The high cost of insulin has been a niggling thorn in the side of regulators and patients for decades: Prices for the 100-year-old drug have increased more than 600% in the past 20 years, and stories of patients rationing doses abound. Even the most conservative economists point to it as an example of a market gone sour.

Despite repeated efforts at the federal and state level to rein in the cost of pharmaceuticals, prices go up each year, growing quicker than any other health care service and routinely outpacing the rate of inflation.

This year, California is poised to do something different to cut the cost of insulin, attacking the problem on three fronts. And if it works for insulin prices, it could work for other drugs:

• Lawmakers have introduced a bevy of bills targeting out-of-pocket insulin costs. They have also advanced legislation ensuring cost savings for all drugs get passed down to patients;
• Attorney General Rob Bonta is suing the nation’s largest insulin manufacturers and pharmaceutical benefit managers for driving up the cost of the life-saving drug, alleging unfair business practices;
• And Gov. Gavin Newsom recently announced a $50 million state contract with generic drug company Civica Rx to manufacture three types of cheap biosimilar — or generic — insulin for diabetic Californians.

This three-pronged approach isn’t perfect — measures like the ones suggested by lawmakers this year have failed several times — but legislators are hopeful the resources of usual opponents will be divided among the state’s other efforts. Health economists and patient advocates believe the state’s lawsuit will lift the veil on opaque pricing tactics for the first time nationwide, potentially shifting how industry players behave.

“It’s good the state of California is using its power as a purchaser, a regulator (and) a litigator to try to address this issue,” said Anthony Wright, executive director of Health Access California, a consumer advocacy group that routinely sponsors health care affordability measures. “This is such a multi-faceted problem that it requires a lot of different solutions.”

Insulin: The poster child for a broken market

So who’s to blame for the skyrocketing cost of pharmaceutical drugs? Ask any number of industry players and you’ll get stuck in an endless loop of finger pointing. Manufacturers blame insurers and intermediaries known as pharmaceutical benefit managers for exploiting profit models. Those groups in turn blame manufacturers for setting high prices to begin with. In the end, the patient pays.

“There are no heroes in health care,” said Kevin Schulman, a professor of medicine and operations, information and technology at Stanford University. Schulman sits on the scientific advisory board for Civica Rx.

In California, between 2017 and 2021, state-regulated health plans increased spending on prescription drugs by more than 22%, or $2.1 billion, according to a recent price transparency report. By comparison, medical expenses increased 18.4% during the same time period. Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, medical expenses had increased just 8.2% while drug spending increased 14.4%.

For many people with health insurance, increasing pharmaceutical prices are obscured because insurance picks up a majority of the tab. However, people who are uninsured or who have not hit their annual deductible pay the full drug price out-of-pocket.

The cost of insulin has become the consistent linchpin of these drug price discussions. Some people with diabetes — approximately 37 million in the United States and about 3 million in California — need insulin to regulate their blood sugar. Without it they will die.

“There are no heroes in health care.”
— Kevin Schulman, professor of medicine and operations, information and technology at Stanford University

Until very recently, the average list price of insulin increased about 11% annually, with some common brands exceeding $400 per vial. Actions by the federal government to impose out-of-pocket price caps and penalize manufacturers that raise prices faster than the rate of inflation spurred the three largest insulin manufacturers to drop prices to $35 earlier this year. However, during a U.S. Senate committee hearing last week, executives from Novo Nordisk and Sanofi would not commit to keeping prices that low.

“We’ve seen a little bit of a collapse these last few weeks…this will provide some relief, but at the end of the day the thing we don’t know is how (pharmaceutical benefit managers) are going to respond to these cuts,” Schulman, who researches the pharmaceutical market, said. “In theory, they have no interest in supporting these low-cost products.”

Why wouldn’t these intermediaries support low cost drugs? The answer lies in a complex and convoluted system of rebates that drug companies pay pharmaceutical benefit managers. Pharmaceutical benefit managers control the list of drugs that health insurance plans cover, also known as a formulary. Consolidation has resulted in three companies — CVS Caremark, Express Scripts and OptumRx — representing more than 80% of the market. To incentivize benefit managers and insurers to cover their products, manufacturers offer them a cut of the sale price, or a rebate.

The trade group representing pharmaceutical benefit managers claims more than 90% of these rebates, also known as discounts, are passed on to insurers to help lower the cost of health insurance premiums. But researchers say without regulation mandating transparency, it’s impossible to know who exactly keeps the rebates and how they’re used.

Erin Trish, an associate professor of pharmaceutical and health economics at the University of Southern California, said what results is a competitive market where prices for many drugs are driven higher rather than lower.

“It creates incentive for these (pharmaceutical benefit managers), who are making money as a share of the list price of the drug, to negotiate for drugs that have higher list prices with bigger discounts rather than lower prices,” Trish said.

It also results in a system where the sickest patients — those who use the most prescription drugs — subsidize the cost of insurance for everyone else, which is the opposite of how insurance typically works.

In a study analyzing financial reports from 13 of the largest drug manufacturers, Schulman found that from 2011 to 2019, manufacturers went from sharing nearly 30% of their annual revenue with pharmaceutical benefit managers to more than 67% in the form of rebates and other discounts. In fact, with insulin, as prices have gone up, manufacturers’ profits have decreased.

Pharmaceutical benefit managers disagree that they are the bad actors in this equation. In a statement reacting to California’s insulin manufacturing deal, the Pharmaceutical Care Management Association said assertions that pharmaceutical benefit managers are responsible for increased prices are “just not true.”

“We applaud any move to lower high drug prices, recognizing that these are the root cause of gaps in prescription drug affordability, including for insulins,” the statement said. “The savings pharmacy benefit companies negotiate with drug companies are used to either lower health insurance premiums or prices at the pharmacy counter, usually a combination of both.”

Bill Head, assistant vice president of state affairs for the Pharmaceutical Care Management Association, said his members’ job is to lower costs for health insurers. Manufacturers, not pharmaceutical benefit managers, control the prices, he said.

“We will always go with whatever the lowest net cost to the payor is, so if (manufacturers) want to just lower the cost and make it more attractive, great,” Head said. “If that’s what’s going to save the payor, the health plan…or the employer money…that’s where we’ll go.”

Can California get around the middlemen?

Tackling the market distortions will take action at the federal level, but in many ways California’s new deal to manufacture its own insulin and other generic drugs circumvents the problem and may influence how industry players behave.

“We have already done something to disrupt the market,” Dr. Mark Ghaly, state secretary of health and human services, told CalMatters. “What we’re doing is starting to take some of the price games away that are traditionally played.”

Civica Rx will produce for the state three of the most commonly used insulins, interchangeable with the brand name drugs Lantus, Humalog and Novolog. Patients will be able to purchase them out-of-pocket for $30 per vial, far less than brand name equivalents, at pharmacies throughout the state, according to the Department of Health Care Access and Information, the regulatory body overseeing the initiative. The state has set an aggressive target of making the first vials available by 2024, although Allan Coukell, Civica senior vice president of public policy, told CalMatters it can’t control how quickly the FDA will approve the drug.

Wright, with Health Access California, said this strategy applies unusual pressure to the pharmaceutical market. As both a purchaser representing nearly 3.2 million diabetic adults and a manufacturer, the state has different motivations than shareholders do.

“A typical investor is not going to put up the money to develop a new generic for fear of being undercut,” Wright said. “The state of California has a different incentive. If we don’t sell a vial we get the savings as a purchaser. We also have the public policy goal to try and bring down the costs for everybody.”

But it doesn’t entirely dampen the influence of middlemen in the distribution supply chain. The same manufacturers that make brand name insulin have also sold lower-priced generic insulins for years, but by and large patients have not switched to them.

“What we’re doing is starting to take some of the price games away that are traditionally played.”
— Dr. Mark Ghaly, state Secretary of Health and Human Services

In 2021, the state’s prescription drug cost transparency report showed generic insulins were not among the top 25 most commonly prescribed generic drugs. In contrast, excluding COVID-19 vaccines, Humulin, a fast-acting insulin, was the most commonly prescribed brand name drug that year. Other brand name insulins ranked fourth, fifth and eighteenth on the list of top 25 most commonly prescribed brand name drugs.

Brand name drugs accounted for only 10.2% of all prescriptions that year but made up 20.8% of spending, according to the report. Health plans spent the second-most amount of money on Humalog, another fast-acting insulin, among the top 25 most costly brand name drugs in 2021. Other brand name insulins ranked fourth, seventh and nineteenth.

The reason lower-cost generic insulins aren’t more commonly prescribed: Manufacturers don’t offer rebates for them, which means intermediaries and health plans can’t profit, said Neeraj Sood, a health economist and professor at the USC Price School of Public Policy.

The state will have to find a way to entice middlemen and health plans to cover its cheaper insulin or else patients with insurance won’t necessarily benefit, Sood said. Of the more than 3 million adult diabetics in California, only about 95,500 are uninsured and use insulin, according to the state Department of Health Care Access and Information.

The department refused to make anyone available for an interview and asked for emailed questions. According to an unattributed statement from the department, Civica will be responsible for distributing the state’s insulin and will “engage with major wholesalers, retail pharmacies and health plans.”

Medi-Cal, the state insurance program for low-income Californians, will conduct a “fiscal analysis” to determine whether the drug will be covered for enrollees, said Anthony Cava, spokesperson for the Department of Health Care Services.

It’s unclear whether California can mandate that private insurers cover state-produced insulins, but Civica Vice President Coukell said the company is confident most health plans will cover its insulin.

“Health insurance is not monolithic,” Coukell said. “There may be some that continue to pursue rebates, but there are other plans that are going to go for the lowest net cost, and our strategy is a lowest net cost strategy.”

According to Head, with the Pharmaceutical Care Management Association, that strategy aligns with his industry’s goals.

“Any time there’s more competition, any time there’s somebody who’s driving down the cost in the brands, from our members’ standpoint, that’s always a good thing,” Head said.

Mary Ellen Grant, a spokesperson for the California Association of Health Plans, said the plans “strongly support” the use of lower-cost alternatives and “look forward to the opportunity to provide a lower cost version to their members when it becomes available.”

Other state strategies

In the meantime, other state leaders are trying to lower costs through litigation and direct regulation.

The lawsuit filed by Attorney General Bonta alleges the nation’s three largest insulin manufacturers and pharmaceutical benefits managers have engaged in unfair and illegal business practices to artificially increase prices. Five other states have filed similar lawsuits. Researchers and policymakers hope that legal action will shed light on how backroom price deals are made and help drive down consumer costs.

And a bill brought forward by Sen. Steven Bradford, a Democrat from Gardena, proposes requiring health plans to use at least 90% of rebates passed down from pharmaceutical benefit managers to cut what consumers pay at the pharmacy.

The bill, which is sponsored by a coalition of patient advocacy groups and drug manufacturers, has been quietly killed in committee three times in the past three years, with health insurers and pharmaceutical benefit managers opposed. The controversy stems from the proposal’s potential to increase insurance premiums for all enrollees by $200 million annually, according to a fiscal analysis from the non-partisan California Health Benefits Review Program. Attempts to do the same thing at the federal level have also failed out of fear of increasing insurance costs, although several states have implemented similar mandates.

Le Ondra Clark Harvey, executive director of the California Access Coalition, which is sponsoring the bill, said claims of increased health care costs are misleading. The $200 million represents just a 0.3% premium increase, Clark Harvey said, and the same report estimates patients with brand name prescriptions would save upwards of $70 million collectively.

“There will be an increase but not a significant one,” Clark Harvey said. “We’re not trying to beat up on health insurers and pharmaceutical benefit managers — we think that everyone has a role. But in this particular scenario, there has been what can be described as a loophole or cushion for them to collect this extra money after they’ve negotiated.”

In opposition, health plans and their intermediaries argue that “cushion” is exactly what helps them keep premiums down.

“(Point-of-sale) rebates won’t help the majority of patients who use generics or lower-cost brands and instead will lead to an increase in everyone’s premiums,” Head said during a recent Senate health committee hearing.

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

Three men in dark suits knocked on Pam Holland’s door one night last June. They told her that her son was dead, shot to death in a neighboring county by a sheriff’s deputy. The shooting, they said, was being investigated under a new California law that requires the state Justice Department step in when a police officer kills an unarmed person.

Pam Holland hoped the investigation would be quick and fair. Her father had been a Kern County Sheriff’s reserve deputy. She grew up around cops. She thought she could trust them — but she also believed that police agencies protect their own.

“I was like, wow, that’s awesome, this is great, they’re going to take it out of the hands of the local cops, who would instantly feel anger toward my son without even knowing anything,” she said.

But an investigation that the Justice Department officers told Holland would take eight months is quickly approaching 12. Now, she is among several Californians whose family members were killed by the police in the past two years and just want the state investigations to end.

The Justice Department opened the program in 2021 to carry out a law enforcement accountability law that gained traction after a Minneapolis police officer murdered George Floyd. Attorney General Rob Bonta, who co-authored the law when he was in the Legislature, pledged that the investigations under the law created by Assembly Bill 1506 would be completed within a year. But some police shooting reviews have already stretched 18 months or more.

The oldest unresolved police shooting case is from August 2021, more than 21 months ago.

While the investigations proceed, the families and their legal teams have as much or as little information as the rest of the public and they cannot push forward with lawsuits against the policing agencies.

“I am at the point where I believe families have to pay a visit to Bonta in Sacramento,” said Jonathan Hernandez, a Santa Ana city council member whose cousin was shot to death in September 2021. “All of us, every family who’s waiting for 1506 investigations, if he doesn’t give us a response, we will give him a response.”

Bonta, the elected head of the Justice Department, refused to answer questions about delays in the investigations. His office responded to questions with an unsigned email.

“I feel for the families having to patiently wait, but rest assured, independent investigations for civilian deaths by law enforcement is vital in demanding more transparency and accountability.”
— Assemblymember Kevin McCarty, Democrat from Sacramento

The length of the Justice Department investigations leads to other impacts: District attorneys cannot develop police shooting cases to decide whether criminal charges against the officer or officers are merited until the Justice Department’s review is over.

In Holland’s case in San Bernardino County, the sheriff’s office said it could not issue a final verdict on its officer’s conduct while the state review is underway – an interpretation of the law that the Justice Department denied in a written statement to CalMatters.

The department “has no policy prohibiting a local law enforcement agency from completing its administrative investigation while our investigation is proceeding,” unnamed representatives for the Justice Department wrote.

In the meantime, the deputy who shot Holland is back on patrol duty.

Bonta’s predecessor, fellow Democrat Xavier Becerra, initially opposed the bill that led to the state’s role in police shooting reviews. Becerra argued at the time it would be too costly for the Justice Department, which is under the attorney general, to take on a responsibility that normally fell to local district attorneys.

One issue is money. The Justice Department asked for $26 million to pay for the new shooting investigation teams. The Legislature allotted half of that, about $13 million.

Becerra complained about that discrepancy to the bill’s author, Democratic Assemblymember Kevin McCarty of Sacramento.

The $13 million budget allocation “is significantly lower than our estimates and not enough resources to stand up professional teams to perform these new investigative and prosecutorial duties,” Becerra wrote to McCarty in January 2021. “As a result, the (Justice Department) will have limited capacity to implement this bill, short of redirecting resources from other essential, mandated work, which could compromise those operations.”

Now, the length of the state investigations is “longer than average” for police shooting cases, said California District Attorneys Association CEO Greg Totten, a former Ventura County prosecutor. He added that every case is different.

Prosecutors “try to move the cases as quickly as we can, but they’re not always straightforward,” Totten said.

Bonta’s office in the unsigned statement acknowledged the slower-than-expected pace of the investigations.

“As you know, the California Department of Justice requested more funding than we ultimately received to carry out our AB 1506 work, and we’ve had to adapt and make it work,” the statement read.

“This does sometimes mean that investigations may take longer to complete than they would with additional funding and resources, but we owe it to the families involved as well as our communities to ensure that each case is done right, and supported by a thorough, fair, and comprehensive investigation.”

McCarty said in a statement last week that the slow pace of investigations is a result of thorough work.

“It’s been slow to roll out and implement, but I still have confidence in the program — as it’s better to be right than to be fast,” McCarty said in a statement emailed to CalMatters.

“I feel for the families having to patiently wait, but rest assured, independent investigations for civilian deaths by law enforcement is vital in demanding more transparency and accountability.”

Pam Holland’s son, Shane, was an intravenous drug user with a litany of arrests and jail sentences. He had outstanding warrants and he ran from the police. She knows how all this looks. But she hoped the state, with its $13 million annual budget for police shooting investigations, would at least provide a dispassionate, thorough resolution.

Now?

“I wish they would have never gotten involved.”

A shooting on a desert highway

On a dark street in a San Bernardino County exurb, Shane Earl Holland gave a fake name to a sheriff’s deputy and ran.

Holland, 35, was a passenger in a car pulled over by San Bernardino County Sheriff’s deputy Justin Lopez about 2:30 a.m. one day last June. Holland had outstanding warrants. Lopez yelled at him to stop running and get on the ground. Holland replied several times, “I’ll shoot you.”

Lopez, according to audio from his tape recorder obtained by CalMatters, chased Holland on foot for one minute and 17 seconds, then fired six shots, killing him. Moments later, Lopez’s sergeant arrived at the scene.

“You good?,” asked the sergeant, whose name has not been released by the sheriff’s department.

“I’m good,” Lopez said, still breathing hard from the chase.

“Where’s his gun,” the sergeant replied. “Did he have a gun?”

“I don’t know,” Lopez said. “He said he was going to shoot.”

Pam Holland holds a program from her son’s funeral while sitting in her home in Tehachapi on April 20, 2023. Photo by Larry Valenzuela, CalMatters/CatchLight Local

Pam Holland first heard that recording in January – a recording her daughter obtained from the Justice Department with a public records request.

“Honestly, like if there was no audio recordings, if I didn’t hear the audio recording, I would not believe the story,” she said. “If I didn’t hear it for my own self and they told me, well, you know, he said he was going to shoot, I wouldn’t believe it.”

On the recording, Lopez and his sergeant briefly discuss the injuries to Shane Holland’s body, mentioning that they can see his skull. She wants to know if he suffered.

Holland’s family has been assigned an advocate, who works for the Justice Department. Holland and two of her daughters sometimes do an imitation of the advocate’s frustrating responses to their questions: “‘I’m sorry, we can’t tell you that,’ ” they mimicked in chorus during an interview at Holland’s Tehapachi apartment.

“He killed my kid. But he’s running in the dark, chasing someone who says, I’m going to shoot you. That’s not okay.”
— Pam Holland, mother of Shane Earl Holland

Holland has questions about the night of the shooting. Why did the deputy chase the car’s passenger, leaving the driver to his own devices? Were her son’s pants falling off like they usually were? Did he have his hand at his waistband to hold them up as he ran? Did it look like he was reaching for a gun?

“I waver between thinking the cop needs to suffer, go to prison himself, to feeling bad for him,” she said. “And that makes me wonder what the hell’s wrong with me. He killed my kid. But he’s running in the dark, chasing someone who says, I’m going to shoot you. That’s not okay.”

When should police chase on foot?

Ed Obayashi, a former Plumas County Sheriff’s deputy who is now a nationally recognized expert in police use-of-force cases, also has questions about the shooting. CalMatters shared the tape recording of the shooting with him.

He broke the deputy’s decision-making into two parts: Why chase Holland, and why fire shots?

“Officers, it’s embedded in their DNA to chase,” Obayashi said. “That’s why we’re cops.”

But state and federal courts have held that simple fleeing is not a reason for a police officer to detain a person, said Obayashi, who also has a law degree.

Lopez, the deputy, told the driver that he had a reflective coating on his license plate, making it hard to read. Obayashi said he doesn’t understand what threat Holland posed to the officer when he fled.

“A physical threat, that hardly exists here because he’s running away,” Obayashi said. “And it’s inherently dangerous to be chasing anyone during the day, much less at night.”

“There is a skill associated with investigating not only officer-involved shootings, but just shootings in general, that the Attorney General’s office doesn’t have.”
— Brian Marvel, president of the Peace Officers Research Association of California

The San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department has a policy for vehicle pursuits, but not pursuits on foot. In emailed responses to CalMatters’ questions, department spokesperson Mara Rodriguez said the department relies on guidance from the California Commission on Peace Officer Standards and Training, or POST.

The POST guidelines – which are merely suggestions and not mandatory – call foot pursuits “one of the most dangerous and unpredictable situations for officers.” They say an officer should have observed criminal activity before starting a chase.

“I just don’t see the legal justification for this shooting,” Obayashi said. “Fleeing alone is not a good reason to chase. Matter of fact, that’s no reason at all.”

But when Holland threatened Lopez, Obayashi said, his fate was sealed.

“I’m not taking that chance, if he’s saying he’s going to shoot,” Obayashi said. “It’s very easy for someone to pull out a gun and spray bullets behind them. The individual made a distinct threat and the deputy’s thinking, oh shit, this guy is going for a gun.”

Pam Holland stands in the doorway of her apartment in Tehachapi on April 20, 2023. Photo by Larry Valenzuela, CalMatters/CatchLight Local

For the deputy, the ramifications of using deadly force will be compounded by investigations by the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department, the local district attorney’s office and the Justice Department, said Brian Marvel, president of the Peace Officers Research Association of California.

“That adds up to a lot,” Marvel said. “Having to wait long periods of time and going through that is, it’s pretty rough. I think anybody under any circumstances having to wait those types of time frames, (it) takes a toll on your psyche, it takes a toll on your health and it’s difficult to get through.”

Marvel said it’s not surprising that the Justice Department investigations are taking a long time – the people doing the investigations are still learning to conduct them at this level.

“I think what you’re dealing with now is, you have an Attorney General’s office that has never done this before,” Marvel said. “So, in essence, you’re having to train up special agents to do officer-involved shootings. There is a skill associated with investigating not only officer-involved shootings, but just shootings in general, that the Attorney General’s office doesn’t have.”

Councilmember watched his cousin’s death

Another family who lost faith waiting for the Justice Department’s investigation has long roots in Orange County. Hernandez, the Santa Ana city councilmember, watched from behind a police barricade as officers shot his cousin, Brandon Lopez, 22 times after a police chase in Anaheim on Sept. 28, 2021.

Lopez, 33, had three outstanding warrants and was driving a stolen car that crashed at a construction site. During an hours-long standoff, police shouted commands to him, telling him to surrender. In a video presentation of dispatcher audio and body camera footage prepared by the Anaheim Police Department, police said Lopez was “smoking narcotics” inside the car and refused to leave.

Santa Ana police handed over the standoff to the Anaheim Police Department. Soon after, Anaheim Police officers fired a flashbang grenade and tear gas canister into the car. Lopez emerged from the car’s backseat moments later.

The officers called out that Lopez had a gun. Police fired multiple rounds, and Lopez is shown in the video falling to the ground. He died at the scene. He was unarmed.

“What they called a standoff was a public execution of an unarmed man,” Hernandez said. “The days of lynching have gone away and have evolved into the modern day police shooting.”

Hernandez ran in 2020 against an incumbent former Orange County Sheriff’s deputy on a police reform platform. He won by 9 percentage points.

At the scene before the shooting, body camera footage shows the councilmember in a T-shirt and shorts, asking to speak with his cousin and telling an officer he’s worried because “cops kill people every day.”

The officer responds: “People kill people every day.”

“Absolutely,” Hernandez said, “but you’ll get away with it.”

CalMatters requested raw footage, interviews and relevant documents associated with the Lopez shooting from the Anaheim Police Department in September. The department denied the request, citing the ongoing investigation.

When the Justice Department took control of the investigation, Hernandez said he was hopeful it would avoid the local politics of Santa Ana and Orange County. Unlike Holland’s family, Hernandez said his relatives do not think well of the police. He and Lopez’s mother, Johanna, told CalMatters they refused to speak with the local cops after the shooting.

“You cannot trust the people who just murdered your loved one to properly investigate each other,” Hernandez said.

Now, because of the delay, he wonders whether he and his family can trust the Justice Department.

Pam Holland holds a photo of her late son as her two daughters, Solana Roberts and Reymi Updike stand by her, in front of her home in Tehachapi on April 20, 2023. Photo by Larry Valenzuela, CalMatters/CatchLight Local

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

Dennis William Eugene Ganfield (Denny), age 51, unexpectedly went home to be with his Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, on May 5, 2023. He was born in Arcata on March 1, 1972 to Dennis and Phyllis Ganfield. Denny was an active child who loved growing up in the small town of Mckinleyville, where there were always friends and family close by. A few years later he became a big brother and protector of his little sister, Brandy. He learned to hunt and fish alongside his dad, grandpas and uncles.

Sports time was also family time, where his biggest fan, his mother, could be seen and heard cheering him on! From a young age it was evident that Denny was athletically gifted. All through his youth he dominated on the soccer fields, baseball fields, basketball courts and especially on the football field. It was on the gridiron where Denny found his true passion. When he entered Mckinleyville High School in 1986 he went to work polishing his skills at the wide receiver position. It didn’t take him long to establish himself as a prolific wide receiver. Throughout his varsity years he struck fear into the heart of HDN Big Four and Little Five defensive backfields. Denny established himself as the premier wide receiver of the HDN his senior year while helping his team shatter records and write themselves in the CIF state record books. Denny was a team player who worked tirelessly on and off the field. Denny and his teammates were honored for their undefeated North Coast Section Championship season by being inducted into the Mckinleyville High School hall of fame.

After high school and working locally, Denny enlisted into the US Army in 1993. Upon graduating from basic training in South Carolina he was stationed at Fort Bliss, Texas, where he became a certified Vehicle Mechanic and achieved the rank of Specialist. During his time in service he would be awarded the National Defense Service Medal, Army Good Conduct Medal, Army Service Ribbon and Expert Marksmanship Qualification Badge with Rifle Bar. During his time in Texas he was blessed with his two boys, Kyle and Dennis Jr. Ganfield.

Denny later returned to his roots in Humboldt County, where he was employed as a mill worker, and always found time to head to the outdoors where he continued to hunt and fish. He loved his children and showed them the beautiful nature that Humboldt County has to offer and was very proud of the men they are today.

Denny always had a special place in his heart for his sister, Brandy, and her children, Chase and Jovie. He cherished being a part of and watching his nephew and niece grow up. He loved his mom’s home cooking and drinking a cold beer over long talks with his dad.

Later on in life, he found purpose and meaning in his Christian faith. He was baptized as an adult and attended Church on a regular basis.

Denny left us too soon and will be deeply missed. Rest in peace in God’s care, we will be reunited in Heaven.

Dennis is survived by his sons, Kyle and Dennis Jr. Ganfield, and their mother, Patricia Coria; grandchildren, Matthew Anthony Ganfield and Kaylee Grace Ganfield; his parents, Dennis and Phyllis Ganfield; his sister, Brandy Eskra, and her children, Chase Evenson and Jovie Fischer; aunts, Donna (and her son Tommy), Sandra Weeks, Lois Crawford, and great-aunt Bonnie Benjamin; uncles, Marvin (and Peggy) Ganfield, Robert Ganfield, Bob Reynolds, and numerous cousins and lifelong friends.

He was preceded in death by maternal grandparents, William and Audrey Reynolds; paternal grandparents, Marvin and Thelma Ganfield; his brother-in-law and great buddy, Scott Eskra; aunts, Sheryl Whitaker, Jean Van Epps, Sharron Sandal, and Bonnie Kay Reynolds; uncles, David, Darrell, and Roger Ganfield, Mel Peterson, Bill Reynolds, and Thomas White; and cousins, Cherie Reynolds and Winter White.

We invite family and friends to attend a gravesite memorial in honor of Denny on Saturday, May 27 at 12 p.m. at Greenwood Cemetery, which is located at 1757 J Street in Arcata. After the memorial, we would be honored to have you join us at the Arcata Veterans Memorial Building, located at 1425 J Street in Arcata.

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FURTHER READING: 

• Eureka Woman Dies at Moonstone Beach One Day After Graduating From Nursing School
• OUT of the SCRUM! Meet the 18-Year-Old Arcata Native Whose College Rugby Team Just Won Nationals
• Body of 44-Year-Old Man Recovered After His Boat Was Swept Out Of Klamath River Mouth
• Fishing and Conservation Groups Sue PG&E Alleging Harm to Salmon and Steelhead on the Eel River
• State Senate Will Host Hearing on Offshore Wind and the Fishing Industry Tomorrow, McGuire’s Office Announces

HUMBOLDT TODAY can be viewed on LoCO’s homepage each night starting at 6 p.m.

If you’ve strolled along the Eureka waterfront trail much over the past few summers, chances are you’ve come across “Chalk Talk,” a series of essays written in chalk on the surface of the trail, the letters in all caps, the words spaced roughly one step apart.

Reading Chalk Talk requires you to walk forward with your head down. As you do so, the words unspool from background to foreground, like an inverted version of the “crawl” sequences at the start of each Star Wars film.

The author, whose real identity is unknown to us at the Outpost, goes by K.P. Smile, and their temporary word installations address matters pertaining to our local homeless residents.

K.P. Smile describes their creation as “a talk radio show that plays out right here on the waterfront trail,” and the latest installment — listed as Season 4, episode 1 — recently appeared on the pathway, its full message stretching for nearly a mile. (It begins at the intersection of First and C streets and continues southwest almost to Schmidbauer Building Supply.

The latest episode of Chalk Talk focuses primarily on the potential legal ramifications of privately organized homeless “sweeps.” You can watch the video above to read the whole thing, and as we head into summer, look where you’re stepping: You might come across another edition.

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You probably saw all the hoopla earlier this year about Cal Poly Humboldt’s rugby team kicking butt at nationals. Well, in other rugby news, last weekend the Claremont Colleges women’s rugby team – the Foxes – won the College Rugby Association of America’s D2 National Championship for the second time. And though that might not usually be news of particular interest in Humboldt County, it turns out that one member of the national champion team is born-and-raised Arcata gal, 18-year-old Flannery Warner. 

Warner, who graduated from Arcata High, just finished up her freshman year at Scripps College – one of five Claremont Colleges that have members on the team. So this was her first year playing rugby for the Foxes, which made it especially exciting for her to be part of winning nationals. In fact, Warner told the Outpost, it was actually her first year playing rugby at all. 

“At Arcata High I was a competitive swimmer,” Warner said in a recent phone interview. “And then I decided when I went to college that I was kind of burnt out with swimming and I wanted to try something new. I knew that this team had won nationals the previous year. And so that of course was like a little bit intimidating, but I was like, ‘why not?’”

One of the nice things about the rugby team, Warner explained, is that anyone can join, even if they don’t have rugby experience. Since rugby is not a hugely popular sport in America, compared to American football or other sports, a lot of high schools do not have a rugby team. So many of the players are athletes coming from another sport, like soccer or basketball, and they learn how to play from the coaches and senior team members. 

After new players join the team, the process is sort of “self-selecting,” Warner said, because many people realize within the first few days of training that rugby isn’t really for them. “A lot of people don’t continue because they realize they don’t like being tackled and all of that stuff,” Warner said. 

But Warner said that even though she was a little wary of the intense physical contact of the sport at first, she discovered that she really likes it. As a swimmer Warner did a lot of weight training, which she said was something she always really enjoyed. One of the things that made her interested in transitioning to rugby is that it’s a sport that really emphasizes being physically strong.

OK, so here is the part where this reporter who knows nothing about rugby (or, really, sports in general) tries to explain a little bit about how rugby is played. If you are a rugby aficionado, just go ahead and scroll past this part and save me the embarrassment. During a rugby match, there are 15 players per team on the field, who are grouped into eight “forwards” and seven “backs.” One of the jobs of the forwards is to form the scrum, which involves the forwards from each team packing closely together with their heads down and attempting to gain possession of the ball. Warner generally plays as one of the “props,” whose role is to support the “jumper” as they compete for the ball. 

Evan Wollen, one of the team’s coaches, told the Outpost that props have to be very strong and usually have a larger body type, so it is not a position commonly given to a freshman. But Wollen said that Warner is very strong and has worked very hard to prove her capabilities. 

“Her statistics in the weightroom really improved over the year,” Wollen said in a recent interview. “She didn’t just show up and get that position. She worked her way into it.” 

Of course, Wollen is very excited that the team won nationals for the second year in a row and is impressed with all of the team members, many of whom had never played rugby before joining the team. There are 40 members on the team and 25 on the roster for each game. In the nationals match against Howard University, Warner was put in as an alternate for the last 18 minutes of the game, Wollen said, and got to be a part of winning the title. As a particularly determined team member, Warner was always trying to figure out a way to be on the field.

“Her dedication was kind of an example for the other freshmen,” Wollen said. “She asks me at the end of pretty much every practice what she can do to improve. Trying to stay ahead of a player like Flannery is a challenge. But a good challenge.” 

Growing up in the hippie-town capital, Arcata, Warner’s drive seems to come from living in a very sports-centric family. Warner’s older and younger brother both also play team sports, and her father, Tim Warner, is one of the regular announcers for the Humboldt Crabs. The whole Warner family has spent many summers working at the Crabs games, and Flannery said she will be working with them again while she is home for the summer. 

Other than working at the ballpark, Warner said that she plans to spend most of her summer back in Humboldt catching up on rest. In addition to playing rugby, Warner also has a full schoolwork load and is planning on majoring in biology and doing pre-med. With the team’s final game on the weekend right before finals, Warner and her teammates were stretched pretty thin, using most of their downtime in Houston to study in their hotel rooms. The team really didn’t even have enough time to celebrate their win. 

But Warner said that traveling with her teammates was still a lot of fun and she is so excited to have been a part of winning the D2 nationals. Though she plans on going into the medical field after school, Warner said she plans to play rugby throughout her college career. 

“It was super fun…” Warner said. “I think I would have been a lot more socially isolated without the team. I think that if I hadn’t had the team and the friendship of the team, [freshman year] would have been a very different experience.”

Press release from the office of Sen. Mike McGuire:

Senate Majority Leader Mike McGuire, Chair of the Joint Committee on Fisheries and Aquaculture (JCFA), is gearing up for this Wednesday’s hearing in the State Capitol focused on California’s burgeoning offshore wind industry. This hearing will explore how to expedite the deployment of green energy while protecting the interests of California’s fishing fleet and ensuring coastal environmental safeguards remain in place.

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For the first time, the hearing will bring all sides of the issue together for a groundbreaking discussion that will feature representatives from federal and state agencies, tribal leaders, offshore wind industry representatives, representatives from the fishing fleet, labor leaders and environmental organizations.

Presenters will focus on why offshore wind energy is essential to the State’s green energy future and energy supply, the need to incorporate fish and wildlife in the development process, and how wind energy can be compatible with the protection of California’s fisheries.

“This first-of-its-kind hearing will bring all sides of the offshore wind discussion together, ensuring the State can expedite the deployment of this valuable energy resource while protecting the interests of California’s storied fishing fleet and guaranteeing coastal environmental safeguards,” said Senator McGuire. “It’s critical to have these voices at the same table as we develop the roadmap for offshore energy, healthy oceans and a thriving fishing fleet to co-exist here in the Golden State.”

The hearing begins at 2 p.m. tomorrow, Wednesday, May 17th in the State Capitol Swing Space, 1021 O Street, Room 2100. The public is welcome to attend the hearing.

The hearing will be live-streamed via the Senate Website. For more information about the hearing, visit the Committee web site at Committee web site.