Judge puts fate of county counsel on hold for now

Humboldt County legal counsel Jeff Blanck has been on paid administrative leave for more than a year without being officially fired, a status that won’t change for at least another few months.

The head county attorney was told that a hearing would be held April 30 to determine if he will be terminated over multiple anonymous personnel complaints against him.

But on Tuesday, U.S. District Court Judge Richard Seeborg ordered that the hearing not be held before June 1, partly because the ongoing coronavirus pandemic would make it difficult for Blanck to track down favorable witnesses.

Seeborg wrote that Blanck has raised “serious questions” about whether the county violated his right to free speech when it placed him on leave right after he began raising issues with the county’s financial conduct.

“Given Blanck was fired immediately after a closed-door session at which the individuals against whom he had complained, were present — and themselves admitted a conflict of interest — it seems probable Blanck’s protected speech was a motivating factor for his firing,” states the order granting Blanck’s injunction.

The county has sought to schedule Blanck’s termination hearing after an outside investigator recently completed a report on anonymous complaints against Blanck — claims that remain unknown to the public.

The attorney has been unsuccessful in trying have the investigator’s report dismissed. He claims he was interviewed “under duress,” since the investigator said declining to interview would be seen as insubordination.

But Seeborg disagreed that this was enough to toss out the report.

“Should the County be unable to use the Report, it will be forced to re-investigate the complaints against Blanck, a process that seems to have taken many months in the first instance,” the order states.

The county did not respond to a request for comment on this story.

The ongoing legal strife between the county and its chief attorney began in March 2019, after Blanck accused the Human Resources director of sending hundreds of thousands of dollars in payments to an outside legal firm without his approval.

He said the payments were excessive and violated California laws that dictate when a county can hire outside attorneys.

But as Blanck attempted to create an agenda item to discuss these payments, he was placed on leave over anonymous complaints against him.

In a deposition earlier this year, 4th District Supervisor Virginia Bass said the board had “substantiated” the complaints before voting to place Blanck on leave, according to court documents.

Blanck, meanwhile, has unsuccessfully filed for damages against individual county employees, but a judge rejected a motion to dismiss Blanck’s claim that his free speech, as a private citizen, was violated.

Following Blanck’s claims on financial misuse, the county last year changed its practices so that payments to outside legal firms fall under the chief attorney’s oversight, instead of being approved by the Human Resources department alone.

In July 2019, the former Human Resources director accepted separation pay to leave her job — a formal way of describing what Seeborg refers to as termination in his latest order.

The anonymous complaints against Blanck continue to stand. But given the coronavirus pandemic, it’s unknown when a hearing will be able to be held.