Sabatier runs for second term to represent District 2 on Board of Supervisors

LAKE COUNTY NEWS REPORTS

Posted On Monday, 21 March 2022 01:14

21 March 2022

LAKE COUNTY, Calif. — Bruno Sabatier is running for a second term as District 2 supervisor for the county of Lake.

The Lake County Registrar of Voters confirmed that Sabatier will run for his second term unopposed.

The election will be held on June 7, as part of the statewide primary.

Between 2015 and 2018, Sabatier served as a Clearlake City Council member, helping Clearlake progress on many of its issues.

During his first term, beginning in 2019, he said he has continued those efforts as a member of the Board of Supervisors by utilizing the strategies and successes that he has learned along the way.

He has not only represented District 2, but he said he continues to collaborate in order to provide and support initiatives in other districts as well.

The past four years have not come without its obstacles to overcome. Cannabis, COVID, drought, and a decrease in consequences toward petty crimes have been some of the major obstacles to deal with, he said.

Sabatier said he works to tackle problems head on and provides information to better understand the problem while also providing solutions on how to resolve or break through these obstacles.

For cannabis, Sabatier said he not only provided greater support for expanding the industry’s footprint within the county, but he also drafted resolutions enhancing the environmental review and neighbor notification process before obtaining an early activation.

In 2020, after reviewing the applications being processed and noticing their infringement on traditional and historical ag areas, he drafted the Farmland Protection Zone banning outdoor cannabis from the areas and clarifying future traditional farmland protections.

Following the rules set up for the industry is important to him as well, as he said he has worked with staff to shut down a couple of legal operations in his own district that were not in compliance after receiving complaints from the community.

Due to the drought and the increased number of water trucks, especially related to cannabis farms both legal and illegal, Sabatier drafted a resolution making water haulers accountable for delivering water illegally to any cannabis grows.

He also drafted a resolution requiring that all projects going before the Planning Commission provide a hydrology report considering the cumulative impacts to neighboring properties and that all applicants provide a proposed drought management plan for their projects.

During the onset of COVID-19, many Lake County businesses were forced to close. Sabatier drafted many letters for the board’s approval to send to the Governor’s Office requesting that businesses be released from the closures set in place.

When state contracts, assisting the county with COVID mitigation, were not forthcoming or were being breached, Sabatier said he reached out to the state and advocated for the resources that Lake County needed, eventually receiving what Lake County was promised during the pandemic.

With state criminal law reducing the convictions and consequences for petty crime, Sabatier said it has become apparent to him that code enforcement could provide assistance in cleaning up our communities where law enforcement’s capabilities had been reduced.

He has advocated for increased code enforcement staffing throughout his first term and proposed the Road Map Task Force in February 2021.

The task force was approved by the board and provided a $1 million budget to clean up the Clearlake Oaks area in District 3. Ensuring a safe and clean environment in our communities is paramount to Sabatier’s agenda for a better tomorrow.

Sabatier said he works with other supervisors to enable success. The Road Map Task Force is one example of wanting to see the county succeed in other areas, not just District 2.

With two dedicated law enforcement and two dedicated code enforcement officers, the quality of life in Clearlake Oaks has the potential to increase with efforts being made to entice investors to come and invest in vacant commercial lots and develop more opportunities for jobs and economic growth.

In District 4, he proposed to meet with Supervisor Tina Scott and other department heads to discuss the former juvenile hall facility being transitioned into an emergency homeless shelter. He said the new Elijah House has been critical to the county’s pandemic response with many who were homeless now having transitioned out of the shelter and into their own homes.

While providing support in other districts, Sabatier said his true passion still lies with the city of Clearlake, and he continues to enjoy strong relationships with the current council and city staff.

He is working with county groups such as the Rural Arts Initiative to bring in new murals and art sculptures in the city, and the Bureau of Land Management and Cal Fire to help protect the city from future fires.

Sabatier said he is always looking for ways to compliment the work being done by the city with his own initiatives. Currently, after receiving approval from the board, he is working on a new upgraded concrete skatepark for Austin Park.

So what’s next in the next four years? What are the key items that Sabatier wants to focus on?

When prompted with these questions, Sabatier responds with, "We need to build economic sustainability with the new revenues that we’ve created mixed with a safer and cleaner environment to bring in new investors."

He wants to continue focusing on the success of the Road Map Task Force in hopes that in two years it will be carbon copied into another area of Lake County.

He plans to focus on food sustainability within the county as most of the agricultural crops are not grown for food purposes.

He wants to focus on the illegal cannabis market and make them accountable for their unfair business practice, evasion of taxes, and their environmental crimes.

If you’ve been following the Board of Supervisors meetings, you will know that Sabatier reads everything that is provided to him. Oftentimes, he will pull consent agenda items just to fix a dollar amount that didn’t match or to ask follow-up questions.

"I have worked hard these past three years to learn as much as I could as quickly as I could by being present and active. When reelected, you can expect the same level of work ethic that I have shown since day one," he said.

Sabatier has many more ideas and plans for the upcoming years. If you’d like to hear more about them, you can reach him at 707-695-0834 or via email at [email protected] ( attr(href) ).