Wolfsheimer Says City Staff Withheld Data on Land Sale

San Diego City Councilwoman Abbe Wolfsheimer on Thursday called for an investigation and the immediate resignation of high-ranking city officials she claims have purposely withheld critical information involving the proposed sale of surplus city land--a sale she vehemently opposes.

City Manager Sylvester Murray responded by saying he will personally conduct an investigation of his staffers who are involved in the matter, including senior administrators John Fowler, a deputy city manager, and James Spotts, the city’s property director.

However, Murray said he “can hardly imagine these two men doing something against the public interest and City Council” policy.

Wolfsheimer accused high-ranking city officials--she would not name Fowler and Spotts specifically--of conspiring with developers to undermine her by “influence peddling” and manipulating information and reports given to the City Council.

“This is an attempt to withhold information from me and a conspiracy to withhold information,” Wolfsheimer said at a press conference in her City Hall office.

“I believed city staff was playing on the same ball team I was,” Wolfsheimer said.

“My constituents have asked me to manage San Diego’s physical growth. I intend to do this, but I cannot manage San Diego’s physical growth effectively when there is a cancerous growth among high-level city staff members.

“This is a cancer of deceit. It consists of the manipulation of data by key department heads in violation of the public’s rights. It obstructs the legislative process and prevents council members from fulfilling the obligations of their office.”

To back up her accusations, Wolfsheimer released a copy of a July 29 letter from San Diego attorney and land-use lobbyist Paul E. Robinson to Jeff Parks, an official with the Lomas Group of La Jolla, which is represented by Robinson.

The Lomas Group, through Lomas Serenas Company, wants to buy 326 acres of city-owned property that lies in Escondido and straddles the new North County Fair regional shopping center. The land is valued at $12 million.

The city bought the land many years ago and planned to use it for a reservoir, which was never built.

Technically, the City of Escondido would buy the property and then resell it to the company. The development company would then build houses, hotels and a golf course.

Wolfsheimer wants the city to keep the land as open space. The issue comes before the council Monday, and a city manager’s report suggests pursuing further negotiations for the sale.

Robinson’s letter describes how he and Mac Strobl, president of TCS Governmental Consulting of San Diego, met with Fowler and Spotts on July 25 concerning the property.

Robinson says in the letter, marked for “personal delivery” to Parks, that he is enclosing a copy of the draft city manager’s report on the matter--a report Wolfsheimer said the City Council had not seen at the time.

“Even though the city manager’s report discusses various possible alternatives, Jim Spotts will give a very brief oral report to the city council . . . He will emphasize the city manager’s recommendation, ‘That the city manager explore disposition--including lease, sale, exchange, or any other means--of the properties with the city of Escondido and the Lomas Serenas Company,’ ” the letter says.

“It is incumbent upon us to meet with every city council member except District 1 (Wolfsheimer), to make certain the discussion does not result in the possible limiting of the ability of the two cities to remain totally flexible in their negotiations. I am sure you will agree it is virtually impossible to accomplish that goal with District 1. For that reason, we all agreed that it would be important for (Escondido) Mayor Jim Rady to meet with Mayor Maureen O’Connor as soon as possible to:

“1. Expose Mayor O’Connor personally to Escondido’s desire to acquire the San Diego city owned properties; and 2. To ask her support for the city manager’s recommendation found in the enclosed draft city manager’s report.”

The letter also says that, at Fowler’s suggestion, Fowler and well-known San Diego land-use attorney Paul Peterson would discuss the city manager’s report with O’Connor during a tour of East Coast convention centers. The men accompanied O’Connor on the tour along with other government officials.

“The mayor will play an important role in the limiting of discussion by the city council, specifically one council member. If this does not occur, there is enough information in that city manager’s report to allow a particular city council person to continue questions for most of the afternoon (of the hearing) and thus confuse the issue,” the letter states--an obvious reference to Wolfsheimer’s style of persistent questioning during council meetings.

Robinson also wrote in the letter that he and Strobl tried, “obviously without success, to talk John (Fowler) and Jim (Spotts) out of issuing this report. They feel strongly that they are bound to answer the many questions by council member Wolfsheimer. They don’t intend to discuss the alternatives, but will be forced to do so if they are questioned.”

Wolfsheimer said Robinson’s letter was mailed anonymously to her office.

Saying that the scenario described in the letter is a “common example of how us elected officials are challenged,” Wolfsheimer said, “It is inappropriate to have conferences behind my back.” She added that she will ask the City Council to defer Monday’s hearing on the city manager’s report until the investigation is finished.

Both Fowler and Spotts, while declining to elaborate on the accusations, said they did nothing wrong and welcomed the investigation.

“She has misconstrued our intent on this whole thing,” Fowler said.

Fowler, in an interview with reporters in his office, described the letter as “Paul Robinson’s view of what was said” at the July 25 meeting.

Fowler said he did nothing out of the ordinary in discussing the property deal with Robinson and Strobl or in supplying them with a draft report.

He said he did those things as a result of a City Council committee decision made earlier this year, at which the city staff was urged to explore sale of the property.

As for the statement in the letter that Fowler and Spotts would refrain from discussing alternatives to the sale, Fowler said it is common practice at City Council meetings for administrators to “give brief and concise report on our recommendations . . . (it’s) almost the operating procedure at the City Council.”

The general City Hall practice, Fowler said, is to make more extensive presentations before City Council committees and to stand by for questions at subsequent City Council meetings once the staff’s recommendation is presented.

“It’s up to the city manager to look into the matter . . . I welcome the opportunity for him to” do that, Fowler said.

Spotts, in a brief interview outside his City Hall office, said he did nothing but follow the directions of the City Council’s Public Facilities and Recreation Committee, “which said to go ahead (and pursue the sale). It was in response to that.”

Robinson’s office said he was out of town and unavailable for comment. Parks did not return a phone call made to his office.

But Strobl, who attended the July 25 meeting on which the letter is based, said there was never an attempt to manipulate the city manager’s report or to withhold information from the City Council.

“I really don’t want to characterize what Paul (Robinson) said in the letter, since he wrote it . . . but I think it’s inaccurate to suggest that there was anything improper or inappropriate in the course of that meeting,” Strobl said.

“There was never an attempt to deny information,” he said. What happens in government, Strobl explained, is that competing interests collide.

In this case, he said, Wolfsheimer and those seeking the sale are at odds. “But to say we tried to hide something from the council is incorrect and untrue,” Strobl said.

“Councilwoman Wolfsheimer is one member of the City Council . . . and she may have a perspective others on the council may not agree with.”

Strobl said that he and Robinson wanted the city manager’s report delayed. He said they felt it was premature for the city manager’s office to make a report without all the alternatives, such as leasing, land exchanges and selling, being more fully negotiated.

“We were suggesting that procedurally the scheme of events was wrong . . . but as the letter indicates, they (Fowler and Spotts) felt it was important at this point to take it to the council,” Strobl said.

Paul Downey, O’Connor’s press secretary, said: “The mayor was offended that her name even appeared in the letter and that people could feel she could be lobbied on this whole issue.”

Despite what the letter suggested, Downey said, the mayor never met with Rady or talked to Fowler or Peterson about the land sale during her recent East Coast trip.

As to whether the mayor agrees with Wolfsheimer’s premise that high-ranking city administrators routinely manipulate and withhold crucial information, Downey said the mayor is not ready to comment on that.

“She wants to wait and see what the city manager’s investigation on this whole issue turns up, if anything,” Downey said. “She doesn’t know if there is a problem at this point.”

Murray, who said he is not “presupposing any kind of action,” said he would personally conduct the investigation requested by Wolfsheimer.

“I will not precipitously ask for a resignation . . . but I will be very sincere in the investigation,” said Murray.

As for whether the city staff should be giving draft city manager’s reports to parties with a vested interest before the City Council receives them, Murray said: “No.”

But moments later Murray said he didn’t find anything wrong with providing vested parties with such reports as long as there was no attempt to have the reports rewritten for a particular interest or fundamentally changed.

“It is appropriate for issues to be discussed with all interested parties,” said Murray, explaining that he recently told his staff to seek responses from garbage companies on a matter pertaining to garbage.