EDC supervisors intend to sue auditor-controller
Updated: On Dec. 10 at 3:10pm with county counsel comments.
By Kathryn Reed
El Dorado County Board of Supervisors voted unanimously this week to sue a fellow elected official, Auditor-Controller Joe Harn.
At issue is payment of $169,859 in developer mitigation fees to Diamond Springs-El Dorado Fire District. This is not a new issue, but is actually several years old.
Joe Harn
Harn believes it would be illegal for him to release the funds based on the county not performing its nexus studies in a timely manner and an appellate court decision that came out this fall. If Harn is correct, anyone who paid the fee could personally sue him as well as the county if he were to pay the money.
The county believes the court decision is not a factor and that the check should be written, and has told Harn to do so. Harn continually refuses to. That is why the board took the action on Dec. 8.
Before Tuesday’s vote Harn had already retained a private attorney. Neither Harn nor his attorney was at the meeting, which was in Somerset instead of Placerville.
Harn on Nov. 15 asked in writing for a deputy county counsel to be assigned to assist with the matter in order to get it resolved. That has never happened.
“They ordered me to transfer some money. I said I need a more robust legal opinion before I transfer the money. I haven’t gotten one yet,” Harn told Lake Tahoe News on Dec. 9. “In order to sue me they need to establish written legal arguments as to specifically why I need to do this. That is what I have been asking Robyn Drivon for for a long time.”
Drivon told Lake Tahoe News, “How many written legal opinions does he need? It has been asked and it has been answered. This is an issue driven by facts. He has been provided all the facts.”
Neither Brian Veerkamp, chair of the Board of Supervisors, nor Sue Novasel, who represents Lake Tahoe on the board, returned a phone call.
Drivon said she hopes conversations between her office and Harn’s continue so litigation can be avoided. She doesn’t have a hard date as to when she will call off talks, but said she is hoping for resolution in the next few weeks.
Too bad taxpayers can’t sue the Board of Supervisors for ineptitude and mismanagement the last decade.
I second that idea. One corrupt Board after another has been doing the opposite of serving the people they represent. When there are missing millions of tax payer’s money directly tied to the continual hiring of people in top appointed positions with no background checks, it should be a crime, it is gross malfeasance. This present matter should be easily resolved with a legal opinion which appears to be missing.
Don’t hold your breath on the return calls. That is one of many reasons there has been a recall started and will begin in Jan in District V. The city and CM is also being sued from two sides as it should for what they have done.
Kenny who is suing the city and CM?
First one in the retired employees union filed on Dec 2 or around that time frame.
http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20151202006334/en/Rose-Law-Sues-City-South-Lake-Tahoe
Second one was filed yesterday By Joanne
https://www.laketahoenews.net/2015/12/retirees-sue-s-lake-tahoe-over-health-benefits/
LTN staff
Admin. Thanks
Can I sue Jenkins for not getting a performance bond on the “the hole” project years ago?
Can I sue the City for wasting $400,000 per year on the “airport?”
Can I sue Meyers for not letting me build (if I wanted) a five story five star hotel with a gondola to Sierra at Tahoe?
Can I sue Bush and Cheney for getting about 4,000 GI’s killed and 32,000 wounded while blowing about $1.2 Trillion in Iraq?
Can I sue Rumsfeld for negligence over the Iraq War, the ill will created by Abu Ghraib Prison scandal and the takeover of Iraq by the Shiites?
Probably not… oh well… Lawyer up.
Between the President, Congress, SLT city council, and the EDC BOS is it no wonder people distrust their elected leaders. (Stinking) politics as usual.
Example numero uno is the 15 years it took the SLT city council to tighten up the VRO. A bunch of beholden politicians to rental interests who would not act until the people threatened to take matters into their own hands.
Both Joe Harn and Vern Pierson are being recalled, just google vern pierson recall…
For ‘don’t give up’, then working backwards, great theme material can be found in the “Peter Principle” [a concept in management theory formulated by Laurence J. Peter in 1969]…
The theory “in which the selection of a candidate for a position is based on the candidate’s performance in their current role, rather than on abilities relevant to the intended role. Thus, employees only stop being promoted once they can no longer perform effectively, and “managers rise to the level of their incompetence.”
In the ‘Peter Principle: Why Things Always Go Wrong’, there is always much “temptation to use what has worked before, even when it may exceed its effective scope”, probably also the reasoning behind so much current ‘status-quo’ and subsequent denial. . .instead of any serious look at changing anything. . .
This can come directly from the inability to do one’s homework on issues, instead relying on consultants for “objectivity”, even though they have no stake in a successful outcome. . .leaving ‘peterians’ to sort it out.
in its 40+ years since being introduced, ‘don’t give up’ is correct to imply that our institutions are failing us, as they end up relying on our donations instead of taking the time to pay attention to issues important to those donors, and their constituents: You. . . the issues then become too large to handle in civilized & reasonable ways.
It is also has a great & extremely funny way with case histories as examples. . .that fit a lot of ‘petty politic’ shenanigans. . .
Garry Bowen,
You are the King of obfuscation and damning with faint praise on this LTN comment section. Congratulations.
K.Clancy:
Thank you – not sure what that meant (obfuscation on your part), but most people don’t pay attention to what’s going on around them. . .& I’m just giving them a way to find a clue, as things get worse. . .