A grand jury has charged that three Hughson City Council members violated the Brown Act and other rules and ordinances and recommended that they be removed from office. -DB
Three Hughson City Council members received not so glad tidings on Tuesday when the Civil Grand Jury handed down a recommendation that they be removed from office.
The three council members are not named in the grand jury recommendation and referred to as Councilman A, B, and C but descriptions of each council member make their identities obvious. Thom Crowder is described as Councilman A, being appointed in January to fill the vacant position by the mayor and owning an ambulance service. Doug Humphreys, who is a former director of the Hughson Fire Protection District, is described as Councilman B. Ben Manley, who was elected in November 2008 and is a former member of the Hughson Planning Commission, is described as Councilman C.
According to the grand jury report, public documents such as e-mails, newspaper articles, and minutes of the public Hughson City Council meetings, along with the recorded conversation between Crowder and Humphreys at the Jan. 12 meeting were explored. The grand jury also interviewed city staff, the mayor and the city council members during their investigation between August and November.
They concluded that Crowder, Humphreys and Manley were in violation of the Brown Act, Fair Political Practices and Regulations and the Hughson Municipal Code.
“I know the Brown Act inside and out,” Crowder said. “I wouldn’t do anything to violate that. This is absurd and untrue. I don’t agree with the Civil Grand Jury nor will I change the way I do business.”
“I believe the three councilmembers — Ben Manley, Doug Humphreys, and Thom Crowder — discussed this special meeting previously behind closed doors to put Whiteside on the council,” said Candice Steelman at the Nov. 9 meeting. “That is a violation of the Brown Act.”
The grand jury stated in their report that the Brown Act was violated through numerous e-mails exchanged between the three council members, the city manager, the mayor and the city attorney.
Evidence of this violation was found in one of the e-mails sent from Manley to all city council members on Nov. 16 expressing his opinion on making plans for hiring a new city manager and sharing a complaint about the mayor.
A violation of the FPPC was found through an e-mail from Crowder to a competing ambulance company on Oct. 6 requesting a position with them because of “my years of experience in Stanislaus County . . . the Board of Supervisors will be looking for options, put to them the EMSC, and I have tremendous influence with the Board of Supervisors, and could lend my name as an employee of your company,” stated in the Civil Grand Jury Case No. 010-04 report.
The Hughson Municipal Code violations were found through the recording of Crowder and Humphreys at the Jan. 12 meeting. The code that was violated was Title 2, Administration and Personnel, Section 2.08.140, which states that it is the duty of the city manager to investigate matters involving city administration.
The recording at the Jan. 12 meeting has Crowder and Humphreys expressing their criticism of the city clerk and city engineer along with referring to Manley as he has already discussed plans for the city.
“I respectfully disagree with the Civil Grand Jury,” Crowder said. “That is an opinion, they can’t prove it. They have no facts. It is only an assumption.”
The Civil Grand Jury recommends Crowder, Manley and Humphreys to step down from their position on the Hughson City Council, be removed by the Attorney General of the State of California or hold a recall election by the citizens of Hughson.
Copyright 2009 The Turlock Journal, CA.