Q&A: Roxy Montana opens up about serving on San Benito County Civil Grand Jury

She discusses their responsibility, investigations and membership.

- Article courtesy of Mission Village Voice

MVV had a “grand” meet up with Roxy Montana, the current Foreman of the San Benito County Civil Grand Jury, who has served on the Grand Jury for six terms since 2001. Read about how these 19 jurors represent you to protect the public interest. If you think you’ve got what it takes to be a great grand juror, reach out to Roxy!

How many people are on the SBC Civil Grand Jury?

San Benito County must impanel 19 jurors to begin each fiscal term – July 1 to June 30. Once impaneled, we can lose a few due to time constraints or inability to meet at the time the plenary group chooses, but we must maintain a quorum.

How do you find jurors?

By hosting periodic open houses, usually on a Saturday morning 10 a.m.-1 p.m., inviting the public to come learn and ask questions. I explain in detail what the Grand Jury is, what it does and what it does not do, and offer reading materials. Jurors may be returnees who have served on an earlier term of the Civil Grand Jury. We have had several spouses join together. Because of the high level of confidentiality, jurors absolutely may not discuss the business of the grand jury with non-members.

What are the careers and the lifestyles of the current Civil Grand Jury?

A broad spectrum of careers is represented from MD, PhD, executives, business, firefighting, law enforcement, ranching, mental health/nonprofits, education, technology, human resources and legal fields. Retirees and non-commuters are often most available to devote the time needed for a successful experience. The time commitment makes it demanding for students.

You have committees?

We have five working committees and also ad hoc committees specific to issues. Each has a chairperson and four or five jurors with a focus at separately scheduled meetings. Any juror may attend any meeting of any committee at any time.

We have the Law and Justice Committee, the Health, Education, and Welfare Committee, the City Committee which includes Hollister and San Juan Bautista, a County Committee, and a Special Districts Committee, which includes water districts, airports, etc.

Anyone can review your findings and recommendations?

Yes, I enthusiastically invite the public to visit archived grand jury reports and responses at:

https://www.sanbenito.courts.ca.gov/general-information/jury-service/grand-jury

What does “look into” mean?

Penal codes instruct grand juries to at least “look into” issues of the “local prisons or jails.” The San Benito County Civil Grand Jury does an annual inspection of our county jail and often inspects the juvenile hall facility.

We may go to locations to individually interview multiple employees of a department or to inspect safety issues. It might be because their department is cramped and may need more space, or it could be that they’ve just moved into a new facility.

Do you respond to complaints?

Yes, we do! Any citizen or local public employee can print a complaint form available in English and Spanish found on the Superior Court website. It’s a highly confidential process and completed forms must be mailed to our private post office box, to which only we have the key. The complaints don’t go through the court. If it involves criminal activity, we then refer those to the District Attorney’s office.  All complaints are opened and read at the plenary meetings, and the grand jury decides if they fall into our jurisdiction. This is done by a super-majority vote with considerations to time and scope. If voted to go ahead with an investigation, an individual committee may look into them procedurally by scheduling appointments with the complainant and the department(s) involved.

Investigations are complaint driven as well as self-initiated?

If it’s self-initiated, it means that it may be time to do a review on a department that hasn’t been visited in a while or if there’s a rumble of curiosity with the public. Anybody, including jurors and elected officials, can go on to social media and read about what the public complains about. What generates general public interest may influence the grand jury to seek answers on their behalf.

Who do you report to as a Grand Jury?

The grand jury stands for the “We, THE People” of the community who pay taxes to fund and support the officials and departments of the city and county. We want our findings and recommendations to ultimately reach the public who we stand to serve, for they are the voters who decide to keep or lose those officials who manage the county, cities, school boards and the staff therein. Our annual Consolidated Final Report goes to the Board of Supervisors and other department heads that we interview, inspect, and investigate. We must have findings and also co-relating recommendations for each report in order to promote good government for all.

What happens if you don’t get 19 jurors?

The county doesn’t get a Grand Jury.

What happens when you don’t get a Grand Jury?

My associates at the California Grand Juror’s Association tell me there are counties who have had no Grand Jury for the past year or two, especially since Covid. They struggle to get back a foothold of interested and resolute jurors. This has even happened in our county in the past.

So, you’re never really in a courtroom?

We avoid courtrooms (laughing) and people who have been processed as criminals through them!

We are looking for people who are open-minded to learning about the operations of the city and county because if you come in pre-conceived, you’d be surprised.

That must be hard to find?

It can be. However, I think it’s how the meetings are managed. I would also say that while we all have our own opinions, we are adult enough to be able to put those opinions aside and look at any issue from an open perspective. There’s respectful discussion but no arguments or talking over others. We are civil!

How do you vet potential jurors?

The presiding judge does the initial individual interviews, and the Foreman has everything to do with working with and managing the jurors and guiding committees. I’ve discovered when it’s just not a good fit, especially for someone who has a personal agenda or ax to grind.

And the current Grand Jury?

We’re blessed with a socially mature team with outstanding life experiences and temperaments. With rare exception, they are dedicated to showing up consistently with a servant’s heart to work on behalf of the community.

Grand Jurors 2021-2022

Jae Eade

John Eade

John Ferreira

Natalya Gallion

Michelle Gutierrez, Correspondence

Patti Knoblich-Gonzalez

Dennis Lawn

John Lemos

Bob Marden, Pro Tem

Raul Sanchez

Dr. Parveen Sharma

Laurie Serpa Sabin

Stacie McGrady, Secretary

Shiven Singh, I.T.

Roxy Montana, Foreman

Bill Healy, Treasurer

Dave Busch

Cherie Toll

To learn more “About the Grand Jury,” visit https://www.cosb.us/departments/grand-jury/about-the-grand-jury

BenitoLink
BenitoLink Staff
March 21, 2022

[San Luis Obispo] Grand jury releases continuity report on school district

Report includes responses from city, superintendents, school district trustees

– The 2021-2022 San Luis Obispo County Civil Grand Jury has released its continuity report concerning the responses by three entities who were cited in the 2019-2020 Grand Jury report entitled “Paso Robles School District: A Cautionary Tale.”

The report chronicles the responses from the City of Paso Robles, the Superintendent of Education, and the Paso Robles School District trustees and superintendent. Starting in January of 2021 and lasting till August of 2021, information from the organizations has been submitted in response to the grand jury recommendations.

“The responses have not completely resolved the issues pointed out by the grand jury report,” said the jury in a press release, “We have recommended more follow up by the next grand jury in an effort to ensure the implementation of those issues still outstanding.”

Paso Robles Daily News
News Staff
March 23, 2022

 

 

Napa County grand jury query clarifies jail inquiry requirement

The 2017-18 Napa County grand jury has helped grand juries across the state get clarity on their duty to annually inquire into the conditions at public prisons.

As a result of a Napa County query, the State Attorney General’s Office recently concluded that “public prisons” include "local detention facilities" such as county jails. This is a question that has been debated in the grand jury community, the opinion said.

It apparently is a complex question. The 13-page Attorney General's opinion delves deep into a grand jury provision enacted by California in 1850.

But the requirement to “inquire” into jail conditions doesn’t mean grand juries have to investigate or write a report. They can fulfill the requirement by doing such things as touring the jail or interviewing the jail commander, the California Grand Jurors' Association said.

The matter is a bit technical, 2017-18 Napa County Grand Jury Foreperson Alan Charles Dell’Ario said. But the opinion that came about from Napa County’s query is precedent for all 58 California counties, he added.

Napa Valley Register
Barry Eberling
March 17, 2022

Santa Barbara City Attorney Responds to [Santa Barbara] Grand Jury on Funky Zoning Issue

City Agrees With Grand Jury Findings, But Won’t Implement All Recommendations

Neighbors rose up against a seafood processing facility on the Eastside in 2015, claiming the business was causing a stink; their concerns over odor, noise, and traffic were brought up to City Council, eventually leading to a Santa Barbara Grand Jury review of the zoning and permitting issues.

The December 2021 Grand Jury report presented a play-by-play of how things turned sour between the anonymous complainants and the fish market facility at 528 N. Quarantina Street, including recommendations as to how the city could prevent similar situations in the future.

The council unanimously approved City Attorney Ariel Calonne’s official response to the Grand Jury report Tuesday, in which Calonne agreed with all six findings but noted that the city would not be implementing the recommendations, stating among other things that people who live in a commercial area should expect some noise and traffic.

Among the Grand Jury findings was the fact that the city issued a building permit for the facility in 2014 without input from the planning commission; the report recommended that the city hold a public hearing for any zoning and permitting decisions “that may lead to obnoxious or offensive operations in any zone.”

Calonne responded: “Santa Barbara processes literally thousands of such permits annually. Implementing the recommendation would cost millions of dollars, even if lawful.”

The Grand Jury report questioned whether the company or the complainants were right about their interpretation of the zoning ordinance, while the city contended its zoning language, could lawfully allow the Santa Barbara Fish Market’s “food products manufacturing.”

The city also found that the facility had made “good faith” efforts to respond to all complaints, including making renovations and signing a settlement agreement with the residents who made the complaints. The agreement “recognized that the parties have differing interpretations of the Santa Barbara city code” and allowed the company to continue operations at the location.

Santa Barbara Independent
By Ryan P. Cruz
March 16, 2022

California Grand Jurors' Association publishes free informative eBook

Earlier this month, the California Grand Jurors' Association announced the publication of an informative new 50-page eBook. It was created to answer questions about California civil grand juries and their watchdog role in local governments.

Lou Panetta, the president of the association, says they hope to increase the pool of qualified grand jurors.

Our intent is to get people to understand the value, the impact they can make as citizens. They can recall an official, they can vote against or campaign for another official and they can demand a change," Panetta said.

In Kern County over the last year, the cities of Arvin, McFarland and Maricopa were investigated and reported on by the civil grand jury, in addition to the Fairfax school system.

All 58 counties in the state have to impanel, per constitutional law, a grand jury every single year. The publication includes information on the history and mission of the grand jury.

The civil grand jury is made up of citizens who conduct investigations on local governments and report findings to other citizens to be confused with a criminal grand jury, which is held in secret and involves the county's district attorney's office looking at evidence for possible indictment.

The book can be downloaded here.

Bakersfield Now/Eyewitness News KABK
Savannah Welch
March 15, 2022

[Tulare County] Civil grand jury calls for applicants to volunteer for 19 open positions

The civil grand jury announces the application period is open for volunteers to serve beginning July 1, 2022 through June 30, 2023

Residents wanting to have greater influence over their local government could get their chance if they apply for the civil grand jury.

The term for the grand jury is July 1, 2022 through June 30, 2023. The Tulare County Superior Court is already accepting applications for 19 spots which will be chosen in a random drawing. Grand jury volunteers will be studying and reviewing the operations of local government and making recommendations for improvements or changes.

Volunteer applicants must be over 18 years of age, a U.S. citizen, a resident of Tulare County for at least a year after being selected, and an individual of ordinary intelligence and good character who possesses a working knowledge of the English language, according to a grand jury informational flyer.

For more information, call the court at (559) 730-5000 ext. 1359. Or, visit the court’s website at: www.tularesuperiorcourt.ca.gov. Applications can be emailed to: administration@tulare.courts.ca.gov

The Sun-Gazette
The Sun-Gazette Staff
March 17, 2022

Opinion: Dick Spotswood: Marin [County] Civil Grand Jury offers chance to work as public ‘watchdog’

Each of California’s 58 counties is required by state law to empanel a civil grand jury.

The jury’s mission is succinctly stated on the Marin Grand Jury’s website, “The Civil Grand Jury is the only independent ‘watchdog’ investigative body in Marin. Our job is to monitor the performance of local government and make recommendations which can save taxpayers’ dollars and improve services. We do so through investigation of officials suspected of misconduct or potential government inefficiencies.”

“Civil” is the operative word. The jury isn’t involved in criminal matters. Effectively, grand jurors are collectively Marin’s ombudsperson.

It’s easy to complain about the government but, at least in Marin, it’s surprisingly easy to do something about it. One route is to run for city or town council or apply for a county or municipal planning, park or library commission. Those options don’t work for everyone. For many, it’s too great a commitment given busy lives trying to earn a living, raise a family or participate in nonprofit and church groups.

Serving on Marin’s 19-member grand jury is one venue for citizens who want to give back and create change with only a one-year commitment. The jury is now recruiting for the 2022-23 term starting in July.

While it’s an honor and gratifying to serve, there’s zero pay or benefits. It’s pure public service.

The heart of their job is determining which citizen complaints to analyze and then prepare reports with suggestions for improvements and efficiencies. Local agencies are mandated to reply to grand jury findings but occasionally their responses are disingenuous. Then it’s up to Marin’s media and voters to push recalcitrant local governments to get their act in order by following the jury’s well-thought-out suggestions.

To get a flavor of the jurors’ work these were the reports issued in 2020: “Opioid Misuse,” “Roadblocks to Safer Evacuation,’” “The Gun Next Door: Firearm Safety,” “Reading, Writing and Therapy: Mental Health Challenges in our Schools,” “Climate Change: How Will Marin Adapt?,” and “Cyberattacks: A Growing Threat to Marin Governments.”

The oversight role is crucial in regard to Marin’s 30 special purpose water, fire, sanitary and community service districts. They are subject to no oversight by state, county or municipal governments. The only entity commissioned to keep an eye on special districts is the grand jury.

It’s a serious responsibility. Service is only for one year. I’ve heard some past jurors call it the “experience of a lifetime.” Qualifications: Be 18 or older, U.S. citizen, Marin resident for one year, computer literate, able to commit to at least 10 hours per week to the task, willingness to keep investigations confidential and the ability to work collegially with 18 others to achieve a common goal.

Interested? Go to the grand jury’s website for details and an application. Jurors are selected by Marin’s nonpartisan Superior Court judges. There are no insider political appointees.

Marin Independent Journal
Dick Spotswood
March 15, 2022

California Grand Jurors’ Association’s free eBook detailing civil grand jurys’ local government watchdog role now available and downloadable

The California Grand Jurors’ Association is excited to announce the publication of an informative new 50-page eBook. The public is urged to download and read this comprehensive new book, California Civil Grand Juries: History, Law and How They Operate in order to better understand the California Civil Grand Jury’s activities and their very important “watchdog role” of local government in all 58 counties in California. The system is unique in being an ongoing program enshrined in our state constitution to give every county citizen oversight of county and government, schools and special districts.

The book can be downloaded at https://www.cgja.org/sites/default/files/californias_civil_grand_juries_edition4.pdf.

Louis Panetta, President of the California Grand Jurors’ Association, said, “We are so pleased to update this “go to” resource for explaining what the California Civil Grand Juries do and the impact they make on good governance.”

There are many issues that arise about the activities of local government and special districts. Just read some letters to the editor or attend a public meeting and you’ll hear many varied opinions. Many issues become the subject of investigations by the Civil Grand Jury members within a county.

Each year, there are excellent investigations and reports available for viewing on the CGJA website at https://cgja.org/search-grand-jury-report-topics. “Now more than ever, I urge the public to take the time to read our new book, learn more and apply to serve on the Civil Grand Jury for your county.”

The carefully selected jurors serving on a Civil Grand Jury in California are dedicated to ensuring that local government is effective, efficient, accountable and transparent.

Panetta adds, “Not only are they using their critical thinking and writing skills to better understand a specific local government activity, but they often create friendships among their fellow jurors that last a lifetime!”

“Throughout California,” Panetta points out, “Why not search reports to read about wild fires, homelessness, or the environment, a few of the many fascinating investigations which effected important changes within local government.”

According to James Perry, a past California Civil Grand Juror in Monterey County, “Serving as a Civil Grand Juror allows people the opportunity to do great things and become instruments of justice! It’s like having a backstage pass.”

Investigations and reports

In the forward to the book, Judge Quentin L. Kopp (retired) states, “Established in the state constitution in 1850 and codified by the California legislature in 1872, grand juries devote hours of time and attention to city, county, school district and special district administration and governance in an effort to secure effectiveness, governmental efficiency, and understanding of taxpayer expenditures and public office holder and entity integrity.”

As a truly independent body, each grand jury is free to choose which local governmental entities or public officials to investigate. With very limited exceptions, no one outside the grand jury can direct it to conduct an investigation.

Ideas for investigations generally come by way of three avenues: citizen complaints, matters raised by the members of the grand jury, and referrals from the preceding grand jury.

During its investigations, the grand jury acts as a finder of fact. In addition to determining if the official or entity under investigation is adhering to the laws that govern the operations of that entity, the jury analyzes whether the entity is operating in a businesslike manner and providing public services effectively and economically.

While it has no authority to order or otherwise compel compliance with its recommendations, it is through its reports that the grand jury wields its power. Those reports are influential because they attract the attention of the media, and subsequently, the voting constituencies of the investigated officials. The resulting public pressure often prompts the implementation of the recommended changes.

Typically, over 500 reports are issued each year by California’s 58 county grand juries.

About the Civil Grand Jurors’ Association

The California Grand Jurors’ Association is an all-volunteer, membership nonprofit organization (501c3) dedicated to promoting, preserving and supporting the civil watchdog function of California grand juries. Each year, CGJA provides training to grand juries to help them more effectively fulfill their state constitutional authority to, among other things, investigate and report on the conduct of local government as an arm of the Superior Court.

For more information, go to www.cgja.org. To apply to serve as a juror, check out the website of the Superior Court in Lassen County.

Lassen County Times
swilliams
March 2, 2022

[Santa Barbara County] Grand jury says Santa Barbara County fails to properly monitor idle oil wells; supervisors disagree

The Santa Barbara County Board of Supervisors is scheduled to approve a response to a grand jury investigation into 1,374 idle oil wells in the county that disagrees with the findings and rejects the resulting recommendations when it meets Tuesday in Santa Maria.

The response is part of the board’s administrative agenda, which consists of items generally approved in a single vote unless a supervisor pulls one for discussion or for a separate vote or a member of the public asks to comment on one.

Grand jurors made four findings and four recommendations to the board in their report released Dec. 20.

In their proposed response, supervisors wholly disagree with all four findings and say none of the four recommendations will be implemented.

In general, the grand jury found the health and environmental risks from idle wells are not being adequately addressed; the county is too understaffed to adequately monitor idle wells; code provisions requiring drilling equipment and derricks to be removed are not fully enforced; and the county may face financial liabilities from inadequate monitoring.

The “idle wells” referred to in the report are 926 “long-term idle wells,” those inactive for at least eight years, and 448 “inactive wells,” those out of production more than two but less than eight years, identified by the California Geologic Energy Management Division in 2019.

At that time, the county also had 4,215 “abandoned wells,” which had been out of production for two years or more but whose owners or operators applied for permits and followed procedures for taking them out of service.

Those procedures included plugging the wells with cement to prevent hydrocarbons from leaking into groundwater or soil or onto the surface.

Only one well in the county in 2019 was classified an “orphaned well,” where the owner had declared bankruptcy, become insolvent or simply deserted it without taking steps to properly seal it.

The rest of the 1,028 wells in the county at that time were considered “active wells.”

Grand jury's findings

The grand jury noted oil seeping from both active and idle wells can contaminate the soil and groundwater, and leaking methane gas can cause air pollution.

But the report said because idle wells are usually unattended, the seepage and leaks can become extensive before they are discovered, thus posing a greater risk to the public and environment.

“An example of the effects of seepage can be seen in the Santa Maria Valley, where there were thousands of active oil wells in the past,” the report says. “Some homes in Santa Maria had to be demolished because the area’s soil had been contaminated by seepage from old wells that had not been properly abandoned and plugged.

“There appears to have been no county remedial action on a number of the old wells around Orcutt, and no action by the owner to abandon them,” the report continues. “Abandonment under the required legal procedures would have led to capping. In the absence of capping, the health and safety of the area are not secure.”

The grand jury recommended supervisors direct the Planning and Development Department to identify health and environmental risks and determine actual and potential fiscal labilities from idle wells in annual reports to the board.

It also recommended supervisors direct Planning and Development to maintain enough trained personnel to staff the Petroleum Unit of its Energy, Minerals and Compliance Division and to enforce County Code requirements for removing equipment and derricks from idle wells.

Supervisors' response

The board’s proposed response says annual Planning and Development, County Fire Department and County Air Pollution Control District inspections of active and idle wells provide sufficient regulatory oversight to minimize risks to public health and the environment.

However, the response says in order to provide annual well inspection data to the public, within one year Planning and Development will launch a public-facing web portal that lists inspection dates and results for each well that’s inspected.

In the proposed response, the board also says it won’t require a report on fiscal liabilities because those are the responsibility of the state and the well operator.

The response also says the board won’t implement the recommendation on increased staffing because an Energy, Minerals and Compliance Division part-time supervisor and another staff member are trained and available to assist with annual inspections.

As for requiring Planning and Development to enforce code requirements for removing equipment, the proposed response says that’s not warranted because the storage of idle well equipment is regulated by the department’s Petroleum Unit through annual inspections.

The response also notes that while County Code requires timely removal of equipment from new well drilling sites and from abandoned well sites, it does not require equipment to be removed from idle well locations.

Santa Ynez Valley News
Mike Hodgson
March 4, 2022

[San Luis Obispo County] Grand jury investigates SLO County's response to COVID-19 pandemic

A new report from the San Luis Obispo County Grand Jury looks into the county’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic, providing recommendations based on the members’ findings.

The 26-page report released this week states the Grand Jury received complaints from citizens who said the county “did not act fast enough and appropriately in managing the distribution of vaccines in response to the life-threatening pandemic facing SLO County residents.”

The report calls the pandemic “the single largest event to upend the way of life in San Luis Obispo County (SLO County or the County) in decades” and because of that, the Grand Jury felt it was important to look into how the county responded.

It details vaccinations and the difficulties the county had with receiving vaccines in early 2021 and how they prioritized who received them and when.

Despite an “unknown and unreliable supply,” the Grand Jury says the county did a “commendable job” in responding to the public health emergency.

The report also states SLO County “was one of the few counties in the State to provide mass vaccination clinics and moved quickly to set them up before receiving directions from the State.”

The Grand Jury did not find fault with the county’s response, but did provide recommendations to the county based on the investigation, including:

Conducting lessons-learned evaluations with people who participated in its COVID-19 vaccination response

Documenting what went right during pandemic response and what could be improved upon for the next major community health threat

Reviewing existing emergency plans for mass vaccination events and making sure lessons learned from the COVID-19 response are incorporated when appropriate

Developing a process to educate the public every so often about the county’s response to another public health emergency

Proactively and as needed provide mental health services to county employees who experienced stress as a result of COVID-19 pandemic response

Interviews conducted by the Grand Jury were done prior to the surge in Delta-variant cases in late summer of 2021.

KSBY.com
Staff
March 2, 2022

Palo Alto won’t pursue mixed-use projects to build affordable housing in official response to [Santa Clara County] Grand Jury report

The report slammed Palo Alto for not building enough affordable housing, comparing it to its neighbor Mountain View

After a recent grand jury report slammed the city for its poor performance on building affordable housing — comparing it unfavorably to its neighbor Mountain View — council members are pushing back on the notion that they are not doing enough.

As Santa Clara County struggles to meet state-mandated goals for housing construction, a civil grand jury report released in December spotlighted the two next-door Peninsula cities — one for taking the right approach and the other for slacking.

In its report, “Affordable Housing: A Tale of Two Cities,” the Santa Clara County grand jury praises Mountain View, saying the home of Google is on track to meet the housing targets through planning, political will, and creative financing. But Palo Alto, the home of Stanford, comes up well short, according to the grand jury.

While preparing its official response to the grand jury due March 16, Palo Alto council members Monday juggled with the jury’s recommendations, opting to take their advice on fixing the arduous “Palo Alto Process” but pushing back on the idea that the city should consider more mixed-use projects like those found in Mountain View to increase affordable housing. They approved the response in a 5-2 vote, with council members Alison Cormack and Greg Tanaka dissenting.

In its response to the grand jury, the city stated that “whether cities consider both the demand and supply impacts, or just the supply in isolation, makes an enormous difference in how to evaluate a project’s housing availability and affordability impacts.”

When demand is considered, “neither Palo Alto nor Mountain View effectively increased their affordable housing,” the city continued, and instead, “both cities saw declines in it with Mountain View experiencing more than five times the decline as Palo Alto.”

In his remarks to the council, councilman Eric Filseth said building mixed-use projects that increase the amount of office space in the city would be detrimental to the city’s goal of building affordable housing and keeping people from being displaced.

“The grand jury has several useful projects — about community education, council advocacy, and outreach,” Filseth said. “But we have big reservations about the mixed-use approach.”

Filseth explained for each square foot of commercial space used to fund affordable housing, a mixed-use development would produce “somewhere like three times as much demand.” If the city were to go ahead with making precise plans for specific neighbors and build mixed-use projects like those found in Mountain View then “for each low-income person you house you’re going to displace two more.”

Mountain View has added thousands of jobs and office space in the past decade, and when looking at supply and demand, Filseth says “nobody is ahead.” If you look at affordable housing units per new job, Palo Alto still has more affordable homes than Mountain View and an average of the rest of the county, according to city-data.

Filseth’s comments and the city’s official response doubles down on the predominant idea among councilmembers that the jobs-housing imbalance should be flattened, not exacerbated. That’s why the city  put an office cap on new developments in 2018.

“To the grand jury’s immense credit, they do ask the question: if a project creates more demand for affordable housing than it supplies, should that project be done?” Filseth said. “We don’t agree with the grand jury on the use of commercial development to fund affordable housing.”

But councilmember Alison Cormack pushed back on her colleagues’ ideas about demand and how it would impact the city if planners began working more like they do in Mountain View. The flaw with the “jobs-housing imbalance narrative,” Cormack said, “is that we assume people live in the city where they work.”

“That’s not true in Palo Alto, where two-thirds of people work elsewhere,” Cormack said. “They don’t come here to live and work necessarily. While it’s a helpful discussion, it shouldn’t be the only metric and the focus of the rest of our discussions.”

Cormack also questioned why her colleagues would be so quick to discount precise planning and area-specific developments when they’ve worked in neighboring cities, and asked economic development director Johnathan Lait about their use.

“We have this report here which says we should use precise plans and I have two colleagues saying we shouldn’t use them,” Cormack said.

Lait responded that “professionally, we don’t need a precise plan to determine where we’re going to place our affordable housing.”

“We need to have clear zoning regulations and we need to communicate where geographically we want that housing and provide incentives,” Lait said. “It’s a bit of a ‘pick ’em’ on that. You don’t need precise plans to identify where you want to build housing.”

Cormack ended up voting against sending the city’s response after attempting to amend parts of the response she felt were shifting blame.

But Vice Mayor Lydia Kou, was satisfied with the city’s response to the grand jury, while noting that she didn’t appreciate the comparison between Mountain View and Palo Alto, which she felt was “simplistic,” “missed the mark” and attempted to pit “two cities against each other.”

“We’re all trying to resolve the affordability issue in our own ways, and each city comes up with different ways to address problems,” Kou said. “How Mountain View chooses to do it is their prerogative. It seems to pit the two cities and perhaps even blame, and there’s no blame to go around. It’s a problem the whole state is facing.”

Bay Area News Group
By Aldo Toledo
March 1, 2022

[San Luis Obispo County] Grand Jury releases report on county response to pandemic

Jury releases results of 18-month review into county vaccination efforts

The 2021-2022 San Luis Obispo County Grand Jury has released the culmination of an 18-month review of the method the county employed to handle vaccinating county residents as a means to combat the COVID-19 virus over the past two years.

The findings of the report say that SLO County moved quickly to establish vaccination capacity well in advance of receiving the COVID-19 vaccine and that during the first months when the vaccine was available, the county’s per capita vaccination rate was one of the highest among the counties the jury sampled.

“This huge task is a tribute to all the residents, staff, and medical professionals who stood up, accepted the challenge, and mobilized to fight a vicious unknown and support their fellow citizens,” writes the jury, “It is testament to the spirit of the county to face the unknown, overcome fear and help their neighbor. The people of the county should share the kudos with the medical professionals in the fabulous response to the pandemic. We all truly deserve congratulations.”

Paso Robles Daily News
News Staff
March 3, 2022

[Santa Clara County Civil Grand] Jury transcripts shed light on Santa Clara County sheriff corruption accusations

 Thousands of pages of testimony portray Laurie Smith as willing to bend and defy laws to defend her agency and practices

Longtime Santa Clara County Sheriff Laurie Smith, whose conduct is the subject of a forthcoming corruption trial, knows what the rules are. And evidence gathered for that trial suggests she knows how to use them to her advantage.

In 5,600 pages of newly-released grand jury testimony, Smith emerges for the first time as a central actor in her office’s efforts to dodge gift-reporting requirements, direct concealed-carry weapons permits to powerful donors, and undermine the work of a civilian auditor reviewing an explosive jail-injury case.

Each of those scandals has become public over the past two years, leading to indictments of some of her closest aides, but Smith’s involvement remained obscure.

Now, the testimony of 65 witnesses called before the civil grand jury has her facing the end of a long career. The state attorney general has also begun a probe of Smith’s office.

One former top aide, for instance, recalled Smith directing her to buy three lower-cost tickets to a Sharks hockey game, to hide the fact she would be sitting gratis in a donor’s luxury suite.

“So that was to avoid disclosure of a gift?” the prosecutor asked.

“Correct,” the former aide said.

Other testimony made clear Smith’s key role in her office’s granting of an outsized number of gun permits to people with celebrity, power and connections, and showed that she personally and purposefully delayed the progress of an investigation into the jail-injury case of Andrew Hogan that led to a record $10 million settlement from the county.

Concealed guns and concealed truth

Civil grand jurors concluded in December that Smith committed “willful and corrupt misconduct in office” by her actions regarding the concealed-carry weapons, or CCW, licenses.

Their findings – officially referred to as “accusations” that now lead to a full trial – are based largely on a retracing of two previous criminal grand jury proceedings linked to the CCW permit scandal that resulted in bribery indictments for then-Undersheriff Rick Sung and Capt. James Jensen, Smith’s second-in-command and a close adviser, respectively. But the civil proceedings were more sharply focused on Smith.

Jon Golinger, an investigator for the San Francisco District Attorney’s Office – which oversaw the civil grand jury because of conflicts cited by Santa Clara County’s counsel and district attorney offices – testified that an analysis of records showed that between late 2015 and early 2019, just 36 of 248 new CCW applicants were granted licenses, a 14.5% approval rate. But of the ten donors who applied, nine were approved — a 90% success rate.

Lara McCabe, a program manager in the sheriff’s office, testified that Smith said she opposed issuing CCW permits widely because “she doesn’t like to have a lot of guns out there on the streets.” Smith’s attorney and longtime political adviser Rich Robinson testified that Smith “would not issue CCW permits unless there was a demonstrated need.”

But her actions belied those claims, witnesses indicated.

Several permit applicants who were not donors described to the grand jury how they applied for CCW licenses because of documented stalking, death threats or physical abuse. Three did not even get a response, though state law requires a notice of approval or denial within 90 days. The fourth received a form letter citing a backlog in applications.

Meanwhile, a known campaign donor testified that he was passively guided by the sheriff’s office into providing his daughter’s address for his permit renewal because he had moved out of the county. Another longtime Smith donor, NVIDIA founder Chris Malachowsky, testified that he had no safety reason for applying, and left the “cause” field in the application blank, but was issued a permit anyway.

In contrast, and as was suggested in testimony before the earlier criminal grand jury, any permit application that didn’t have a green light from some combination of Smith, Sung or Jensen was left in a filing cabinet.

But former public information officer Rich Glennon offered new insight into Smith’s alleged role in that practice when he testified that Smith told him the “law was on her side in that if applications were always pending, she never had to render a decision on the application,” so if a criminal background check and fingerprint check were “never completed then she’s within the code.”

“So that was her explanation to you, personally, of why she could just keep applications pending indefinitely?” the prosecutor asked.

“That’s correct,” Glennon said.

Despite this evidence, the civil grand jury rejected bribery accusations against Smith, suggesting it couldn’t draw a direct line between her and what prosecutors in the criminal case have alleged was a pay-to-play brokering scheme partially orchestrated by Sung and Jensen.

How Smith might explain all this remains unknown. She was not called before the civil grand jury, and In one of the criminal grand jury proceedings, she invoked the Fifth Amendment in refusing to testify. Publicly, she has characterized efforts by the Board of Supervisors to investigate her office as politically driven attacks.

The Sharks suite situation

Three additional corruption accusations from the civil grand jury involve Smith’s use of a CCW permit recipient’s luxury suite at the SAP Center for a San Jose Sharks game. Knowing she’d be using the suite, Smith allegedly asked McCabe to purchase three general admission tickets for her, Sung and Jensen, to skirt reporting requirements for elected officials who receive gifts worth more than $500.

McCabe said that Smith told her explicitly that she was looking to avoid putting the suite tickets on a public gift-reporting document.

The suite – where Smith on Feb. 14, 2019, held a gathering of close friends and supporters to celebrate her 2018 re-election – is also the subject of a bribery indictment against the suite’s owner, Harpreet Chadha, alleging that Sung extracted the donation from him by holding up his gun permit renewal. Chadha has said that he routinely gives out the suite.

The civil grand jury rejected allegations that Chadha committed bribery.

Resisting an investigation

The final misconduct finding by the civil grand jury accuses Smith of “failing to cooperate” with the Office of Correction and Law Enforcement Monitoring – a civilian auditor – in its probe of the case of Andrew Hogan. No previous grand jury has examined this allegation, although the Board of Supervisors has excoriated her actions.

The county paid a $10 million settlement to Hogan and his family after the mentally ill man repeatedly injured himself in 2018 while riding unrestrained in a jail transport van, and jail staff and commanders stood by as he lapsed into unconsciousness. Hogan is now severely disabled. The settlement was the county’s largest-ever payout to resolve a jail-injury case.

Last fall, the Board of Supervisors tasked the auditor, Michael Gennaco, with investigating why an internal sheriff’s office probe abruptly ended with no conclusion or discipline being issued. But Smith’s office allegedly refused to hand over documents about the case to Gennaco.

In testimony to the civil grand jury, McCabe and Juan Gallardo, a former administrative services director who was the most senior civilian employee in the sheriff’s office, said Smith directed her staff to delay key meetings with the agency’s two main labor unions to stymie an information-sharing agreement with Gennaco.

“I believe she – something to the effect of, if – if the meeting doesn’t happen then we can’t proceed with the Information Sharing Agreement or at least slow down the process,” Gallardo said.

Other witnesses’ anecdotes and statements show additional instances in which Smith seemed to knowingly flout the rules.

Gallardo testified that during her 2018 re-election campaign, Smith was in contact with an independent expenditure committee run by two of her ardent supporters – even though under federal law, Smith and her campaign were barred from “cooperation, consultation, or concert with” the committee.

“I recall her saying that she wasn’t supposed to know” the inner workings of the independent committee, Gallardo testified, “but she knew what they were doing.”

The Mercury News
By Robert Salonga
February 26, 2022 /Updated: February 28, 2022

California grand jurors’ Association chapters celebrate Grand Jury Awareness Month in February

The California Grand Jurors’ Association urges everyone to celebrate Civil Grand Jury Awareness Month in February.

According to Louis Panetta, president of the California Grand Jurors’ Association, “We all know there are many issues that arise about the activities of local government and special districts. Just read some letters to the editor or attend a public meeting and you’ll hear many varied opinions. Some of the issues that are raised can become the subject of investigations by the Civil Grand Jury members within a county. Each year, there are excellent investigations and reports that are available for viewing on the CGJA website at https://cgja.org/search-grand-jury-report-topics. Now more than ever, I urge the public to take the time to learn more and consider applying to serve on the Civil Grand Jury or recommending it to a friend.”

The carefully selected jurors who choose to serve on a Civil Grand Jury in California are dedicated to ensuring that local government is effective, efficient, accountable and transparent. Panetta adds, “Not only are they using their critical thinking and writing skills to better understand a specific local government activity, but they often create friendships among their fellow jurors that last a lifetime!”

According to James Perry, a past California Civil Grand Juror in Monterey County, “Serving as a Civil Grand Juror allows people the opportunity to do great things and become instruments of justice!”

Established in the state constitution in 1850 and codified by the California legislature in 1872, grand juries devote hours of time and attention to city, county, school district and special district administration and governance in an effort to secure effectiveness, governmental efficiency, and understanding of taxpayer expenditures and public office holder and entity integrity.

As a truly independent body, each grand jury is free to choose which local governmental entities or public officials to investigate. With very limited exceptions, no one outside the grand jury can direct it to conduct an investigation.

Ideas for investigations generally come by way of three avenues: citizen complaints, matters raised by the members of the grand jury, and referrals from the preceding grand jury.

During its investigations, the grand jury acts as a finder of fact. In addition to determining if the official or entity under investigation is adhering to the laws that govern the operations of that entity, the jury analyzes whether the entity is operating in a businesslike manner and providing public services effectively and economically.

While it has no authority to order or otherwise compel compliance with its recommendations, it is through its reports that the grand jury wields its power. Those reports are influential because they attract the attention of the media, and subsequently, the voting constituencies of the investigated officials. The resulting public pressure often prompts the implementation of the recommended changes.

Typically, there are over 500 reports issued each year by California’s 58 county grand juries.

Del Norte Triplicate
February 28, 2022