While my community outreach efforts were successful in many ways, I encountered the occasional thorn. One of my very early community involvement endeavors was to join the Shasta Lake Chamber of Commerce. My intention was twofold: first, I was genuinely interested in the City of Shasta Lake and being a positive force within its community; second, I wanted to pursue any angle I could to legitimize my business, and I saw this as one of them.
The chamber seemed happy to have 530 Collective as a member and grateful for another business owner who wanted to get involved. I eventually found myself on the board of directors.
Initially, I was excited to be involved and had high hopes of accomplishing some positive work within the organization and of bringing new, engaging events to the city. I had expected to find the other members—those of both the organization and the board—similarly energized and motivated. What I found instead was an organization that seemed to be struggling on several fronts. At first, I thought these challenges and the subsequent discussions around them would be motivators for change. Yet the challenges seemed to dull the organization’s overall appetite for change, and meeting after meeting yielded more of the same stagnation.
After months of frustration with the apathy, and in a moment of unbecoming self-righteousness over a unilateral and what I felt to be an inappropriate decision made by one of the other board members, I resigned. The situation that led to this moment is insignificant, but what is not is how I handled my departure. My letter of resignation was very pointed with regard to my thoughts and feelings regarding this one member and the situation.
What I would learn in the coming years, in the face of subsequent slights and snubs from certain members of the chamber, was that being so direct and open with my opinions in such a small town—particularly when the individual on the receiving end of my pointed comments was a retiree and a well-liked, active member of the community—was very unwise.
I suddenly found 530 Collective passed over on the invite list for and communication around community events, even events to which we had always been invited and in which we had participated in the past. My loyal assistant, Stephanie Pierce, the record holder of Longest Tenured Employee, was fiercely protective of the company, ever vigilant, and ever sensitive to these slights. When she noticed we had been left off the email or guest list, she diligently inquired with the appropriate contact as to why. Stephanie was always given a predictable excuse: they had meant to include us, but they must have sent the information/invitation to the wrong email address, or something similar. Stephanie, bless her and her heart of gold, was always the picture of professionalism and grace, accepting the apology no matter how many times she heard it before, and successfully secured our invite to the event.
I was, and always have been, very fond of the City of Shasta Lake community and even quite fond of all the members of the Chamber of Commerce. The barbs of rejection stung, but I knew it was my own doing. Pointed comments may sometimes have their place, but more often than not, their barbs come back to bite you.
I had learned a very valuable lesson: there is much power in the words left unspoken.
I gained nothing by my negative comments in that resignation letter.
In the first couple of months of 530’s existence, I had gotten off on the wrong foot with a local leader by the name of Gracious Palmer, who served as both a city council member and mayor for the City of Shasta Lake.
We were both at a Shasta County Board of Supervisors meeting where one of the agenda items was a dispensary ban in the unincorporated areas of the county. She and I had both queued up to speak in the public comment period. I knew who she was, but we had never officially met.
Gracious spoke before me and, while at the podium, made a comment that both cannabis dispensaries in her town were run by men. When it was my turn to speak, I introduced myself and responded that clearly, I was not a man. Despite her error, she, rightfully, did not like being called out so publicly for her mistake, and her attitude made that quite clear when I tried to approach her after the meeting.
Our conversation did not go well, and I thought I had made an enemy for life.
Gracious was very active in the community; she had lost her reelection campaign in 2009, but she still went to all of the city council meetings as well as all the planning commission meetings. Our paths crossed often at these meetings, but she completely ignored me, and I made no further attempts at conversation.
She also attended nearly every community event I went to. I began to notice how much of her time she gave to the city, its people, and its organizations; she genuinely cared about the community.
We were very different people. We came from different generations; we had very different backgrounds; and we had different goals. Yet for all those differences, we were both driven by our desire to be a positive force in the community. Over time, I came to view her with the utmost respect.
In 2013, one of the city’s seven planning commissioners suddenly resigned her seat. I didn’t give the vacancy much thought, beyond the fact that there would be a new face at future meetings.
Nothing, therefore, could have surprised me more than the day my phone rang and it was Gracious Palmer on the other end, calling to encourage me to throw my hat in the ring for the planning commissioner appointment.
I was stunned.
After recovering from the shock of Gracious’s phone call and giving the idea much consideration, I decided to pursue the appointment. I prepared my résumé and my letter of interest for the city council. I presented both documents in person at a meeting, and Gracious even got up and spoke on my behalf. The city council voted unanimously to appoint me to fill the vacancy through the end of its term, which was about seven months away. When that term was up, I sought, and received, appointment for a four-year term on the Shasta Lake Planning Commission. Gracious and I never spoke about our past differences. It was unnecessary, our mutual respect being self-evident.
Serving on the planning commission was an unforgettable experience. I learned volumes not only about the city itself but also about the public process—knowledge and experience that would serve me well in later years during my advocacy work on state legislation as well as throughout the statewide regulatory processes.
There are many ways to serve within a community: volunteerism, financial contributions, and organization membership. Having engaged in all of them throughout my cannabis journey, I can say with authority that the most rewarding community service I’ve ever done was serving as a city planning commissioner for Shasta Lake.
It is very easy, especially with today’s hypersensitive, hyperpartisan political climate, to point the finger at the government, touting all of its shortcomings from our soapbox. But government work is hard, often thankless, work at all levels, from those who choose to go into electoral politics, to law-enforcement officials like Captain Bartell, to the individuals who volunteer time to any number of boards or committees.
I would encourage anyone who has a genuine interest in bettering their city or county to find a way to get involved in civil service.
You won’t regret it.