A secret committee of Fresno’s regional planning could be serving as the vehicle to help special interest groups leverage $2 million in tax dollars and exploit a loophole to lower the threshold of approval to extend Measure C, Fresno County’s half-cent, multi-billion dollar transportation tax, a new complaint alleges.
A complaint filed Sunday with the Fresno County District Attorney’s Public Integrity Unit alleges that Fresno’s Council of Governments and Transportation Authority are violating California’s marquee transparency laws to host the shadow committee and their efforts could be teetering on the verge of misusing taxpayer funds in support of political advocacy surrounding the prospective ballot measure.
The backstory: The Measure C Renewal Facilitation Committee first came to light in July, when Fresno County Supervisor and Fresno County Transportation Authority (FCTA) Chairman Buddy Mendes raised concerns that the Facilitation Committee could be involved in the Brown Act – California’s open meetings law.
- Mendes sent a letter to Parlier Mayor Alma Beltran, Clovis City Councilmember Lynne Ashbeck and Mendota Mayor Victor Martinez to tell them that their participation in the Facilitation Committee cannot be in an official capacity with their positions on the FCTA.
- Beltran, Ashbeck, and Martinez were vocal advocates for including social justice-backed group Transportation For All on the Measure C Steering Committee.
- Mendes wrote in the letter that FresnoCOG has been involved in forming and scheduling meetings for the Facilitation Meeting. Yet no evidence of the Facilitation Committee exists on FresnoCOG’s website, where it posts agendas and minutes for its own meetings.
- He also told The Sun at the time that he and the FCTA do not have any involvement with the Facilitation Committee, necessitating his letter.
Driving the news: Former Fresno Unified board member Brooke Ashjian – who stepped down from the Steering Committee as a representative of the City of Fresno – filed a Public Records Act Request with FresnoCOG to receive a membership roster of the Facilitation Committee.
- Ashjian also requested all meeting minutes and agendas for the Facilitation Committee, as well as emails between FresnoCOG staff and Ashbeck, Beltran, Mendes, Building Healthy Communities executive Sandra Celedon, Leadership Counsel for Justice and Accountability representative Veronica Garibay, Fresno Mayor Jerry Dyer, and Central Valley Community Foundation chief Ashley Swearengin.
- FresnoCOG Executive Director Robert Phipps replied to the Public Records Act request saying FresnoCOG will not provide a membership roster or meeting minutes for the Facilitation Committee “because no such records exist.”
- All other records will likely be available by Nov. 1, Phipps told Ashjian and Whelan in a letter.
Roster revealed: Despite Phipps’ assertion that there is not a membership roster for the Facilitation Committee, a complaint filed by Ashjian’s Guardians of Growth shows that FresnoCOG organized the meetings, distributing invitations by electronic calendar.
- The invitation, sent by FresnoCOG Deputy Director Paul Herman was sent to:
- Robert Phipps, FresnoCOG Executive Director
- Lynne Ashbeck, Clovis City Councilwoman, FCTA Representative
- Alma Beltran, Mayor of Parlier, FCTA and FresnoCOG Representative
- Victor Martinez, Mayor of Mendota, FCTA and FresnoCOG Representative
- Sandra Celedon, CEO of Fresno Building Healthy Communities / Transportation for All
- Veronica Garibay, Co-Founder of Leadership Counsel for Justice and Accountability / Transportation for All
- Ashley Swearengin, CEO of Central Valley Community Foundation
- Steve Brandau, Central Valley Community Foundation representative
- Cary Catalano, Central Valley Community Foundation representative
- Kendall Flint, then-FresnoCOG Consultant for Measure C Renewal
- Buddy Mendes, Fresno County Supervisors Chairman
- Andy Levine, Transportation for All Representative
- Moses Stites, Fresno County Rural Transit Agency General Manager
- Brenda Thomas, FCTA staffer
- The complaint alleges that Dyer was later added to the committee and that the committee met on July 9, July 16 and July 23 before moving to an every-other-week schedule on Wednesdays.
Inside the complaint: After getting the response from Phipps, Ashjian filed the complaint with the Fresno County District Attorney’s Office’s Public Integrity Unit concerning the Facilitation Committee.
- Ashjian detailed that FresnoCOG’s formation of the Facilitation Committee constituted an ad hoc advisory committee subject to the open meetings and notice requirements of California’s Ralph M. Brown Act.
- He added that, based on existing California case law, FCTA’s participation or consent wasn’t entirely required. The committee’s status as an ad-hoc advisory committee was established by FresnoCOG’s actions and would still subject it to the Brown Act.
The bigger picture: Ashjian, in his complaint, alleges the reason behind the Facilitation Committee’s secrecy has a more nefarious, bordering on illegal, purpose.
- “[T]he Facilitation/Synthesis Committee was crafted to ensure that FCOG could leverage $1.75 million in taxpayer dollars to develop and shape a sham Measure C renewal for the 2026 ballot that could be usurped by the private citizen members of the Facilitation Committee to kickstart a privately-funded citizen’s initiative,” Ashjian wrote.
- “We believe such concealment is part of a clearly-devised strategy to avoid public scrutiny of a hurried, sloppy process designed to grant special interest groups wholesale control over the development of a tax measure at the expense of Fresno County taxpayers,” he added, referencing the public records request response from FresnoCOG.
- Ashjian pointed to the committee’s non-governmental membership, which is comprised of representatives of Transportation for All and the Central Valley Community Foundation, two groups that led the opposition to the 2022 version of a Measure C renewal.
- Celedon, Garibay, and Levine each represent various groups that are members of Transportation for All. Swearengin is Central Valley Community Foundation’s chief executive officer. Catalano and Brandau are noted consultants to the nonprofit.
- Ashjian’s complaint notes that the Facilitation Committee’s formation began after Central Valley Community Foundation’s board chair issued a promise to bankroll the signature gathering costs for a citizen’s initiative in order to incentivize collaboration with Transportation for All.
Why it matters: Since 2017, California case law governing Proposition 218 has held that citizen’s initiatives concerning special sales taxes are subject to simple majority threshold. Meanwhile, government-initiated special tax measures are subject to a two-thirds majority vote threshold.
- This loophole was utilized following the 2018 election when Building Healthy Communities sued the City of Fresno to enforce collection of the city’s 30-year parks tax, Measure P. The measure’s text specified a two-thirds majority threshold, but the social justice nonprofit argued that 2017 court rulings nullified the plain text language of the measure.
- Measure P would be deemed approved based on the 2017 Supreme Court rulings, despite not garnering 66.67% of the vote in 2018.
- The measure, coincidentally, was authored and heavily bankrolled by Swearengin’s Central Valley Community Foundation.
- Ashjian’s complaint notes that, by openly conspiring with a would-be citizen’s initiative sponsor, FresnoCOG and Fresno County Transportation Authority are at risk of misusing taxpayer dollars for political advocacy, a serious violation under California’s government code.
What he’s saying: “The decision of whether roads get fixed or a light rail gets built are being made in a smoke-filled backroom at the FresnoCOG offices between a small handful of politicians and nonprofit activists,” Ashjian said in a statement. “Fresno County voters deserve to know whether our tax dollars are being illegally used to develop a ballot measure that worsen our potholes in favor of pie-in-the-sky, going-nowhere ideas from the Bay Area and Los Angeles.”
FresnoCOG responds: Beltran sent an email to The Sun on Monday in response to Ashjian’s complaint, saying the Facilitation Team is hardly secret and has been addressed on numerous occasions in Ashjian’s presence during Steering Committee meetings and at FresnoCOG and FCTA meetings.
- Beltran said there is no official roster or minutes for the Facilitation Committee.
- She also pushed back against Ashjian’s assertion that the Facilitation Committee was crafted lead to a private citizen’s initiative.
- “This is patently untrue,” Beltran wrote. “As was explained at the June 26 Board meeting, the Facilitation Team was formed to assist Fresno COG staff and its consultant team at the time with synthesizing public input from two parallel outreach processes – Fresno COG’s and Transportation For All – to provide to the Steering Committee, as well as to help frame the recommendations from the Steering Committee to the Fresno COG and FCTA Boards. In addition, the Facilitation Team offers recommendations for future Steering Committee agendas based on Board feedback.”
- Beltran said Transportation For All and the Central Valley Community Foundation reached out to FresnoCOG in April “to warn of a parallel process underway to run a competing, citizens’-led initiative against Measure C unless a collaboration was brokered to combine the two efforts. This approach led to members of Transportation For All joining the Steering Committee and the Facilitation Team.”
Read the complaint:
