Humboldt County D.A. Sues Logging Firm, Alleging Fraudulent Practices

In a lawsuit filed Monday, Humboldt County’s new district attorney accuses Pacific Lumber Co., a logging firm and long-standing economic force on the North Coast, of fraudulent business practices in its handling of environmental documents.

The lawsuit contends that the company concealed information about the dangers of logging activities that ultimately caused environmental damage in five watersheds, resulting in “major landslides and destruction to the streams, bridges, roads, homes and property rights of the people of Humboldt County” and contributed to the loss of a dozen ancient redwoods in a nearby state park.

The Superior Court suit, which alleges that Pacific Lumber withheld the information to win state approval for a timber-cutting proposal, seeks a court order to stop the logging, as well as $250 million in fines.

In a prepared statement, Pacific Lumber CEO Robert E. Manne said Dist. Atty. Paul Gallegos was resurrecting old, discredited claims and relying on inaccurate information.

“Yesterday’s action taken by the Humboldt County district attorney, after barely two months on the job, is both disappointing and distressing,” he said. “There is no factual or legal basis for these allegations. There is no substance to the complaints. This is nothing more than another step to put the company out of business.”

The firm has been cited for myriad violations of state environmental regulations over the years, but company critics said the lawsuit breaks new ground for the county.

Environmentalists praised the lawsuit.

“It feels like a bright, new, sunny day in Humboldt County,” said Cynthia Elkins of the Environmental Protection Information Center, a Garberville group that has battled Pacific Lumber over its logging of old-growth redwoods.

“We’ve never had a D.A. willing to stand up and take action. It’s very exciting,” Elkins added.

Gallegos, a defense attorney with no prior political experience who moved to Humboldt County eight years ago from Southern California, ousted a 20-year incumbent last year in an election that also saw voters dump the incumbent county sheriff.

Gallegos attributed his victory in part to the support of the local Green Party.

After he was elected, locals say, he wrote letters to area groups, asking them what problems they thought deserved his attention. Among the issues raised was Pacific’s environmental documentation.

Gallegos said he was not going after Pacific Lumber. “We’re targeting bad conduct this company happened to engage in.... What we’d like to do is send a message to business that they have to [conduct themselves] legally and ethically and internalize the cost of doing business as opposed to externalize it, where it’s borne by the citizens.”

The allegations involve actions Pacific Lumber took after striking a high-profile deal to sell to the state some of its ancient redwood stands in the Headwaters Grove.

As part of the agreement, the company also outlined conservation and logging plans for its remaining 211,000 acres of timber holdings.

The lawsuit alleges the firm disputed a scientific analysis that some of Pacific’s timber harvesting plans would lead to landslides and sediment pollution of streams and rivers when the company, in fact, had information supporting the analysis.

Though the firm eventually gave the supporting data to the state, the suit contends that Pacific Lumber deliberately delivered it to a state forestry officer in Fortuna rather than Sacramento headquarters, which never received it.

The firm then successfully lobbied the state for approval to log hillsides susceptible to landslides.

Manne contended that Pacific Lumber “continues to be singled out and targeted as part of an organized effort to prevent us from operating profitably, and preserving the jobs of our employees.

“Nevertheless,” he added, “we are determined to prevail, and will take this opportunity to demonstrate once again that not only have we not done anything wrong, our scientists and employees have created a model of how a timber company can operate profitably and responsibly.”