Mayor: All an Innocent Mistake

Huntington Beach Mayor Dave Garofalo said he cast about 300 votes on behalf of advertisers who gave him thousands of dollars to appear in local publications he owned, but said he began abstaining as soon as he was alerted to a potential conflict.

At a hastily called news conference Thursday also attended by his lawyer, Garofalo for the first time offered an estimate for the number of votes he had cast during the past 5 1/2 years on behalf of companies that provided the income for his publishing business and whose projects had come before the City Council.

Garofalo said he believed at the time that his votes on the projects were proper and that he was acting within the law, which forbids public officials from voting or deliberating for 12 months on matters affecting those who have given them $250 or more. He said he mistakenly thought he could continue to vote because his business was incorporated and it would receive the income.

“Out of 300 votes, [only] five or eight or nine of them weren’t 7 to 0,” Garofalo said from the Huntington Beach Boys and Girls Club, for which he has raised money over the years. “I don’t think there was a time I led the way or changed the world with my vote.”

When asked if it was easier for him to sell ads as a member of the City Council, he said, “Of course not.”

The Times has reported that Garofalo voted at least 87 times on behalf of nine major advertisers appearing repeatedly in the annual Visitors Guide, which he has published since 1994. In all, 113 advertisers have appeared in the guides since 1995, Garofalo’s first full year on the council. On Thursday, he said he sold the “publishing rights” to the business on Jan. 14, 1998--about three weeks later than his previous statements indicated.

Garofalo’s voting record is under investigation by Orange County Dist. Atty. Tony Rackauckas to determine if he improperly voted on behalf of advertisers in the Local News, a bimonthly newspaper he published until recently; the city’s annual Visitors Guide; and an annual business directory distributed through the Chamber of Commerce.

Prosecutors also are looking at the details of a home Garofalo bought in July 1998 for $565,000 and sold a day later to a friend for $625,000. Garofalo said the difference was for upgrades and that his profit was $1. He bought the house after being offered the first lot in the gated St. Augustine tract in Holly Seacliff, jumping ahead of about 300 people on a waiting list.

Though Garofalo pledged to provide documents Thursday detailing the home sale, his attorney, Steve Churchwell, said he wouldn’t do so because of the ongoing investigations. Churchwell is former general counsel to the state Fair Political Practices Commission.

Churchwell said the investigation will show Garofalo made less than $250 in profit on the home he bought on Poppy Hill Circle and sold to oil tycoon George A. Pearson. During the news conference, Garofalo repeated earlier denials that he knew he was receiving special treatment, and said he bought the home as a favor for Pearson, who was farther down on the waiting list.

However, Garofalo may still have had a conflict of interest in voting on matters affecting the developer and home builder because they bought a full-page ad in the 1998 Visitors Guide. Garofalo cast eight votes while the home was in escrow and another six votes in the year after the sale.

Churchwell said he couldn’t comment yet on whether those votes--and hundreds of others--violated state conflict-of-interest laws because each vote would have to be examined to determine whether it materially affected those who paid Garofalo.

“The law is so arcane it’s gotten to a point that no one can follow it even if they’ve got a copy of it,” he said.

He couldn’t predict when his vote-by-vote review would be completed, though Garofalo said he wanted Churchwell to “cut to the chase” and clear his name as soon as possible.

“There is an appearance of wrongdoing, and that appearance has given an incredibly violent, small, militant minority an opportunity to tear me apart,” Garofalo said. “These are serious charges and I’m pretty serious about my reputation, about my life.”