After months of struggle over whether members of the La Jolla Community Parking District Advisory Board (CPDAB) should publicly disclose their financial interests, San Diego City Attorney Mike Aguirre Wednesday sent letters advising members to halt their daily parking-connected activities.
Aguirre said public disclosure is moot while his office investigates allegations of collaboration with city employees and council members over “rubber-stamping” new La Jolla parking plans.
“A lot of evidence has been presented,” said Michael Calabrese, Deputy City Attorney. “And I can definitely say that this is a very serious concern for our office.”
Aguirre wrote a letter to Martin Mosier, acting CPDAB chair, explaining that the La Jolla board should halt its parking plans until members fill out a conflict-of-interest form. Although members thought they were exempt from disclosing financial information, the city attorney said he has evidence of ongoing collaboration with the city council, which gives the board greater power. Aguirre said he is investigating Mosier’s relationship “” including alleged meetings “” with Council President and District 1 Councilman Scott Peters.
“Although the short time frame has not yet permitted us to conduct a thorough review of the history of Council review of CPDAB recommendations, anecdotal evidence so far suggests that CPDAB recommendations are, in fact, routinely approved,” Aguirre said in the letter.
Many La Jollans have been at odds with the parking board, which wants to implement paid on-street parking in the Village of La Jolla. Months ago, District 6 Councilwoman Donna Frye and the city attorney began looking into Fair Political Practices Commission (FPPC) regulations, which govern conflicts of interest and state transparency laws. Calabrese took an altered code “” if adopted, a conflict of interest form would be rendered from that code “” written with members of La Jolla’s parking board to February’s meeting of the San Diego City Council. But the council denied the code and asked Calabrese to return in April with options for the council that would free board members from disclosing their financial interests.
Calabrese agreed at that time, he said, as long as parking board members operated only in an advisory capacity. But when CPDAB members sent out the March 19 agenda saying they would “discuss and make recommendations as to a parking plan in La Jolla,” Aguirre told Mosier his office was surprised that Mosier “intended to have the LJCPDAB act on a parking plan so quickly.”
The city attorney said it makes no difference whether the board believes it is behaving in an advisory capacity, because he is investigating relationships between Mosier, board members and Peters. According to Calabrese, the City Attorney’s Office has evidence of past, current and ongoing collaboration. If this is true, he said, then any parking plan the board sends through the system would be “rubber-stamped.”
“Our inquiries have led to two grave concerns,” Aguirre wrote to Mosier. “There is evidence that the planned intervening staff review will not be ‘substantive’ in any meaningful way.”
The parking board sends the plan to the City’s Traffic Engineering Department for review, then to City Council, but workers at the Traffic Engineering Department told the Village News last November they had been instructed to refer any La Jolla inquiries back to Mosier.
“We are also concerned that the relationship of the board generally, and [Martin Mosier] in particular, with Council President Peters would render any nominal City Council review of your decisions a mere formality,” Aguirre wrote. “Our understanding is that you have met with Mr. Peters to develop strategy for ensuring approval of your mutually preferred parking plan.”
The CPDAB can continue to operate at this point, Calabrese said, after members disclose their financial interests. La Jolla is the only parking board affected, he said.
“They would have to make all of the disclosures and then they’d be freed up,” Calabrese said.
However, in addition to issues of collaboration with the council president and the Traffic Engineering Department, Steve Haskins, attorney for La Jollans for Clean Government, gave Calabrese evidence alleging that some parking board members are manipulating the plan for their own means. Calabrese said the City Attorney’s Office is wading through the evidence.
“There are also allegations of Brown Act violations,” Calabrese added.