Humboldt Supes Narrowly Approve New Lighting Regs

A new Humboldt County lighting ordinance seeks to “protect and preserve our skies” with restrictions on brightness and shielding requirements.

But the county Board of Supervisors’ Aug. 19 approval of the new regulations wasn’t unanimous, with two supervisors voting against them due to concerns about the costs and viability of enforcement.

One of the ordinance’s primary means of controlling light is a cap on intensity, as measured in lumens.

There’s a residential limit of 1,100 lumens and 3,200 lumens for commercial, industrial and agricultural uses.

Lights are required to be directed downward and either fully shielded or, when “warm” lighting is used in inland areas, shielded with a translucent material.

Lighting warmth refers to lighting color in the yellow range.

Types of lighting prohibited unless approved through a conditional use permit include flashing lights, “search light-style” lights and lighting that distracts “the traveling public”

Exempt lighting includes temporary holiday decorations, warm-colored string lights, and lights that illuminate U.S. flags.

During a public comment period representatives of Astronomers of Humboldt and Humboldt Waterkeeper welcomed the county’s regulation efforts.

Various aspects of ordinance were highlighted by Jen Kalt of Humboldt Waterkeeper.

“The warm color temperature is really critical for migrating birds in particular, which our region is so famous for,” she said, adding that reducing light pollution has many benefits including “just being able to see the stars.”

The new rules apply to new development and existing lighting is exempt – unless it poses a nuisance.

“A nuisance basically is something that makes it hard for somebody else to enjoy their property,” said Planning Director John Ford. “An example is where you’ve got somebody with a spotlight that is coming in – we’ve got two or three of these complaints right now – a spotlight coming into their house, they can see their own shadow on their wall, inside their house from somebody else’s light on an adjoining piece of property.”

That “makes it hard for them to enjoy their property and that’s by definition a nuisance,” he continued.

The fix would be to advise the offender that their lighting has to be “either shielded or redirected.”

But Supervisor Rex Bohn questioned whether the county’s code enforcement unit has the resources to back up the ordinance’s new rules.

“Who’s doing all this?” he asked. “I’m just trying to figure out, who’s gonna do this because if we have those people on hand now, I would love to see some of them working on some code enforcement stuff that’s been going on too long.”

A majority of supervisors supported inland and coastal versions of the ordinance and approved them with modifications, including a 10 p.m. limit on use of string lights and requiring conditional use permits for athletic field lighting.

Street lighting and parking lot lighting will be covered in a separate ordinance which Ford expects to be before supervisors by the end of this year.

Supervisor Michelle Bushnell agreed with Bohn on the impracticality of enforcement and they voted against the ordinance.