By Robert Haugh
Last week, Councilman Anthony Becker asked for a special meeting to fire a City employee.
Multiple sources, including at least one, who has talked to Becker confirm that he’d like to fire City Attorney Brian Doyle.
But Becker doesn’t have a reason for firing Doyle. Here’s what Becker wrote in an email to City staff on Wednesday, August 25, 2021.
“I would like to request a special closed session meeting promptly to consider the dismissal of a public employee for no-cause under their employment contract.”
That’s right. Becker put in writing that there’s no cause to fire Doyle. He’d just like to do it anyway.
Becker also told City staff in his August 25th email what info (or lack of info) to disclose to the public:
“The notice shall read as follows and shall not include the name or the title of the employee.”
‘PUBLIC EMPLOYEE DISCIPLINE/DISMISSAL/RELEASE or Gov’t Code§ 54954.S(e)’”
Wow. That’s right. Becker wrote “not include the name.” Becker wants to get rid of Doyle but doesn’t want anyone to know about it in advance.
Good thing we were watching. So was the SF Chronicle. Here’s their story.
Becker also told City staff when to schedule the meeting. Here’s what he wrote in his email:
“I hearby [sic] request that this special closed session be scheduled as soon as possible but no later than Friday September 3, 2021 to consider this item.”
Why is Becker in a rush? Maybe there’s an important 49ers court case coming up. His push is raising lots of questions.
(Note to Anthony: turn spell check on.)
Becker is not a lawyer. So he probably doesn’t use the word “hereby” a lot.
According to retired City employees, they’ve never seen anyone do that before in Santa Clara history. Never.
They also expect Doyle to sue the City. Most believe he has a really strong case.
We wonder if Becker will have to write another apology to Santa Clara residents for costing the Mission City lots of money.
A recall of one or more City Council members is governed by California State law. Here is the official guide, last revised in 2020, https://elections.cdn.sos.ca.gov/recalls/recall-procedures-guide.pdf See Chapter III, Recall of Local Officers, pages 14 – 24. Also, regarding replacement candidates, see Chapter IV, The Recall Election, Local Officer section, page 26.
The process is formal but not overwhelming. A recall petition circulates in the district which the selected Council member represents. Depending upon the population of the district, anywhere from 10% to 30% of registered voters need to sign the petition. There would be a separate recall petition for each selected Council member, so a petition for Suds Jain in District 5, a petition for Raj Chahal in District 2, a petition for Kevin Park in District 4, and a petition for Anthony Becker in District 6. The petitions could be written identically with District information changed for each one.
I don’t know how many registered voters there are for each District or for the City as a whole, but the July 2019 population for the entire City is published on the City web site as 130,365. if we, very conservatively, assumed that 3/4 of all citizens are registered voters, we’d have 97,774 voters in the city. Dividing by 6 yields approximately 16,296 voters per District, so 20% of registered voters would need to support the recall. By the numbers I’ve assumed (which would need to be verified/changed) that would mean each petition would need 3,259 registered voter signatures.
This is doable.
Becker is a joke. Although I do get a laugh watching him picking his nose and sliding down in his chair looking wasted during the meetings, I wont miss It when hes gone. He is an embarrassment for Santa Clara. Watching him trying to put together complete sentences or make a motion is a joke. His drug addeled brain makes him a perfect 49er puppet. He’s rude, uneducated, has no career, no class, no life skills, no business experience, no respect, no clue, no home, The last council meeting was hard to watch, he is so stupid. He needs to step down and apologize to the citizens of Santa Clara for being an embarrassment.
The guy with nothing if sued.
Patty or Jed doesn’t care if Anthony Becker ends up back in his car. He can barely afford the room he rents.
And this guy is making decisions for the City.
Has anyone researched what the Recall process entails?
Doyle has literally saved SC millions with he 49ers alone. He has been a bulldog against shady against greedy business interest. The only misstep I saw was when he represented himself to make comment – that is a big no no.
I just received an email from the City regarding another, for many, important meeting at the same time as the above City Council meeting. The Climate Action Pan (CAP) zoom meeting is being held on 9/1/2021 at 530 pm. I suggest that folks interested in both either, at 530pm, attend the Public Comment portion of the City Council meeting to make a public comment and then, when the Council moves to the closed part of their meeting, switch to the CAP meeting.
Or be sure to make an eComment at any time before tomorrow evening. eComments are read during the Council meeting, so they become part of the record. Again here’s the URL, (remember to Sign In at the top of the webpage) https://bit.ly/3DwdyeF
One day left to leave an eComment for the Council (remember to Sign In at the top of the webpage): https://bit.ly/3DwdyeF
Oh, and people -might- want to check out the stretch of the City Code that supports citizen recalls of elected city officials, such as Councilmembers (“electors” BTW refers to us, citizens of the City) “There are hereby reserved to the electors of the City, the powers of the initiative and referendum and of the recall of municipal elective officers.”, https://www.codepublishing.com/CA/SantaClara/html/SantaClaraCH.html#700
Wonder how that’s done … recalling certain elected Councilmembers who do not have the City’s interests at heart but rather their own interests and a football team’s interest. I’m sure some of us will be following up.
It’s very clear Becker (with others) is suffering from Delusions of Grandeur from his Glass House!
Doyle deserves it. He’s been costing my city too much for far too long.
But no Ms. Mahan we won’t let it be.
Kevin Park hasn’t often been right lately but when he said the world is watching he may have been more correct than he would like.