Two Stockton City Council members who voted in favor of holding a special meeting Thursday to examine claims of possible financial wrongdoing by the former interim city manager didn’t show up — meaning the meeting couldn’t proceed for lack of a quorum.
At its regular meeting Tuesday, City Council had voted to hold Thursday’s special session to discuss claims by Vice Mayor Jason Lee that former interim City Manager Steve Colangelo promised a nonprofit about $824,000 without council approval.
The claims underlying Lee’s request for a special session date back to last week, when the vice mayor shared a letter with the media apparently from Colangelo and bearing his signature. The letter stated that the city was committing the money to the nonprofit Service First of Northern California to bolster the organization’s application for more than $8 million in state grant money.
In a press release, Lee claimed Mayor Christina Fugazi was aware of the letter and that the nonprofit’s leader had donated to the Fugazi’s campaign, prompting a response from the mayor that she’d returned the donation.
Colangelo didn’t immediately respond an email seeking comment on the claims.
On Tuesday, Lee, Councilmembers Michael Blower, Mario Enriquez, Michele Padilla and Mariela Ponce had voted “yes” to a meeting at 5 p.m. Thursday to discuss the issue. Fugazi and Councilmember Brando Villapudua voted “no,” with Fugazi saying she couldn’t make it.
But come Thursday, Padilla, Ponce and Villapudua didn’t show up.
Lee led the session, kicking it off at 5:15 p.m. But at roll call, four councilmember seats were still empty. “At this time, we do not have a quorum,” Stockton City Clerk Katherine Roland said.
Under City Council rules, no meeting can happen without a quorum — a majority of the council’s members — present. There would have needed to be at least four of the seven members present to proceed.
The three councilmembers in attendance Thursday rescheduled the meeting for next Wednesday.
In a statement to Stocktonia about the reason for her absence, Fugazi said she had a prior engagement.
The mayor added, “It is not my intention nor desire to participate in the Vice Mayor’s constant attempt to take the focus off of bettering the life of our residents, reducing crime, homelessness, and bringing more resources to our city to join in his attempt to turn our city into his reality show.”
Ponce told Stocktonia she was at work, and would call back later. Padilla and Villapudua didn’t immediately return calls for comment Thursday evening.
Councilmember Mario Enríquez attended the meeting but wasn’t available for comment afterwards and also didn’t immediately return a call following the meeting.
After the brief session, Blower and Lee both said they weren’t notified in advance that so many colleagues would be absent.
“It’s a waste of my time, wasting the public’s time,” Blower said. “The rest of the council owes it to the public … so the fact that we had to just not hold a meeting, and people came, to me just seems ridiculous.”
“We all voted in public” to have the meeting, Lee said. “We all knew it was today. We knew the time. The public knew, everybody here remembered … but they didn’t show up.”
When asked if his colleagues’ non-attendance would derail exploration of the claims against Colangelo, the vice mayor said, “If I had to bet, I think there is a desired effort to prevent this conversation from happening. The only problem with that is, that I’m not going anywhere and the issues aren’t going anywhere.”