Why are the insane salaries paid to Bell City Administrators in CA not a criminal matter?

Factual Questions
1

This story has been in the news and the administrators effectively agreed to quit. The were receiving half million dollar plus salaries for part time positions in a middle class city of 36,000 people.

My main question is why these people were allowed to resign vs the matter being turned over to the police and the participants arrested or charged with some sort of malfeasance. It sounds like the city is willing to let them walk.

Can they really get away with this?

States Atty Jerry Brown is looking into it here-

Brown said his department’s investigation is looking at all possible violations of

2

There’s no doubt that their salaries are morally reprehensible, and not serving the interests of the taxpayers, but what crime do you think that they committed? Having a job that pays you too much isn’t a crime.

3

As far as I know it is no more against the law than bonuses to AIG executives after the company got bailed out. It is against no criminal law because too many people would want to prevent it being criminal because they do it or hope to do it.

4

So there is no criminal malfeasance argument to be made in a group of politicians colluding to set their salaries to seven to ten times the norm seen in similar demographic communities?

I’m guess I’m just stunned this apparently went on for years before they were called on it.

5

As I understand it, they went through the motions and voted on their salaries and conducted their business according to rules set up under the city’s charter. They took it to ridiculous lengths, which I’m sure the authors of the charter never imagined, but I haven’t read anything to indicate they broke any laws in doing so.

6

[quote=“astro, post:4, topic:549108”]

I’m not stunned. This is in keeping with the particular historical characters of the governments of the municipalities of southeast L.A. county. It has to do with the changing demographic span that came out of the post-WWII era.

7

plus, the OP’s own cites indicate that both the District Attorney and the Attorney General of the state are investigating the situation, to see if there are any criminal infractions. That takes time.

8

It’s a question of authorities. Did the citizens of Bell City, through the city charter or other legal formation documents, give the city council authority to raise their own compensation to the amount that they did, and did the council have the authority to raise the city employees salaries to the amount that they did?

I’m sure the city attorney and the state attorney will make a determination.

9

It’s not just salary, but pension, too.

10

What I want to know is – WHERE DID THAT MUCH MONEY COME FROM? It can’t possibly have come from income taxes and property taxes in a fairly small city with an average to low income base. If they had tried to raise taxes to a level to support those salaries, it definitely would have been noticed.

I’ve only read one or two of the stories about this, but I don’t recall seeing anyone raise or answer this question. Seems to me their city employment with those lavish salaries was more of a laundering operation for some other activity. That’s probably where the criminal charges will come into play.

11

That was my thought, too. Any violation of the law, I suspect, might’ve been in secretively holding executive sessions for the actual setting of salaries when that wasn’t permitted under the state sunshine law, or underreporting income in violation of federal tax law, or the like. “Being a breathtakingly overpaid public official” is not, in and of itself, a crime.

12

Can’t find the cite right now, but I read that these guys a part of the ‘3-50’ plan under Calpers. That allows them to retire anytime after age 50 with 3% of their highest salary times years of service. There is a max of 30 years of service (or 90%), but I think they can retire at 90% of those salaries with little problem…

13

The City Council Members got around state limits on city council salaries through a ballot measure that converted Bell into a charter city - thus exempting them from those limits.

14

There is currently a question whether they violated California’s open meeting laws. If that is the case, the district attorney could declare the salary agreements null and void (cite). Timed “correctly”, it could be a big boost to Jerry Brown’s gubernatorial campaign, so he’s probably got all available hands scouring the evidence.

15

In fact, it may have; many of Bell’s citizens claimed their property taxes had been hiked by thousands of dollars in just two years. One woman’s taxes went from $6000 to $9000 in twelve months. I guess this charter city thing is what allowed it.

16

My quick and dirty calc is they stole about 400 dollars each from every resident. And that doesnt include any pension monies.

THIS is why revolutions and vigalante justice arent always a bad thing.

17

Yes, it can. Mike Davis, author of City of Quartz, stepped outside of L.A.'s city limits to look at its “edge cities.” In particular, he looked at that group of small cities just southeast of L.A., including Bell. In chapter 12 of Dead Cities: And Other Tales (1992–The New Press) he writes about Vernon, one of these cities about two miles away from Bell, and how its clan-like government was determined to become an industrial core:
[QUOTE=Mike Davis]
…the city has been controlled by a single family, the Basque-origin Leonis dynasty, since its formation in 1905. Originally established as a safe haven for “sporting” activities (boxing, gambling, and drinking) under attack by L.A.'s early municipal reformers, Vernon evolved during the 1920s into an “exclusively industrial” (official city motto) base for eastern corporate branch plants. Under the iron heel of John Leonis, city founder, existing housing was condemned or bought out in order to reduce the residential population to a handful of loyal retainers living in the literal shadow of the…bunker-like city hall. Elections in Vernon thereby became a biennial farce where the Leonis slate (now headed by grandson Leonis Malburg) is unanimously reelected by a micro-citizenry of Leonis employees. (Although civic officials are required to live in the city of their election, the mayor has for decades brazenly flouted state law by residing in a family mansion in Los Angeles.)
[/QUOTE]
Bell and Maywood form a remaining northern residential “peninsula” surrounded by this industrial drive. The result in these cities was first a white flight (after WWII) which allowed (typically unionized and originally southern black) factory workers to move in, and then a black flight, as Latino families became able to do the same. This cultural shifting and instability allowed city governments such as Vernon’s and Bell’s to do whatever they wanted under the proverbial radar. Until now.

So the money did come from the property and sales tax bases–it’s just that the citizenry of these edge cities is typically not established enough to be paying a lot of attention to things like this. A lot of the local public expenses that larger cities have to face can be shunted off to the county, and–as micro-economies–their residential communities are hardly differentiated by city limits.

Davis once told me that a lot of the research he did on these cities was by necessity just hanging out in the local bars where the people who control their civic life hang out.

18

Bell and Maywood form a remaining northern residential “peninsula” surrounded by this industrial drive. The result in these cities was first a white flight (after WWII) which allowed (typically unionized and originally southern black) factory workers to move in, and then a black flight, as Latino families became able to do the same. This cultural shifting and instability allowed city governments such as Vernon’s and Bell’s to do whatever they wanted under the proverbial radar. Until now.

So the money did come from the property and sales tax bases–it’s just that the citizenry of these edge cities is typically not established enough to be paying a lot of attention to things like this. A lot of the local public expenses that larger cities have to face can be shunted off to the county, and–as micro-economies–their residential communities are hardly differentiated by city limits.

Davis once told me that a lot of the research he did on these cities was by necessity just hanging out in the local bars where the people who control their civic life hang out.
[/QUOTE]

That’s fascinating.

19

While some of the city officials in Bell have been criminally charged, the County DA has another solution for Vernon, the “dummy” city created as a harbor for industrial concerns to locate next to Los Angeles, but avoid Los Angeles regulations. For the second time a Vernon mayor has been indicted, and the DA wants to get a law passed that would allow the county to take over a corrupt city:

[QUOTE=L.A. Times]
“The Vernon saga continues. This has been going on for 75 years,” [Los Angeles County District Attorney Steve] Cooley said in an interview. "There has to be an ultimate solution. About two or three years ago, we worked on a project within this office to propose legislation that would allow a process of disincorporation when a city becomes something that’s not really a city, more like a fiefdom…
[/quote]
Although corrupt in the same way, Vernon, as a city, presents different circumstances, one of which is that effectively no one really lives there:
[QUOTE=Wikipedia]
Although Vernon and Bell share a border in Southeast Los Angeles County, they are very different cities. Bell is a working-class, largely immigrant city with 38,000 residents. Vernon has fewer than 100 residents and is largely a business and industrial hub, however they share some of the same city woes.[7]

The Los Angeles Times reported that Eric T. Freschthe, the former Vernon city administrator, who now serves as a legal consultant, has passed the $1 million mark for the last four years. He was paid almost $1.65 million in salary and hourly billings in 2008, when he was serving as both city administrator and deputy city attorney. [18]

Others in Vernon received $570,000 to $800,000 in 2009. Former City Attorney Jeffrey A. Harrison earned $800,000 in 2009 and City Treasurer/Finance Director Roirdan Burnett made $570,000. In 2008, Harrison was paid $1.04 million. [18] In 2009, the Vernon city administrator and municipal utility director Donal O’Callaghan, was paid nearly $785,000. He has been relieved of his duties while city officials conduct a “comprehensive review” of his and his wife’s financial business with the city. [19]

The Los Angeles County district attorney’s office is looking into a 2009 contract between the city of Vernon and an energy firm owned by the wife of the then-city administrator. In September, 2010, the Los Angeles Times reported that the inquiry follows the newspaper’s report that Donal O’Callaghan received $243,898 in consulting payments through June, 2010, through Tara Energy, Inc., the company run by his wife, Kimberly McBride. The payments were in addition to O’Callaghan’s yearly salary of $380,000. The District Attorney’s office stated prosecutors are working to determine whether the contract represented a conflict of interest. [20]
[/quote]
What if one of those 91 people who live in Vernon should take up the Mantel of public service to right this situation? Don’t count on it:

[QUOTE=Wikipedia]
The city held no contested elections from 1980 to 2006; Most of the city’s 100 or so voters are city employees who live in homes rented at a nominal fee. In 1979 a firefighter tried to run for mayor and was immediately evicted and told he couldn’t run. In 2006 a group of outsiders tried to move into Vernon and run for office. The city tried to cancel their registrations but was ordered to allow them to run and to count the ballots. Almost none of the city employees voted for them. Leonis Malburg, the mayor for fifty years, was convicted of voter fraud, conspiracy, and perjury in December 2009. The former city admininistrator has charges pending for misappropriating public funds.
[/quote]

It gets even more interesting:
[QUOTE=Wikipedia]
In 2006, a controversy arose concerning a few people who moved into Vernon and ran for city council…[The] results were announced and all three incumbents retained their seats on the city council. In January 2006, the city came under public scrutiny for attempting to stop an election challenge by evicting 10 persons who had converted a 1950s era office building into a five-room apartment (the building had previously been used as a tanning facility turning sheepskin into billiard/pool pockets)…

Furthermore, the City of Vernon had the men followed by private investigators carrying unlicensed firearms on at least two occasions, one of which resulted in the arrest of a private eye in South Pasadena in February 2006… The City of Vernon alleged that the men were part of a hostile takeover attempt by convicted felon Albert Robles, who nearly bankrupted the nearby city of South Gate as treasurer and Eduardo Olivo a former Vernon attorney who also worked with Albert T. Robles in South Gate…

[I[t was alleged that all three of the newcomer candidates had direct ties to Albert T. Robles. Alejandro Lopez is a first cousin, David Johnson Jr., is the brother-in-law of a business partner, Don A. Huff is associated through Eduardo Olivo. In August 2006, Judge Munoz ruled that the newcomers were trespassing on private property, that they received free rent and jobs prior to registering to vote and that they were involved in a scheme orchestrated by Albert T. Robles and Eduardo Olivo to “steal” the election, but that such actions were not illegal.

…The officials failed to prove their claim of voter fraud…On October 19, 2006, it was announced all votes have been counted and all three incumbents will retain their seats on the city council despite the challenges. In total, 68 votes were cast in contrast to the city’s 90 registered voters. [12]

Subsequently the mayor, his wife, and son, were all convicted of voter fraud. By the time of his conviction, the son was already sentenced to prison for child molestation uncovered during the District Attorney’s investigation. Leonis Malburg and his wife were convicted at trial and sentenced to pay over $600,000 in fines and restitution. He had already agreed to repay the city $1.5 million paid to his criminal defense attorneys.

Today Vernon still has approximately a hundred voters who live in strictly limited and controlled city housing.
[/quote]

20

Colma, Ca (AKA “the city of the dead”) is an incorporated city south of San Frncisco. Most of its inhabitants are dead (the city is 96% cemetary land), so it would seem that the city government needs are pretty limited. Anybody know what they make?