[Shasta County] Veterans still struggle to get health care

Blog note: this article references a grand jury report on the subject.

One morning in April, 68-year-old Richard Chaviers could not catch his breath. His sister knew he slept restlessly overnight and he was hospitalized a few days before, so she was worried. She called 911. An ambulance took him from his Shingletown home to a waiting helicopter that flew him to a hospital in Redding.

It was the Vietnam veteran’s second trip to a hospital in less than three weeks. In early April, Chaviers experienced similar troubles breathing, but when the ambulance pulled into the parking lot of Shasta Regional Medical Center, his heart gave out.

“That’s the type of thing someone does in a firefight. You hold out, and keep fighting, and you have to give it your all before you get to safety,” Chaviers said. “I felt the ambulance get to the hospital and I must have just let go.”

Like many veterans Chaviers receives his regular health care through the U.S. Veterans Affairs Department. He goes to the clinic on Hartnell Avenue in Redding, about 35 miles from his Shingletown home.

He and others who go to the Redding Veterans Outpatient Clinic are better off than some of their big-city counterparts, who can wait months for appointments. By contrast, the Redding VA has an average wait time of around four days to see a primary care doctor and 10 days to see a specialist. It boasts five doctors, two nurse practitioners, two pharmacists and five registered nurses, among other support staff and volunteers.

“The Redding clinic offers so much for such a remote location and the staff go out of their way for the population,” said Tara Ricks, spokeswoman for the VA Northern California Health Care System.

Chaviers and other veterans have plenty of hassles with the VA. But the worst of the agency's well-documented failures have occurred elsewhere. Although veterans here must travel to Sacramento or San Francisco if they need a VA hospital, those facilities both had three out of five stars at the end of last year, in a secret internal rating system obtained by USA TODAY and published last week.

The VA determines the ratings for 146 of its medical centers each quarter and bases them on dozens of factors, including death and infection rates, instances of avoidable complications and wait times.

Even so, some local veterans find they must turn to the Veterans Choice Program to see physicians sooner. The program allows veterans to see doctors and specialists outside of the VA, which can be helpful in metropolitan areas. But in a rural area like Shasta County, the selection of doctors through the Choice program is slim, and veterans find themselves competing with the general public also seeking appointments among a limited pool of doctors. Veterans who have major medical needs must travel to Sacramento or San Francisco for care.

Chaviers knows about trying to get in to see specialists. After his hospitalization, he spent time in a rehabilitation facility to regain his strength. Staff advised him to follow up with a pulmonologist — a lung specialist — after he was discharged. The pulmonologist would teach him how to properly breathe as he copes with end-stage lung disease. He had already met with one during his stay at the rehabilitation facility, where his condition improved.

He said he made an appointment with the VA clinic to see a doctor who could recommend him to a pulmonologist. They scheduled him for one four weeks out – but a couple of weeks before the appointment, he learned his doctor was leaving the VA. His appointment was rescheduled for a later date.

Taking shrapnel and a bullet

Before he was old enough to buy a beer, Chaviers traveled to a foreign country to fight in a war. He enlisted in the U.S. Navy at 17 and was stationed in Vietnam and later in the Parrot’s Peak in Cambodia as a gunner’s mate in a river patrol boat. He sat in a small niche in the boat surrounded by ammunition and survived taking shrapnel from a rocket and a few minutes later a bullet to his chest. He received a Purple Heart. He was also exposed to Agent Orange, the chemical agent used to thin out the jungles in Vietnam that eventually washed away into the rivers.

“We washed ourselves in that water and the crud would build up on our backs," he said. "We didn’t know then what we were wading through.”

Now, he speaks with a heavy rasp, his breathing labored. He is winded after crossing his living room. According to medical records, Chaviers smoked until the day he was brought to the hospital in April.

Chaviers’ sister, Gayle Boren, is his full-time caregiver. She struggles to get his medical bills paid. After several weeks of speaking to the VA claims department, Boren was told her brother’s bills were paid. She even received a letter from a Congressman’s office notifying her his staff worked with the claims department to settle her brother’s bills. But the final notices from the doctor’s offices kept coming several months after the hospital stay.

“It’s difficult to weave and bob your way through the VA medical system,” Boren said.

Boren’s great fear is that her brother will die while waiting for paperwork to be filed or an appointment to see a doctor.

‘You have to advocate for yourself’

In 2015 more than half of the 14,800 appointment visits at the Redding VA clinic were by Vietnam War-era veterans.The next highest group of visits was Persian Gulf War-era veterans with 2,300 visits.

Veteran Denise Quantz, 48, of Anderson said staff members at the clinic are responsive to her concerns, including when she was seeing a mental health therapist who had different political views than her.

“He was a helpful guy, but once he began to share his liberal views I couldn’t ignore that. I’m conservative and I wanted a doctor who would have those views,” said Quantz. The mental health staff listened and assigned a conservative doctor.

Quantz served in the U.S. Navy and was stationed in Gulfport, Mississippi, during the Gulf War. For most of her life Quantz has had anxiety. She was taking medication provided by the VA and pain pills for fibromyalgia that included neck and back pain. She also lost her leg through a bone infection about a decade ago.

Quantz said veterans need to be assertive when dealing with the VA.

“You have to advocate for yourself, strongly. I have to make sure I ask for things all the time. It’s almost a full-time job.”

Benefits process flawed

Veterans say it's also not simple to get benefit claims resolved.

Benefit applications are facilitated by the Veterans Service Office in Redding. Staff members determine which conditions or injuries were received during wartime and they build a case for those benefit claims. They search through the veteran’s history to establish a timeline and verify all the information of service.

The VSO was the subject of a Shasta County Grand Jury report in July, which said a lack of trained employees was responsible for a backlog of applications and a slow response for veterans. Veterans Service Officer Tommy Keys said the grand jury based its report on outdated information, and that currently there are no backlogs with benefits and several staffers will be trained on how to file benefit claims on behalf of veterans.

Richard Chaviers, a Vietnam Veteran, walks out of the Redding Veterans Affairs Outpatient Clinic on July 18th.  (Photo: Andreas Fuhrmann, The Record Searchlight-USA TODAY NETWORK)

“We’ve always been in touch with the county to let them know how we’re doing and what we strive to do on behalf of all the veterans,” said Keys.

But the VSO’s filing only guarantees the benefit claim is passed along to the Veterans Administration, which processes all claims. It doesn’t mean the VA will respond immediately.

Boren said her brother filed a benefit claim in July and in August was told the paperwork was not filed by the Redding VSO. Chaviers’ rent was due and other bills were piling up, along with the doctors’ bills. “I called and they apologized and said it wouldn’t happen again,” Chaviers said.

In May Boren reached out to Rep. Doug LaMalfa, R-Richvale, for help getting a response from the VA.

LaMalfa’s office cannot speak about the specifics of Chaviers’ filing, but the Congressman has made a habit of discussing wait times veterans endure. One anecdote he shares is hand-delivering a veteran’s benefit claim to an office in Washington, D.C.

Mark Spannagel, LaMalfa’s chief of staff, said if the VA is unable to see a veteran, LaMalfa’s office will push for local providers to see them. About 80 percent of the casework his office takes on is veteran related. It’s worked on more than 1,500 veterans’ cases.

It’s September and Chaviers shuffles through an envelope with his medical records and test results. He holds up a paper that details his heart condition and shakes his head, then lets out a chuckle.

“I wrote ‘unknown’ on it, because I don’t know what it means. I can’t get anyone to tell me what these tests showed,” said Chaviers.

His sister said her brother did more than was asked of him by serving three tours in Vietnam.

“The VA said they have advocates within the system who will help Richard,” Boren said. “But at this point I’m his advocate and without me, well, I feel sorry for anyone who has to do this alone and going through some type of ordeal in their life.”

December 10, 2016

Record Searchlight

By Nathan Solis

[Stanislaus County] Case dismissed 41 years ago gets civil grand juror dismissed from panel this term

Blog note: this article is a wow!

Glenn White will tell you he’s had quite a life thus far. The 62-year-old Oakdale resident retired three years ago after 13 years working in Chevron’s IT security sector.

Before that, he worked on offshore oil drilling rigs, including projects in the Santa Barbara Channel and along the Pacific Rim. Then he went back to school to earn a business degree with a minor in economics from Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo.

White loves to shoot, owns several weapons, and the Stanislaus County Sheriff’s Department issued him a concealed carry permit.

To do most or all of the aforementioned, he needed to pass extensive background checks, and did every time – until now.

After moving to Stanislaus County a couple of years ago, White decided he had plenty to learn about the county – and plenty to offer, as well. So he applied to serve on the civil grand jury, which investigates complaints about county and city government agencies, as well as special districts and school districts.

Among the qualifications to serve on the civil grand jury: “Must not have been convicted of malfeasance in office or any felony or other high crime.”

He was accepted and sworn in last summer. Then, in August, he suddenly was unaccepted. The background check performed by civil grand jury staff turned up a felony conviction listed on Livescan, a database that accesses information and fingerprints on file at courts and law enforcement agencies from local to federal levels.

It’s a felony conviction that White adamantly maintains – and has paperwork to support his claim – did not happen. What did happen?

Nineteen years old, no angel and living with a minister’s family in Ventura County in 1975, he was arrested for being in possession of a stolen motorcycle. Hence, a felony charge. But no conviction.

“The preacher’s kid stole it and told them I did it,” White said. “I had no idea it was stolen. He got convicted. The charge against me was dropped.”

When told by a civil grand jury staffer that the Ventura County incident surfaced on his Livescan and jeopardized his seat on the jury, he contacted the Ventura Superior Court and received a document that shows a box checked “No Criminal Records Found.”

“It would have been very simple if they would have just called (Ventura County officials) and they would have found out there was no such conviction,” White said.

Instead, was dismissed from the civil grand jury in a letter signed by presiding Stanislaus Superior Court Judge Marie Sovey Silveira, though his name still appears on the list of 19 jurors along with four alternates for the 2016-17 term. It states, “ ... the court has independently reviewed the facts surrounding the Juror’s qualifications and finds that the Juror’s removal is appropriate.”

Silveira told me it is extremely rare for any juror to be accepted, sworn in and then dismissed because a background check turned up a felony conviction. Convicted felons typically don’t volunteer for grand jury duty.

Prospective jurors are nominated or apply to serve on the jury for one-year terms. They are interviewed by a Superior Court judge – in White’s case, Judge Timothy Salter – and are subjected to the Livescan backgrounder that includes fingerprints and any criminal histories. Juror selections are made the last week of June.

“If something comes up that is adverse, (staff) lets them know and they have a period of time to address it,” Silveira said, speaking only in general terms and not specifically about White’s case.

Which White did. The document he received from Ventura County showing no criminal history is dated July 27. Yet he claims he could not convince staff to accept it as proof, restore him to the jury, nor get an appointment with Silveira to discuss it.

By that point, the sitting jury needed to begin its training and move forward into investigations and facility tours.

“He can apply again next year,” she said.

So how could White pass a background check to work in IT at Chevron – which works closely with the Department of Homeland Security – and also the sheriff’s background check for a concealed carry weapon permit – and not pass muster to be on the civil grand jury?

Sheriff Adam Christianson wonders the same. He said his department uses all of the available resources, including Livescan, Smart Justice and other databases that provide background information.

“I want to make sure the same individual I’m issuing a permit to has no background issues, no felony convictions,” Christianson said.

He said he is absolutely certain White met all the requirements to receive the CCW. And everything White told me about his past, Christianson said, matches up with what he told sheriff’s investigators who interviewed him during the background process.

“While I cannot disclose the specifics of his criminal history, I can tell you that everything was either dismissed or set aside pursuant to 1203.4 of the California Penal Code.” Christianson said. “What he told you is truthful. He is a lawful, legal and law-abiding citizen.”

At that same time, Christianson said, background checks are dependent upon available information. Sometimes that information is wrong, misstated or involves mistaken identity. Technology is still reliant on humans, and they make mistakes.

“One time, I denied a gun permit based upon information that (the person) had been arrested,” Christianson said. “The applicant wrote me a letter saying, ‘That wasn’t me. I’ve never been arrested.’ He was right. We had to go back and fix it in the database.”

As for White, he is ready to serve and wants to be reinstated. The felony charge was removed from everything but a Livescan document, a clerical error that resurfaced 41 years after the fact.

That case, indeed, was dismissed. White, it seems, should not have been.

December 10, 2016

The Modesto Bee

By Jeff Jardine

Ventura County Grand Jury Calls For Improvements In Public Access To Campaign Spending Reports

This year’s elections once again raised big issues about campaign spending.

A new Ventura County Grand Jury report says while information on spending on local races was available in the county, it was sometimes difficult to find.

The Grand Jury started an investigation after receiving a complaint about the difficulty of accessing records. The panel says that in many cases, the only way to access required campaign spending filings at the county level, or in the county’s ten cities is in person. The report says it most cases, you can’t find the information online.

The Grand Jury recommends that that the county and its cities move to make the information readily accessible online. It notes that Simi Valley has the most user-friendly format, and suggests that other jurisdictions adopt it to make doing campaign spending searchers easier.

December 7, 2016

KCLU – NPR for the Central Coast

By Lance Orozco

[Stanislaus County] Health board member steps down after 45 years

Former grand jury investigator joins committee

Blog note: this article suggests that there is a life after serving on the grand jury.

Ed Maring has a record of service that fellow Del Puerto Health Care District board member Dr. Steven Pittson couldn’t emulate “if I wanted to.”

“I’m too old to even start,” he said, noting Maring’s 40-plus years on the board.

Before Del Puerto staff and officials, Maring said goodbye during a high-spirited breakfast ceremony Friday. Except for four years, he has sat on the board continuously since 1971.

“You’ve been able to lead us and be there for us for all of these changes that we’ve experienced,” Cherie Swenson, human resource manager, said, addressing Maring. “And you were always the rock, you were the strength, and we could count on you.”

Betty Carlson, former director of nursing and board member, said that Maring is “such a dedicated person to good health care in this little town.”

Replacing the longtime board member is Frank Daras, who recently sat on the Stanislaus County civil grand jury during an investigation into the Del Puerto Health Care District. After meeting and interviewing Maring, Daras was motivated to run for the board.

“Ed’s really been an inspiration,” he said. “I agree with his ideas for the future. I’m younger, have a little more energy, and maybe I can take some of those ideas and move forward with them.”

Maring said Friday that during his four-plus decades of service, the district “has had a lot of adversity.”

“Probably the toughest thing was closing the hospital, because we knew it was never going to come back, at least not in our lifetime,” he said, referring to the former Del Puerto Hospital, which closed in 1998 and was destroyed by a fire earlier this year. “We were criticized for it … but if we didn’t close the hospital, we probably wouldn’t be here today, because we’d be bankrupt.”

Del Puerto Hospital opened its doors in 1950, built through the Hill-Burton Free and Reduced-Cost Health Care Act of 1946. Hill-Burton provided grants and loans for the construction of health facilities; it stopped supplying funds in 1997.

The hospital already in debt, the board at that time shut it down a year later “so that we could, as they say, rise again,” Maring said.

He then noted how proud he was of the new Del Puerto Health Center building, which opened in 2012 and hosted his goodbye ceremony, calling it a “beautiful facility.”

“There’s all these hospital districts and health care districts that went out of business … but after we got financially where we were strong enough, we opened this facility, and I think it’s wonderful.”

Maring said that he was comfortable with Daras as his successor, commending his efforts on the civil grand jury. Though offering a number of recommendations, the grand jury’s report, released in June, found that the district delivers “good quality” health care and ambulance services and is “effectively managed.”

Daras took the oath of office Friday alongside Anne Ielmini Stokman, who won her third term. Both ran unopposed in the 2016 election and were appointed to the board.

The newcomer said he was excited to get to work with the district.

“I’m really looking forward to it,” Daras said, complementing Del Puerto staff. “Like we said in the grand jury (report), they do a great job providing health care for this whole region – phenomenal job.”

December 7, 2016

Patterson Irrigator

[Alameda County] Oakland Fire Department’s troubled building inspection effort

Blog note: this article references a 2014 grand jury report in the fire department’s inspections.

Two years before the deadly Ghost Ship warehouse fire, the Alameda County civil grand jury sounded the alarm about deficiencies in the Oakland Fire Department’s inspection bureau — saying the city wasn’t even trying to check a third of the 12,000 commercial properties that were supposed to be examined every year.

Despite assurances from Fire Department brass that they would address the problem, the city continues to have fewer inspectors on the streets than its website reports, interviews and public records indicate — leaving most buildings to be checked by rank-and-file firefighters on a catch-as-catch-can basis.

An Alameda County civil grand jury report found in 2014 that Oakland’s fire inspection efforts were lacking. Some fear that not much has changed since then.

Under California law, cities are required to enforce building standards that the state has adopted. That means inspecting businesses and large residential structures for fire hazards and other safety dangers — including live-work warehouses like the one that burned Friday in Oakland, killing 36 people.

But according to records that the Oakland Fire Department submitted to the civil grand jury for the watchdog panel’s 2014 report, fire inspectors were being sent to only 8,000 buildings a year — and couldn’t gain access to 2,000 of them.

The remaining buildings — 4,000 in all — were going unchecked because of what the Fire Department called competing priorities.

The upshot, according to the grand jury: The Fire Department was giving people “the false impression that all commercial businesses are inspected annually.”

One big problem, the grand jury concluded, was that Oakland’s funding source for the $1 million-a-year inspection program was being pinched. City fees assessed to commercial operations were supposed to help pay for it, but budget cuts left City Hall unable to collect all the money. The city turned the job over to the Fire Department, which didn’t have the capacity to handle it, the grand jury said.

Grand jury members are barred from speaking individually about an investigation, but one source who had a hand in the report told us that Fire Department officials “were quite concerned” about the missed inspections. Nonetheless, the source said, they chose to not bolster their fee-collecting efforts because that might divert money needed to retain firefighters.

“They didn’t seem to understand their mission — their mission seemed to be to keep (firefighters’) jobs,” the source said.

One of the big questions after Friday night’s disaster, which happened during an electronic music show at the live-work warehouse at 31st Avenue and International Boulevard, was when fire inspectors last checked the place. The Ghost Ship operation had been there since at least 2013.

It’s a question Oakland officials have yet to answer. The city has promised to release inspection records from the property, but hadn’t done so as of Tuesday.

Fire Chief Teresa Deloach Reed did not respond this week to our requests for comment on how her department reacted to the grand jury report. Neither did Mayor Libby Schaaf, who was on the City Council when the jury issued its findings.

However, in an 11-page response to the grand jury at the time, Deloach Reed acknowledged that many of its findings were accurate and that the Fire Department was “working diligently” to correct the problems — including improving its revenue collections and filling jobs that had been frozen or eliminated because of budget cuts.

Other city officials, however, say they doubt the Fire Department is doing all the inspections it’s supposed to do every year.

“We don’t have the personnel to do that,” said City Councilman Noel Gallo, whose district includes the Ghost Ship building.

Gallo agreed with the grand jury’s finding on why the department fell behind on routine inspections.

“They went through the budget cuts years ago, and many were laid off,” in both the fire and building inspection departments, Gallo said.

The Fire Department’s website says the agency has seven fire-code inspectors and an equal number of “vegetation management” inspectors, who specialize in making sure hillside neighborhoods have defensible spaces. But sources tell us the actual number of inspectors on the street may be about half that number — a problem some inside the Fire Department say was exacerbated by the defeat of a 2013 ballot measure to extend a city tax meant to reduce the threat of wildfires.

Payroll data from the state controller show that Oakland had nine fire inspectors in 2015 and one vegetation management supervisor. But four of the inspectors made less than $40,000 in base salary — one was under $18,000 — indicating that they may not have been on the job full-time.

“We have always pointed out the need for additional, full-time, dedicated fire prevention inspectors,” said Daniel Robertson, head of the Oakland Firefighters Union.

Don’t look to Sacramento for help. Scott McLean, a spokesman for the California Fire Marshal’s Office, said the state does not keep tabs on local inspection rates.

“It’s all done in-house. The city or county are responsible for their own inspections,” McLean said.

Oakland officials have said the city opened a blight investigation into the Ghost Ship last month, but that’s a different assignment from the one given to fire inspectors.

The safety checklist that fire inspectors are tasked with is a long one. Buildings are supposed to have unobstructed and marked entry and exit points, working fire sprinklers, functioning smoke alarms and fire extinguishers, and proper electrical wiring. Combustibles must be safely stored.

Because of Oakland’s shortage of fire inspectors, neighborhood engine companies — like Engine 13 at 1225 Derby Ave., just around the corner from the Ghost Ship — now handle many inspections in between calls for fire and medical runs, according to department sources.

However, firefighters say the local stations generally steer clear of politically sensitive places like the arts-centered Ghost Ship — leaving them to be handled by inspectors in the overworked fire prevention bureau.

As one station house firefighter, who wasn’t authorized to speak for the record, told us, “If the owner of an illegally occupied building tells us to our face that nobody is sleeping there, all we can do is refer it up (the command chain) or come back and try and catch them in the act.”

No easy feat for crews making 20 or more emergency runs in a 24-hour shift.

As for filling the budget hole so the city can pay for more inspectors? Gallo said one possibility will be to tap licensing fees for newly legalized marijuana operations.

“That is going to generate billions of dollars, I’m told,” Gallo said.

December 6, 2016

San Francisco Chronicle

By Matier & Ross

[San Diego County] El Cajon has paid nothing in police excessive force and civil-rights claims over past five years

Blog note: this article references city rejection of a grand jury report recommendation.

The city of El Cajon, thrust into the national spotlight in September when police shot and killed Alfred Olango, an unarmed black man, has had a spotless record the past five years defending its police over claims of excessive force or civil-rights violations.

A review of the legal claims filed against the Police Department during that time shows the city has not paid out any money to claimants or plaintiffs.

The largest expense has come in legal costs to the city for handling the claims. That totals $438,836.

The only significant police-related payout in recent years was made to one of the department’s own employees. Officer Christine Greer settled a sexual harassment lawsuit filed against Sgt. Richard Gonsalves for $90,000 last year.

She said Gonsalves had sent her lewd photos and texts and made unwanted advances toward her. Gonsalves is also the officer who fatally shot Olango in the parking lot of a taco shop the afternoon of Sept. 27.

Greer has since filed a second lawsuit alleging the department retaliated against her for her previous suit.

The lack of payments in excessive force and civil-rights claims echoes other data the city reported earlier this year when it rejected a call by the San Diego County civil grand jury to set up a citizens review board for police conduct.

At the time, the city said it had received just one formal complaint in 2015 out of 93,000 contacts with citizens, two the year before and eight in 2013. It said the low numbers of complaints showed there were good relations between the police and community.

Mayor Bill Wells said the claims payout data correlates to the complaints data.

“To keep the number of complaints at that level and the lawsuits at this level is indicative of the fact our police officers are trying and succeeding in staying in bounds and treating people with respect,” Wells said.

The city provided a list of all claims filed against the Police Department since 2011 in response to a Public Records Act request filed by The San Diego Union-Tribune. The list included claims for excessive force as well as more routine matters, such as traffic collisions.

The newspaper then asked for copies of 23 of those claims that alleged some kind of police misconduct involving excessive force, assault and brutality, and the amount of money paid out, as well as information on the Greer claims.

Formal legal claims are the first step that must be taken before filing a lawsuit against a government agency. Governments have 45 days to accept and pay a claim or reject it.

After that, the person making the claim has the option to file a civil lawsuit in court. Only seven of the claims the Union-Tribune reviewed ended up in state or federal courts.

The city prevailed in four of them, either winning dismissals or in one case a jury verdict, while three remain active.

That verdict came in a lawsuit filed by Raymond Goodlow. Officer Robert Bonilla shot Goodlow on the morning of Jan.18, 2013, in a used car lot on East Main Street. The officer had seen him riding a bike on the sidewalk, which is against the law in El Cajon, and when he tried to stop him Goodlow rode his bike into the lot.

There, stories diverge: Goodlow said after hearing a single command to get on the ground he was shot. Bonilla said Goodlow did not comply with commands to show his hands, cursed at the officer and seemed to be pulling something from his waistband. 

After a four-day trial in federal court in 2015, the jury cleared Bonilla of using excessive force.

Other claims were less dramatic. One woman said she was roughed up by police when she was arrested Christmas Day in 2013, but after the city denied her claim she did not follow up. Another man said he was injured when he was being taken in a city police car to the Sheriff’s Department  in 2012.

Among the active cases, Muayed Salih sued after he said police fired on him during an arrest on Sept. 1, 2012. When police encountered him, he was holding a tire iron, according to the lawsuit in San Diego Superior Court.

Lawyer Elliott Kanter said it can be difficult to win excessive force suits against police, because often the case comes down to one person’s word against the officer’s. Kanter represents a man in a current lawsuit who contends he was wrongly arrested and assaulted by police during an incident at an Applebee’s on Fletcher Parkway on Nov. 22, 2105.

“You’ve got to have independent witnesses, because the police officer is going to say certain things and you want your own independent witnesses,” Kanter said about the challenges for these cases.

Larger departments than El Cajon’s, which has 120 sworn officers, will pay settlements in excessive force cases more frequently. For example, San Diego in June paid $75,000 to a couple who said they were roughed up during an arrest in November 2012.

In July 2015, the Sheriff’s Department paid $1 million to the family of a Vista man with Down syndrome who was hit with a baton and pepper sprayed by a deputy who thought he was resisting arrest. In reality, the man was frightened and confused because he could not understand the deputy’s commands to him.

For El Cajon civil-rights advocate Estel De Los Rios, the city’s successful track record in excessive force claims should not be seen as a reason to reject citizen oversight of the department.

She has been an advocate for forming a review board, both before and after the Olango shooting.

“It shows to me we still need a civilian review board,” De Los Rios said. “I would say to Mayor Wells, if this shows there is a good relationship with the community, then let’s put it into practice with the board.”

On Tuesday, Olango’s father called for a federal investigation into his son’s death. Olango’s family have filed two claims against the city over his death, and the District Attorney’s Office has not yet finished its review of whether the shooting was justified.

Olango was killed when police responded to reports and a 911 call from his sister that he was acting erratically. As Gonsalves approached, Olango took what police described as a "shooting stance" and clasped a silver object with both of his hands. Gonsalves opened fire.

Olango, 38, had been holding a vaping device with a silver cylinder, police later said.

It was the 12th shooting by El Cajon police in the past 10 years, which is the highest per capita rate of shootings by any local police agency in the county, according to an analysis of shooting data by the Union-Tribune.

December 3, 2016

The San Diego Union-Tribune

By Greg Moran

[Kern County] Grand Jury report praises Teen Court, makes no recs for city

Ridgecrest feels neglected by Kern County, but the city's Teen Court has an exemplary approach to combating youthful criminal activity. Overall the city appeared to get a clean bill of health, with no recommendations for improvement.

This is the upshot from the Kern County Grand Jury report on the city of Ridgecrest, based on an Oct. 4 visit.

Under the comments section, the report notes that “[d]ue to their location in the extreme northeast corner of Kern County, the City feels somewhat neglected by County Government.”

“I think there may be some people who do feel neglected by Kern County and I think most of it comes back to the funding issues,” Mayor Peggy Breeden said Thursday. “Issues with the jail and those kind of things. We are working on it, that is the biggest part. But we have to have action with the talk.”

Breeden said that the issue is not limited to Ridgecrest, given Kern County's well-known budget challenges. “I can't imagine anyone in Kern County saying 'we're getting everything we want.'

“I don't think that we [Ridgecrest] are that unique. That's not defending the county, but we have to understand the limitations and find ways of fulfilling each other's needs.”

Another comment in the report is more upbeat, stating that “[t]he city of Ridgecrest is a leader in efforts to combat youth criminal activity. Other cities should emulate their efforts using by using a similar approach.”

The commendation is based on findings of the Grand Jury regarding the Teen Court. The report summarizes the role of Teen Court as follows: It is funded by the city and staffed by the city and by volunteers. Elementary school and middle school aged youth are held accountable for misdemeanor offenses. Youth are given the opportunity to complete certain steps to avoid being charged. If they successfully pay a fine for any destruction, perform community service and sit as a juror on a similar case they can avoid being charged for their offenses. “Teen Court has proven to be extremely successful in addressing juvenile crime,” according to the report.

Ridgecrest Police Chief Ron Strand attributes the success of the Teen Court program to Theresa Cook, who runs the program, as well as the many volunteers who make the program work. Strand listed volunteer judges, PACT volunteers, reserve officers and explorers as all contributing to the effort. Also critical to the program’s success, according to Strand, is the School Resource Officer Program. This is “run on a day to day basis by Officer [Elizabeth] Franco and Officer [Eddie] Hamilton. It is truly their work that makes this whole juvenile justice crime prevention effort work,” he said.

City Background

The report gives historical background for the city. Ridgecrest was incorporated in 1963, largely to support the mission of the Navy. The Naval Air Weapons Station China Lake/Naval Air Warfare Center Weapons Division continues to be the major employer for city residents.

Ridgecrest is the only incorporated community in the Indian Wells Valley and has a population of roughly 28,348.

The city is served by a wastewater treatment plant constructed by the Navy and operated and maintained by the city. The facility also provides service to NAWS. According to the report, the city contributes 70 percent of the influent processed by the facility and the Navy contributes 30 percent.

The report also mentions that the city's Parks and Recreation Department is planning to implement a smart irrigation system to conserve water, presumably early next year.

According to the report, the Ridgecrest Police Department has 32 full-time officers and 51 staff members total. RPD has a 24-hour dispatch center and operates the local animal control shelter.

The Grand Jury committee was informed on the date of their visit about the closure of the Kern County Sheriff's Jail Facility, according to the report. “With the closing of the Kern County Sheriff's Jail in Ridgecrest, all felony arrestees are now transported to the Mojave Substation and/or the Central Receiving Facility in Bakersfield,” according to the report.

The report also includes the finding that “[w]ith approval of the City Council, monies can be loaned from the Waste Water Fund to other City entities.” It also notes the history of .75 percent sales tax Measure L. The final finding is that the Comprehensive Annual Financial Report for fiscal year ending June 30, 2015 passed an audit with an independent auditing firm.

Under the section titled “RECOMMENDATIONS” the report states “None.”

December 2, 2016

The Siskiyou Daily News

By Jessica Weston

[Placer County] Be it homeless, student breathalyzers or cracked courthouse plaster: Grand jury gets answers

Want to know about how Del Oro High School reacted to a Placer County grand jury’s take on how it’s handling using breathalyzers to check for alcohol use at school dances? Or the Placer County health administrator’s take on grand jury criticism of how the growth of the homeless population is being handled? How about the grand jury’s recommendation for the Sheriff’s Office to repair the plaster that was exposed on the bottom right of the doorjamb entering the Placer County Courthouse in Auburn? Last summer’s grand jury report voiced plenty of concerns for local government to address. Government responses to those issues are now out in a new compendium released this past week and now available for viewing. Once the grand jury makes their reports in July, government agencies are required to respond, stating any objections or detailing what they have done to address juror recommendations. The responses filtered in to the grand jury through the late summer and early fall and have been assembled for online perusal. Sheriff Ed Bonner, for instance, responded to the jury’s recommendation on the plaster repair. In his mid-August response, the sheriff said that the Judicial Council overseeing courthouse maintenance had authorized a work order for the repair. Jeff Brown, director of Placer County Health and Human Services, provided one of the county responses to concerns about homeless growth from the jury. A key grand jury recommendations was for the county continue to work with residents about the issues that accompany the homeless. Brown’s response, filed in late August, was that Placer County will remain committed to solicit input into the operation of existing homeless service programs while planning for new programs. The county would also hold quarterly meetings during the fiscal year in North Auburn to continue to share information and gather neighborhood feedback regarding the Right Hand Auburn temporary homeless shelter at the Placer county Government Center, he said. The county would also be soliciting input from key stakeholders and local residents as part of its ongoing planning process to expand housing opportunities and safety-net services, he said. On the matter of breathalyzer tests at school dances, Placer Union High School District Superintendent George Sziraki said that the district had implemented grand jury-recommended policies addressing use of alcohol detection devices.

The response attached a copy of the district’s new policies related to testing, indicating that training to principals, assistant principals and district staff on implementing the alcohol testing would be provided. The program is voluntary, with parental consent required, but requires all students attending Del Oro dances to be tested with a breathalyzer before admission.

Reports and responses are published and available for viewing at placergrandjury.org. Hardcopies can be requested by contacting the grand jury at grandjury@placer.ca.gov. Requests should include a contact name, title, agency name, department name and complete mailing address.

December 1, 2016

Auburn Journal

By Gus Thomson

[Kern County] Grand Jury gives closer look at county's Central Receiving Facility

The closure in late June of the Kern County jail facility in Ridgecrest has focused the public's attention on challenges facing local law enforcement.

According to Ridgecrest Police Chief Ron Strand, RPD books roughly 1200 detainees a year--based on data from the past three years. Strand said 25% of these have historically been transported to the Kern County Sheriff's Office Central Receiving Facility in Bakersfield. The rest were historically booked either in Ridgecrest or Mojave.

Strand said it is too soon to tell exactly how the recent jail closure will ultimately affect these statistics going forward.

Strand said currently some detainees are held in a holding cell in Ridgecrest and some are cited and released. The remainder are transported to Mojave or the CRF, usually by the new Community Service Officers.

A recent report gives some insight into the Central Receiving Facility many of these detainees are being booked into. The Law and Justice Committee of the 2016-2017 Kern County Grand Jury paid the facility a visit on Aug. 15 to perform an annual inspection. The resulting report gives some statistics and history on the facility as well as making a number of recommendations. According to the report, CRF needs to work on its daily housekeeping issues, possibly clean up their food handling practices, re-key locks add and add signage to an unsecured basement entrance.

History and statistics

The four-story building on Truxtun Avenue in Bakersfield opened for operations in 1958. It was closed from 1993 to 1998 and operations were transferred to the facility at Lerdo. The CRF reopened in 1998 as the Inmate Reception Center for booking, processing and housing inmates in Kern County.

The CRF holds a maximum capacity of 292 male and female inmates. On the inspection date, it held 73 male and 22 female inmates. According to the report, the average cost per inmate (excluding medical costs) is $85.17 a day or approximately $31,087.05 a year.

The facility houses no federal inmates.

According to the report, four inmates escaped in the four month period between Apr. 15 and Aug. 15, and all four were returned to custody. The details of the escapes were as follows: one inmate escaped from a Kern County courtroom, one escaped from Kern Medical while under guard, one escaped from Kern Medical wearing an ankle monitor and one inmate escaped by hiding underneath an inmate transportation bus.

The CRF provides onsite and offsite medical staff 24/7 and has two mental health staff members at the facility on a daily basis. The facility has an Automated External Defibrillator available for medical emergencies.

Inmates receive three meals a day, prepared and processed at the Lerdo Facility then transported to CRF.

The facility has 128 cameras. Designated CRF deputies wear Taser Axon Body Worn Cameras. According to the report, a pilot program was started on March 12, 2015 which equipped 10 deputies with BWCs and “currently the BWC video recordings are kept indefinitely and have unlimited storage capacity.”

The report quotes the Kern County Sheriff's Office as saying they are “committed to zero-tolerance for any form of sexual abuse and sexual harassment. The KCSO Detention Bureau is committed to enforcing the standards set forth by the Prison Rape Elimination Act (PREA). The KCSO conducts a thorough PREA intake screening of each inmate received at the jail.”

Health and safety issues and recommendations

The Central Receiving Facility, Kern County's main book facility, needs to work on their daily housekeeping issues according to the report. Also a priority should be re-keying locks to reduce the number of required keys from 38 to five and adding signage to an unsecured basement entrance.

Other recommendations included closely monitoring general maintenance and facility repairs, and ensuring the process for food storage and handling complies with the California Code of Regulations.

The committee reported observing several health and safety issues during the facility inspection. Three of the issues identified related to food.

“Several bags containing food items for inmates were sitting on the floor. These items required refrigeration. CRF staff was unable to confirm the length of time these sandwiches, which contained meat and cheese, had been sitting out. These food items were immediately discarded,” according to the report. The report also noted a freezer log entry posted a day ahead of time and the fact that “several areas were littered with trash and food items.”

Other health and safety issues observed at the CRF, according to the report included leaky faucets, trash in a water fountain, broken furniture and tile, and altered or missing drainage grate covers. The report also notes “[a] shower head in the male dress-out room had a plastic bag over the nozzle. According to Staff, this was done to direct the water flow when filling buckets. This shower is operable for inmate use, as needed.” The report also noted that a shower on Deck B “was littered with trash.”

The first recommendation listed is to reduce the number of keys required by the CRF. According to the report, the facility currently has 109 locks that require 38 keys to access the jail doors. The goal is to reduce the number of keys needed to five.

“This project should be elevated and given priority, it has been an ongoing issue and noted in prior Grand Jury Reports since 2012-2103,” according to the report.

December 1, 2016

Gridley Herald

By Jessica Weston

San Mateo County police departments moving forward with body cameras

As police departments across San Mateo County prepare plans for body cameras, City of San Mateo police said in early November the department could begin fully using them by September 2017.

Five police departments in the county already have body cameras. The San Mateo County Civil Grand Jury recommended in May that the remaining 11, as well as the sheriff’s department, develop an implementation plan by Nov. 30. The grand jury set a target date of Oct. 31, 2017, for agencies to actually be using the cameras.

San Mateo, Brisbane, Colma, East Palo Alto, Pacifica and South San Francisco all told the grand jury this summer that they were committed to getting cameras in 2017 and would release their plans by the end of this month.

Civil grand juries investigate and report on local government in each California county. Agencies are not required to follow grand jury recommendations.

The grand jury report came as law enforcement agencies nationwide have faced growing pressure to use body cameras to increase transparency, especially in officer-involved shootings.

San Mateo County agencies are finding that it’s not as simple as buying the cameras. There are budget constraints to navigate and potentially new personnel to hire. And crafting comprehensive policy involves considering privacy concerns and public records laws.

“There is the equipment, which seems like it’s the most important right up front to everyone. But in fact, it’s probably the easiest thing,” San Mateo Police Captain Dave Norris said, adding that the other aspects are more complicated. “That’s when I think a lot more thought and decision-making have to come in.”

San Mateo Chief of Police Susan Manheimer told the City Council Nov. 7 that her department plans to test body cameras for three months starting in December. After selecting a camera company, the department will give the council a final budget projection.

Manheimer estimated equipment and data storage will cost $130,000 to $260,000 per year. She said there will likely be additional infrastructure and staffing costs.

The San Mateo City Council expressed support, although several members voiced concerns about the cost. Deputy Mayor David Lim and Council Member Rick Bonilla requested that the police department research cost-sharing with other agencies.

Norris said the department was considering body cameras even before the grand jury report came out. The city has a body camera implementation committee, which includes representatives from several sections of the police department, the City Attorney’s office and the District Attorney’s office.

Beyond the costs, the committee is considering policy on how cameras are used and what happens to the footage. Typically, the cameras don’t run constantly — officers turn them on when they make contact with a member of the public. That still generates an unwieldy amount of video, which has to be stored on a local server or in a cloud-based system.

For the five departments currently using cameras, the minimum period of time they keep most video ranges from six months (Foster City) to two-and-a-half years (Menlo Park). Departments generally store video from serious incidents longer.

Public access to body camera footage tends to be murky.

“There’s nothing that’s written in black and white that says, ‘This is what you’re supposed to take in, and this is what you’re supposed to put out,’” Norris said.

“And so each agency is, I think, doing it a little bit differently,’’ he added.

In Belmont, Hillsborough and Foster City, media can view footage “with permission” of the chief or another department official, according to policy documents included in the grand jury report.

Menlo Park specifies that videos “that unreasonably violate a person’s privacy or sense of dignity” will only be publicly released if required by law or court order.

As San Mateo develops its release policy, it is consulting recommendations published by national and international police organizations, Norris said.

Norris said privacy considerations include the public’s privacy and officers’ privacy.

“At this point we don’t even know if any of it is going to be constituting public records because you have some major agencies out there that have large deployments of body-worn video and who are not providing any video to the media or anyone else,” Norris said. But he added that the San Mateo Police Department values transparency. “And I think that also there is sometimes a public need for release of video. We’ll have to address that.”

Despite the complicated implementation process and the privacy issues, Norris said most of the department welcomes the addition of body cameras.

“The temperature nationwide has grown increasingly to the point where it’s a good thing for officers to have accountability tools at their disposal,” he said. “We see it as more a positive than a negative.”

This story originally appeared on Peninsula Press, a project of the Stanford Journalism Program.

November 28, 2016

SFGate

By Courtney Lewis, Peninsula Press