Features

Council Says Sitting on Two Commissions is Legal By MATTHEW ARTZ

Friday September 16, 2005

Just 21 years old, Jesse Arreguin, a UC Berkeley senior and tenants’ rights advocate, has made a name for himself in Berkeley. 

He’s been elected to the Rent Stabilization Board, appointed to the Housing Advisory Commission (HAC), of which he is the acting chair, and at Tuesday’s City Council meeting he emerged victorious in what some of his opponents dubbed “The Jesse Arreguin Affair.” 

By a 6-2-1 vote (Wozniak and Olds, no, Capitelli, abstain) the council passed an ordinance so that Arreguin could continue to serve in both offices. 

“I think it was clear to everybody that there has been a partisan attack by the property owners to smear me,” Arreguin said after the meeting. 

The vote ended a dispute over the past week as the Berkeley Property Owners Association (BPOA) and its political allies mounted a campaign to unseat Arreguin from the HAC. They cited an opinion issued by the office of City Attorney Manuela Albuquerque last May, at Arreguin’s request, concluding that the two offices Arreguin holds present potential conflicts of interest under state common law. 

Tuesday’s vote by the council overrode the state doctrine. Councilmembers approved a city ordinance making it legal for a resident to sit on more than two decision-making boards that might have overlapping responsibilities. Had the council not acted, Arreguin would have had to resign from the HAC. 

As a member of the pro-tenant Rent Board and the HAC, Arreguin has been at the heart of the board’s long-running dispute with the BPOA. Most recently he has supported laws, set to go to the council next week, that would make it more expensive for property owners to convert rental units to condos and give tenants lifetime leases to protect them from condo conversions. 

“It’s true Jesse Arreguin is not a political friend of ours,” said BPOA President Michael Wilson. “But that doesn’t change the fact that the city attorney found instances where he would have conflicts of interest and it doesn’t mean those six councilmembers should sacrifice principle for the sake of a political ally.”  

The council majority held that it was the BPOA that was playing politics. “We’ve got a conflict here, but it’s a political conflict, not a conflict of interests,” said Max Anderson, a former Rent Board member. 

“This is quite political with the BPOA,” said Councilmember Linda Maio. “I see no reason for it.” 

In calling for the issue to be held over until next week, Councilmember Gordon Wozniak said the council, which had not seen the city attorney’s opinion, needed more information before voting. 

“I’m reluctant to overturn her opinion,” he said. “It’s not good public policy to change the law for one individual.” 

Years earlier Albuquerque issued an opinion that Wozniak had a conflict of interest by serving on the city’s environmental commission while working as a scientist at Lawrence Berkeley Lab. In that case as well, the council voted to overturn the city attorney and allow Wozniak to continue serving on the commission. 

Arreguin is not the first elected official to also serve as an appointee on a different decision making body. His colleague on the Rent Board, Chris Kavanagh, had also served on the HAC until last year. 

Arreguin, who has pledged to recuse himself from votes that could be construed as having conflicts of interests, requested the opinion from the city attorney’s office last March. At the time, the Rent Board was scheduled to vote on passing through $200,000 in affordable housing funds that the HAC administers. 

Arreguin said he voted for the transfer after the Rent Board’s attorney issued an opinion finding no conflict of interest. However Albuquerque found several instances where the jurisdiction of the two bodies overlap.  

For instance she wrote, in the case of the Drayage, the West Berkeley warehouse where building officials have ordered tenants to vacate, the HAC could be called on to hear appeals of city abatement orders. Yet, as a member of the Rent Board, Arreguin has already voted in favor of a resolution supporting the tenants and calling on the board to consider legal action if they are evicted. 

“Conflicts of interest can be about divided loyalties,” Albuquerque told the council. “It’s based on the notion that the role one plays on one body may make it difficult to play a role on the other.” 

Under the new rule, Albuquerque said it might be possible for a citizen to be appointed to several similar decision making bodies including the Planning Commission, Zoning Adjustment Board and Landmarks Preservation Commission. 

 

Other Matters 

• The council voted unanimously to call for the California National Guard to be immediately returned from Iraq. 

• By a 6-1 vote, the council called for a new public hearing on a proposed new house in the Berkeley hills, that one neighboring family says will obstruct their views. 

• A proposal to send new business quota rules in the Elmwood to the Planning Commission for review was held over while Councilmembers Wozniak and Kriss Worthington settle disagreements over the plan. 

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