The 2025 City Council majority and the rookie it chose as city manager make a persuasive case for being the worst Stockton leaders in living memory.
The squabbling majority didn’t create policy so much as act out a French existential play about people who create their own hell.
“I feel like we’re in this hamster wheel of chaos,” said Vice Mayor Jason Lee at the Nov. 18 Council meeting. “Pulled into another political distraction, another targeted attack, another expansion of an investigation.”
That’s rich coming from a guy who went online to compare Mayor Christine Fugazi to Donald Trump yet who himself constantly trolls people online like the president does.
But Lee was right that the infighting hurt the city. On top of a musical chairs of interim city managers, he noted, “We have no auditor, we have no CFO, … no budget officer, no procurement director.” (The city also has no recreation manager, who also manages the libraries.)
He added that while the council quarrels the city may be backsliding toward a second bankruptcy, a chapter 18 which would shatter city government and make Stockton a laughingstock. “Yet we keep doing the same thing. It’s actually the definition of insanity.”
I’ll give Lee this: whether out of an atavistic urge to crush his rivals, a character trait he seems to possess, or genuine watchdogging, he asked the state controller’s office to investigate the possible favoritism in hiring for public jobs and misspending of public money, a process which has begun.
Meanwhile, the council majority voted last August to further investigate Lee’s (wholly unnecessary) participation in a Wild ’N Out show at the arena and whether he inappropriately cudgeled staff to throw public funds at the show. The show manager told the city its promoters would lose $170,000 on the event.
What started the hamster wheel spinning was the resignation under pressure of honest, competent City Manager Harry Black and the hiring of his tragi-comically unqualified replacement, Steve Colangelo.
On top of Colangelo’s record—he exited as CEO of the San Joaquin County Fair amid audits that found financial accountability issues —was his sheer lack of qualifications to run California’s 11th-largest city.
According to the executive search firm Peckham & McKinney (which the city hired for its most recent city manager search), a qualified city manager candidate should boast seven to 10 years’ experience as a city manager, deputy city manager, department head or CEO of an organization comparable in size and complexity to Stockton’s municipal government.
Colangelo, by contrast, offered no comparable qualifications, and soon hired a real city manager, Stephen J. Salvatore of Lathrop, to guide him. Salvatore’s fee was $11,000 a month.
The selection of Colangelo was inexcusably bad judgement by Mayor Fugazi. It calls into question her motives. It was a black mark on the councilmembers who went along with her. Not since the reckless decisions that led up to Stockton’s bankruptcy have Stockton leaders bungled so badly.
Fugazi declined to answer most of the questions sent over about Colangelo, as well as her relationship with what the San Joaquin County Civil Grand Jury previously called the “unethical influence” of the 209 Times’ political machine—questions any elected official should answer. The Mayor’s Office huffed she would not submit to a “full-blown interrogation.”
That’s another red flag of this council majority: they preach transparency, but they practice secrecy. They behave as if they have a catacomb of skeletons in their closets.
In Stockton’s council-manager form of government, the city’s Charter vests the most power in the city manager. Fugazi would not be the first Stockton mayor to chafe at the statutory limits placed on her office.
But there’s a good reason the city manager is appointed and not elected , and given the most power: to insulate, to the degree possible, a city’s top decision maker from grubby politics. The city manager is there to make the best decision for Stockton—for you—not their friends, relatives, supporters or greedy back-room connivers.
And, boy, is this especially important in Stockton. In addition to the usual special interests seeking influence, an unusual number of charlatans, hacks, and sleazeballs enter city politics. And, sad to say, they do so with the help of an unwitting electorate.
Lee now fumes that Fugazi duped him, which she did.
“I came in gaslit,” he said from the council dias. “And then I got in here then started to realize quickly, after she put the fox in the henhouse, that I had been used.”
Correction, vice mayor: You put the fox in the henhouse, too.
Questions emailed to Lee went unanswered. Another champion of transparency.
The mayor is the most seasoned leader on the council. She served two terms on the city’s Planning Commission and two on the council representing District 5. She appears to have genuine sympathy for Stockton’s disadvantaged and the policy chops to make a difference.
And yet her first year degenerated into calamitous division and forehead-slapping acrimony. In addition to the council chair-throwing, there are reportedly now state investigations.
A word to these agents, and their bosses, who never prosecuted those who plundered Stockton Unified though they were hiding in plain sight: Do your damn job.
While unwilling to answer tough questions, Fugazi’s office was happy to list the mayor’s accomplishments.
To be fair, she:
· “…renewed focus on revitalizing shipbuilding in the Port of Stockton and has made significant inroads with decision-makers.” This could mean “hundreds, if not thousands, of new jobs.”
· Spruced up Columbus Park, McKinley Park, and reopened the Victory Park Pool, “all wins for the neighborhoods.”
· Launched The Mayor’s Light Up Stockton initiative which repaired or replaced hundreds of lights and light poles in long-dark neighborhoods throughout the city.
· Hosted California Forward’s California Economic Summit, “bringing hundreds of movers and shakers from across California to showcase how Stockton is a City on the Rise.”
· Formed a Regional Work Forward Initiative which “brings together education, industry, and workforce development partners to build livable-wage careers for Stockton residents and attract companies to relocate to Stockton.”
· “… The Mayor, along with residents, celebrated the installation of the (safer) HAWK crossing system on Pershing Avenue at Victory Park, and we have seven more going in city-wide.
· Brought back the Youth Advisory Committee.
· Launched an “affordability initiative,” “not from a top-down perspective … but by talking to those affected by the current affordability crisis …then seeing what we as a city can do to help.”
Some on that list are goals, not accomplishments—setting up a committee is not an accomplishment—but others deserve credit.
“Even with all the distracting noise, she believes we have a council that cares deeply about Stockton, each in their own way, and as a council, they were still able to accomplish quite a bit,” the Mayor’s Office said.
Councilmembers have expressed hope that the hiring of Johnny Ford as the new city manager will unify the council. But that does not address the real bone of contention: the 4-vote council majority that consistently backs Fugazi and her agenda, versus the the the 3-vote minority consisting of Lee, Mario Enriquez and Michael Blower. District 5 representative Brando Villapudua, who was supported in his campaign by 209 Times, has flipped flopped, and is now back on Team Fugazi.
Remember, the 2023-24 San Joaquin County Civil Grand Jury found the 209 Times’ operators “have consistently attempted to undermine the local democratic process by misleading the Stockton electorate and attempting to affect election results through unethical influence.”
In my opinion, there’s a clear through line from the mismanagement of the San Joaquin County Fair through the mismanagement of Stockton Unified School District to the mismanagement of Stockton’s municipal government.
The worry is the playbook is the same as Stockton Unified, too: Replace the upstanding leader with an executive who’ll play ball. Gain a board majority of enablers—that much has already happened—then, well, at Stockton Unified, competent people were elbowed out and replaced with cronies. Millions of dollars disappeared. State Controller, get busy.
If Stockton’s going to make anything of itself in 2026, the city needs more citizens like Tashante McCoy, who spoke during a Council meeting’s public comment period.
“Stop letting yourself be controlled by the people behind the curtain,” McCoy implored. “Because when you allow darkness to sit at the table, eventually it takes over the whole room.”
Michael Fitzgerald is on X (Twitter) and Instagram as Stocktonopolis. Email: michaelf@stocktonia.org.
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