A new San Joaquin County Civil Grand Jury report says Stockton City Council’s public infighting, leadership instability and failure to fully address past oversight reports have weakened city governance and distracted officials from serving residents.
The civil grand jury’s 2025-26 annual report, released this week, includes an investigation into Stockton’s City Council titled “Governance in Turmoil.” The report describes a pattern of dysfunction at City Hall, not just one isolated issue or dispute.
The findings follow a turbulent year marked by leadership changes, public clashes among councilmembers and repeated disputes between Mayor Christina Fugazi and Vice Mayor Jason Lee, both on and off the dais.The civil grand jury is a panel of residents that reconvenes with new members yearly to investigate local government and reports on misconduct, inefficiency or mismanagement.
This most recent investigation into Stockton City Hall first focused on complaints regarding whether councilmembers violated the Brown Act — California’s open-meeting law — or shared confidential city information. But the civil grand jury said it later found broader problems, including council infighting, money concerns, low staff morale, ethics issues and the city’s failure to fully address past recommendations.
The grand jury did not single out individual councilmembers in its findings, instead directing its criticism at the City Council as a whole. But Stockton residents have watched many of the tensions described in the report unfold publicly over the past year.
The new report builds on continued civil grand jury scrutiny in recent years of Stockton City Hall.
In 2024, the civil grand jury released “City of Stockton: Crisis in Government,” a report that similarly examined public meeting violations, alleged leaks from closed sessions and complaints about a hostile and ineffective work environment inside Stockton city government, making nearly a dozen recommendations for change.
A year later, the civil grand jury found Stockton had adequately addressed five of its previous 11 recommendations, but said six still needed more follow-up. This year’s report says the council’s most recent response last September to the civil grand jury’s previous report addressed only three of those six outstanding recommendations.
The most recent round of controversies at Stockton City Hall escalated in January of last year, after then-City Manager Harry Black abruptly left the city on threat of termination by the new City Council following a shift on the board’s dynamics as a result of the 2024 election. His departure left Stockton without a permanent city manager for much of the year and set off disputes over how the city should be run.
The council soon appointed Steve Colangelo as interim city manager in a controversial 4-3 vote, despite concerns from the community and some councilmembers that he wasn’t qualified for the job, which exacerbated tensions on the council and set off a string of controversies related to Colangelo’s leadership. A longtime events manager, Colangelo had never worked in city management and his resume did not boast education typically required for city manager candidates. It was later revealed through a Stocktinia investigation that Colangelo used public money to hire another longtime city manager from Lathrop as a consultant to help him do his job.
Stockton’s current city manager, Johnny Ford, was appointed to the position permanently to the position November, ending months of uncertainty over who would lead City Hall.
The civil grand jury said the absence of a permanent full-time city manager contributed to a lack of checks and balances in Stockton’s council-manager system of government.
Now, the council is facing nine new findings from the civil grand jury, along with several recommendations aimed at fixing problems the report says continue to affect City Hall. Some of those concerns echo issues raised by previous civil grand juries that the latest report says the city has not fully addressed.
Public conflict and divided votes
The civil grand jury’s first finding says public conflicts among councilmembers have seriously damaged public trust in the council’s ability to conduct business in a transparent and professional way.
Another related finding says the council has been marked by frequent disagreements, contentious meetings and voting patterns that consistently divide the body.
Those findings track much of what has played out at City Hall over the past year. Council meetings have repeatedly featured arguments, accusations and 4-3 votes on some of the council’s most contentious decisions, though the split has not always involved the same members. Some of the most visible tensions have involved Mayor Christina Fugazi and Vice Mayor Jason Lee, whose disagreements have spilled beyond regular meetings into public statements, press conferences and social media.
The civil grand jury recommended that the council document how it plans to follow its own conduct rules, including standards for meetings, public statements, online activity, professionalism and mutual respect.
Council interference with staff
The civil grand jury also found that councilmembers interfered with city staff in violation of Stockton’s charter.
Under the city’s council-manager form of government, councilmembers are supposed to work through the city manager rather than direct city employees themselves. The civil grand jury said some councilmembers bypassed that structure, creating confusion inside City Hall and contributing to operational problems.
Instability at the top of City Hall also created uncertainty in multiple departments and contributed to poor morale, the report said. Concerns were also raised about allegations that some councilmembers became improperly involved in personnel matters.
The civil grand jury linked those problems to the departure of experienced city employees and said the loss of institutional knowledge and severance payments created a financial cost for the city.
Those concerns followed a wave of departures after Colangelo’s appointment. In February of last year, Stockton parted ways with interim Chief Financial Officer Jay Kapoor and Assistant Chief Financial Officer Queen Gray, two of the city’s top finance officials, shortly after Colangelo became interim city manager.
To address leadership issues within the city, the civil grand jury recommended more training for councilmembers on the Stockton City Charter, council conduct and the rules that define the relationship between elected officials and city staff.
Money decisions and internal investigations
The report also raised concerns about the cost of city investigations. The civil grand jury said the city budgets $500,000 a year for investigations and that, in a typical year, “$200,000 to $300,000” is used. But the report claimed that the “entire $500,000 was exhausted” by the first half of the 2025-26 fiscal year.
The civil grand jury noted that not all of that money was spent on investigations initiated by the City Council, and said it could not verify how much was spent specifically on council investigations.
The report points to several money-related controversies at City Hall, including internal investigations initiated by councilmembers. The civil grand jury said some of those investigations produced little or no clear public benefit.
Several of those issues have also played out publicly over the past year, including the city’s $50,000 subsidy for a Wild ’N Out Live comedy show in which Lee made an appearance, investigations into DEI funding decisions, questions over contracts tied to a forensic examination of city finances and scrutiny of Colangelo’s creation of the Office of Public Transparency, Information and Communication, known as OPTIC.
Some outside reviews found no legal violations, but still pointed to problems with process, judgment or how decisions were made at City Hall.
In January, outside investigators found Lee did not violate state or city law related to the Wild ’N Out event and had no financial interest in contracts tied to the show. But investigators also said his votes on whether to investigate himself fell into a legal gray area.
The report also highlights an April decision involving city housing funds. According to the civil grand jury, city staff scored applicants for a notice of funding availability, known as the NOFA process, then used an artificial intelligence-based evaluation to confirm the scoring. The council later voted 4-3 to award money to developers who scored lower than other applicants.
The civil grand jury noted that the council is also not required to follow staff recommendations, but said the decision raised questions about why councilmembers ignored their own staff’s work. It also recommended that councilmembers receive training on city spending procedures, including how projects are approved, funded and overseen.
Ethics and social media
The civil grand jury also found that the council does not appear to follow ethics principles laid out in state-required training and the city’s own code of conduct.
The report criticized the use of social media and public forums, including press conferences, to air grievances or advance personal agendas. Those actions are inappropriate when councilmembers are speaking about city business or acting in their official capacity, the civil grand jury said.
That finding connects to months of public fighting among councilmembers, including disputes aired at meetings, in public letters and online, sometimes involving personal attacks.
The report recommends that the city strengthen its ethics rules and create written guidelines for how councilmembers use social media and public forums when discussing city business. It also calls for Stockton to begin work on an independent ethics commission or similar body by the end of the year, with the goal of launching it by January 2028.
Outside influence and transparency
The civil grand jury also found that some councilmembers pursued personal agendas or outside interests in ways that raised transparency concerns.
While the grand jury wasn’t specific about what they meant, that finding echoes issues identified from the 2024 civil grand jury report, which examined 209 Times, a local social media platform run by Motecuzoma Sanchez, and its influence on city government. The earlier report said the platform’s conduct contributed to a threatening work environment and criticized councilmembers who publicly associated with it.
The issue resurfaced in March, when Fugazi presented Sanchez with a city proclamation. Two councilmembers asked to have their names and signatures removed from the recognition, one councilmember left the dais before it was read, and Lee said publicly that the mayor alone made the decision to issue it.
This most recent civil grand jury report does not focus on the proclamation, but its findings on ethics, outside influence, social media and public conduct mirror concerns raised in the earlier “Crisis in Government” report.
Campaign contribution limits
The civil grand jury’s final finding says Stockton does not have local limits on campaign contributions beyond state law, which the report said leads to a lack of transparency. The report specifically raised concern that councilmembers or candidates for council can contribute to each other’s campaigns, saying that could create the impression of voting blocs meant to influence city policy.
It was recommended that Stockton adopt its own campaign contribution limits by Dec. 31, 2027. The report says those limits should apply to monetary contributions, in-kind contributions and campaign committee contributions.
Past grand jury responses remain an issue
The new report also criticizes Stockton’s response to prior grand jury recommendations. It said Stockton has “consistently failed” to follow the required format for responding to findings and recommendations under state law.
The follow-up report said the City Council’s last response in September to previous civil grand jury findings addressed only three of six outstanding recommendations. Issues still unresolved include recommendations related to outside social media influence on city government, policies for threatening communications, election transparency and the city’s ethics hotline.
City Council must formally respond to the new report’s findings and recommendations by Sept. 23.
“The citizens of Stockton expect the Stockton City Council to conduct the business of Stockton efficiently, in a businesslike manner, and in accordance with the rule of law,” the report says.