By Carol Benham/Contributing Writer, LompocRecord.com -
Lompoc City Council members approved a response to the Santa Barbara County Civil Grand Jury report, “A Failure of Oversight: Lompoc Housing and Community Development Corporation,” on Tuesday evening that omits any acknowledgment that a lack of oversight existed over the failed nonprofit and its defaulted loans and blighted properties.
Though the 14-page response was eventually approved, with revisions, by a vote of 5-0, the 90-minute discussion demonstrated that council members are not unanimous in their desire to determine accountability for failed oversight or how to improve oversight of agencies in the future.
Council members rejected the first prepared response at a meeting Aug. 21, criticizing the tone of the response for implying there was no failure of oversight.
But Councilwoman Cecilia Martner objected Tuesday night to the two sentences added by staff to improve the tone of the response. Referring to the “very unfortunate situation regarding LHCDC,” the response read: “The City Council regrets inactions by Lompoc City Councils that have diminished the public trust.”
“ I find that sentence misleading,’ Martner said. “Why do we say it is only the City Council that is causing public mistrust. We have a problem here. The problem is that the staff, some members of the staff, did not do that part of their job which was to report noncompliance issues. The Grand Jury report has over 60 citations. I did not receive them from the city staff, I received them from the Grand Jury.”
Martner also pointedly reminded the council that the Grand Jury report documented the county’s failure to oversee compliance with contracts and loan regulations.
Yes, the Lompoc City Council is at fault — previous, present, and even future, maybe. I don’t want to absolve staff or the county,” Martner said.
Along with Martner, Councilman Dirk Starbuck repeatedly tried to simplify and strengthen the city’s response.
“I think it would behoove us to look through each of these points. I want to make sure we’re on the right path because this response is going to go to the Grand Jury in two days,” Starbuck said. “I feel we should invest the time right now and look at these responses because this is what our policy is probably going to be based on.”
Starbuck originally asked the council to delete or condense new language explaining a policy for financial audits and suggested instead that the council inform grand jurors that a policy had been requested by council months earlier and would be forwarded to the Grand Jury once it was approved.
His suggestion received no support, but midway through the discussion, Councilwoman Ashley Costa suggested language be included to explain that the response was a prospective policy, not an actual policy, and that an approved policy would be forthcoming. For the remainder of the discussion, council members repeatedly alternated between referring to the contents of the response as a policy and as mere recommendations for a future policy.
“This is not the proper way to draft a policy,” Martner said. “We’re convoluting the process.”
Though council members eventually agreed they were not writing a policy from the dais, they continued to add details to what should be in a policy, including ways nonprofit agencies could pass on administrative costs for conducting annual financial audits.
Starbuck, observing the ongoing confusion, said, “There’s 12 Grand Jurors and there’s five of us. If we’re confused, think how confused they’re going to be.”
The approved response never mentions that council members voted Oct. 4, 2011, to request a policy be developed by staff to improve compliance with city contracts and loan requirements, and establish specific steps the city will take to enforce compliance. The policy has not yet been developed or presented to council.
Martner also objected to staff’s inclusion, as part of a proposed policy, that City Council members will decide what action to take when agencies fail to respond to two written notices about audits being due, which would occur 10 months after the end of the audit period.
“That is not a policy,” Martner said. “One of the reasons why I requested a policy was to remove the politics out of the process. It’s been rumored thousands of times that LHCDC had the support of the elected officials and the elected officials looked the other way and kept giving them more allowances and more time. I wanted a policy that would prevent that from happening. I would prefer to have an impartial policy that establishes what the consequences are and that they’re acted upon regardless of who is sitting up here.”
Starbuck expressed frustration with the piecemeal approach to determining policies and notices to council. “This does not alleviate the central report that we need to be available. We have audits, and RDA, and CDBG. Sometimes the right hand doesn’t talk to the left hand. We have to compile all of these loans and all of these covenants into one place.”
Resident Pam Wall, who questioned the Council two weeks ago on the Grand Jury’s documentation of multiple years of LHCDC overcharging tenants, again asked if either the city or the county was currently monitoring compliance of properties under bank receivership.
Mayor Linn, who had promised to return with answers to Wall’s questions two weeks ago, said the city receives monthly reports, but he could not share them. Linn indicated he was still trying to find an answer to Wall’s questions on overcharging, adding “I’m not going anywhere.”
“Neither am I,” Wall quipped.
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