Bill Smallman, a director of the San Lorenzo Valley Water District, said this week he will be filing a complaint with the Santa Cruz County Civil Grand Jury, seeking an investigation of his own water district, its board of directors and its staff.
Smallman’s unusual move comes amid a social media buzz that “observers” for the current sitting Superior Court Civil Grand Jury have attended several of the most recent water district board meetings
Court officials and grand jurors cannot comment on the status of any investigation or confirm whether a grand jury investigation even exists. However, two men have identified themselves as “observers for the grand jury” to ratepayers and to the Press Banner at the two most recent public meetings of the water district board.
The 19-member civil grand jury, which was sworn in in June, serves one year and conducts all of its meetings in private. It may or may not release reports of its investigations, usually in the spring.
Smallman’s fellow directors this week did not respond to Press Banner requests for comment on his announcement, which came at the end of a long Letter to the Editor, and which was repeated in an email exchange with the Press Banner.
“I welcome a second Grand Jury investigation,” he wrote Tuesday in the letter to the Press Banner, which was not solicited. “I am filing a complaint, and encourage others to do so as well.”
The next day, he wrote in an email: “I’m going to go down there tomorrow” and file a complaint in with the grand jury in Superior Court. Any citizen can file such a complaint.
Smallman, who took office in late December after he unseated incumbent water district director Randall Brown in the 2016 election, said he has been increasingly isolated by the rest of the board.
He alone opposed paying the legal bills of former director Terry Vierra, including an unsuccessful attempt to have Vierra’s conflict-of-interest judgment reversed; Smallman also opposed use of the herbicide glyphosate on district-owned land, and recently called for the board to release for public view a letter in which the district said Vierra asked the district to pay his legal bills.
He has on several occasions, in written statements and at board meetings, warned his fellow directors they might be violating the Ralph Brown Act, which aims to preserve transparency among elected officials, governments and public agencies.
“A Santa Cruz County Grand Jury investigated [the water district board] several years ago and reported several serious improprieties, including ‘insufficient transparency,’ Smallman wrote in his letter. “The board at that time, including [Margaret] Bruce, just replied that they ‘disagreed.’ “
The district directors disagreed with seven of the nine findings of the 2013 grand jury report, which criticized the district for its lack of transparency. in the year following the grand jury report, the water district board fired its general manager, and three incumbent directors did not return to the board. Smallman also revealed that board members this week were cautioned by district counsel Gina Nicholls that grand jury investigations are strictly confidential, and that board members should refrain from discussing any aspects of a grand jury investigation, especially if they become aware that any investigation exists or is pending.
Smallman said he did not know about the grand jury observers.
“I was motivated to write about the grand jury, because I believe they will clear me of any wrongdoing by releasing the information that I did,’ he said. Smallman has been criticized harshly by other directors for revealing some details of the board’s private discussions of the alleged letter from Vierra, even though board President Gene Ratcliffe revealed the letter’s existence and discussed its content in a public statement at a water board meeting.
Smallman said he wants the grand jury to look into the board’s failure to release public information, especially the Vierra letter, the influence of the Valley Women’s Club, the continue support for challenges in the conflict-of-interest court case, the propriety of retaining a counsel who acts for both the board and a former director in the same case, and the district’s “lack of transparency.”
Mark Messimer, of Felton, who administers the San Lorenzo Valley Watchdogs Facebook page, wrote this week of the grand jury observers: “Members of the Santa Cruz County Grand Jury have introduced themselves to community members at recent board meetings. Looks like there’s a new dog on this hunt.”
