San Diego Port Commissioner Disciplined for Misconduct and Accused of Retaliating Against Top Attorney

San Diego Port Commissioner Sandy Naranjo, who earlier this week was disciplined for misconduct, falsely accused the agency’s top attorney of being corrupt and sought to have him fired for investigating his outside financial dealings that could create conflicts of interest. interests, according to a partially redacted confidential personnel investigation made public late Wednesday.

The 23-page summary report was accompanied by 373 pages of annexed materials and was prepared by HR Law Consultants in September for the port’s outside counsel.

Naranjo, the investigation concludes, “sought retaliation” against the General Counsel of the Port, Tom Russell, “because she felt unfairly singled out by him when she was trying to obtain information to clarify her various conflicts of interest as they came to her knowledge.”

The report served as the basis for another law firm, Best Best & Krieger, to declare that Naranjo breached his duties to the port, repeatedly retaliated against Russell, withheld financial information from the agency and violated the Brown Act, among other things. The behavior was described by Sonia Carvalho, a lawyer at Best Best & Krieger, as “self-serving, reckless and potentially malicious.”

The Board of Port Commissioners, citing HR Law Consultants’ investigation and Best Best & Krieger’s findings, formally reprimanded Naranjo for misconduct on Tuesday. The reprimand, which does not remove Naranjo from the board, strips the commissioner of her position as vice president, prohibits her from holding management positions on the board, and prohibits her from holding positions on internal or external committees.

Cory Briggs of Briggs Law Corporation, Naranjo’s attorney, called the investigation a flawed “coup de defect” in an email sent to reporters Wednesday night.

Prior to the report’s release, Briggs portrayed Naranjo as a whistleblower who is being targeted by the agency after trying to expose bad officers, a view Naranjo herself also shared with investigators.

“The port is not a commissioner-driven agency. It is a staff-led agency. It’s been a problem for a long time. The people who sit on the stand for many years have been just rubber stamps. They finally have someone to ask questions. There is an internal reaction. So it’s not a surprise,” Briggs said after Tuesday’s penalty. “But the lawyer who knows all the dirty laundry on all the people who have been here a long time is doing things behind the scenes to get rid of the person who has been asking questions.”

Naranjo, a South Bay native and self-described environmental justice activist, was sworn in in January 2021. She represents National City on the seven-member board of port commissioners. The board makes policy decisions for the San Diego Unified Port District, which encompasses 34 miles of marshes. The bayfront territory includes lands and waters of five member cities: San Diego, National City, Chula Vista, Imperial Beach and Coronado. Commissioners are appointed for four-year terms and do not receive a salary.

The commissioner is accused of deliberately trying to destroy Russell’s reputation after he pressured her for additional information about a union consulting firm that had not initially been disclosed on required forms.

Although Russell’s name is redacted in the investigation – he is identified as Employee A – his position is not, nor are other identifying details. Multiple documents included in the appendices also include both Russell’s title and name. The general counsel acts at the discretion of the board, which is also responsible for evaluating the performance of the legal director and approving his remuneration.

“Ultimately, Naranjo’s unfounded allegations about Employee A may have created liability for both Naranjo and the district for slander per se,” the HR Law Consultants report states. “He raised unverified allegations that Employee A was associated with a company accused of fraud and implied that he was negligent in failing to disclose his own conflicts of interest.”

The allegations occurred during a closed-door review of Russell’s performance on December 13, 2022.

The investigation exposes that what should have been a routine review of the role – and which ultimately ended with a raise and a contract extension for Russell – turned combative, leaving other commissioners baffled.

In the closed-door meeting, Naranjo “cross-examined” Russell about his relationship with former Los Angeles Port Commission Chairman Nick Tonsich, whose company had been sued for fraud by a Port of San Diego tenant. He also expressed concern about Russell obtaining a patent for a marine propeller.

“”One commissioner described Naranjo’s interrogation of Employee A as ‘antagonistic,’ with an ‘air of retribution,’ and a second commissioner described it as leaving everyone in the room ‘shocked like deer in headlights,’” it states. The report. “One of the commissioners described the event as a ‘radical personal encounter’ executed in a ‘personally atrocious’ manner. Naranjo was essentially implying that Employee A was involved in corruption by ‘feathering his own bed.’”

Five commissioners also told investigators that, following the events of the closed-door session, they believed Naranjo was not fit to serve as commissioner.

The tense atmosphere spilled over into the public during the regular board meeting on December 13, 2022, when the board elected Commissioner Rafael Castellanos as the next president, Naranjo as the next vice president, and Commissioner Danielle Moore as the next secretary. The first motion to make the appointments was not seconded, leaving the issue hanging in an awkward silence before Naranjo presented an identical motion that was approved.

Although the investigation was initiated by Naranjo’s behavior during the closed-door session, the antagonistic relationship between the commissioner and Russell dates back to her first year at the port.

That’s when Russell, who is also the agency’s ethics officer, was trying to determine how Naranjo’s business dealings would affect his ability to vote on port issues. At the time, Russell was concerned that a consulting firm formed by Naranjo and her then-husband, Andrew McKercher, could pose a potential conflict of interest in real estate deals with employment implications, such as the financing package already approved for the RIDA hotel project in $1.2 billion Chula Vista Bayfront.

The consulting company, Common Wealth Action Consulting, was incorporated on January 11, 2021 and dissolved on December 17, 2021. Naranjo did not include the company in his initial declaration of economic interests, known as California Form 700. She declared herself as her husband’s company in a later statement.

However, Russell only became aware of the company after two union officials “reported that Naranjo’s husband had been soliciting business from the unions by taking advantage of Naranjo’s position on the board as a decision-maker on potential contracts for projects. construction on a ‘pay-for-play’ plan,” the report states.

Russell sought input from outside law firms and the California Fair Political Practices Commission.

The company, which Naranjo said had no clients, presented no conflict of interest if it only worked with union groups outside San Diego County, according to opinion letters commissioned by Russell. However, during the investigation process, Naranjo reportedly refused to cooperate in attempts to obtain additional information about the company.

Naranjo has maintained that she is a whistleblower. Russell targeted and retaliated against her because she is “queer, a low-income woman of color” and a racial and environmental justice activist, she told investigators. The commissioner also claims, according to the material in the report, that she has been mistreated by Commissioner Castellanos, who chairs the board.

Additionally, Naranjo told an anonymous commissioner that “the district is a racist, sexist and classist organization that was built by white men for the benefit of white men,” the report states.

It is unclear whether the newly released investigation will have additional ramifications for Naranjo or, conversely, jeopardize the port’s relationship with its member city, National City, which has so far only expressed support for the commissioner and her work. .

There is also the possibility that the situation could become a scandal for the port, which could be perceived as the use of pro-public law firms to force Naranjo off the board.

“Employers like the port hire so-called independent investigators to come to the conclusion they want them to come to,” said Josh Gruenberg, an attorney at Gruenberg Law who represents employees. Gruenberg has not reviewed the investigation in detail and has an admitted bias against personnel investigations of this nature. “In my experience, these investigations are a foregone conclusion.”

Naranjo is also legally authorized to accuse Russell of corruption, she said.

“It may not be pleasant and it may not be true, but did he have the right to make that accusation from a public policy or free speech point of view? Absolutely,” Gruenberg said.

The board does not have the authority to remove Naranjo. The National City City Council, which appointed Naranjo, would have to do it. The City Council is scheduled to meet Thursday at 3 pm in a closed session to discuss the reprimand and investigation.