Board of Supervisors - Regular Meeting

Good morning. Here we are. Welcome to the Humboldt County Board of Supervisors meeting of Tuesday, October 6, 2026. And we will start with a roll call, please.

All right. Supervisor Arroyo will be here just a few minutes late. All right. Let's start with the salute to the flag. Chair Hansel, will you lead us today? Yes. Excellent. All right. We are now moving into modifications on the agenda. And let's see if there's anything. Oh, you know what? I skipped something. We need to do our virtual attendance instructions. So you can take that away, Anne.

All right, thank you. All right, now we're going to move to modifications to the agenda. Do we have any modifications expected today?

Okay. All right, so D2 and D13 on consent are being pulled. Is that what I'm hearing? Correct. For discussion, okay. All right. We're gonna move, and just so for everyone, D2 is the Breast Cancer Awareness Month, so if you're here for that, we're gonna do that after consent. And hold on, let me look at 14 for a second. Council or CAO, can you? D14, can you tell me what D14 is? Oh, D13. Oh, good thing I wrote it down. Okay, planning and building department. Sorry about that. Got it. Okay. Moving on to we are on the consent calendar now. So we are gonna have that discussion, things that are on t

Thank you. I just wanted to recognize for the public that there are quite a few supplementals that are on this consent calendar. And oftentimes, you know, when we see supplementals that are contingencies out of general fund, we pull them. These are not those. They are moving monies around within departments as it's the end of the year trying to balance their internal budgets. And I just wanted to recognize that.

Great, and we have a couple of thank yous. We have a letter of appreciation to Katrina Taylor for service on the Humboldt County McKinleyville Municipal Advisory Committee, as well as to Bob Doherty for his service on the Humboldt County Behavioral Health Board. We appreciate everyone's service on all of these committees and boards. Please sign up for them as you see fit. And what I'm trying to get at is sign up for our meeting if they're full, because when openings come up, our staff will send you opportunities to do that. OK, I'm going to ask if there's any comments or questions from board m

Okay, is there anyone else who wants to speak on consent items? Can I get a motion to approve consent calendar minus D2 and D13?

I'll make a motion to approve consent minus D2 and D13.

Second. Okay. We have a motion by Bushnell and a second by Madrone. Is there any more conversation on this board? And because we're missing somebody, I think we're going to go to roll call vote, please.

All right. I think we're going to move to things pulled from consent right now. And the first item is going to be D2, Breast Cancer Awareness Month.

Thank you. I think there are some folks here for Breast Cancer Awareness Month. If you want to come forward, please. And you all can come forward if you want. Karen.

Okay, this is a proclamation in honor of an awareness of Breast Cancer Awareness Month. whereas breast cancer is an epidemic that will strike one of eight American women in their lifetime, and whereas breast cancer is the most common form of cancer among women, and while the risks increase with age, even younger women can be affected. And whereas it is estimated that 321,910 women and 2,670 men will be diagnosed with breast cancer in the United States in 2026, and which affects not only the patient, but their family, employer, and friends as well. whereas although breast cancer remains the sec

Thank you, and thank you for all the words that were spoken today. If you look around the room today, there will be approximately, and probably someone already has been touched by breast cancer in this room, but three women in this room, possibly in their lifetime, will get detected with breast cancer. It affects so many people, and if your spouse is the one that is dealing with breast cancer along with yourself, it is terrible to have to be a bystander and watch your loved one go through breast cancer cancer or breast cancer. And it just really is so, it just changes a family and early detect

Okay. Any other supervisors before I open up to public comment?

Yeah, I just, the girls in pink, I mean, they, they approach cancer and you have to remember this affects men also. So, and they support both and the numbers are actually kind of high for men also. So as this moves forward We've got a small but mighty group of very attentive people in our office that are part of the Cancer Crushers. But the day of the auction, there'll be 60 to 70 volunteers put up, 450 people. It's a pretty amazing thing. I've got the great honor of being involved and have been very fortunate to work with a great bunch of people. I think it's when a small group like this take

Billy thanks for the patch can I get a badge and a few other things so I can get out of stuff just just a wild thought there I also want to recognize along with the sheriff's department that across Humboldt county police officers and Eureka Fortuna are also wearing pink and pink badges and I think it's really important to like sheriff Hansel said to say hey I see that I was at the Fortuna city council meeting last night and They were all decked out in pink and that was really great to see. Also the pink cans in Fortuna, the first city that has done that, which is really amazing. It's been a ve

Okay, anyone else on the board? Any words? Seeing none, I'm gonna take this out to public comment. Starting online. Okay. Anyone else in the room want to speak to this? All right. Well, as far as Bushnell.

I'll make a motion to approve the proclamation.

And I'll second it. And I just speak to the second. I want to say I want to associate myself with all of the comments from my fellow board members. I, I actually don't even really know of anyone who hasn't been touched by breast cancer in their family or in their, you know, I just, I just, it doesn't seem to exist to me in terms of like someone who hasn't unless there's so young, they don't have, have knowledge or understanding of it in their, in their lives. But this is really about detection and prevention and and it, it, it overflows into other. forms of detection and prevention in terms of

All right. With that, we are going to go to D13, which was pulled from consent.

Great, good explanation of what is somewhat of a minor change. So any questions from the board on this? I just have just a question on the rehab program. Is that fully utilized in terms of like, do you feel like if there was more money in that program, would there be more rehabs? Yes. Okay. Do you have an estimate on what the capacity is? You have right now 230,000, I think, in there. So if it was a million, would there be a million dollars worth of requests? What do you think would be?

OK. And if you don't have an answer for this, it's OK. Do you have an estimate of sort of like the per capita or per residence amount we spend in that program, more or less?

Okay. I was just looking for effectiveness, you know, efficacy on money spent and how many homes we get, you know, either up and running or to continue for residency because... It has impact on, you know, people always are asking us or commenting on what it costs to house people. And when we build new units, everyone's like, oh, it's $800,000 a unit or half a million dollars a unit. But then there's sort of the efficiency of taking existing units, either rehabbing them to get folks back in them or to keep people housed. And so maybe that's for a future discussion, but I just want to put that o

Okay, so would you advise folks in their community if they see a homeowner in their community that looks like they could be distressed in terms of their ability to stay there because of needing repairs, maybe help them contact your office? Absolutely. Okay. That was my only comment. I appreciate that very much. Do we have public comment online?

Okay. Do we have public comment in the house? And then I'll bring it back to the board.

Excellent. Are there any comments from board members? Supervisor Bowen.

I'd like to recognize Planning and Building and John Ford right now for standing up with We Are Up since its inception. I've had the honor of helping with their fundraisers and being involved with Mary Keene since the beginning. And this is a huge project, and I think they're only going to use Up 12% of the land. It's a small use. They're going to have a community garden for the kids to sell or for the autistic kids. And it's a combination. If you see it, it's a combination of senior housing and autistic adults who are ready to go out on their own but need a little overseeing. and the seniors

All right, any other comments? We're good? All right, I just wanna again associate myself with the comments from the other supervisors. I think that we are a project, I mean in my mind, speaks for itself in all its wonderful benefits and anything we can do to raise that up is going to be great. I do really actually, I wanna point out or sort of lift up what Supervisor Bone was talking about in terms of like the co-housing or the sort of mixed housing opportunities within that and taking different groups of folks and working together to benefit everybody. And I think there's a need to do that m

Great. And if we could have a roll call vote, that would be great.

All right. Take a minute here to change things around. Okay, let's see. The next thing we're gonna do is public comment on non-agenda items. Let's start with folks not in the room.

Okay, we'll bring it back into the room. Again, this is comments on non-agenda items.

Okay. Is there any more comments from non-agenda items? One more? All right. If there's any more folks that could line up, that would be great. Thanks.

All right. So anyone else on public comment for things not on the agenda? Okay, moving on, let's see here. We are into public hearings, and the first of those is for Public Works, and that has to do with the approval of renewal agreement with Humboldt Sanitation for the operation of maintenance of the northern container sites and Recology Eel River for Redway Transfer Station.

Nope, I can open it right now. Opening public hearing. Do you have comments besides that?

I do. Okay, go ahead. Okay, I just want to, the Redway transfer site, it's coming along great, and the community is very thankful for that down there. I also just want to comment with the southern outline sites, and that's what we're talking about, right? I know those, like Bloxburg, Whitethorn, all of those, they're expensive, and I understand Recology wanting to pull out, but it It will increase the amount of trash that are dumped on the sides of the roads. Those sites are utilized well. The containers are full every week, almost every week with rural folks out there that utilize that. So an

That's great, because I have seen in the past, you know, there was some staffing issues and they weren't open for, you know, several months at a time. And I saw increased trash dumping on the sides of the roads, which is just terrible and ends up costing the county more money. So I appreciate all the work, Tom, that you guys have done to keep those sites open and Recology as well.

Okay. Council President Bowne. All right, well, any more comments from our board before we move to public comment? Moving to public comment, we're going to take it to the public online.

Okay. Thank you. Do we have anyone in the room that wants to speak to this? Nope, okay, moving on. I'm gonna see if there's any more comments from staff on this or the board. Seeing none, I'm looking for a motion to approve staff recommendation for D13.

No, not D13, I'm sorry. Public hearing. Public hearing for, excuse me, G1.

Can I ask time uncertain or continuance? Time uncertain. Okay, so. Okay, thank you. I'll make a motion for staff recommendations and a continuation time uncertain of this item. Okay. Public hearing.

Sounds good. We will get these contracts done. It will happen. All right. We have a motion and a second. I need a roll call vote, please.

Thank you. All right. Thanks for that. I have to take a break for a few minutes, if that's all right. I apologize. So we will be back in 10 minutes. We'll be back at 10.15. Thank you. It's a family issue I need to deal with. So, moving on to... I'm sorry. Okay, we have some options here because I want to point out we have the next thing on here is a four-fifths item. And we're missing somebody who said they will not be here. We're missing Supervisor Arroyo says she can be here at 1045. Because it's a four-fifths, I'm just going to ask for the board's indulgence to... postpone that item so that

Great, well then that's what I'm gonna do, because it seems like it's a four fifths. I would like actually, if we can, I'd like to move to something on the more positive note, although And is the sheriff still here? All right. And I'm not sure we need him, but I'd actually indulge us to talk about item I-1, which is brought to us by Supervisor Bone. And this has to do with the El Nino emergency preparedness funding for sandbags and sand and additional resources. And Supervisor Bone, are you prepared to talk about this?

Can I ask a question, Chair, through the chair? Yes. So is the H3, you have your planning staff sitting here, and I don't think that one's a for this. No, it's not. Is there any way we could?

Let's do that. I think it's a great suggestion. Thank you, Supervisor Bushnell, for a wonderful suggestion, which we're going to do. Number three, which is the interjection of ordinances amending various sections of chapters one and two of the Humboldt County Code, title three, division five, related to public nuisances, abatements, and penalties to clarify definitions, yada, yada, yada. And all the other good stuff. Thank you. All right, we're gonna move into that one.

Do you want a question now or do you want to wait until he's done?

Well, I'd like to address some of these right before they all get blended. On the Cap 4 violation, this is a new property owner that's bought a piece of property with a Cap 4 violation, right? Bought a piece of property that has a cannabis violation on it, yes. I think the other thing is, is what I've heard for years now, the biggest problem is, is that violation is not making it into the records. Either it's going through and everything else. So it's never when the title company does a search, it's not there. So the guy says, I don't have any violations. It's not on my title. And then all of

How much money have we spent going out and putting those violations on these properties? Our ROI is terrible. And so what I want to do is if there's any way we can get it going forward quicker before it transfers hands, it protects the buyer. I know it puts a hindrance on the seller.

I fully agree with that. There's been more than just one. But I fully agree with that. But somewhere in the process, when we turn that in and we report it, can we follow up that it actually gets on there? Because that's where the economics come into play, because that's where we collect the money. Just putting a violation on someone that becomes non-collectible doesn't do us any good. There is a violation. There's an environmental violation. I've had a lot more complaints from people that have bought properties and then found out later that I have people that are trying to sell a property that

If I can, I'm going to reign this back in. I'm going to let Supervisor, excuse me, Director Ford finish his presentation. Then I'm going to ask supervisors to direct their questions to Supervisor Ford in a way that... gets to the point of what we're trying to get to here. And we're going to then open up to public comment, and then we're going to bring it back for more discussion. I don't want to have a big back and forth right in the middle of a presentation, if we can. So please proceed, Director Ford.

Great, okay, now we're gonna bring it back to the board for questions. Supervisor Bushnell, do you have any questions on this?

Okay, gotcha. All right, back to Supervisor Bone. Do you have any more questions you wanna get into?

Okay, we're gonna open this up to public comment and then we will bring it back to the board for discussion. So Kayleigh, do we have anyone online that's interested in this subject and wants to speak to it?

And there's no time set at the moment. So by all means, please jump in.

OK. Thanks for the clarification. Really appreciate it. OK. Anybody in the room have comments on this item? Okay, we are gonna bring it back to the board for discussion. All right, take it away, Supervisor Bushnell.

Thank you, I have just one question. So say someone buys a property and it's not recognized on the title report that there's a violation and they get into the property and then later down the road they're sent a, or somehow it's caught that there's a violation and you guys send them documentation, what does that look like with this new? Because sometimes if it's not recognized on the title report, they don't even know to call you or check or anything.

Okay, thank you for that. And then also, I wanted to ask around this item, the work that you've done with Humboldt Realtors Association to make realtors more aware and to have easier access. I know that you and Cliff went and had a meeting with them and did a public meeting with folks coming. So could you just talk about that a little bit to try to help with this process?

Okay thank you and then lastly I just want to recognize more for the general public that it can get a little sticky when you do owner carry and there isn't a realtor involved and just to do your due diligence and reach out to the planning department to see if there are any violations on the property is that correct director Ford that is correct thank you for bringing that one up yep thanks that's all my comments questions I think that is probably one of the

some of the salient points of today. Buying property that either you suspect or know has had cannabis operations on it, please check with the planning department. please notify other people. They should be checking with the planning department. And so I think that is really, really important. Okay. Is there any more comments from the board? Supervisor Bone, do you have anything else you want to add? talk about in terms of this, and by all means, jump in.

No. Later on, we do need to probably maybe address some of these things, because our return on investment on all these violations, we're a lot better getting them cleaned up than trying to chase money, because we have people chasing these violations. And a lot of them, we know we're not going to get the money. I mean, cut our losses would probably be the word. And then the other thing is having somewhere in there giving you a little more I mean, I know we had one, I believe, out towards Honeydew where they had built a concrete floor metal building that was going to be used for cannabis. I don'

No, and I understand that. But what I'm saying here is the public has to understand we're not cleaning it up for the person that we're cleaning it up for. We're cleaning it up for the neighbors. And we've got properties, one that was a 12-year property. We finally both got them cleaned up. And all of a sudden, the house next door sold for $80,000 more than it had just sold for because it was next to them. And that's that's in a down market but the house was now an acceptable value so that's you know we need that leniency and and and for you to do but we also need six and eight years to clean u

Okay. Before we go to vote, I got a couple of things on this. One is I let's start with where I concur with a supervisor bone on cleanups in general, that there's a difference between a foundation you know, basically a piece of concrete and say pesticide spills. They're just very different things. And, and to concentrate on those things that aren't just about neighbors, but about watersheds and really thinking about that and things that are static in there, in the environment, I would say probably not our biggest biggest issue. So... And I and I I don't just say it's just for us I I mean I hav

Okay, great. I'm going to go back to something again. This is, I think, will have a positive outcome.

Yes, Chair. You have another item for planning and building number four?

Hold on, let me see here. I was really excited about getting the sandbags, but all right, all right, all right. Let's take a look at this.

Yeah, actually I'm gonna come back to that one if I can. I'm gonna keep on the roll because also there's some folks who wanna talk about this. So I'm gonna go to item I-1, which is the El Nino Emergency Preparedness Funding for sandbags and sand and additional resources if we can. And, That's what we're going to do. If you guys stick around, you guys are going to be next after this. Okay. Two feet back. All right. So this was brought to us by Supervisor Bone. I'm glad we had this on the agenda, and I'm grateful to Supervisor Bone for...

Getting ahead of this... As much as we can and I don't think it's gonna be the end of it so I want... Supervisor bone to lead us off on this discussion and see where we go well I don't know how far ahead I'm getting for the last thirteen fourteen years I've been having sand dumped down in King salmon Tom's been giving us bags I think and... I've been getting the sand donated by... private contractors so people could fill their own sandbags. Then I think about seven or eight years ago, we had a big issue in Ferndale. One of the contractors has a sandbag machine and we went from making with the

Okay. I have a couple things to say about this, but Tom, please come on up because we'll have questions for you. I think this is just the start of that conversation. I think OES is gearing up and we're going to need to hear from them hopefully as soon as possible. We've been told that there has been a state of emergency that's been proclaimed by the governor in relation to El Nino. and the weather patterns from that. I've heard also that it's not impossible that the major portion of that focus of the energy of that event will be south of us, but nonetheless, we have been here in this place whe

Okay, great. Zubrize Bone, one comment or two, and then we're going to take it to the comment.

Is there... Are we going to run into a problem with delivering the sandbags like to King Salmon, or can we come down and do it ourselves for? I mean, I'd pick up a trailer load and drop them off all the way across, all the way out to wherever it's needed. But if that becomes something public property or private property. And then the other thing is, are we making any sand at Worswick with the new machines?

Are the machines capable, or do we have to add another screen?

Understood. I'm talking, if not Carlotta, I mean, we're, We truck stuff from Blue Lake to there, so I mean, we just, the idea of getting sand and dumping it now, when we have the time, I think we're still okay to dump it across from, I know King Salmon is a central location for Fields Landing, Elk River, and those places, and letting people go at their own rate, and it's pretty wide open right there, across from the power plant, so, where we've dumped historically.

Correct. Okay, and then I actually have a question that's in relation to cross-jurisdictional collaboration and cooperation. Do we see that? I mean, like, you know, Blue Lake has some issues, and sometimes Arcade has some issues, and as well as... other jurisdictions. Do we have some communication in that regard in terms of resources?

OK. But if a jurisdiction reaches out, you'll talk to them if they need it, right? Yes. OK. That's what I want to hear. All right. With that, we're going to take it to public comment online.

All right. We're going to bring it back to the board. Supervisor buchanel.

Thank you. I wanted to ask director matz a question. I appreciate Supervisor Bowen also bringing this forward and I hear the discussion around the availability for sandbags in the north area but also in the southern area, Chem 2, Phillipsville, Shelter Cove. What does that look like for availability?

Okay thank you I just want to make sure you know that we do address those other maintenance sites and that we have some availability there and I know it'll you know it could be nothing in the south and a ton of in the north so I know that that the need is always the first request.

Sorry, I just wanted to. So it looks like with this agenda item that we are going to have it. If we vote, it would go into the CEO's hands for some funding criteria monies and then come back. Would it come back on consent or so it could come back on consent and then it would go once it passes, then Tom, you would start utilizing that.

Okay, my message to folks is I think Maggie did a good job of pointing out that there are, don't just rely on the county itself, but actually get your communities together. And this is a message to those communities. We're gonna do our best to be prepared, but also please reach out. Please let us know what your needs are. hopefully and strategically before we're all running around in an emergency situation. So with that, I think we're ready to vote on this. Can we have a roll call vote, please? Oh, we need a motion. Yeah, give me a motion. Anybody? I move. Go ahead.

I will make a motion to direct the County Administrator's Office in coordination with the Humboldt County Sheriff's Office of Emergency Services and Department of Public Works to return to the board with a financial plan not to exceed $25,000 for the purchase and strategic placement of sand, sandbags, and other emergency preparedness resources in flood-prone and low-lying areas and locations identified as appropriate based on historical flooding, community need, and emergency preparedness.

Great, I'll second it. And with that, we'll have a roll call vote, please.

Yes, and thank you again to Supervisor Boehme for bringing this forward.

Of course, but it always amazes me. Our consent calendar was millions of dollars, and we sat up here and spent 25 minutes talking about $25,000 for sandbags. That's government. Yes.

OK. With that, we're going to go back into the regular order of things. And we're going to start with H1, adoption of an interim urgency ordinance establishing a 45-day moratorium on the acceptance of applications to permit data centers in unincorporated Humboldt County and with that we're back with director Ford welcome back sorry thanks to present

Okay. Is there any questions from the board on this before we move to public comment? Supervisor Bushnell and then Supervisor Arroyo.

I have a variety of questions, and I've spoke with the Director for it yesterday. I am happy to wait until after public comment, however, and then come back to it. Okay.

I know we haven't provided much direction on this matter yet, although you got a little bit that we wanted to see this item come forward. But are you aware of other example ordinances from other jurisdictions that might be a good template for this? I'm just wondering how heavy of a lift this is going to be.

All right, anyone on this side? Seeing none, we're gonna go to public comment.

Okay, is there public comment in the room on this item?

All right then, bringing it back to the board, I know Supervisor Bushnell has some questions, but I wanna jump in just for a second, if I can. I just wanted to emphasize that this is a interim moratorium, and that for the development of an ordinance. So we've already given instruction I think, for the development of an ordinance. So that's already on there. So this is one part of a two part direction from this board to do that. And so this is the first part. And with that, Supervisor Bush, no.

Thank you. So at our last board meeting, you know, I had made comments around the moratorium and the issues that we currently, to get a permit for a data center, you would have to, there isn't an ordinance, so you would have to apply for a permit, a conditional use permit. Is that correct, Director Ford?

And during that discretionary permit process, public notice is given, it would go to the Planning Commission, then it could be appealed to the Board of Supervisors, is that correct?

So in large, the moratorium, I'm not sure why we're doing it, because there's already a process for protections around these items with communities that it would be very discretionary My concerns are with smaller data centers that may be appropriate for private lands somewhere not centered around residential areas. And with this moratorium, Director Ford, what does that do for kind of that situation?

So even a smaller facility, if a person was to apply, it still would have to go through the CUP process, right? And any facility would have to go through the CUP process?

Okay. My concerns are just around that we already have a process in place for... doing this type of permitting and that it is those processes are protected through the the Planning Commission that public can can weigh in their feelings, notifications. I just think that we're duplicating or restricting and not allowing the public to have that input with the processes that are in place.

Just to be clear though, so if someone completed an application for a conditional use permit and then we're going through the process on that, there would be a method for the community to weigh in and for us to evaluate the impacts and create conditions of approval and things like that, but it wouldn't prevent them from moving forward with an application if the project was if we didn't have some sideboards around what the appropriate criteria were, size, water usage, things like that for data centers. Would that still give us the opportunity to say this isn't really consistent with our communi

I have a, let me take a shot at this. From my perspective, and especially a temporary moratorium is to relieve or reduce anxiety in the community about whether or not they want to engage in one of these processes. I think that's part of the issue is like, sure, we could have a big process about it, but if we have very strong feelings about whether or not to even start engaging in that, which I think we received, I received very robust comments from the community that this is more or less something they want to be extremely cautious about, do not want to engage in anytime soon unless something'

Since you brought up McKinleyville, I don't know how much more talk you want to do on a piece of property that was set to have that. I think that was set 35 years ago to be a commercial business park. So I think it's been discussed. But anyway, that's another thing. 45 days, except for a roof, I don't know any permit we're going to get through in 45 days anyway. And I mean, you brought up a great point. Trying to build a warehouse in a principally permitted area has now gone on for over a year. I don't think a 45-day moratorium on warehouses would have helped. So most of the systems, how many

The one you talked to is going to probably provide their own power and do it via closed-loop system? That hasn't been worked out yet. A majority of the new data centers that are being built, you guys, I'd still love it if I was on my flip phone, so I don't give a damn about data centers either, which way I just know that's where everything's going, it looks like. But as we move forward, most of the ones being built, especially in areas like this, are going to be off-grid, off-grid, closed-loop systems. 45 days, man, it's gonna look great that you stood up and did this and everything else, but

We're going to bring him back around to Supervisor Bushnell and then to Supervisor Royal.

Thank you. Director Ford, how long realistically for an ordinance? Year and a half?

Can I ask the first process for a moratorium is the 45 days, so then you can come back and get the longer extension for 11. Correct. You can't just do 11 months. You have to do the 45 days. Correct. So the intent is to have the moratorium in place for almost two, so a year and a half.

It's a year total? Yeah. So if you don't get the ordinance done in a year, and I'll just reference to low-impact campaign that's taken longer than we anticipated, what happens to that moratorium in a year?

And so it could be extended past that one year, another year?

Okay. So I'll ask again, do you anticipate having an ordinance ready in a year?

Okay. In the meantime, and I understand people's anxiety around data centers, and I also have anxieties of my own around data centers because I don't have the knowledge, like Supervisor Bone said, and to what it would do to the environment, the community. et cetera, et cetera. But I am concerned with the same thing that Supervisor Bones said, that we first of all have a process already that works through the planning department, that if someone were to apply for it, and as you said, nobody has, that it would go through the processes of denial or acceptance with community input, planning commis

So it's not something that would happen without very large public process. And also, the five of us up here, if it got appealed, having input for our districts. Also, the five planning commissioners that we appoint plus two extras would have that input as well. Is that correct? OK. So my concern still, again, is we have a process. And we seem to be superseding that process. To put an ordinance together. If we don't pass this moratorium, are you still going to be working on an ordinance?

Okay. So without the moratorium, we still will get an ordinance within a year. And in the meantime, it would go through the process that it would normally go through and have all that public input process, ways to reject or approve, correct?

Okay. If the moratorium passes today, is there any, because I would expect it's not going to be 45 days, it's going to be a year. Is there anything that we can do to allow for a process for smaller outlying areas that may be acceptable for these things?

But okay, so if we did an exemption to allow for a conditional use permit to be applied for, then those conditions could also come through Planning Commission. And I suspect they would. Given the concerns with the community, I suspect that those conditions would be implemented anyways through Planning Commission or through the Board of Supervisors. Just given the knowledge of the Commission and this board.

Do you, in your professional experience, have concerns about the capacity for electrical or water infrastructure to support these uses?

And can can we take turns here? Just can I and so the chair?

All right, so I'm going to thank for that. I just want to, as a reminder, as a forfeits vote, I feel that we may not have that. I think we have three votes more or less. I haven't heard from Supervisor Madron, but he did vote for this to move this forward before, so I'm going to assume that's the same position he's got today. So with that, unless there's more conversation that is going to modify or change someone's mind about this, I would hope that we can move forward with a vote to either do this or not do this with an understanding that if this moves forward with a moratorium, You're still

I mean, just for the sake of seeing where we land, I'll move staff recommendation.

Okay, great. I am going to second staff recommendation. And so like I'm saying, if there is more discussion that we feel like it's gonna move us one way or the other, then let's have that discussion. Supervisor Bushnell.

Thank you. I'm not going to vote for this, and it's not about data centers right now. It's about, say, doing a moratorium when we have processes in place and for allowing people to apply for permits for whatever reason, but we do have these processes already in place. What are we restricting? A permit application? I talked with Director Ford about this yesterday. And it's not about the data centers. I agree about the data centers, which we're going to be working on the process already in an ordinance. And anybody that applies for one, because there isn't any ordinance, is going to be very scru

Would you have to do that with this process?

Any process. And then also, would referrals go out with an application like this if there was one? And so it would go out to all the agencies that it normally goes out to?

Present that to commission, do all the things?

Is there an amendment that we could do that I would feel a little bit better about this that would allow for small facilities? Because I do anticipate this is going to be over a year in place, taking place, that would at least allow them the opportunity to get the no or to get the yes in the meantime without having that moratorium.

And so those are things that we are going to be probably putting into this ordinance as well, right? Okay. I would ask the motion maker, because I'm not comfortable voting for it as is, but I do think and I recognize the community's, you know, concerns around the bigger data centers. So I'm going to ask the motion maker if you would consider amending your motion to include that.

Could you repeat, sorry, you're a little quiet today, John. Could you repeat what that criteria was that you articulated?

Do you know offhand what the megawatt impact of the existing Arcata Center and the Hoopa Valley one are?

Okay. I'm just trying to get a sense of what kind of scale we're talking about there. I'm open to talking about that. I just kind of want to see where that is in the comparison, so I'm going to do some quick searching.

Well, the seconder is in favor of that amendment, but supervisor Boehm.

Yeah, and you guys, I understand jumping on the bandwagon and everything else, but we have none banging on our door. The ones that are banging on our door are going to be closed loop, providing their own power. The public advocates, now we're going to use your rates, are going to go up. The Public Advocates Office in California is working with PG&E, and I believe Southern Edison, that all before they will hook up a data center, they want to come into an agreement, and I think Rodney's probably right about this, is they will pay all fees. They will go under contract. They will pay for all fees

Rex, can I ask, who are you referring to as them?

The Public Advocates Office, they're a governmental, we have 5,000 agencies that are out there to protect us, that's one of them. But they're working for the PUC, and you know the PUC. PUC is going to put all the costs that'll be borne, because this is one of the biggest concerns we have, or one of the things is we're gonna have to pay for all their power. What they're doing now is trying to come to an agreement along that. I'd like to see how that goes. I think the idea of somebody comes in and says, hey, I'm not going to use your water, I'm not going to use your power, but I'm going to provi

I know you just jumped in on what we were doing, but I think Supervisor Madrone was kind of next in line for talking, and so I wanted to make sure he got his time in. Supervisor Madrone.

A lot of theory, a lot of conjecture. We really don't know. What I do know is that the primary driver for these data centers is the increasing use of AI. And I will say I have a lot of concerns about that. I also have a lot of concerns with the fact that we already have maxed out power and aren't able to provide it to that Redway facility and a whole lot of other things in Southern Humboldt and around the community. So I'm going to be voting on the side of the ratepayers. And you can say whatever you want about it, Supervisor Roem, but it's a real thing. Costs are going up all over the place f

Thank you. OK, so a little very quick back of the napkin math around the existing facilities we have. The Hoopa data center megawatts I don't think has been publicly specified. And if it has, I just haven't been able to find it. Arcata's is half a megawatt capacity, and it takes up about 10,000 square feet. center that was proposed and talked about in the news, but again I'm relying on sort of local reporting for this, was proposed to be between four and eight megawatts and 30 to 50,000 square feet, which is, as we've learned, a pretty non impactful in my view warehouse size or comparable to o

Just a little bit of research. And what I'm seeing is basically 1,000 to 2,000 square feet per megawatt. So in general, which is the range. So 25 megawatts. I'm not sure where that goes. That's for high density. And for low density uses, it's 10,000 to 20,000 square feet per megawatt. So we don't really know necessarily what that impact is. There's orders of magnitude different between those two things. And if Arcata's system is half a megawatt, I can tell you, if someone who lives near it, it is a fairly large building, and when it kicks in on its self-powered system, you know it. You can hea

Thank you. I think the difference would be the renewable energy compared to the one in Arcata. Again, my concern is not around specifically, like the data center is in my communities, our concerns as well, but it's the process that we go through in denial of people of their property rights that concern me. We do have a process, even with 25, it still would have to go through Planning Commission could be appealed, could come to this board. And it is with the conditions that Director Ford had said it is very robust in making sure that that renewable energy and water and public resource trust is

Okay, Supervisor Bone, and see if we can get to a vote.

Yeah, I'm with Steve on AI. Scares the hell out of me, and I'm maybe the only person up here that's never used AI, I don't know how it works. But with that being said, average sawmill uses anywhere between 3 and 5 megawatts. And we're worried about where these are going to go. Most of them use anywhere between, some of them use up to 800,000 gallons of water a day. and most of it's through wells, so they have water rights already. And most of these sawmills in our area had anywhere between 80, and I've looked at just four or five, 80 to 140,000 square feet under roof. Under roof, permitted und

I think we throw out as many horrible things as we can and hope to say we stopped it but it's got to start first okay so all we're really working on at the moment is trying to see if there is an amendment that will get us a fourth vote or not and we'll move on from there at this point I want to propose an amendment to that amendment to limit it to five megawatts because And if that doesn't get it, then we got nowhere to go. Because to be frank, that is a small center. And I will also say that we have many land use restrictions that restrict what people can do with their land. It's called zonin

I would request the motion maker do 15. And I think that what you said, Mike, is part of what my issue is is that there are land use zoning that work. We don't put moratoriums on things because those work. That's my point. Not so much about data centers for me because I share the sentiment of concern around data centers. So I would ask that you go halfway and do the 15 and then call for the vote.

Okay. The only other thing I can think of is I don't know how someone generates 15 megawatts on site of renewable energy and That seems almost impossible to me, so I'm fine with that. They would have to do 15 megawatts of solar, as far as I can tell, or something else, which would just be a huge burden and lift. So if that is the... I'm happy to go to 15, and let's see if we can get this going.

With the criteria being that they generate their own power on-site, that is enough to... Renewable. Yes. That is enough to power 12,000 homes. So if they can do that, I will be impressed. But I think if we can get there together, I'm willing to make that amendment.

Yes, one moment, Supervisor Bone. I want to get a clarification from the director that he understands the motion as amended, and will that get us over the hump?

Okay, Supervisor Bone, one question, and then let's try to get to a vote.

So would they be allowed to contract directly with RCEA knowing that in all fairness, most of their renewable comes from the natural gas powered power plant out there and then the rest is done through an exchange. So would that be okay if they contracted with them and set up an exchange with a, out of Nevada or somewhere else, solar facility or things like that? Are we gonna let them be creative?

Okay, are we ready to vote? Let's have a roll call, please.

Okay, great. We have a few more items to get to today before we, yep, I was just gonna say we're gonna take, how long of a break, five or 10? All right, we're gonna take a five minute break and we're gonna come back to, hold on a second, that one's been pulled. We're gonna come back to the Redwood Coast Energy Authority, speaking of energy, MOU when we get back at noon-ish.

Does anyone know where Supervisor Bone is off to?

All right, we are back. We are going to discuss the Memorandum of Understanding with Redwood Coast Energy Authority to establish a regional climate committee. And so I'm gonna give this to Director Ford. Thank you, Chair Wilson.

Thank you. We'll start with supervisor Bush. Now again, we'll do questions, then we'll hit the public comment and then we'll come back for discussion and a vote.

I see the funding sources, general fund contribution to the long range planning unit. So that would that be an additional request for the 80,000, whatever, or is it already budgeted?

All right. Moving down the line. Anybody here? Okay. We'll go to public comment online.

Great. Thank you very much. In the room?

All right, anyone else? If there's more, please line up.

Okay, I'm gonna bring it back to the board. If there's any more discussion, This is the time to have it. And Supervisor Bushnell.

Thank you. So I'm wondering, it originally says that HCOG was supposed to be the person to do this. What happened there? I'm going to ask you my questions and you can answer, okay? Secondly, the TAC, who will be appointed? It says members of each agency. So it would be Eureka, the ones you listed, plus the county, right? And... Thirdly, what is the goal and purpose of this with our, with this group? Like what are the focus, what are they going to do? And lastly, what is the program manager, who would that be?

Can I ask a question around that? Yeah. Adopting ordinances, would this group adopt ordinances or they would recommend and it would come back to this board for the county?

Who appoints for the TAC? There's several appointees or positions, and it does reference to staff. So does the, like, say, the city of Eureka, they decide who's going to be on the TAC? Is that how that works? So then you, as a planning and building, would decide for the county?

Who would be the program manager and who would decide that?

Okay. And so would the TAC decide or no, would RCEA decide?

Well, I'm thrilled that we've gotten here and it has taken time to get the momentum of all the jurisdictions kind of together and I appreciate your role, Director Ford, in helping lead the way and making a commitment, budgeting for this and making it clear that we're ready and able to move forward. I think that leadership has been really important. I also really want to acknowledge the leadership of Beth Burks. She was the director at HCOG during the time when this was being considered for HCOG to do, and there was a little bit, Less movement on it when she when she left, but she did bring tha

Oh my, do I ever. I would like to move approval of staff recommendation.

All right, I'll second. Unless I see anyone here to the left of me. Supervisor Madrone?

Okay, great. I just want to say we can talk about this in terms of climate change and all the impacts that we're trying to both mitigate and also lessen but really there's two big focal points one is we've talked at this the county level talked about a resiliency officer position which I think this is probably what we've morphed it into and What we have to understand is that that really helps with availability and eligibility for all kinds of funding sources that we are not currently eligible for. So that's the energy put into it. And those projects, a majority of them will likely be resilienc

Excellent. Okay. I think we are getting close to the last item of our non-closed session items. Does everyone agree with me on that? Okay. We're going to go into a resolution from the County Board of Humboldt Supervisors opposing Proposition 45 on the November 3rd ballot, and urging Humboldt County voters to vote no. I need to bring it up on my computer if I'm to read it, but in essence, basically, this is a measure or a... a proposition that would decrease turnaround times, especially around public responses as well as studies in relation to CEQA processes statewide. There are multiple concer

All right, bringing it in the room. Any comments? And again, if you are here, please get in line and let's do it.

All right. Thank you. Anyone else? Seeing none, I'm gonna bring it back to the board. I'm looking for a motion and a second to approve this resolution. All right. Well, we can discuss it as well. Discuss the motion. Is there a motion? Do you want a discussion? No. Okay.

I'll move approval of the recommended or the provided letter.

Okay, and there's a motion, a second, now there's a couple of text edits, and so maybe I'll have our attorney lay those out so that we get them absolutely correct.

Right, so we're gonna change those two things in the motion.

Okay, is there any more discussion on this? Supervisor Bush, no. Approve the resolution. So either if you agree with the resolution, vote yes. If you disagree with it, vote no. That's what we're gonna do. Okay, great. Can we have a roll call vote, please?

Okay, and I think that ends what we have in-house today. Now we're gonna go into closed session, so let's read that in, and we'll take a little bit of a break after that so that people can get a little food or whatever they need, sustenance, and we'll get into closed session maybe in 15 minutes or something like that. I think that seems reasonable. Okay, so.

That's all online. Anyone in the room? Seeing none, we're going to go into closed session. I'm expecting folks in the conference room at 12.50. All right. 12.50.

All right, and we are back from closed session, and I will ask our county council for a report out.

All right, and with that, we are adjourned. And we are not meeting next week, so we'll see you in two weeks.