Long front-page PD article "Feud Over Grange Halls in March 29 PD

[Shepherd]

Note the quotes by Sebastopol Grange leaders Lawrence Jaffe and Nancy Cadigan at the end of the article. We made decisions that enabled us to stay out of this feud. This is a complicated ongoing feud that has been going on for years--inside and outside the courts.

BENNETT VALLEY » Historic chapter joins others changing names, igniting potential property fight with 150-year-old national group


Property fight over historic Bennett Valley Grange Hall

Feud over grange halls, By NICK RAHAIM 

THE PRESS DEMOCRAT, March 29

The meeting hall is known to some as the Fort Bragg Guild. To others, it’s known as the Fort Bragg Grange.
When members of the guild arrived Monday evening, they found the locks changed and doors bolted shut from inside. So they broke into the building, believing it to be the rightful property of the Fort Bragg Guild. But members of the grange say the property is theirs.



Deputies with the Mendocino County Sheriff’s Office responded but made no arrests, calling the issue a “civil dispute.” Ownership will likely be decided by the courts.



This dispute is not limited to the coastal city of Fort Bragg. In Sonoma County and across the state of California, the loyalties of former comrades are split between the 150-year-old National Grange of the Order of Patrons of Husbandry and the breakaway California Guild.



Those loyal to the National Grange argue for tradition and the authority of the Washington, D.C.-based organization that lobbies on behalf of agricultural interests and rural families. The secessionists of the guild contend the national 
order lost sight of local control and democratic decision-making.

“We’re incredibly sad to give up the name,” said Bill Finkelstein of Santa Rosa, who is treasurer and an executive committee member of the Bennett Valley Guild. Amid a nationwide dispute over grange properties, the guild voted to change its name from Bennett Valley Grange.

A new sign hangs on the Bennett Valley Guild Hall. A trademark infringement lawsuit, won by National Grange of the Order of Patrons of Husbandry, forced some North Coast chapters to change their names.

With multiple court cases ongoing in both state and federal courts, the California Guild headed by Bob McFarland of Sacramento has yet to score a victory in front of a judge. But local guild chapters are moving forward and sparking property fights along the way.

So far in Sonoma County, the chapters in Bennett Valley, Healdsburg, Hessel and Sonoma Valley have dropped “grange” from their names and added the name “guild” instead. Members of the Bodega Bay, Rincon Valley, Sebastopol and Windsor granges have chosen to stick with the national order.

Bennett Valley has the oldest continually operating grange hall in the United States, located on a rural stretch of land running southeast from Santa Rosa. Members quietly voted in December to rename their chapter Bennett Valley Guild. The change in name is not to differentiate themselves from the National Grange with whom the chapter cut ties, but because the U.S. District Court in Sacramento found the word “grange” is a trademark of the national order.

“We’re incredibly sad to give up the name,” said Bill Finkelstein of Santa Rosa, treasurer and executive committee member of the Bennett Valley Guild. “But we’re not going to give into tyranny. We’re not going to give up this building and let them sell it off to people who want to build a McMansion.”

Finkelstein, a retired tech executive, said the National Grange has been consolidating its ranks. Smaller granges throughout the state were closed and sold, including Fair Oaks Grange outside Sacramento, with members moved to “supergranges.”

This has happened despite granges across the country and in Sonoma County experiencing a renaissance over the past decade with the growth in local food, organic and farm-to-table movements. While the National Grange lobbies in Washington, D.C., local chapters have served as community centers in agricultural areas throughout the county.

The National Grange was established in 1867, during the Reconstruction following the Civil War. The original goal was to provide farmers in Northern and Southern states a network to cooperate in both business and agricultural know-how. The organization quickly spread throughout the country with the Bennett Valley Grange opening in 1873.

Membership peaked at the turn of the 20th century but faced a steady decline as family farms gave way to industrial agriculture. Over the past century, granges remained the realm of more conservative and traditional populations, but the influx of new blood has upset the old order, especially in the left-leaning state of California.

When members of California granges elected McFarland president of the California State Grange in 2009, he upset the order. Having only been a member of the grange for six years before his election, many felt he cut in line.

“They were closing and selling granges — it was a cash cow,” Bruce Broderick said Tuesday by phone while standing guard in the Fort Bragg building his guild had laid claim to the night before. “Bob expanded the membership by 40 percent in just a few years. He went in a reverse direction of where the good ol’ boy network wanted to go.”

In 2013, the national body revoked the charter of the California State Grange, prompting McFarland to carry on separately, bringing many local chapters with him.

Then the National Grange re-established the California State Grange in 2014, this time headed by appointed President Ed Komski. The national and reformed state bodies filed suit against the state grange headed by McFarland for trademark infringement and property rights, in state and federal courts respectively.

After losing the trademark infringement case in U.S. District Court in Sacramento, McFarland’s group was forced to stop using the word “grange” and changed the official name of the organization to the California Guild in early 2016. The suit also required local chapters siding with McFarland’s faction to change their names to guilds, including Bennett Valley.

When the Bennett Valley chapter changed its name, Komski revoked its charter in January and requested the bank account and the keys to the Bennett Valley hall be turned over.

Nancy Cadigan, a longtime member of the Sebastopol Grange, was then appointed president of Bennett Valley Grange by Komski. The two sides remain at odds, both claiming to be the rightful owners of the historic grange hall that hosts the Bennett Valley Community Association meeting and is the emergency shelter for the valley. Cadigan said she is hoping for an amicable resolution, but Komski doesn’t parse words.

“The Bennett Valley Grange has been reorganized using the charter,” Komski said. “Who the Bennett Valley Guild is, only they can explain. The grange owns the property, not the guild.”

The guild then sent a cease-anddesist order to Komski’s California State Grange, stating the grange hall is the property of the Bennett Valley Guild. So far, the issue of ownership in Bennett Valley has not been taken to the courts.

“We’re the same organization but with a new name,” Finkelstein said. “We don’t lose ownership rights just because we changed our name.”

The California Superior Court of Sacramento County ruled against the California Guild’s assertions of property rights in November 2015. The breakaway body occupies the Grange Hall in Sacramento, a building the national order wants back. The case is being appealed in Sacramento, but the final decision could affect the claims the Bennett Valley and Fort Bragg guild have on their property.

“Local members have built halls, paid for halls and paid property taxes themselves,” said McFarland. “It was never part of the deal that the building would become property of the National Grange and the California State Grange.”

But if the California Guild and its affiliated local chapters don’t win in the courts, their arguments will be moot.

For Lawrence Jaffe, who was the president of the Sebastopol Grange in 2015 when members voted to stay with the national order, the current squabbles are exactly why he didn’t want to join the breakaway group headed by McFarland.

“Boy, I am glad the Sebastopol Grange is not going through that,” Jaffe said about the standoff in Fort Bragg. “Things like that are what I was afraid of when I voted to stay. It takes away all of the energy and community spirit. It’s sad.”

A new sign adorns the Bennett Valley Guild Hall following its name change from Bennett Valley Grange.

“It was never part of the deal that the building would become property of the National Grange and the California State Grange.”

BOB McFARLAND, leader of the California Guild.