The City Council needs an ethics policy, according to a new report from the San Joaquin County Civil Grand Jury.
The grand jury — a 19-member citizens body that is empowered to investigate, among other things, the operations of local governments — issued a report last week summarizing a yearlong review stemming from a complaint about the council.
During a meeting on April 4, 2017, the City Council voted 3-2 against adopting a policy to require members to recuse themselves from votes that would affect a family member. Mayor Robert Rickman, Mayor Pro Tem Veronica Vargas and Councilwoman Juana Dement all voted to not adopt the policy. Councilwomen Rhodesia Ransom and Nancy Young voted against that motion, saying they thought the policy was prudent.
At the time, Rickman said, “I’m against it the way it is. Like I said, you follow the rules that are set forth before you. You follow the law. … If the individual council member wants to, he or she can say, ‘Hey, I have a family member on that.’ And I think that would suffice.”
Young disagreed.
“As voting against this, it just shows that we don’t want to be held accountable. And we should be,” she said during that meeting.
After the meeting, a Tracy resident — who the Tracy Press has confirmed was Tracy lawyer Steve Nicolaou — requested that the grand jury look into the vote.
“The Grand Jury was presented with a complaint describing a perceived conflict of interest in the City of Tracy,” the report read.
Though that specific complaint was found to lack merit, “the Grand Jury decided to investigate and determine if the adoption of an Ethics Policy could provide the necessary guidance to help avoid such missteps, real or perceived, from occurring in the future.”
The jurors interviewed 33 people from eight county municipalities and examined documents and policies pertinent to the issue of ethics. Tracy, Escalon, Lathrop and Manteca all lack specific policies.
“Ethics policies are not based upon the rule of law,” the report read. “They are based on moral concepts of acceptable conduct. They help individuals who are governed by them to understand how best to handle a given situation, how to be transparent in their actions, and how to avoid even a perception of a problem.”
The grand jury concluded that the lack of an ethics policy for elected officials or city department heads “has resulted in conflict, mistrust, and allegations of misconduct.” It recommended that the council adopt an ethics policy governing the behavior of elected officials, appointed committee members and senior staff by Oct. 31.
During its regular meeting March 20, the City Council instructed City Attorney Tom Watson to schedule a workshop to craft a policy. Watson did not return calls this week seeking information about the workshop.
June 29, 2018
Tracy Press
Press staff report
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