City officials, candidates to amend disclosures

Mathis Winkler

NEWPORT BEACH -- Half a dozen Newport Beach city officials and council

candidates on Friday said they plan to amend their financial disclosure

statements after realizing that they may have failed to include all the

required information on their stock holdings.

“Yes, I do own stock,” said Planning Commissioner Steven Kiser, who

had not listed any stocks on his disclosure form. “But I’m going to find

out real soon -- over this weekend -- if I should disclose any of that.

You almost consider whether you should put everything down.”

Others have already done that.

City Councilman Tod Ridgeway, Planning Commissioner Michael Kranzley

and council candidate Bob Wynn said they had decided to list all their

stock holdings regardless of whether the company did business in Newport

Beach, therefore creating potential conflicts of interest.

“I thought to be on the safe side, I should list every stock I own,”

said Wynn. “So I just listed everything.”

City Council members and candidates, planning commissioners, the city

attorney and the city manager are required to file so-called “statements

of economic interests” annually. Those statements are mailed to the

state. City Hall also keeps similar records for the city clerk,

department heads and all members of city boards and commissions, said

City Clerk LaVonne Harkless.

In addition to loans, gifts, travel payments and property holdings,

officials must list their investments on the form.

The law requires them to list only investments of more than $1,000 in

companies that are located or do business within their jurisdiction.

But here’s the tricky part: companies fitting that description are not

limited to those with offices in the jurisdiction -- in this case,

Newport Beach.

Officials also must disclose investments in a company that

“manufactures, distributes, sells or purchases products or services on a

regular basis. ... has an interest in real property ... [or] has an

office or sales outlet in the jurisdiction,” according to filing

instructions from the Fair Political Practices Commission.

Even if a company plans to do any of the above or has done any of the

above within the last two years, officials are required to disclose their

investments in those companies.

Planning Commission chairman Edward Selich, who only disclosed his

investment in Conexant, said there was no easy way to check out the

business involvements of every company in the city.

“I made a reasonable determination,” he said, adding that he would not

have a problem disclosing all of his stock investments. He listed an

international cable company, an agricultural company and a Japanese index

fund as examples of companies in which he had invested.

The city attorney’s office plans to investigate whether Selich

violated conflict of interest rules by participating in a commission

discussion on Conexant’s 566,000-square-foot expansion proposal. Selich

said he had not been aware that he still owned the Conexant stock at the

time the discussions took place.

Along with Councilmen Gary Adams and Tod Ridgeway and Planning

Commissioner Larry Tucker, Selich also participated in negotiations for a

developers’ agreement with Conexant.

Adams and Ridgeway each own stock in the company. No decision has been

made on the expansion project and company officials have withdrawn the

proposal from the city’s calendar for unrelated reasons.

Word of the Conexant stock ownership prompted supporters of

slow-growth Measure S on Friday to ask Adams, Ridgeway, Selich and

Councilman Dennis O’Neil to fully disclose their investments in the

company “at a time when you may have been involved in some capacity in

processing the proposed ... development.”

Although O’Neil said he owned more than $100,000 worth of Conexant

stock during the last year, he did not have any direct involvement in the

negotiations; the project never came before the City Council.

Measure S, the so-called Greenlight initiative, proposes to put before

a citywide vote any development that allows an increase of more than 100

peak-hour car trips or dwelling units or 40,000 square feet over the

general plan allowance. The Conexant proposal was one project highlighted

by Greenlight supporters.

Fair Political Practices Commission officials said they advise those

filling out disclosure forms to check with each company to find out if it

did any business in their jurisdiction.

“A lot of times, that’s usually one phone call,” said one commission

official, adding that the commission usually asks individuals to file

amendments to their statements if it discovers that an investment had not

been disclosed.

Mayor John Noyes, who said he does not own any stock, said disclosing

all investments seemed like the right thing to do.

“If you are going to do a financial disclosure, I’d think you should

disclose everything,” he said. “Not just [those companies] limited to

your jurisdiction.”

Councilman Dennis O’Neil listed more than $100,000 worth of Conexant

shares in his 1999 statement and said he has since sold that stock. While

he corrected an earlier statement to the Daily Pilot that he had lost

money on Conexant, acknowledging that he “may have made some profit” on

the stock, he said he has since lost money after investing his Conexant

earnings in a technology company based in Northern California.

O’Neil said he owns stock in many other companies, such as Cisco

Systems, AOL, Microsoft, Hewlett Packard and Texas Instruments. He added

that he had failed to disclose his investments in those companies because

he believed he was required only to disclose interests in companies

located in Newport Beach.

“If I’m wrong, I’ll list them,” he said, adding that he would check

into the matter. “If it’s appropriate, I’ll amend the last statement and

will list all the stocks that I have. I certainly won’t mind doing that.

I’m in public office.”