Summary: Supervisors Keep Pot Tax Money Promised To Taxpayer-Approved Purposes for Themselves.
“Measure AJ. Advisory Vote Only.” [2016] “If Mendocino County adopts business license taxes on cannabis businesses by the adoption of the measure adopting Chapter 6.32, Measure AI [the County’s version of a pot permit program which has since turned out to be pathetically unworkable], should the County use the majority of that revenue for funding enforcement of marijuana regulations, enhanced mental health services, repair of county roads, and increased fire and emergency medical services?”
The County’s “Impartial Analysis” which accompanied the Measure in 2016: “If the voters approve Measure AJ, it would serve to advise the Board of Supervisors that the voters want a majority of the revenue generated by the Cannabis Business Tax, Measure AI, for enforcement of marijuana regulations, enhanced mental health services, repair of county roads, and increased fire and emergency services.”
In other words, to get the public to approve the County’s Cannabis Business Tax program (as opposed to an alternative measure put forward by local cannabis farmers), the County sweetened the deal by promising to spend “the majority” of the cannabis tax proceeds on “enforcement of marijuana regulations, enhanced mental health services, repair of county roads, and increased fire and emergency medical services?”
Note the particular use of the words “enhanced” and “increased” which have never been mentioned in future discussions of Measure AJ.
For the first four years of the unworkable program which saw about two thousand growers attempting to get legal of whom less than a dozen actually obtained county and state licenses, well-meaning growers had paid about $16 million in cannabis taxes, yet nothing — absolutely nothing — was done to account for the revenues and expenditures as promised in Measure AJ.
In December of 2020, Supervisor John Haschak finally raised the question of how to distribute the County’s cannabis tax revenues in accordance with Measure AJ. They even set up a short-lived ad hoc committee to “examine cannabis tax revenue available for the purposes specified in Measure AJ,”
When the subject arose that day in December of 2020, Supervisor John McCowen said, “Maybe Supervisor Gjerde and myself should be able to ask questions of staff regarding the cost of certain budget items that legitimately could be recommended for coverage through the cannabis tax. The goal is to get down to a net amount that would then be divided according to the advisory measure of the voters.”
Supervisor Gjerde replied, “We can send an e-mail out by the end of the year and if the responses come in next year that's okay.”
In other words, four years and millions of dollars of misspent pot tax revenues and they were only then getting around to maybe asking questions of staff — next year.
Gjerde continued: “I think [sic, it shouldn’t matter what anyone “thinks,” the measure is quite clear] that one category alone probably we are spending the majority of the revenue on law enforcement. Mental health, county roads, and fire emergency services… If you look at our general fund allocations to fire and emergency services which are outside of Proposition 172 and which are outside the Campground Transient Occupancy Tax, between fire and emergency and enforcement we are probably spending all of our cannabis tax in the coming year could be shown as going to those services.”
Gjerde basically said that since the County spent some general fund money on the services mentioned in the Advisory Measure, then that was good enough and no special effort need be made to determine how to allocate the cannabis tax revenues.
Haschak and Williams quickly glommed onto Gjerde’s self-serving idea and it was accepted by his colleagues. Not one nickel of what had at that time become well over $20 million in cannabis tax revenues had ever been earmarked for the purposes the voters overwhelmingly advised them to allocate it to.
Everyone also carefully avoided the words “enhanced,” or “increased” in the language of the measure.
Fast Forward to now: On Tuesday, April 8, 2025, the subject of how to allocate the Measure AJ proceeds arose again during the budget presentation. No mention was made of the 2020 Dodge. As requested by the Supervisors at the prior meeting, staff even prepared this “guilty as charged” chart:
In 2023 the CEO’s staff presented this summary of Cannabis tax revenues:
Since 2023 another couple of million has come in, bringing the total cannabis tax revenue to well over $24 million. Yet no attempt whatsoever has been made to honor Measure AJ. As last Tuesday’s presentation admits, all those millions were just plopped into the General Fund and mindlessly absorbed with the “willful ignorance” of the Board based on Gjerde’s bogus 2020 interpretation.
On Tuesday, all five Supervisors played dumb. They pretended that the subject had never been discussed previously. They ignored their decision back in 2020 to make no attempt to properly allocate the funds. They ignored the fact that the measure specifically used the words “enhanced” and “increased.” And they pretended that all that was left to discuss was how to allocate the cannabis tax revenues in the future. Never mind the $24 million that had already been wasted on themselves.
Supervisor Madeline Cline asked what it would take to “track” the revenues, even though the staff has already been doing that. She also wanted to know what it would take to track the allocations according to the text of the measure, again failing to mention the words “enhanced” and “increased.”
Supervisor Mulheren, who had agreed with the Gjerde Dodge in 2020, added, “It’s a disservice to taxpayers to not follow the measure.”
Supervisor Bernie Norvell agreed with Mulheren and asked what were they going to do to “remedy this.” “It’s a trust thing,” said Norvell. “If we ever go back to the public to ask for taxes, we have to show that we are doing what we are supposed to be doing.”
Two-faced Williams, who had gleefully agreed with the Gjerde Dodge in 2020, was even so bold as to say, “The public expected we would pay for emergency services. The County hasn’t done any of that. Staff is trying to clean up a mess. We clearly didn’t do that. Let’s surface it and do what’s right. I don’t want to use an Enron style pass through the General Fund. Let’s fix it going forward.”
“Going forward”? Why only now, when the cannabis tax revenues have slowed to a trickle? How about for the entire program as required by the Measure?
A normal voter would interpret the language of Measure AJ as not more than half of the total proceeds going into the General Fund, and not less than half of it going to “enforcement of marijuana regulations, enhanced mental health services, repair of county roads, and increased fire and emergency medical services?”
In other words, the County can keep the $12 million accrued so far, but the other $12 million-plus must be allocated as directed in the Measure. Otherwise, as Supervisor Norvell noted, “If we ever go back to the public to ask for taxes, we have to show that we are doing what we are supposed to be doing.”
After Supervisor Mulheren casually noted that following Measure AJ “might be a way to fund struggling fire departments,” Supervisor Williams moved to direct staff to “Present as much accounting as we have today, with detailed reports, and a plan to allocate the funds in accordance with Measure AJ going forward, a plan to implement Measure AJ allocating the funds to the four voter designated categories.”
Nobody mentioned the millions already wasted. Nobody asked for a date when the staff will respond with another ignorable “presentation.” And nobody seemed bothered in the slightest that the Measure has been ignored for more than nine years now, and is only being considered for “remedy” “going forward.”
As we noted back in 2020 when the discussion first belatedly arose, those “struggling fire departments,” that Supervisor Mulheren mentioned were already owed more than $2 million to fund “INCREASED fire and emergency services.”
Will any allocations ever be made to the specified purposes?
Given the convenient amnesia of the Board and the CEO’s staff, and the County’s alleged multi-million deficit, the odds are very, very low.
The Board of Supervisors has betrayed Mendo voters yet again.
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