The Humboldt County Board of Supervisors is set Tuesday to consider the public censure of Supervisor Rex Bohn after an independent investigation sustained allegations that he engaged in “abusive and hostile behavior” toward staff during a virtual meeting in June.
The largely symbolic gesture, basically amounting to the board making a public statement of disapproval about the longtime First District representative’s conduct, requires a two-thirds vote of the supervisors present to pass.
It was Bohn who first made public the allegations against him while commenting during a Nov. 4 discussion before the board censured Supervisor Michelle Bushnell for similar behavior.
“This is not a process. This is a very slow death by a thousand cuts,” he said before adding, “I’m going through this myself right now, before someone leaks it out.”
As previously reported after the complaint and emails were released to the Journal a month later in response to a public records request, Bohn was notified in July that the process had been initiated and given notice in late September that an investigation was underway.
The complaint outlines that Bohn called the June 24 meeting with staff to lobby for a friend — the owner of a Northern California gas station chain — to receive an exemption to a non-transfer clause included in the Tobacco Retail Licensing Ordinance unanimously passed by supervisors in 2023.
At issue, the complaint states, was that three of more than two dozen locations the individual was looking to sell would lose tobacco licenses once the deal closed under the provision, which only applies to unincorporated areas of the county.
“Supervisor Bohn was upset with this result, even though he voted for the new ordinance,” the complaint states. “He aggressively pushed on staff to offer some sort of waiver for his friend and when they explained they did not have the authority to do that, he continued his attack on staff.
“Supervisor Bohn continued his rants and I spoke up and asked him to calm down and how inappropriate it was to be pushing so hard for this waiver,” the complaint continues. “He said, ‘I know I am an asshole, I am just an asshole.’ This is not the only incidence of this behavior on Bohn’s part. The tension in the meeting was still very high and at no time did Bohn apologize or offer an acknowledgement of the position he was putting staff in.”
According to the executive summary of the ensuing investigation conducted by the outside law firm Kramer Workplace Investigations, the four witnesses interviewed were “undisputed” that Bohn “acted in a disrespectful and aggressive manner toward county employees, which included the use of profanity.”
Dated March 5, the one-page, 300-word document also states that all four were “undisputed” in the perception “that Bohn scheduled the meeting to influence the staff members to quickly take action to create a waiver or an amendment to the Tobacco Retail License Ordinance to ensure that Bohn’s friend was able to transfer all of his tobacco retail licenses when his friend sold his gas stations.”
“The allegation that Bohn used an intense tone, an elevated voice, and exhibited body language that indicated he was frustrated, angry, and/or irritated with county employees for failing to take action regarding a waiver or amendment to the Tobacco Retail License during the meeting on June 24, 2025 is sustained,” the executive summary states.
It also includes the footnote: “Bohn declined to participate in the investigation.”
The county declined public records act requests by the Journal to release the entire report as well as the one into Bushnell’s conduct, which resulted in her censure, with Bohn casting one of the four needed votes, and her removal as board chair late last year.
By contrast, when the city of Arcata hired the same firm to conduct an inquiry in 2022 into allegations former Councilmember Brett Watson sexually harassed an employee, the city publicly released the full 28-page report, in addition to nearly 600 pages of support documents with names redacted, before a special meeting on the findings.
The censure item on Tuesday’s agenda is part of the process outlined in the Humboldt County Board of Supervisors Code of Conduct, which was amended in 2022 in a unanimous vote, including Bohn and Bushnell.
Under the revamped procedures, complaints filed against a supervisor go before a three-person committee consisting of the county administrative officer, county counsel and the human resources director, who then decide by a two-thirds consensus whether a formal investigation should be launched.
If an outside investigation substantiates a violation of the code of conduct, as was the case here, that’s reported to the board in open session with the option of a public censure.
According to the staff report on the agenda item, the investigation into Bohn’s conduct has cost $15,991 to date and was paid out of the board’s liability fund, but it is “expected that there will be additional invoices related to this matter.”
“This investigation will also cause the liability charges for the board of supervisors budget to increase, by how much is unknown at this time,” the county staff report states.