Garofalo OK on council abstention

Angelique Flores

HUNTINGTON BEACH -- Despite raising questions from critics, Mayor Dave

Garofalo broke no laws at last week’s City Council meeting when he

remained in the room during a discussion and vote involving a Huntington

Beach mall redevelopment, an issue from which he has been advised to

abstain, officials said.

“There are no specific rules on leaving the room,” said John

Symkowick, spokesman for the Fair Political Practices Commission.

Robert M. Stern, who helped draft the state’s political reform laws,

said council members should leave the room, just to be on the safe side.

“I would have advised the person not to remain in the room, just so

anyone couldn’t say there was any bias,” said Stern, president for the

Center for Governmental Studies, a nonprofit research organization in Los

Angeles. “It would be better for appearances sake.”

Although Garofalo did not vote on the matter, he called on the

speakers and called for the votes -- raising questions and concern about

the propriety of his actions.

Last month, City Atty. Gail Hutton advised Garofalo to abstain from

voting on any advertiser that has appeared in his publications -- the

Local News, the Huntington Beach Conference & Visitors Bureau visitors

guide and the Chamber of Commerce Business Directory. The district

attorney’s office and state officials are investigating Garofalo for

potential conflict-of-interest violations involving advertisers in his

publications.

The mall’s owners, Ezralow Retail Properties, advertised the mall’s

redevelopment in the 2000 visitor’s guide.

According to the Political Reform Act of 1974, “no public official at

any level of state or local government shall make, participate in making

or in any way attempt to use his official position to influence a

governmental decision in which he knows or has reason to know he has a

financial interest.”

Even if the law didn’t mandate Garofalo leave the room, his directing

of the speakers is somewhat questionable, experts said.

If it’s just a list of speakers the official is calling upon to speak,

it’s not a problem. But if he’s deciding on who speaks, it starts to get

more discretionary, Stern said.

Although critics such as environmental attorney Debbie Cook and

Councilmen Tom Harman and Dave Sullivan were outraged, Garofalo stayed

within the law by abstaining from the vote and the discussion.

The City Council does not require members to leave the room when they

abstain. Council members must only say they’re going to abstain from the

vote.

The Planning Commission has approved its own protocol, which advises

commissioners abstaining from an item to leave the room.

Gerald Chapman, chairman of the Planning Commission, said he has left

the room on a number of occasions when abstaining from votes.

“We’re not to do anything to influence,” Chapman said. “If you’re

there, the perception or faces you make could bring influence to the

decision.”