Modoc County Grand Jury • 2025-2026

Fiscal Year 2025-2026 Modoc County Grand Jury Report*

Published: June 24, 2026 27 pages

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⚠️ Translation Notice: This content has been automatically translated. The original English text is the official version. Translation may contain errors.

⚠️ Este contenido ha sido traducido automáticamente. El texto original en inglés es la versión oficial. La traducción puede contener errores.

Findings 7 findings

Residents in unincorporated communities are hesitant to report code violations due to a lack of familiarity with the complaint process and a perception that reports will not result in action.

Interaction between residents of unincorporated areas and county officials regarding code enforcement is largely reactive, occurring only after a formal complaint is filed, rather than through a proactive process. This style of interaction has left residents of unincorporated areas unsatisfied with the current way code enforcement is approached.

The absence of a unified, publicly accessible explanation of the code enforcement workflow, coupled with a lack of visibility into how complaints are triaged, investigated, and resolved, has fostered public distrust and created a perception among residents that the county has abandoned unincorporated areas to blight and safety hazards.

Authority for code enforcement is fragmented across multiple agencies (Environmental Health, Sheriff's Department, Building and Safety, etc.), resulting in no single department holding clear accountability for enforcement outcomes. The absence of a centralized permanent authority with clear oversight responsibility for code enforcement prevents Modoc County from meeting eligibility requirements for various state and federal grant programs, thereby limiting access to critical funding needed to expand enforcement capacity and improve the conditions of unincorporated communities.

The county currently lacks a risk-based prioritization framework for code enforcement expenditures, leading to inefficient allocation of limited resources and an inability to target high-risk properties effectively.

Participation in the California Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) vehicle abatement program poses no financial risk to the Modoc County General Fund, and yet the county has not fully leveraged this state-provided program for removing abandoned vehicles.

County employees responsible for code enforcement have met their statutory and procedural obligations within the existing complaint-driven system despite operating with limited staffing and funding resources.

Recommendations 5

R1

The Modoc County Board of Supervisors create a Standing Steering Committee on Code Compliance to coordinate inter-departmental efforts by October 1, 2026. The Committee shall be tasked with developing a prioritization matrix and identifying grant opportunities. It is recommended that the committee include representatives from Environmental Health, the Sheriff's Department, Building and Safety, Planning Department, Public Health, Department of Agriculture, County Administrator's Office, and Board of Supervisors.
R2

The Modoc County Board of Supervisors direct the relevant departments to conduct a feasibility study on the California DMV Vehicle Abatement Program and similar state grant opportunities. A report detailing the findings, potential cost savings, and a recommendation on adoption or a detailed explanation of infeasibility, to be presented at a public meeting or released as a public report
R3

The Modoc County Board of Supervisors initiate outreach to residents of unincorporated areas to gauge interest in and facilitate the formation of a Municipal Advisory Council as a pilot program in at least one unincorporated community, by April 1, 2027, to provide a structured voice for rural communities in code compliance.
R4

The Modoc County Board of Supervisors review county revenue and gauge public interest in the establishment of a small annual parcel assessment tax specifically for code compliance by July 1, 2027. If there is public interest, the county should put this special tax on the ballot of the following general election.
R5

The Modoc County Board of Supervisors adopt a Strategic Code Compliance Plan tailored to the county's fiscal constraints by July 1, 2027, and present the plan to the public via a formal report or public hearing. The plan will include a review of the City of Alturas Rental Housing Inspection Program as a model, and establish a proactive, fiscally sustainable approach to blight reduction.

* This report's PDF did not contain easily extractable text and required Optical Character Recognition (OCR) for analysis. There may be minor errors in the extracted findings and recommendations due to OCR limitations with scanned documents.