Paul Hobbs & Ken Wilson: Wine Country’s Clearcutting Crooks

[Zeno Swijtink]

Paul Hobbs & Ken Wilson: Wine Country’s Clearcutting Crooks
by Will Parrish on Jun 2nd, 2011


Paul Hobbs, internationally renowned winemaker with headquarters in Sebastopol, is described in his web site biography as a “trailblazer” and “prospector.” Those are fitting designations, if not always in the ways his publicist intends. Formerly the winemaker at two of the most prestigious wineries in the country, Opus One and Simi, Hobbs currently “crafts” — to use the term of trade — numerous acclaimed vintages under his own self-titled label, also working as a consultant on 30-35 other wines at a given time, in as many as six countries spanning three continents. By advertising Hobbs’ association with their brand, those who hire him automatically see a boost in sales.

Kenneth C. Wilson, real estate capitalist and winemaker with headquarters in Healdsburg, is not the first person wine industry observers would typically associate with Hobbs. Whereas Hobbs is widely regarded for his winemaking artistry, as a veritable winemaker’s winemaker, Wilson is better known as an opportunistic investor. The latter has built his own “mini wine empire” — to quote Wines and Vines magazine —- across northern Sonoma and southern Mendocino counties in recent years, largely on the strength, it seems, of superior access to wealth.

Yet, the two men’s activities are closely linked, if only by a single factor: their zeal for deforestation. The practice of clear-cutting is common to vineyard development across the Central Coast, North Bay, and North Coast regions of California. The land clearances Hobbs and Wilson have conducted stand out, however, largely owing to an impressive feat: Each man ran afoul of the law, in spite of the preferential treatment the state and county regulatory apparatus has for so long bestowed on the wine industry.

During the end of April through the beginning of May, Hobbs oversaw a 10-acre clear-cut on a 160-acre parcel he owns in Pocket Canyon, just east of Guerneville, known as Hillick Ranch. The deforestation took place even though Hobbs had not established an erosion control plan nor set forth what portion of the property he would place in a conservation easement, as he was required to do under an agreement with the California Department of Forestry. He also had not bothered to obtain a grading permit or use permit from the County of Sonoma.

It appears that Hobbs had grown tired of waiting for the permitting process to play out, so therefore took a gamble that he would not face any punitive measures if he took matters into his own hands, speeding things along toward installing yet another parcel of grapes to source for his wines.

The clear-cut is in close proximity to Pocket Canyon Creek, where erosion would — and perhaps already did — further damage this fragile waterway, thereby only adding to the cumulative destruction activities of this sort have wrought on the Russian River basin, where the sight of a living fish grows increasingly rare. Owing to complaints by residents, a forester for the Sonoma-Napa-Lake unit of CalFire named Kimberly Sone came to the site and issued a stop-work order based on Hobbs’ failure to attain the adequate permits.

“CAL FIRE was not notified regarding the start up of timber operations as required by the Forest Practice Act,” Sone stated via e-mail. “After conducting a field inspection and reviewing the plan, I requested the Licensed Timber Operator and Registered Professional Forester to stop operations.”

She also stated, reassuringly, that “logs are on the ground and logging debris is still on-site, thereby reducing significant amounts of erosion.” That would seem to be a tacit acknowledgment, however, that some significant degree of erosion has either occurred or is in danger of occurring.

The Hillick Ranch clear-cut has even escalated into a rare instance of county officials being at odds with a vineyard developer. John Roberts, a member of the Sonoma County Water Coalition and the Atascadero-Green Valley Creek Watershed Council, is one of various West County residents who has been active in trying to put a halt to Hobbs’ clear-cutting. Roberts met with Sonoma County Fifth District Supervisor Efren Carrillo on May 18th to provide him documentation on the environmental destruction Hobbs and other vineyard developers have wrought, as well as try to compel him to take action to rein in the star winemaker.

“Efren was aware of the situation and was able to say that based on the visit by officials, enforceable actions took place on the property,” Roberts says. “Since it is under investigation, he could say no more, except that he and many others are very unhappy with Hobbs.”

Hobbs’ action is especially significant because it is the first serious test of Sonoma County’s Timber Conversion Ordinance, which ostensibly governs felling of designated timber land to make way for winegrapes and other “agriculture.” The Board of Supervisors passed the ordinance in 2006. It requires that all timber-to-agriculture conversion projects set aside at least 75 percent of a given parcel in a conservation easement. That’s as opposed to an outright ban on such conversions, as regional environmentalists originally sought. The conservation easement provision is widely seen as having been shaped by Premier Pacific Vineyards, the massive vineyard development corporation run by the infamous William Hill and Richard Wollack, who are attempting to clear approximately 1,700 acres of forested land in the Gualala River basin, on a 20,000-acre parcel, to install miles of grapes.

Ironically, Hobbs has been in the spotlight across recent weeks not because of his precedent-setting Hillick Ranch clear-cut, but because of his court-sanctioned fleecing of Sebastopol neighbor John Jenkel. The saga has attracted a pair of stories in the Santa Rosa Press Democrat, though the North Coast’s paper of record has failed to mention several significant details of the story, while framing others far too leniently toward Hobbs. Jenkel’s side of the story, though entirely absent from the pages of the PD, is worth considering in detail, particularly since it sheds considerable light on the sort of mindset that drives people like Hobbs, whose sense of entitlement seems to be so overwrought that it even surpasses his renown as a winemaker.

A grove of roughly 60 douglas firs stood adjacent to the property line shared by Hobbs and Jenkel just outside of Sebastopol. A few years ago, Hobbs drilled a well roughly 200_ from Jenkel’s existing well, presumably to nourish the thirsty grapes he had planted on the site. Jenkel had a sand filter installed by a pump co. that was supposed to purge itself on a periodic basis. Soon after Hobbs drilled his well, Jenkel’s well started drawing sand for the first time in its many years of service.

The filter malfunctioned, however, and water ran continuously for a few months, with the deluge seriously damaging the root systems of two trees on the Hobbs parcel and affecting six others. A tree blew down and clipped a corner of one of Hobbs’ buildings. Hobbs then took what was apparently, in his mind, the logical next step: he removed the entire grove of trees, claiming all of them were compromised . That’s in spite of the fact that Jenkel had already identified and corrected the malfunction in his pump.

Next, Hobbs sued Jenkel for the cost he incurred in removing the trees. Not only did the judge side with Hobbs, but the winemaker received a judgment of $360,000 — more than twice what he originally sought. Jenkel, who sought to defend himself in the case, is notoriously clumsy in court, making him easy picking for Hobbs. The winemaker has since poured a foundation 50 feet in length for future buildings exactly where the doug fir grove previously stood.


cont. at https://theava.com/archives/11113

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