Let’s see, what else happened this week? Oh, looks like the city of Santa Clara and the San Francisco 49ers owners finally settled their long-running squabble over the team’s management of the city-owned and -financed but team-funded (sorta, more or less, mostly) stadium. That can probably wait for the Friday roundup, let’s see if there any especially interesting details—
That’s when Becker yelled “F— you!” at Watanabe and made an obscene gesture, according to both Gillmor and Watanabe. Gillmor remained in the room after Watanabe left.
Um.
“I called the police because it was obvious he was having huge anger issues. I’m always very careful if it appears anyone is getting out of control. But he was so emotional and I wanted to protect myself.”
Um.
Okay, some background: Gillmor is Lisa Gillmor, Santa Clara’s mayor, who has been fighting with the 49ers owners over the stadium lease terms for years. Becker is Anthony Becker, who was elected in 2020 along with two other councilmembers with the financial backing of 49ers owner Jed York and who is running for mayor this fall against Gillmor. Watanabe is Kathy Watanabe, who along with Gillmor tried to get the settlement discussed in open session, only to see that vote fail, leading to a closed session — which is where the cursing, flipping the bird, and police-calling all happened.
The settlement offer is worth $13 million, according to team execs, but that includes only $1.35 million in actual cash, according to a previous Chronicle report, with the rest including theoretical benefits, including some funds the city already controls, including $1.3 million shifted from the stadium authority’s discretionary funds to general and operating funds, and the 49ers waiving accrued interest they were demanding, leading Thomas Shanks, former executive director of Santa Clara University’s Markkula Center for Applied Ethics, to call it “funny money.”
Topping it all off, it’s not clear whether the council actually approved the settlement, with interim city attorney Steven Ngo first saying nothing had been agreed on, then later saying an agreement had been reached. The Chronicle, however, notes that if a vote was taken, it must have been in closed session while Gillmor and Watanabe were both out of the room, and councilmember Raj Chahal also absent, leaving only four of seven councilmembers there.
Gillmor already wants to reconsider the deal, or at least have it explained in open session so everyone can see what happened while she was out of the room calling the police on one of her fellow lawmakers:
“If this settlement is indeed final, I want the staff to put it on the agenda for next City Council meeting, so we can let the public know exactly what this council accepted and bring some transparency. … I’m very concerned they didn’t report the action out of closed session. There’s been no explanation, and it lends to a lot more suspicions of a back-room deal.”
Gillmor is also considering filing a police report on Becker, and definitely plans to file a complaint with the city’s human resources department. This fall’s Santa Clara mayoral debates are going to be really interesting, let’s just leave it at that.
So…. a point of order… a valid vote could not have been taken while several members of the quorum required for that vote were out of the room.
As a non California resident I cannot accurately describe what administrative law is in that jurisdiction… but I do know that in many/most jurisdictions, any party having business to be transacted before a regulatory or legislative body (which in this case would include both the people of Santa Clara/California AND the 49ers representatives) has the right to have their petition/case adjudicated and administered by persons who have been present for the ENTIRE proceedings and have heard all evidence/submissions presented. Any member of a tribunal, panel or elected body in an official proceedings has to know this… that is why even bathroom breaks for voting members and administrative staff require a recess.
If a vote was taken while a member or members of the voting quorum were out of the room for any reason, that vote is invalid. Again, in many jurisdictions this would be true even if the votes that carried (or rejected) the motion in place were sufficient to defeat the votes of those out of the room.
Anyone who was in charge/notionally in charge of this meeting should not have allowed a vote to take place while members of the voting body were out of the room. In fact, no official business should have been transacted while any portion of the voting body was out of the room…. the meeting should have been adjourned until such time as all members were present and seated/actually paying attention (though the latter is hard to prove).
Democracy appears to have a taken another hit… as have parliamentary rules, rules of order in general and much of the glue that is supposed to hold our societies together.
Are we supposed to be just satisfied that no elected official solicited million dollar re-election contribution during the proceedings????
The way that this meeting was run sounds like the way government/bureaucracy in general is functioning (or not) just about everywhere these days. Your point is spot on!