Insiders knew Foppoli’s winery for its hot tub parties

In the days since a Chronicle investigation was published that detailed allegations of sexual assault by Dominic Foppoli, the public outcry has focused on removing Foppoli from his office as the mayor of Windsor. He has denied the allegations and said he will not resign.

But Foppoli isn’t just a politician. He has another identity, too, one that often confers quite a bit of status in Sonoma County: a vintner. Since 2012, Foppoli has coowned Christopher Creek Winery, on the outskirts of Healdsburg, with his brother, Joe. Following the allegations, Joe has asked Dominic to leave the winery.

My colleagues have been looking at how Foppoli rose politically, and in doing so, they’ve also asked me: How did people in Sonoma County’s wine industry see Foppoli? What was his reputation as a winery owner? Is it possible that other winemakers in the county, too, had heard about some of Foppoli’s alleged sexual misconduct, as former Windsor

Mayor Debora Fudge had ?

In short, Dominic Foppoli was not a household name in the wider California wine industry until now.

Christopher Creek Winery is located in a coveted corridor of the Russian River Valley, yet it never rose to the same level of prominence as some of its neighbors.

ocally, in fact, the winery may have been known more for its notorious parties, according to some members of the wine industry, than for its Pinot Noirs. At the events, alcohol would flow freely, sources say, and a crowd would often end up in the hot tub.

It’s not unusual for wineries to host parties. Harvest parties, held at the end of autumn to celebrate finishing the busiest time of the year, are especially common, and the guest list often comprises employees from other nearby wineries. %n its face, there’s nothing strange about the idea that Christopher Creek — located right between the downtowns of Healdsburg and Windsor, which are just 6 miles apart — could have been a hub for such gatherings.

But there was something different about the Christopher Creek festivities, local industry members told me.

Just as members of civic organization Active 20à0 once put Dominic Foppoli on a “Hookup Mistakes to Avoid” list, people in the local wine industry warned each other about being careful while attending gatherings at Christopher Creek.

“People would say, ÌDon’t stay at Christopher Creek too late, don’t go hot tubbing,’ ” said Erica Stancliff, a winemaker who previously lived in Windsor but now lives in Santa Rosa. Stancliff said she and Foppoli crossed paths several times and were briefly friends.

It was at one of those parties, in 201¥, that 21yearold winery intern Rose Fumoso said she met Foppoli. They got in his car, and he allegedly attacked her, she said.

A number of wineindustry insiders, including Stancliff, said they’d sensed something was a little off about Foppoli’s conduct, but that they’d been unaware of the extent of his alleged actions. Peter Burke, director of the Sun Valley Wine Auction, an Idaho charity event in which many Sonoma County wineries participate, said he has avoided working with Foppoli for years.

“No one I know is surprised, and we are all thinking it’s way overdue,” said en Blair, who works at Preston Farm and Winery in Healdsburg.

Foppoli’s reputation as a party host, it seems, overshadowed his clout as a vintner.

Christopher Creek wines were known among some connoisseurs in the late 1¥¥0s and early 2000s, according to Mike ucia, owner of nearby Rootdown Cellars. He recalls serving the Christopher Creek Petite Sirah during that era, when he was working as a sommelier in Healdsburg. “The winery is known because it existed before he bought it,” ucia said.

More recently, after the Foppolis took over the winery, Christopher Creek’s name has rarely shown up on restaurant wine lists, in wine shops or in press over the last six years. Wine Spectator, for example, hasn’t reviewed a Christopher Creek wine since the 1¥¥t vintage, long before Foppoli came along.

In another industry, a local business known for pool parties might have sounded louder alarm bells. But there are several features of Sonoma County’s wine culture that may have allowed practices like that to endure, said Amy Bess Cook, founder of the Sonoma organization Woman%wned Wineries.

%ne feature is the central role of alcohol to these workplaces, Cook said. Hot tubs may not always be involved in winery parties, but drinking certainly is. That can make the line between a social and professional environment harder to parse, which can potentially lead to dangerous situations.

“Wine is supposed to bring people together,” Cook said. “The way that it does that on the business side, though, can be pretty blurry.”

Another factor is that the Sonoma County wine industry can feel like a “bubble,” which can contribute to a culture that implicitly encourages silence, said isa Rhorer, a Santa Rosa resident who works in wine marketing. Many people working in the wine industry in the county grew up together, she said× it’s common for locals to help each other’s family members get jobs. She believes that makes people less likely to hold each other accountable when bad behavior surfaces.

Foppoli grew up in Sonoma County, and his family has longtime farming roots in California.

“For someone to come forward is a grave risk,” Rhorer said, “because this is such a tight, inclusive community that you’re now going to be known as a whistleblower.” It’s possible that a reputation as a whistleblower could hurt someone’s ability to get jobs in the local industry, she said: “It’s sad, because people don’t want to be hindered from moving forward in their career.”

Though Sonoma County is as prestigious a wine region as any in the world, it’s still a place where many deals are done over a handshake. Winemakers who want to buy fruit from a famous vineyard might rely on the introduction of a friend in order to get in the door with the grape grower. People lend each other equipment, trade wines and write letters on each other’s behalf when someone is applying for a permit to build a new tasting room.

Cook agreed that some people in Sonoma County may be less likely to call out peers’ behavior because of the community’s insularity. “There’s definitely a tightly knit network of people that keeps each other safe in this region,” she said, referring to the people in positions of power.

The Sonoma County wine industry has never before dealt with a public scandal quite like this one. It’s “unprecedented,” said Michael Haney, president of Sonoma County Vintners, a group that moved to expel Christopher Creek on Friday. Another local organization, the Russian River Valley Winegrowers Association, also announced on Friday it planned to terminate Chistopher Creek from its membership.

Beyond formalities like those, it’s not yet clear how the local wine community will respond to the Foppoli allegations in a larger sense — whether there will be attempts to shift some of the cultural norms to ensure that people can remain safe going forward. As I wrote last week, the ¨MeToo movement hasn’t swept through winemaking the same way that it has restaurants or other adjacent industries.

But as the calls mounted for Foppoli to resign or be removed from the Windsor mayor’s office, women including Cook and Stancliff were adamant that the wine industry, too, would do its part to speak out against the alleged assaults.

“We’re going to push back against this in Sonoma County,” Cook said.