Blog note: we omitted non-grand-jury items from this article posting.
Two Alameda councilmembers violated the city's charter by interfering in the city manager's duties to independently hire a new fire chief, the Alameda County civil grand jury concluded in a report released Monday.
"The Grand Jury's investigation revealed a pattern of conduct by two councilmembers that, taken together, amounted to inappropriate interference in the fire chief hiring process and resulted in lasting damage to the city," the grand jury reported.
Although the report did not name the officials, it is understood they are Councilmembers Jim Oddie and Malia Vella.
Among the findings is a determination that Alameda's city charter lacks enforcement of its non-interference rules and councilmembers should receive annual training on governance issues. It is within the grand jury's power to seek the removal of an elected official for malfeasance related to their actions, but it did not do so.
The report quotes for the first time the infamous audio recording secretly made by then-City Manager Jill Keimach of a meeting between her and Oddie and Vella. An independent investigator did not review the audio recording out of fear of abetting a potential crime. Surreptitiously recording of another is a crime in California punishable by fines and imprisonment. The Alameda County DA's office, however, listened to the audio recordings after determining that Keimach had a reasonable belief that the councilmembers were attempting to coerce her into hiring a fire chief backed by the local firefighters' union. The DA's office did not find evidence of wrongdoing in the recordings.
The 55-minute recording capture Oddie and Vella lobbying Keimach on the positives of hiring the union-backed candidate. Keimach remarks that simply selecting the union's choice for the job would be the easiest solution. Oddie then added, "And if he does and you pick him, I mean, you'll have to be able to tell the folks that think you were pressured that you weren't."
The meeting concludes with Oddie jokingly telling Keimach, "And just to be clear ... I know I didn't tell you who to hire, and I don't think [Vella] did either, so just to be clear [laughs loudly]." The grand jury said it believes, "These joking words were intended to erase 55 minutes of pressure to hire the labor candidate." The report adds that Keimach repeatedly voiced discomfort over feeling pressured.
The jury also concluded that a letter written by Oddie to Keimach that recommended the union candidate violated the city charter prohibition on council interference. "[Oddie]'s letter was a direct and very public violation of the charter provision prohibiting councilmembers from attempting to influence the city manager in making an appointment," the grand jury wrote.
It also found that the two councilmembers attempted to use a performance review of Keimach as leverage.
"It was clear that [Oddie] supported a specific candidate and tried to connect the issue to the city manager's evaluation," the grand jury wrote. "[Vella] also brought up the fire chief selection process and inquired about how to communicate with the city manager. Rather than using the evaluation process as a tool to communicate expectations, goals and priorities, it appeared that the process was being hijacked to accomplish individual councilmembers' goals of installing their preferred candidate for fire chief."
In response to the report, Oddie said, "I am pleased that the Grand Jury has concluded its deliberations and happy that the jury determined that no further accusation proceedings are warranted." Vella said in a statement, "Today another independent review of events put into motion in 2017 by former City Manager Jill Keimach show again that her allegations against me were baseless."
June 26, 2019
East Bay Express
By Steven Tavares
No comments:
Post a Comment