The issue of cannabis reeks of contention in Santa Barbara County, most recently in the announcement on Thursday of finalists for a storefront in Orcutt, a bedroom community south of Santa Maria. The previous round ended in a lawsuit brought by NHC Orcutt 405, which missed moving to the finals by just one point. The owner of the property where the cannabis shop was proposed was Helios Dayspring, who made a plea deal with federal prosecutors, announced on Wednesday, that has him acknowledging his guilt in felony charges of bribery of a county supervisor and tax evasion.
In that case, brought by the Public Corruption and Civil Rights Section of the Department of Justice in Los Angeles, prosecutors say Dayspring paid $32,000 — in dribs and drabs of $1,000 to $3,000, mostly in cash — for positive votes and advocacy on cannabis regulations to the Third District supervisor for San Luis Obispo in 2016-2019. That supervisor is known to be Adam Hill, who died of suicide on August 6, 2020; Hill had made a previous attempt on March 11 after the FBI searched his office and two other locations. The plea agreement lists payments to “Supervisor 1” and subsequent votes, including a text exchange during a hearing in March 2019 asserting that Dayspring should support his re-election; Dayspring held a fundraiser at his home in April that collected over $13,000.
The plea-deal filing also outlines Dayspring’s attempt to bribe the mayor of Grover Beach, where one of his dispensaries is located. That effort failed when the mayor did not respond to the offer of $100,000 from Dayspring and an unnamed “Business Partner 1” in exchange for two dispensary permits. The pair did, however, receive a permit for their Grover Beach Dispensary; when Dayspring asked his partner if they owed the mayor $50,000, the partner said they did not because they didn’t get their two permits.