Wielding the power of the subpoena and carrying a mandate enshrined in the state Constitution to serve as overseers of local government, a group of volunteers comes together each year to constitute the Humboldt County Civil Grand Jury.
During their service, the 19 members spend months conducting interviews, making on-site visits and reviewing documents as a part of investigations that delve deep into the inner workings of public agencies, boards and facilities to identify issues and offer solutions in the form of findings and recommendations.
As the civil grand jury release on this year’s reports notes, the county residents are appointed by the Humboldt County Superior Court to act as “watchdogs” in a civilian oversight tradition that dates back to the Magna Carta.
The nine reports released in July cover a wide range of topics, including: conditions at the Sempervirens Psychiatric Health Facility, areas with potential “critical choke points” in case of a life-threatening disaster, life-saving “paw-tnerships” between the Humboldt Animal Shelter and rescue networks, and the success of an inmate voting program in the jail.
The longest (35 pages) details a list of inadequacies that employees in offices of the Public Defender and Conflict Counsel face while fulfilling an often underappreciated — and sometimes dangerous — but vital role in upholding the very foundation of the justice system.
Under state law, the civil grand jury release explains, the Humboldt County Board of Supervisors “must respond” to the reports within 90 days “in most cases,” stating “each report details required responses and response deadlines.”
Here’s a quick look at a cross-section of those reports and the accompanying recommendations.
Scales of Justice Out of Balance?
The report focusing on the Public Defender’s Office and its independent arm, the Conflict Counsel’s Office, found that despite significant obstacles, the attorneys and staff are dedicated to their charge of representing those who cannot afford to provide for their own defense.
Those hindrances, according to the report, include being underfunded, understaffed and under-resourced when compared to the district attorney’s office, which has a budget that exceeds funding to the Public Defender’s Office by $3.5 million, or 36 percent.
In addition, support staff are paid “at least 25 percent less” than their DA’s office counterparts while attorneys in all three offices are compensated at some of the lowest levels in the state, even against similarly sized counties, according to the report.
“The Public Defender and Conflict Counsel’s caseloads are dangerously high, far exceeding recommended caseload levels,” the report says, noting each attorney is performing the equivalent work of 2.5 attorneys based on recommendations from the Office of the State Public Defender in representing about 80 percent of the county’s defendants. “This puts justice, equity, fairness, adequacy of representation, freedom and even lives, at risk in addition to causing serious occupational stress to staff.”
While everyone from support staff to attorneys take pride in their work, the report notes interviews revealed “burnout and secondary traumatic stress is extreme,” especially when combined with the myriad inequities they face.
Those include, specifically in the case of the Public Defender’s Office, an “inadequately maintained, infested, sometimes leaking, dilapidated” workplace without security features, with the civil grand jury noting there “have been rare attacks on staff” and “the lack of physical barriers to provide protection from volatile and violent clients adds to staff stress.”
Other morale issues are also contributing to the staff’s “sense of having ‘no light at the end of the tunnel,'” according to the report, include “the lack of opportunity for advancement, the feeling that you are leaving your team in a bind when taking vacation or even a break, the lack of resources, and the slim chance of ever getting either more staff or better wages.”
“These defenders of justice are disadvantaged, deluged and devalued. They all work stressful jobs, in a demoralizing, decrepit environment, with too few staff, not enough money, little opportunity for advancement, and no hope of relief. Is there equity in our local judicial system? There is not,” the report concludes. “The one and only advantage the Public Defender’s Office has is its quality, highly skilled and dedicated staff. Pitted against a Goliath, these Davids are winning battles.”
Places for improvement recommended by the grand jury on the offices’ front include creating a training policy and materials for newly hired attorneys and investigators by the beginning of the year, and “to create and implement a plan to coordinate management of investigations” by Dec. 1.
The recommendations for the county are mainly focused on eliminating the disparities discussed in the report, including raising salaries for positions across the board, providing a new workspace for the Public Defender’s Office by next summer and a security upgrade in the interim, approving funds for 12 additional positions — including three full-time attorneys — and approving a policy to permit “emotional support dogs” in the offices until “the county makes proactive counseling to prevent burnout and other stress relief available.”
Sempervirens Psychiatric Health Facility: A Key Support System for Humboldt County
Similarly, the report on Sempervirens found building conditions and staffing issues in its look at the region’s only “locked-inpatient psychiatric hospital,” stating “critical structural deficiencies” in the 120-year-old building “now threaten both SV’s operational license and its continued existence.”
The civil grand jury notes the county’s Department of Health and Human Services “received a $45.3 million grant to build a new Psychiatric Health Facility,” which is expected to be completed by 2030.
On the staffing issue, the civil grand jury reports the “medical staff is often under severe strain,” due to the hospital being “understaffed, with several unfilled positions, including the key one of a Behavioral Health medical director” for more than a year.
While the “growing nationwide shortage of (and enormous demand for) psychiatrists” is part of the problem, the report states the grand jury “learned from several sources that the county often takes three to six months to complete the hiring process and, by that time, the interested professional applicants often have moved on and sought other positions.”
Humboldt’s overall low pay-scale and lack of housing were also cited as factors limiting recruitment.
“Sempervirens has some good points, including a strong focus on the well-being and recovery of its patients,” the conclusion states. “SV also has a serious need for new facilities and more local professional staff in order to provide quality patient care.”
The recommendations include making immediate repairs to a leaky roof that leaves “the crisis unit unusable anytime it rains,” streamlining the hiring process by the end of the year and filling any vacant positions as soon as possible.
Humboldt County Animal Shelter: Animal Shelter + Animal Rescues = Lifesaving Paw-tnership
Even amid the barks and meows, the grand jury finds the “real hum of activity” at the McKinleyville facility “centers around the volunteers” who play an integral role alongside the dedicated staff members in giving the animals housed there a new lease on life and a safe place to stay. See a slideshow of some of the adoptable animals at the shelter below.
“They provide walks, enrichment and training for the animals,” the report says. “Organization boards with the animals’ names are posted for volunteers to refer to with suggested activities and buddy walks. While this is a huge undertaking, it’s only the tip of the rescue efforts. A wide-ranging animal rescue network, that often reaches other counties and states, works to lessen the number of ‘deemed unadoptable’ animals.”
The report notes the shelter’s ability to maintain a “low rate of euthanasia even though an increasingly large number of homeless animals stretches shelter capacity to the limit … is due in no small part to the work of the incredible animal rescue network that supports the shelter.”
“The animal shelter has had 3,117 adoptions over the past five years. Add another 1,509 animals transferred to the animal rescue network and the total number of saved animals increases significantly,” the report states. “Collaboration between the animal shelter and the animal rescue network means more animals are saved; it means better community education, better care, and more resources for animals.”
In a running theme, however, the civil grand jury notes issues “with the roof and lighting have plagued the animal shelter for several years.”
“The delay in fixing the roof and outdoor lighting fixtures have created unsafe and unhealthy conditions for the staff, the volunteers and the animals,” the report states. “Repairing equipment and replacing the roof would let the shelter shine like the gem it is, representing the efforts of a community government collaboration.”
The report’s recommendations include continuing the collaboration with the rescue networks and for the board of supervisors to establish April 20 as Volunteer Appreciation Day for all county volunteers, as well as for roof repairs to be completed by Halloween and the lighting by New Year’s Eve. In addition, the civil grand jury recommends the shelter immediately establish weekend hours to open new avenues for adoptions.
Built to Burn? Emergency Access Challenges on Humboldt Hill
After the devastating Palisades Fire in January raced through neighborhoods with few options for evacuation on mainly narrow roads, causing traffic jams that saw residents leaving behind their vehicles in an effort to escape, members of the civil grand jury turned their eyes to where that could happen in Humboldt.
The report notes the county’s Community Wildfire Protection Plan from 2019 outlined several neighborhoods with only one potential evacuation route in the case of a disaster that “could become critical choke points” during an emergency.
The list includes: Humboldt Hill, Upper Jacoby Creek, Liscomb Hill, the end of Ridgewood Drive, neighborhoods along Mitchell, Mitchell Heights, Spears and Pigeon Point roads, and nearby side streets, as well as “dead-end roads to wildland-urban Interface neighborhoods in the greater Eureka area, and the greater Arcata area.”
The report notes the Wildfire Protection Plan outlines two main guidelines for residents living in those kinds of areas: Sign up for the county emergency notification system, known as Humboldt Alert, to make sure they are receiving warnings and “form a local neighborhood fire safety group operating under the auspices of the Humboldt County Fire Safe Council.”
The latter, the report notes, can help educate residents about wildfire risks and preparation.
Another possibility, the report states, is to create an additional evacuation route by repurposing “existing utility easements as emergency access roads,” pointing to a similar effort done in the Santa Cruz Mountains.
“The Humboldt Bay Community Services District owns multiple easements on Humboldt Hill, and with some additional grading work some of these could potentially be linked up to form an emergency egress route,” the report states.
Also noted are requirements that any new developments in the Humboldt Hill area “must include a secondary access road,” with that responsibility falling to the developer if one doesn’t already exist. As it happens, the grand jury says it has “identified a small, proposed development at the top of Humboldt Hill that may provide a solution.”
But that will depend on things moving forward, with the report noting the project has been in the planning stages for a little more than six years.
Regardless, the danger that communities in one-road situations face should a wildfire necessitate evacuations is “serious.”
“Citizens need to understand the danger and work together to find solutions,” the conclusion states. “The grand jury urges the county to facilitate establishing secondary access. This can be achieved either by using existing utility easements as potential emergency egress roads and/or encouraging the completion of the proposed development at the top of Humboldt Hill. Whether a secondary egress road is built or not, the grand jury urges residents to form local firewise communities and to enroll in emergency alert systems to improve community preparedness.”
Other recommendations include that the board of directors of the Humboldt No. 1 Fire Protection “direct” the Humboldt Bay Fire’s chief to continue working with Humboldt Hill residents to form a Fire Safe Council and become a firewise community.
In addition, the grand jury states the board of supervisors should immediately start negotiations with private landowners and public utilities to establish easements and emergency access rights in the Humboldt Hill area for evacuation routes, and “direct the Planning and Building Department director and relevant staff to expedite the completion of the latest subdivision plan in order to grant emergency access to Humboldt Hill residents.”
Locked Up but Not Locked Out: Inmate Voting Rights in Humboldt County
While the civil grand jury is often focused on finding solutions for problems within local systems, one of this year’s reports highlights the success of an inmate voting program in Humboldt County’s jail.
The report notes the work done by the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office with the county Elections Office to ensure inmates’ rights to cast a ballot were upheld, noting correctional officers “actively encouraged inmates to participate in the November election,” and the sheriff’s office reported “inmates were excited about being able to vote.”
“The grand jury learned that in past elections, only one or two inmates voted,” the report states. “During the November 2024 election cycle, 72 inmates participated in the voting process. This number is remarkable. It resulted from improvements employed by county correctional deputies and the Office of Elections.”
As far as recommendations, the grand jury had only one: that the elections manual already being prepared by the jail be “approved and adopted” by New Year’s Eve, noting the document is important “to preserve and record effective inmate voting procedures for future guidance.”
“The Humboldt County Civil Grand Jury commends the county for taking a proactive approach consistent with recent legislative action by the state concerning inmate voting rights,” the conclusion states. “Humboldt County could serve as a model for other counties in the state.”
In addition to the reports highlighted above, the grand jury also looked at navigating a course forward for the county’s Department of Aviation, which saw the abrupt departure of a second director in as many years after that report’s publication, conducted a follow up on 2017 recommendations for addressing the county’s unfunded accrued pension liabilities, looked at operations of the coroner’s office and evaluated the Eel River State prison camp. All of the nine reports can be found on the Humboldt County Civil Grand Jury website (humboldtgov.org/510/Civil-Grand-Jury).
Kimberly Wear is the Journal’s assistant editor. Reach her at kim@northcoastjournal.com.
This article appears in The Grand Jury Reports.
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