MENDOCINO CO., 11/15/26 — Mendocino County’s grape growers and winemakers sat down Saturday for what their president billed as “the world’s fastest member meeting.” It took about five minutes.
The rest of the evening at Barra of Mendocino in Redwood Valley was a harvest party. Wine families caught up with friends and neighbors over barbecued lamb. Mendocino Winegrowers Inc. also gave its top honor, the George Zeni Award, to McNab Ridge Winery winemaker Rich Parducci.
Parducci used his speech to thank the people who came before him. He called his grandfather, John Parducci, “an incredible winemaker and a steward of the land.” He also named “other greats like Charlie Barra and the rest of the group that’s on this trophy.”
“It means a lot to me, but it’s definitely not something I just did on my own,” he said.
Fixing the election rules
The meeting’s main business was a change to the group’s bylaws. Mendocino Winegrowers president Elizabeth Archer said the old rules required a winning candidate to get votes from half of all members, not half of the members who actually voted.
Archer compared it to a race for public office that a candidate could only win with over 50% of all registered voters. “No one would ever win the office,” she said.
Under the old rule, she said, the group was “out of compliance with our election.” Members approved the change by voice vote. They also approved last year’s minutes and financial report. Archer called the meeting to order at about 4:47 p.m., and members voted to adjourn at about 4:52 p.m.
Next, Archer said, the group will hold an election and send members a survey. “We want to know, what do you want from MWI?” she said. “We are only as good as our members.”
Honoring Parducci
Mendocino Winegrowers calls the George Zeni Award a memorial trophy for a winegrower or vintner with an exemplary history of advocacy for and dedication to the county’s wine industry.
Grower Brian White, who sits on the group’s board and has known Parducci since high school, presented it. White said he believed Parducci’s grandfather won the same award in 2004.
“What’s really special to me about this is that you’ve taken it one more generation,” White told him. “We’re all here together, we’ve been struggling, and we’re moving forward, and you keep us moving forward.”
Parducci thanked his wife, Melinda — “my rock” — for running the household through many harvests of “seven days a week, 12, 13, 16 hours a day.” He thanked the McNab Ridge staff, who he said “really do all the work,” and the growers who sell him fruit.
“You don’t make great wine out of bad grapes,” Parducci said. “And so to have the resources we have to work with growers that are dedicated to providing some of the best grapes in the world, it’s been an honor.”
He asked the growers to stay together. “It’s important that we stay together as a group, unified, spread the word, and go out there and show the world the great wines that we have,” he said.
A building shaped like a champagne glass
The party’s venue was built to look like an upside-down champagne glass. Martha Barra, who owns the winery, said a sparkling wine house built it.
The winery’s press kit says the building dates to the 1970s and was originally home to Weibel Champagne Cellars. It was designed to resemble an upside-down coupe, the wide, shallow champagne glass, the press kit says. Inside, the 5,000-square-foot room has 40-foot ceilings, a circular tasting bar and an indoor fountain.
Martha Barra’s late husband, Charlie Barra, whom Parducci named among the greats on the trophy, planted 175 acres of Redwood Valley vineyard in 1955, the winery’s timeline says. He died in 2019 at 93.
What else is coming
Archer ran through the group’s plans before the meeting:
– A pilot deal with the California Association of Winegrape Growers, known as CAWG, the statewide growers’ group. During the Mendocino group’s membership drive in January, members can join both and get $25 off. “There aren’t that many Mendocino County members of CAWG, and we want our county represented in that organization,” Archer said.
– The One Block Challenge, a regenerative farming program the group is bringing to the county with the Regenerative Viticulture Foundation. A second, still-unnamed program is aimed at growers with fallow land. “If you have some fallow land, and you’d like to make a little bit of money and help restore your soil, go talk to those ladies in the back,” Archer said, referring to a table set up by The Grain Project organization.
– The Bacchanal Mendocino festival weekend, which combined the county wine competition and Taste Mendocino, returns on the last weekend of June. This year the professional judges talked through their tasting in front of the public, and the group plans to do that again.
Archer also thanked the Potter Valley FFA students working the party, in case anyone was worried about minors roaming around. “They’re not drinking, they’re cleaning up after us,” she said.