A local winery asked a federal court to weigh in on its clash with Santa Barbara County for collecting mandatory fees that support a newly created wine business improvement district.
The dispute is at the center of a civil lawsuit Flying Goat Cellars co-owners Norm Yost and Kate Griffith filed against the county on May 21 in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California.
“The county is forcing Flying Goat to associate with this private nonprofit business association that Flying Goat does not want to be a partner with,” Flying Goat’s attorney Adam Shelton told the Sun. “All the money goes directly to this private association. It doesn’t go to the government. It’s not a tax in any way. This private association is then able to determine how best to spend the money.”
Last year, the county Board of Supervisors established a 1 percent assessment on all direct-to-consumer winery sales for wineries within the county. The board dictated that those funds go to the Santa Barbara County Vintners Association, partly to support the group’s efforts in marketing the county’s wine industry to the outside world, as one elected official summarized.
“You’re going to be promoting our whole region. … I don’t think 1 percent is a big deal,” 3rd District Supervisor Joan Hartmann said at a hearing in 2025. “This is a way for the wineries across the board to pool their resources and advertise the Santa Barbara brand.”
In its suit against the county, Flying Goat Cellars alleges that because the Vintners Association funds “a broad range of activities” including government lobbying and charitable causes of the nonprofit’s choosing, requiring the Lompoc winery to support speech it may not necessarily agree with is unconstitutional.
“These uses do not constitute generic, nonideological commercial advertising, but are expressive, ideological, and political activities that plaintiffs are compelled to fund and associate with,” the May 21 complaint states. “Among other things, plaintiffs disagree with … the use of funds for [Vintners Association] officials to take trips to South Korea in 2025 and Japan in 2026 for the purported purpose of developing export markets and gaining international recognition, neither of which benefit plaintiffs.
“Rather than focusing on export markets or international recognition, Flying Goat serves local customers in Lompoc and the surrounding area,” the complaint continues. “Norm and Kathleen have built their business on direct relationships with wine drinkers who come through their doors, not the kind of broad promotion campaigns the [Vintners Association] favors.”
Yost and Griffith decided to file the lawsuit after raising their concerns in a February letter to the Board of Supervisors that went “unanswered,” according to the complaint.
“The county does not comment on litigation,” county Public Information Officer Kelsey Gerckens Buttitta told the Sun via email on May 26.
The lawsuit asks the court to order the county to create an opt-out mechanism under which individual wineries can apply for exemption from the 1 percent assessment fee.
It also asks that Flying Goat receive refunds from the county for the assessment fees it “paid under protest” so far, and an award of nominal damages “in the amount of $1” for the county’s alleged infringement on Yost and Griffith’s constitutional rights.
“Faced with no other choice, plaintiffs file this action and seek relief from this court. This lawsuit asks the court to determine whether the county can impose such a heavy burden on one private business to benefit other private entities,” the complaint states. “The Constitution is clear: It cannot.”
This article appears in May 28 – June 4, 2026.