In May, officials said the system needs to generate at least $1.5 billion more annually to provide students the academic, cultural and supportive services they need.

That report triggered a multi-month discussion about upping revenue, culminating with the system’s board of trustees approving tuition hikes of 6% for each of the next five years, starting next fall. But even those hikes aren’t enough to fully fund the system, Cal State officials said. The faculty union and student groups bitterly opposed those hikes. The union also released an accounting study last month that argued Cal State can tap more of its reserves to cover academic expenses, such as faculty pay.

The impasse over finances and tuition played out in the same year Cal State’s new chancellor received a nearly $800,000 base salary — 66% more than what a predecessor earned in 2020. Last year several campus presidents received raises of as much as 29% after a system report said many were underpaid.

In its most recent offer on Monday, Cal State leaders proposed to the faculty union 5% raises this year and two years of subsequent 5% raises between 2024-25 and 2025-26. On paper that adds up to 15% across three years, above the 12% faculty seek in 2023-24.

‘Lack of trust’

But those future hikes are contingent on the system receiving funding that Gov. Gavin Newsom has promised Cal State for the next three years as part of his five-year compact of 5% annual increases. These are promised, but not guaranteed, jumps in state support in exchange for improvements in graduation rates and other academic advances. Newsom and the Legislature approved the 5% increases in state aid to Cal State — and the University of California — in each of the last two years, despite facing a multi-billion deficit in June.

Still, the union doesn’t want to take a deal that is at the mercy of a state budget negotiation process between the governor and lawmakers. Labor leaders feel spurned already; in 2022, they expected Cal State to receive enough state support for faculty to get 4% raises. Instead, the system lawmakers and the governor provided the system enough to approve 3% salary bumps.

“There’s a definite lack of trust with any budget contingency language now,” Wehr said.

The union is also hesitant to accept any multi-year deal now because of a technicality in its contract with Cal State. Right now, the two sides are able to negotiate on just the salary portion of the collective bargaining agreement and several benefits provisions. The full contract expires June 30, 2024, meaning that the union cannot negotiate on other details that will only become fair game to discuss next summer.

“The decision was made to start on the smaller side…to allow us to give some space to escalate.”
— Kevin Wehr, bargaining team chair for the California Faculty Association and a professor at Sacramento State

Agreeing to a multi-year contract now overrides that expiration date and locks into place any matter the two sides haven’t yet discussed. Wehr said the union would in effect need to agree to a whole new contract now to approve a full multi-year deal.

“Management must think that faculty can’t do math,” a faculty union letter to its members said. “Management claims their latest salary offer as ‘15 percent over three years’ (even they acknowledge that is not guaranteed). We are demanding a 12-percent General Salary Increase for just 2023-24 to keep pace with rising costs of living. We will fight for more when the full contract opens next year. The three-year nature of management’s proposal would mean that we cannot bargain over other workplace issues for three years!”

Beyond the wage increases of 12% for all faculty, the union seeks to lift pay for the lowest-paid instructors, expand parental leave, provide lactation rooms for new parents and more.

Cal State would need to give the faculty union a deal that matches, or comes close, to its demands to end the wave of strikes, Wehr said.” If they come at us with seven (percent), I don’t think faculty would accept that,” he said. “It would have to be 12% or very close to it.”

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CalMatters.org is a nonprofit, nonpartisan media venture explaining California policies and politics.

Marjorie Ann Evans (known as Marge) was born in El Dorado, Kansas on June 30, 1937 to James and Katherine Scott. She passed from this world on October 20, 2023 in Fortuna after a brief battle with cancer.

Marge moved to Humboldt County in the mid 50s, where she lived for many years surrounded by her entire family. In 1976 she moved out of the area, returning in 2005 to live out the rest of her life.

She loved to bake and cook and was wonderful at it. She spent many years as a cook at St Helena Senior Center and was later director and cook of the Middletown Senior Center in Lake County.

She had a tender spot for animals. She enjoyed them immensely, carrying treats with her wherever she went. She was a very loyal friend and people got a kick out of her forthrightness. She had a great sense of humor that she kept right up to the end.

She had a giving heart and enjoyed helping others whenever she could.

She loved and enjoyed seeing her grandchildren and great grandchildren. She was known as Nana by most of them. She was able to meet her youngest great grandson before she passed which brought her much joy.

She was preceded in death by her sisters Kathy and Sharon and brother Buzzi

She is survived by her brothers Dick and Howard and sister Elma, as well as her children Kim, Guy, Wendy, Julie, Chance and grandchildren Josh, Winter, Daniel, Jenny, Karri, Levi, Brittany, Eric, as well as her beloved great-grandchildren.

You are missed, Mama!

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UPDATE, DEC. 1: 

• BREAKING: Honsal Makes About-Face, Will Allow Donation of Organs From Man On Life Support 

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Clyde and Jeanine Matilton stood outside the entrance to St. Joseph Hospital in Eureka today, having just left the bedside of their son, 38-year-old Eric Matilton, who is on life support in the Intensive Care Unit.

His injuries have been declared non-survivable, they said. He will likely die within days or even hours, and they say their only hope now — the only thing that might bring them some peace of mind in the midst of tragedy — is if some of his organs can be salvaged from his body to save the lives of others.

They were in the Bay Area on the afternoon of Saturday, Nov. 18, when they got a call from a sheriff’s deputy saying he had bad news: Their son Eric had been found unresponsive, hanging from his neck in his cell the previous day.

Eric Matilton is a registered organ donor, and personnel from Donor Network West, a nonprofit organ procurement and tissue recovery organization, have flown into Humboldt County to help arrange and facilitate multiple donations. 

Humboldt County Sheriff-Coroner William Honsal. | File photo by Andrew Goff.

However, over the past 11 days, while Matilton lay unconscious, his condition slowly deteriorating in the ICU, Humboldt County Sheriff-Coroner William Honsal has denied all requests to allow the donations to proceed. In emails and other written communication to employees of Donor Network West — as well as the chairman of the Hoopa Valley Tribe, of which the Matiltons are members — Honsal has said that because Eric Matilton suffered his fatal injuries while in law enforcement custody, departmental protocol mandates that a full criminal investigation be completed, including an autopsy, and therefore organ donation is not an option.

Clyde and Jeanine Matilton have tried numerous times to get Honsal to explain this policy, to meet them in person or even on the phone and help them understand why their son’s wishes would be denied, but he has declined, saying there’s nothing to discuss. Protocol is protocol.

“Eric wanted to donate his organs,” Clyde said. “We want to honor that, and we still do. But we’re running out of time here and we’re just being stonewalled. The sheriff has absolutely refused to talk about it.”

Robynn Van Patten, chief legal and administrative officer and executive vice president of Donor Network West, said her organization has also been struggling to get Honsal to communicate. She believes his office policy is both unjust and contrary to accepted protocols across the state and beyond.

“Organ donation and autopsy are not mutually exclusive,” Van Patten said when reached by phone this afternoon. “We routinely work with medical examiners and sheriffs because we’re in many counties. And what we do is we cooperate.”

If a criminal investigation needs to be conducted, it can co-exist with organ donation. “We can preserve evidence, take samples, do biopsies. We do that anyway to determine if the organs can be transplanted into a human … ,” Van Patten said. “The issue is that this sheriff is relying on a protocol … that says anytime someone passes away in custody they have to do a full autopsy. But he has not had any discussion with us about the fact that both can occur.”

That fact is even spelled out in state law. California Health & Safety Code 7151.20 says that a county coroner can allow organ donations from people who died “under circumstances requiring an inquest by the coroner.” If the coroner wants to withhold one or more organs from donation for any reason, they (or their designee) must show up to the autopsy. And if they deny organ removal, they can explain their reasoning in an investigative report or explain it to “the qualified organ procurement organization,” which, in this case, would be Donor Network West.

“The sheriff or coroner can cooperate with us,” Van Patten said. “We have mutual objectives: to preserve the integrity of forensic investigation while saving these lives.”

Like Eric Matilton’s parents, she’s been frustrated by the lack of communication from Honsal. “He has not had any discussion with us,” she said. “His belief is just, ‘Hey, that’s our protocol.’ I think it’s a mistaken belief. If he’d have a real conversation — he won’t — there’s a good chance he’d change his mind and have his pathologist say, ‘We can do the donation.’ Instead he just says [conversation is] not necessary. ‘We have a protocol.’ It’s crazy.”

The Outpost emailed Honsal earlier today but did not receive a reply before publication time. The department lost its public information officer weeks ago, and Honsal himself has not responded to Outpost emails for months.

Eric Matilton had multiple run-ins with the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office over the years, including a 2016 standoff in which he allegedly fired a weapon in the direction of deputies, one of whom shot back. His most recent arrest was on Nov. 3. 

Eric Matilton (left) with his father, Clyde Matilton, at a San Francisco 49ers game last October. | Submitted.

But his parents say their son was a lot more than his criminal record might suggest.

“I want people to know about my son,” said his mom, Jeanine, outside the hospital this morning. Choking up, she continued. “I mean, he was a dad, he was an uncle, he was a brother, he was a husband. He was a person. I don’t want to take that away from him.”

A member of the Hoopa Valley Tribe born and raised on the reservation, Eric Matilton has three children, ages 7, 14 and 18, and a fiancee who may as well be his wife, since they’d been together for so long, Jeanine said.

Jeanine and Clyde don’t suspect any foul play in their son’s pending death. They understand that he hanged himself in jail. But they want to honor his wishes, and they want his body to save the lives of others.

“He was the one who wanted to donate,” Jeanine said.

Clyde doesn’t understand why they’ve gotten the runaround. Hoopa Valley Tribal Chairman Joe Davis reached out to Sheriff Honsal on their behalf, he said, but Honsal again said that protocol precludes organ donation in this case, and further conversation would be pointless.

The Matiltons’ requests to at least speak with him have been denied “over and over and over again,” Clyde said. “Then they [deputies] cite, ‘Oh, we had a shooting, we’re short staffed. It was the holidays.’ But now we’re into Wednesday and it’s still just ‘No.’” Clyde shook his head. “That’s a pretty hard ‘no’ because there are four people that are waiting for his organs that could die.”

Van Patten said Eric Matilton’s body parts could save the lives of as many as seven other people. Donor Network West has identified four potential recipients who are matches for his blood type, and with his two kidneys, heart, liver, corneas and skin tissues possibly available for donation, more organ recipients are possible.

The Matiltons said they can’t say where all of his organs would end up, though they’ve been told that his heart would be sent to someone in Los Angeles.

“In this case, here’s the deal,” Van Patten said. “This is a relatively young and healthy man who had, certainly, a tragedy befall him. I don’t know that the family thinks there’s foul play. They just want to know why. They just want the sheriff to talk to them. For our part, look, we’ve expended a lot of resources on this. This would bring a lot of peace to the family. It’s a healing opportunity that they want and that [Eric] himself wanted.”

Van Patten said it’s possible that Sheriff Honsal or one of his designees could find a valid reason to deny the organ donation request. If the office sent someone with medical knowledge into the operating room and identified an organ or two that they needed to withhold for an investigation, that would be within their rights. But to make that determination from afar strikes her as unjust, and possibly tragic.

While Honsal has been “very unresponsive,” Van Patten said she and her staff have managed to get hold of deputies lower on the chain of command for brief discussions. “But at no point have any of them provided a copy of that [department] policy or explained which part is incompatible for donation. It’s like there’s a foregone conclusion that [the organ donation request] will be denied because it’s their policy.”

Donor Network West is considering filing for injunctive relief or an order to show cause, but timing is an issue. There’s not much of it left before the case becomes moot. Throughout the course of her career, she said, only one other coroner — also from a rural county — denied her organization’s request for an organ donation. But in that case, the coroner at least sent someone to the operating room who denied the request onsite.

“Many, many counties are able to do both an autopsy and provide evidence — and do organ donation,” Van Patten said.

Outside the hospital, Clyde said he understands that his son’s fate is now sealed, but others aren’t.

“I believe in the [donor] system, especially now,” he said. “It’s so hard to lose a son. It is. And we’ve got the ability to help some other family that won’t have to go through this. … That’s about the only good that’s gonna come out of it for me, you know. My son’s dead.”

Van Patten made virtually the same point.

“We can’t get away from the human impact of this,” she said. “This one family would have some peace and healing from a tragic thing that occurred, but also this [situation] is important globally because if that’s the [Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office] policy — or if that’s how it’s being interpreted — think about all the lives that will be lost over time.”

Press release from Humboldt Bay Fire:

At 1734 hours on Tuesday November 28th, 2023, Humboldt Bay Fire responded with four Engines, and a Chief Officer to a structure fire at the 1200 block of Ridgewood Dr. While responding to the initial call, we received a report of a possible exposure to the vegetation.

The 1st arriving Engine secured a water source and set up for a defensive attack. The vacant trailer was fully involved with no spread to the vegetation. The second arriving engine provided support and assisted with fire attack and all other engines were canceled. There was a report of explosions and it was determined the owner had butane canisters and propane in the trailer. Crews remained on scene for approximately two hours for overhaul operations.

There were no Firefighter injuries. The property owner sustained minor burns to both hands and was evaluated by City Ambulance. The fire was located and controlled within fifteen minutes of the arrival of the 1st Engine. Damages are estimated to be approximately $53,000. A fire investigation was conducted and the cause of the fire was determined to be accidental in nature.

Humboldt Bay Fire would like to thank our allied partners for their assistance during this incident; HCSO, City Ambulance, and PG&E. Humboldt Bay Fire reminds everyone to have working smoke detectors in their residence and change the batteries twice a year during daylight savings.

UPDATE, 3:56 p.m.: Mark Distefano of the Humboldt Redwood Company tells us that the fires up in the Greenwood Heights/Freshwater are theirs. Looks quite dramatic, but Distefano assures us that the fires are under control and behaving as expected.

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UPDATE, 3:33 p.m.: Sorry — took a while for it to dawn on us that there is in fact another burn underway closer to home, in the hills above Eureka.

We don’t have any information about that one, unfortunately, and for some reason we couldn’t get through to the usually on-it folks at the North Coast Unified Air Quality Management District, who would know. Maybe they’re swamped with other calls at the moment.

In any case, we’re seeing if we can get closer to figure out what’s going on. Bear with us.

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We get lots of press releases for controlled burns this time of year, but people are reporting that this one is very visible north of Arcata. No emergency!

Press release from Green Diamond, sent this morning:

Weather conditions permitting, Green Diamond Resource Company plans to conduct prescribed burning for fuel hazard reduction near Big Lagoon, today, November 29th. Burning operations are implemented in coordination with CAL FIRE and the North Coast Unified Air Quality Management District.  Please note that smoke may be visible in surrounding areas, including Highway 101, while prescribed burning activities are being conducted.  Green Diamond staff will be on site monitoring prescribed burning and fuels reduction operations. 

(Ed. Note: The following editorial was written by Theresa Grosjean, President of the Northern Humboldt Union High School District Board of Trustees)

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McKinleyville High was on lockdown for an hour yesterday. There was no active shooter. There was no specific threat made. Someone saw someone walking near the school with a holstered gun on them (or at least what they thought was) and called the police.

Because in the America we live in today, school violence is all too real a threat.

I have read so many accounts of the trauma our staff and students experienced during that hour. Barricaded in whatever room they were in, as police lights reflected on their walls, as alerts blared through the school speakers, as police went room to room rattling door knobs to make sure they were locked. Not knowing if the threat was real, they waited in locked classrooms. Not knowing if the threat was real, they texted their friends and family. Not knowing if the threat was real, they saw police out of their windows carrying guns.

When the “All Clear” came and they could leave their rooms, they went about their day. Additional counseling was brought in to help those in need deal with their fear and trauma. The threat didn’t need to be real for it to have been traumatic.

Because in the America we live in today, we value gun rights more than people.

Because in the America we live in today, lobbyists have more say than we the people.

Because in the America we live in today, we say we care about mental health, we just don’t care to fund the resources needed to deal with it.

In the America we live in today, people are so busy, working hard banning books, banishing lived history, banning the word gay … all to protect the children.

In the America we live in today, our elected officials expect us to hope that thoughts and prayers will fix our problems.

Our schools should be a place where our kids and teachers and staffs are safe and free from fear. We know why they don’t feel that way. We know what the threats are.

In the America we live in today, there is just not enough will to deal with it.

Our problems are complex and require complex solutions. There is no easy fix. But the desire to make things better should be enough to put our politics aside, roll up our sleeves and get to work actually doing something that will protect people.

In the America we live in today, it’s time for action.