Madam Clerk, the time is 6.33pm. I call to order this special meeting of the Inreville City Council. This meeting is being conducted in person at 1333 Park Avenue here in Inreville, California. The City Council welcomes comments, including criticisms about the policies, procedures, programs, or services of the City Council, or of the acts or emissions of the City Council or of the acts or emissions of the City Council. Speaker Shana used threatening profane or abusive language which disrupts disturbs or otherwise impedes the orderly conduct of a City Council's successor agency, the management of Immigil Services Authority or related meeting. The City is committed to maintaining a workplace free of unlawful harassment and is mindful that City staff regularly attend council meetings. Discriminatory statements or conduct that would potentially violate the Fair Employment Housing Act such as statements or conduct that is hostile, intimidating, oppressive, or abusive is perceptive and shall not be tolerated. I wanted to note I understand the great interests in this meeting. However this will not become a circus. Members of the public will have their time to comment during public comment. It will not be disturbed. Members of the City Council, we will not interrupt one another while we are discussing and making comments. Do we have an understanding? Council members, do we have an understanding? Thank you. Madam Clerk, the roll, please. Council members, do we have an understanding? Thank you. Madam Clerk, the roll please. Council member Bowders. Here. Council member Carr. Present. Council member Priforce. Here. Nice mayor Mora. Here. And Mayor Welch. Here. Item three is approval of the final agenda. Members, do we have a motion on the final agenda? I move approval of the final agenda. Second. Madam clerk the roll please. Council member bowters. Aye. Council member Carr. Yes. Council member Priforce. Aye. Vice Mayor Moira. Aye. And Mayor Welch. Aye. Do any of the members of the City Council have any x-parts a communications report for this agenda? None. Item five is public comment for items not on the agenda, not on the agenda. If you have a public comment for items not on the agenda, not on item 6.1 if you're waiting to comment on that, you can make your comment now for two minutes. Please step up to the podium. The mayor just said something that's false. And that is that this meeting is not going to be, I believe you said, turned into a circus. But it already is a circus made so by you, Mayor Welch. And Councilmember Bouters, who's ready to be turned out having lost his election. So yeah, it's a circus. So I like everyone here to know that Mayor Welsh over the years has called me a fuckboy on her Twitter account and she's called me a liar. She's called me a racist. And she's called me a misogynist. And I just wanted to say, you know, I don't appreciate that. I don't want to be called a fuck boy. My daughter, she's, you know, just recently became an adult. She just want to hear that, you know, on social media about her father being a fuckboy and a racist and a misogynist and a liar. And so I don't appreciate it. And, you know, I don't like, I don't pay my mayor to call people, you know, especially me, but any other people, citizen or ordinary people, a fuckboy. And we don't pay you for that. And beyond pay, it's untorrid. It's untorrid behavior. So we don't, that's a circus to be calling us the public, fuckboy, liar, racist, misogynist. We don't appreciate that. And so we would like the mayor to apologize for to the extent that she's called people in the public fuckboy and other epithets. We think the mayor should apologize for that. Thank you for your comment. Any other members of the public? Yes, I'd like to speak. Thank you. I just want to present the fact that there is a genocide going on right now in Gaza, an ongoing expanding genocide. I just heard that today there were three women who were standing online, three women who probably had multiple children, probably some of them who had been amputated in the past year with no anesthesia, who were stampeded and died, while they were waiting online for bread. Okay, so we need to do everything that we can and you all who are sitting behind there, have the responsibility to boycott, divest, and sanctions. The city of Emriville should not be sending any money to Israel, should not be investing in Israeli bonds or anything that's supporting this genocide. Thank you. Thank you for your comment. Please come to the podium. This is beyond shameful. We're signaling out a person on the council. Is it shameful? Any of the members of the public wishing to comment on items not on the agenda. There will be time to comment on the censure. Hello my name is Jonathan Cadel. I do have I will be speaking later on the censure as well but speaking of more I guess immediate local issues, I would just like to remind everyone of the serious problem we are having with these organized smash and grab thefts in Emeryville. I just saw a news story today about the break-in at Nirvana. I will have next door to that store. I have had a car driven into the building that I live in. I've seen cars driven multiple times into what used to be a dispensary about a block away from my home, as well as the game stop, a short walk from my home. In brief, I cannot take a walk in the city that I live in with my dog that I pay taxes in, without seeing boarded up businesses, boarded up windows and the effects of these incredibly destructive thefts. And it just does not feel like enough is being done to address this problem. Businesses are having to put up their own barriers. They literally just built a little concrete column to put in front of a corner store. This shouldn't be necessary. It's ridiculous and it is shameful. And I do hope that everyone on this city council as well as members of our law enforcement community here will be motivated to do something. Thank you. Thank you for your comment. I'm clerk, the public comments closed. I am moving along to item six. Item six point one resolution of the City Council, the City of Imbebo, centering and imposing sanctions on Council Member Clinton's pre-force. I will, as the Council member that brought this forward, I will begin with a statement that lays out the violations by a Council member, prior force. The conduct of the city council of the city of Emeryville is governed by numerous laws, including the US and state constitutions, the Ralph and Brown Act, the little co-reform act of 1974, the city of Emeryville municipal code and the Emeryville code of Ethics among others. These laws govern complex interest, financial disclosures, election campaigns, and other processes of government. The City Council wishes to maintain trust, faith, and confidence, our residents and businesses by importing ourselves to follow the laws that govern us and wishes to preserve and protect the reputation of the city of Imriville with those outside of our city. We condemn persisting actions that violate these laws and regulations. The above-to-name laws set minimum standards but the City Council adopted a code of ethics in September 2023 to set a standard higher than what is mentally required by law. Councilmember Price Force's behavior has violated the Ralph M. Brown Act, the Political Reform Act of 1974, Henryville Code of Ethics, and has displayed this behavior on numerous occasions. These violations are not isolated incidents, but instead reflect a pattern of behavior that shows he regularly engages in unacceptable conduct, uses poor judgment, bring embarrassment and distribute to the city. The violations are as follows. The Brown Act provides a narrow set of situations where officials may meet with city management and lawyers to discuss matters of a confidential nature, including the legal or negotiating position of the city. And protecting said discussions with privacy by prohibiting the disclosure of the content of those meetings by members of the council. These meetings are known as closed session meetings and confidentiality of those meetings are required by law. Councilor Pryorffs has violated closed session confidentiality thus violating the Brown Act. Even after do not interrupt me, do not interrupt. I already said disruption. I said disruptions will not be tolerated. You get one warning. You get one warning. One warning, Mr. Donna Hugh. Councilman, the prior force has violated closed session confidentiality. That's violating the Brown Act even if you're being advised by the city attorney. On October 24th, 2024, while being absent from the second round of the interviews for the city manager search, Councilman Price Force sent an email to the city manager city attorney, assistant city manager and human resources director. City Manager Search, Council Member Priforcent, and email to the City Manager, City Attorney, Assistant City Manager, and Human Resources Director. In the email, he mentions details regarding two separate closed session meetings. At the end of the email, he stated verbatim that he would share this email publicly. He was advised that sharing the email would be a violation of the Brown Act because it had closed session details. Regardless of this warning, he shared the email and a member of the Brown Act because it had closed session details. Regardless of this warning, he shared the email and a member of the public forwarded me a screenshot of Council Member of Pride Forces email stating that they had received it from him directly and that Council Member of Pride Force requested a meeting with the member of the public to discuss the subject matter. The Political Reform Act of 1974 covers members of the City Council including the Fair Political Practices Commission Councilmember pry force has not filed the following form for 60s Formed for 60 for the period of January 2023 to June 2023 due July 31st 2023 Formed for 60 for period July 2023 through December 2023 due December 31, 2024. Form 460 for period January 2024 to June 2024 which was due July 31, 2024. Councilmember Price Force claimed in an interview with the local blog last year that he had lost access to his campaign account which prevented him from filing the reports and they had hired a firm to complete his filings. In September 24, Councilmember Pry Force filed a form for 60 for a period of a year and a half for which the information is complete, does not align with information in prior filings and is missing required information such as the employment information for his donors and the committee's expenditures. The City Clerk has email customer priours on numerous occasions requesting that he come into compliance and submit reports for the previously mentioned periods. The City Clerk has now forwarded those violations to the FPPC for investigation and review. Under FPPC rules every day that a Form 460 is late may constitute a fine up to $10, combining all these three reports from a prior force stance to face fines in the range of thousands of dollars for as noncompliance. The FPPC has a commission initiated complaint and open investigation against Councilmember Pry Force in case 2023-00785 based on a sworn statement for his failure to comply with fiscal reporting and transparency laws under FPPC. In the 2024 general election, Councilmember Price Force used his own Canada Control Campaign Committee, Price Force for Immiglacy Council 2022, to help finance the campaigns of me as for on the Baron and Calvin Dillenty. Both of those candidates filed late form for 70s initially saying that they would not raise receive or spend more than $2,000 during the election. Despite this thousands of door hangers, male pieces, digital images and as and yard signs appeared in support of them with the notation that the Priforce for in reveal city council 2022 campaign committee had paid for the materials. Neither candidate Esferrande's a Brown nor candidate Dillenty has filed any reports claiming to have received any in-kind contributions for the materials and Councilmember Pry Force has not filed any required filings to show that he made contributions in support of their campaigns to their campaign committees directly as required by law. Also having run a campaign, I'm aware of the value of these materials, including printing and postage and I know the amount exceeds thresholds for form for 70, which again is under $2,000 and would likely require member price for us to also file contribution forms. He has not filed any to date, so voters have no idea how these campaigns were financed. As I previously stated, Councilman Price-Forest claimed that he had no access to his campaign bank account and that prevented him from turning in his filings. But it appears he has access to the account and was able to spend the money on other candidate's materials. Councilman Price-Forest also claimed to be a mayor, candid for mayor of Inriville, an office at a ceremonial in nature and does not appear on the ballot He solicited and received endorsements for this race campaign along other candidates for city council Election as a candidate for mayor creating confusion and spreading disinformation about the city's election Wasting public time and resources while eroding public confidence in our electoral processes. We falsely claim the city and council members changed the rules to prevent him from becoming mayor. No rules were changed. All members of the city council are eligible to be non-a-made and serve as mayor and vice mayor. No members of the council, including member pride force, non-a-dem to serve as mayor or vice mayor. These fiscal reporting campaign transparency and election dishonesty actions can substitute an embarrassment to the city council and the city of Imriville. The city council adopted a code of ethics on September 26, 2023 at a regular meeting and it was approved unanimously with all members present. Section A, paragraph three calls for members of the city council to refrain from abuse of conduct or personal charges or verbal attacks against other council members, staff or the public. Section B covers conduct of members, including paragraph F1C, about the role of the chair running a meeting paragraph to A around being respectful to members of public adhering and paragraph four A through C, which speaks to limiting your participation at committee meetings to questions only, not giving direction, intimidating, otherwise guiding the discussion or implying they report to the council member. Councilmember Pryorff has attacked multiple applicants for commission committee appointments, calling them names, and speaking about them negatively. When Sam Bull brought a B-packed appointment, he called on a troll to use some of racial bias for responding to a social media post in which Council Member Pryor shared inaccurate information by providing the correct information to him and then spoke down his qualifications. When that RISNCOF applied to be a member of the Housing Committee, Council Member Pryor accused him of being a paid lobbyist and a shill for YenB, even though Ned is not a lobbyist and works as a housing policy analyst. He was berated for his qualifications and attack Ned's personal view. Mr. Resnickoff has since resigned from the committee after receiving ongoing and persistent harassment. When council member, former council member, Diane Martinez applied to be on the Kalanit commission. Council member Priforce mocked her, laughing saying that when he is done with the city council, he will just go and won't stick around and try to keep doing things, implying that her ability to serve the city ended when she did not seek reelection to the council. He questioned her qualifications, among many other applicants to city commissions and committees in ways that are not welcome, inclusive or positive. Councilmember Pryor says you social media to bully and attack other members of the city council. Notably myself and councilmember bowters. He has falsely called us corrupt and accused us of federal crimes taking bribes and payoffs from interest he does not like. It made statements that must represent his colleagues and staff members in our service to the city. All this is rooted in fiction and a part of a political game he is playing to undermine the credibility of his colleagues. He has promoted, shared, and perpetuated lies about his colleagues for personal gain, and he often plays victim, making baseless claims that he has been targeted by colleagues or members of the public. Meanwhile, he engages in Donald Trump-like tactics, giving abusive nicknames to colleagues and turning people, I set. Giving abusive nicknames to colleagues and turning people against others and attempted to deflect from his own responsibility. Hi. Oh, you're not nice. The Code of Ethics provides for sanctions when a member repeatedly engages in one or more violations of the Code of Ethics. The RepriForest were really called for a code of ethics, and when it was developed, he seconded the motion to approve the code voting for it. However, he's the only member who has declined to sign the code of ethics, indicating he believes he is above the law, and the rules that govern all council members. I have requests since the agenda item due to the totally other circumstances that show he is unwilling to comport himself in the manner of becoming of a city council member. I have already asked the public there will not be any disruptions. will get your time to speak. This Mr. Tam thank you. The result causes I'm finding the following. It's finding that he has violated the laws and regulations governing his activities as a member of the City Council on numerous occasions and that these are not an isolated incident but reflect a pattern of behavior that show he regularly engages in unacceptable conduct and uses poor judgment, bring embarrassment to the city. A finding that the City Council is tired of his antics and persistent violation of laws around transparency, accountability, confidentiality, and decency, and knowing that he claims victimhood to escape responsibility for his own actions. A finding that condenses actions, but also invites him to reaffirm his oath of office to adhere to the laws that govern activities as members and encourage him to publicly apologize to the people in reveal for these past actions. Councilmember Price Force, you now have the ability to respond to the next room. I'm going to go to the next room. I'm going to go to the next room. I'm going to go to the next room. I'm going to go to the next room. I'm going to go to the next room. I'm going to go to the next room. I'm going to go to the next room. I'm going to go to the next room. I'm going to go to the next page. I'm going to go to the next page. I'm going to go to the next page. I'm going to go to the next page. I'm going to go to the next page. I'm going to go to the next page. I'm going to go to the next page. I'm going to go to the next page. I'm going to go to the next page. I'm going to go to the next page. Thank you. you I'm going to go to the next one. I'm going to go to the next one. I'm going to go to the next one. I'm going to go to the next one. I'm going to go to the next one. I'm going to go to the next one. I'm going to go to the next one. I'm going to go to the next one. I'm going to go to the next one. I'm going to go to the next one. Thank you all for coming. Taking time from your field schedules and busy lives to take part in this exercise of democracy. For some of you, thank you for showing up for me. Today I cannot say a lot. I have questions, and so do you, but legally I have been advised to hold myself back just a little because there are bigger fights that are coming. So I have a request that as you provide public comments and I hope that the time you are given is enough. If you do not wish to speak you can give your time to someone else who has more to say. My request is that you speak your truth but in a way that will be heard by those outside these walls. For investigative purposes, your words matter. You matter. Those two words you matter was why I ran for office. I've only been doing this for two years. So I'm still at the beginning. But to take a line from one of my favorite authors, Frank Herbert, the creator of Doom. A beginning is the beginning. The beginning is the time for taking the most delicate care that the balances are correct. On this day, December 3rd, but a different year, 1907, President Roosevelt gave a message to the American people. At a time when wealthy, powerful businessmen were coming together and forming trusts and therefore monopolizing industries. In his words, in any large body of men, however, there are certain to be some who are dishonest. And if the conditions are such that these men prosper or commit their misdeeds with impunity, their example is a very evil thing for the community. Those men President Roosevelt is describing back then didn't look like me. They didn't sound like me. They didn't come from where I come from. But although times have changed, the people who stand to hurt us the most can look like us. And sometimes they sound like us. But they not like us. Because the name of the game is still about power. Who has it? And who gets their stripped, raped, colonized, gentrified, sanctioned, and recalled? The violence is still the same. Since the moment I ran for election, members of this body have sought to reverse the outcome of an election. In 2022, as a black man, a Haitian man, a Buddhist and a Catholic, a Hactivist, a White House Champion of Change, an educator and entrepreneur, with long locks that carries a walking stick aid, I gained the majority of your vote. You did that, Emriville. That is our potential as a city to do more and be more. And orphaned from Brooklyn Foster Care homes, I've taken your vote and made it sing throughout these halls by championing tenant protections and pushing for rent control. 10th, 10th, 10th, 10th, 10th, 10th, 10th, 10th, 10th, 10th, 10th, 10th, 10th, 10th, 10th, 10th, 10th, 10th, 10th, 10th, 10th, 10th, 10th, 10th, 10th, 10th, 10th, 10th, 10th, 10th, 10th, 10th, 10th, 10th, 10th, 10th, 10th, 10th, 10th, showing up for our babies in our schools, and listening to what our seniors have to say about how they want to spend the rest of their years on this earth who I am. But that doesn't mean they'll stop trying and they're not alone. Today you will hear public comments from those who orchestrated recalls of public officials. Those who made it financially lucrative for them to reverse the will of the people and use the money of wealthy tech and real estate barons to do it. She's not on our side, but guess who side she's on. You hear public comments from real estate lobbyists who will insult your intelligence by claiming that they are not who they say they are, or that the advocacy group that they are employed by did not contribute $10,000 to a member on this council through a separate fund. He is not on our side, but guess who side he is on. You are going to hear from people who want themselves to be judged differently for their behaviors while they subject others to censure and sanction. They seek favoritism, not justice. What you are going to hear today is an apology from me, not to the status quo, but to you. I'm sorry, Emriville. I'm sorry, Emriville, for how your taxpayer money is being used. To support a kangaroo court who love to intimidate, but they can't take it when someone brings an activist rat battle against a high school R&B. I'm sorry and revealed that while you are facing evictions, skyrocketing PG and E-cost, also a campaign contributor to a member of this body, and want better opportunities for your kids and safer streets to ride on, time is being given to drake-like behavior against your Kendrick Lamar movement. I know you want the drama to end. I know you want the rottenness to end. I know you want the page to finally be turned on a new chapter in our politics, a government that places your needs first. And for many of you, a Democratic party that actually cares for working people and working families. Since the beginning, I have done everything I could with you to strike a balance of priorities in city hall. An independent public ethics commission is how we get there. For those in attendance and those who are watching, it doesn't matter if they want to have the last word. When you are the star witness that Emreville needs an independent public ethics commission. So no matter the outcome or how predetermined the results seem to be, movements aren't successful overnight, they take time. The emery rise in movement is bigger than me because it started with you standing up for your city. I'm just a kid from Brooklyn who joined the law. In the words of Churchill, this is not the end, it's not even the beginning of the end, but it is perhaps the end of the beginning. Demand public oversight in Emeryville and let's reach that chapter together. Thank you city city staff. Thank you, residents and workers, and guests to our city. My city. Those are my comments. Yeah! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! I'm not going to say anything. I'm not going to say anything. I'm not going to say anything. I'm not going to say anything. I'm not going to say anything. I'm not going to say anything. I'm not going to say anything. I'm not going to say anything. I'm not going to say anything. I'm not going to say anything. I'm not going to say anything. I'm not going to say anything. the I have a few minutes. Good evening, Council. My name is Sarah Perez. I am an Emoryville resident. I have served as a public servant for almost a decade. I am a union executive one of the largest unions in the Bay area. I have brought a friend with me, my dear friend, Julian, who is also another union executive, also an executive on the Alameda Labor Council. The issue is concerning that you're not operating in the best interest of the city. In the interest of the people, by using implicit bias to sanction Mr. Price Force, the only black man on this council. As an Avrilatean woman, I'm concerned standing before a council that has a history of unethical and unfair labor policies because these determinations negatively impact people who look like me. There was a time that the council voted to lower the minimum wage for the working class. A measure that was introduced by Mr. Botters, this measure would especially have hurt minorities. The decision-hunted Botters political prospects, which is evident in his recent loss. Just like the decision tonight, we'll haunt you. Member Welsh, member Moira, and member Carr. We deserve a council that is for the people, and we deserve to live in a city that promotes equity and fosteres accountability. We, what we don't want, and what we don't need is cronism. I am one of the many on this in the city who will be fighting for independent public's ethics commission as a result of your corruption, which is evident here tonight and more than one way. I hope that Emryville does not become another bell California. And that is why we need the public ethics commission. So I encourage all the people to vote because I will be putting it out to as many people as I can. Thank you for your comment. Thank you for your time. Thank you. Next commenter. Good evening. My comments are specifically directed towards member I'm going to go to the council. Good evening. My comments are specifically directed towards member bouders, Mayor Welch, vice mayor Mora and member Cower. While I am aware of the nature of the charges being made against councilman pry force and the speculation that people have made about the motives behind these charges, That's not what I'm here to talk about today. I would like to address the City Council today on the topic of pragmatic leadership. But simply, now is not the time for infighting within our city government. Not one we are less than 50 days away from the takeover of our federal government by forces hostile to the concept of democracy and the dignity of all Americans. A president who is known to be hostile to this state in general and to our communities in particular. Not when our largest neighbor, Oakland, stands without an elected mayor or a district attorney. We need our leadership focused on how we will survive. The coming four years of political winter. We cannot afford to have our city council divided against itself, shutting out council members because of leftover grudges from the last election. We need every pair of hands on deck, fighting for Emeryville's survival, finding the path forward, despite the grim challenges that are coming to us in 2025. We already face ongoing crises. Homelessness, organized theft, the smashing grabs that I was talking about earlier, pervasive vandalism. this is just naming a few of the problems our community is struggling with. How will we endure the additional pressure of a Trump administration with a divided city council, with a divided democratic leadership in the East Bay? Thank you for your comment. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Good evening, City Council. Good evening, Mayor Welch. My name is Ioana Chuklova. I'm an attorney and community organizer and elected delegate to the California Democratic Party representing Oakland, Alameda and Emoryville. And since I'm not an Emoryville resident, I recognize that I don't know all the ins and outs of what's been happening here. But what I do know and what I have a question for you is this. Where is democracy? Where is democracy in Emmerville when members of the public cannot give public comment online? Where is democracy when you passed at code of ethics which is wonderful although quite late, you did not establish an independent public oversight commission. Where is democracy when members of this body can work to the majority of members of this body can censure anybody on this council who they don't agree with, simply because they're holding different positions. Where is democracy? When councilmember Priforce is facing censure and silencing and with PIM being silent the entire people, the group of people, his constituents who voted for him are also being silenced. Is this democratic? Is it democratic to use your positions of power as the majority to silence somebody who is a minority on this body because of the political alliances that are present here. And so that is my question. Where is democracy right now? And it truly saddens me that at a time when this nation is facing literal white supremacy and fascism, we here in the Bay Area are fighting with each other. Why are we fighting with each other? Right? We have much bigger fights coming ahead of us. And like this person before me said, it is critical that we made for your comment. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Yon. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. I'm going to see you like time. One moment. We are not, excuse me. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Excuse me. Excuse me. We are not interrupting people during public comment. We are not interrupting anyone during public comment. Mayor, may I please request that the disruption on my left be required? I cannot hear the public comment because of what sure to comment on my left. Please can that be. Lieutenant do you need any assistance. I've been captain. When the time is up if you. Madam clerk the time please. the I'm a majoring percent support the Emoryville City Council in the center of Councilman Camilla Preforce. I have no idea who this man is. He has publicly, publicly disrespected me as an advocate of 13 years, a mother who has lost their son. Don't know me from anybody, but you go on social media and disrespect a black woman, a mother. And you stood right here today and kept portraying falsehoods. I've been doing this work for 13 years for free. And I will continue to do this work. You represent the city of Emoryville in the things that you do that is disrespectful. You have disrespected me. You have disrespected my family. You have disrespected my children. You have disrespected 300 and 74,000 citizens of Alameda County. You should be censored. Do not interrupt. You. And that's what I'm talking about right there. So you portrayed a falsehood that there's black, dark, dark committee, dark many, you haven't proven any dark many, where is it? Where is it? But you have went on social media. You have one, that's right, show your proof. You have went on social media, making these claims. But you sit here like you're innocent. You're not innocent. I don't know what your telling these people but you're not innocent. You never been innocent. You're a dish. Thank you for your comment. Thank you for your comment. Next speaker please. I'll see my time to Brenda. That's fine. I'm not going to be a person who is not I don't remember for Embry with Embryville. You don't do it as just you. You do it in the name of this city. Every disrespectful act, which is in, which is in, which is in the paperwork, because you chose to put it on public notice. But you cannot see where I've ever disrespected you. But you stood right here today and mentioned me because you saw me. Do not interrupt. You think that time was seated to her. The way a council person is supposed to act? No, it's not. They are 100% right in centering you because you are making the city of Imrivio, look a mess. I'm going to ignore your friends because they don't know. What you said? Ms. Grisham, please finish your comment. This whole event is just disrespectful. You guys are disrespectful. You are council members. You're disrespecting the public. I'm done because this is a mess but you needs to be censored and I fully 100% support each and every one of you you too. I support you 100%. Thank you for your comment. I'm going to remind absolutely everyone. Everyone deserves a chance to speak. They will get a chance to speak. If someone sees their time to you, you can finish there two minutes. Please, if you want to applaud after someone speaks, that is fine. You are not going to interrupt anyone speaking. Thank you. Please approach the podium. Hello. I'm Celeste Burros. I'm a 30-year resident and I have a water gate. I'm sorry to have to be here today, although I used to like working with City Council on City Affairs. But today's council doesn't behave like the council we used to have did, and it doesn't behave with dignity or the respect for each other that council did back then when I first became engaged with the city. Back then, to defeat an opponent, a politician used elections. And they did not then make attempts to completely destroy another politician personally and professionally. Nor do I recall the kind of anger that we see displayed here through the kind of actions that are being taken. So I will use the pronoun they for she and they to have people who cannot control their own mouth or their own behavior to have them bring charges against the one who points this out to the electorate is bizarre. But it's the kind of thing we've gotten used to on the national scene. So why not do it here too? Yeah. Okay, and council members now have rules which empower the council to be not only this old prosecutor, but also the judge and the jury on each case. Even if their actions are being taken out of personal revenge or to further their own political aspirations. This is what our system allows. But there's something wrong with this system and we don't have to follow it. We can end it. We can end it tonight or very soon. I hope, but I'm not confident that remaining council members can see these actions for what they are. And instead, have the wisdom and the courage to act in a way that brings us closer to the kind of council that we need. That we need now to be able to manage our city well in these challenging times. Thank you for your comment. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Mayor Welch, City Council, I appreciate your time and I will show you the respect and unfortunately it appears you haven't been able to show each other. President Bill Clinton went interviewed and asked about the impeachment and the scandal that almost removed him from office. This is what he had to say. Quote, I think I did something for the worst possible reason just because I could. I think that's the most, just about the most morally indefensible reason that anybody could have for doing anything when you do something just because you could." Isn't this what it's all about tonight? Isn't that what the censure is about? Because you could. You have the votes, and I honor your positions and I respect your votes but there are a lot more votes on this side of the dayous. And emotions are running or emotions are running high on both sides. I consider Councilmember Pryor for us a friend, but most importantly, he's a friend of Emeryville. Yeah. Yeah. Woo. And I think all of you are friends of Emeryville. You all want what's best for the city. They're going to be disagreements. They're going to be hurt feelings. But we can't allow a mob mentality. You have to have a sober approach. I implore you. Don't let this be your legacy. Form a mayor, bowters. You have given so much to this city. Some failures, many successes. Don't let this be your legacy. Thank you. Hello. My name is Rosemary Brooks. I'm not from here. I moved to Emoryville about four months ago. And I too am a mom. I'm here. And I'm here because Kalima, Priforce was here for me and a lot of the parents in the district, when no one will listen to me and they would tell me that a lot of the things that were happening to my children at school, my son was stabbed in the face, he was choked. He was asking me if I wanted to throw him away because as soon as he started fighting back, they were suspending him. And he's only four. I brought him here today. He's here. I'm here because a lot of the times that I've asked for help, they would tell me, no, this is the city problem. And then when I would go to the city hall they would tell me no this is a district problem so who do we run to? As a mom like who do I ask? I asked parents all of them have issues and they say they don't know who to talk to there's no resources there's no help there's no care I've emailed a lot of you people here and I never got an answer. I just, I don't know about this political stuff. I don't know how to speak. I'm from New York City. I am known from, I get to ratchet all those things, but I'm a fight for my kids and he has motivated me to start the first PTA in Emeryville. And I'm just here to say thank you. I don't know what everything is about and I don't know why they're coming for you, but they headed Jesus to. Thank you for your time. Thank you for your comment. Next speaker. Good evening ladies and gentlemen, My name is Edward Escobar. And I've noticed a three-ring circus here. So if you could contain yourself and show some respect, not interrupt the speaker. I'm the founder of the Coalition for Communion Engagement. And I've been attacked back here verbally, costing me verbally stating that I'm a white racist. I'm Cuban and Puerto Rican. So I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Calema pre-forces here under censure. And whatever penalties for council members who engage in berating behavior can vary depending on the severity in the context of the actions. Sensor is one of them removal from committees, ethics investigations, legal consequences. If the behavior crosses into harassment or defamation, which I've witnessed that, personally, legal action could be taken, this might include lawsuits or criminal charges depending on the nature of the conduct. Public apology at which you mentioned, the council member might be required to issue a public apology, training and counseling, also a final and extreme case, they could face also a final and extreme cases they could face also a recall. And just so that you know, we're quite capable in that department. So yes, we are the recallers. And we achieve the results and the people have spoken. It's a very democratic process. Okay, you need to do your studying, get to know what the state Constitution says But enough of this three-ring circus Kalima pre-force claims he says that you matter This is not about you sir. This is about we matter when you're here You need to put aside the you and it's about we it's about. And that's where you've lost your ways, sir. So whatever censure needs to be done. Thank you for your comment. Thank you for your comment. Thank you for your comment. Thank you for your comment. Thank you. Next speaker please. I'm here because the residents of Alameda County spoke up and they spoke up overwhelmingly to have our public elected officials be accountable to the residents of Alameda County. That means 374,000 voters voted to recall. So why would you disenfranchise all these residents and take away their democratic right to recall failed elected? We should hold our elected accountable to the higher standards. And if they fail us, yes, censure them and recall them if we have to. Because unless we take action, do not interrupt the speaker. Because unless we take firm action, people could die. That's why my friend, Brenda Grisham stood up. For 13 years, she represented victims, victims murdered victims and their families. And for pre-force to attack her and her family, it's not acceptable. You should hold your elected council members to a higher standard. That is not a behavior of a leader. That is a behavior of a leader who provide public safety, who represent moms and dads and brothers and sisters who are facing violence. She acted out of her goodness, conscience, and loads of free time. She should be respected. What should be not respected is somebody who attacks somebody like her who represents over 374,000 voters. So I ask you to stand firm, stand with the hundreds of thousands of Alameda County residents who voted to back her and not to back somebody who disrespect a mother. Thank you for your comment. Thank you for your comment. Hello, Mayor. I don't know you, but I'm new to Emery Bell. My name is Marcella Cross. And everybody in Emery Bell probably knows me because I say hi to everybody, have a great day. Happy holiday, tall, y'all. But Mr. Kelly and me has been very nice to me. You know, I just moved here from Emoryville and I have my own story, my own struggle. And you know, some of my neighbors, one of my neighbors don't like me very well. They've been harassing me. Okay, I know it quite well. It's in any state, because my sister is a police FBI and whatever else. So it's 10 to 8. So I had a problem, and of course, from a handicapped. And I am a senior citizen. He came to my house on his own time and literally helped me move my house around. So I went to have these problems. And every time I need his help, or I need you to call him, he's available to me. And whenever the fire alarm goes off, we have a problem in our building. She always there first to help the people in aid and the system. All this other political stuff, I don't think she's like Donald Trump. I'm at Donald Trump. I hate Donald Trump. I am a Democrat. And that's character assassination for you to sit up there and say he's like Trump. Anything else you have to say, you have a right to say, but to assassinate him, that's not okay. Because I think he's a good guy. I think he's a very nice guy, and he does cater to the public. So Emory Bill, I'm not going nowhere. I'm staying in Emory Bill. I don't care. Ooh, I want to put up a fight. I will fight for my right. We all have a right of choice and freedom. And what we like are we don't like. But to assassinate a man and you guys are on the board, I don't see fit. I find that very wrong because not just morally, but in political status, you guys are belittling yourself from the whole community to say he's like Donald Trump. That is my friend and I find him a good man and God bless everybody. Happy all the day. Thank you for your comment. Oh, yes you. Yes. Any other member of the public wishing to make public comment can do so now for two minutes. Really, you're taking him off all the committee positions because he messed up forms and is mean. Okay, if you're if you're so afraid of the wolves, stay out of the woods. Also John Botters, you lost because you're a petty fuckboy. Free power start. Thank you. Thank you for your comment. Next speaker please. I'm Fran. I'm Fran Coutel. I serve on a couple of committees in the city. I think I'm pretty well known to the people on the council. I just want to say I've gotten an education tonight that I don't think I've had in 30 years, but I want to speak to you as a member of a committee. I really enjoy coming to council meetings and seeing the depth of research and the depth of detail and the depth of attention to the matters of the city that are important. And that's really what I want to hear you do tonight. This is a challenging time. We have a lot of things that require serious attention. And I myself want to see every member of City Council come to meetings and be prepared to really address the issues at hand. I also want to come to City Council meetings and not be afraid or intimidated or shouted at or photographed. That to me is harassing behavior. Thank you. Thank you for your comment. Next speaker please. Hi my name is God for Wilson. I'm from Saint Columbia Church and a number of different organizations, men organizations. I've been here for quite some time, been in the city for quite some time, then I moved in with different places and now I'm coming back. Coming back specifically for this meeting to talk about how this man has helped the community, has helped the community by going personally going out and dealing with it. And there's some things there's an order about things and I haven't heard all the order that he should have gone through or helped, I received help for, I should say, so that he can stay on the council in good standing. Now one thing that really pissed me off was that it didn't say his name right. People coming up here, dips, respecting him. That's real discipline. They do that to black folks all the time. And it pisses me off. Everybody knew us name. They told him what his name was. So don't come up here and say his name wrong. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for your comment. Next speaker please. Hi, I'm Cheryl Davi. I don't live in Emeryville. I'm a former council member of the city of Berkeley. And I have to say it loud. I'm black and I'm proud. And I'm so proud that my friend here has done the job that he's done on this city council. And I know if it weren't for him being a black man and actually a big black man that has a big voice and is listened to and is supporting the community that he wouldn't be in this predicament that he is in now. So y'all need to do the right thing. We are in a racist state of America. Turtle Island has been racist and genocidal from the get go. Now we have a fascist coming to town and you're trying to take another black man down. That is not okay. So please do the right thing. Let the man do his job that he's been doing and the community supports. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for your comment. Next speaker please. Mayor and City Council members, my name is Paola Laverde. I am currently a member of the Elimita County Democratic Party Central Committee. I'm a elected member. I am a former Remport Commissioner and elected member in the City of Berkeley. And I'm a proud member of the Berkeley Tenants Union. And I have to say that councilmember of pre-force has been very, very instrumental in trying to get protections for tenants in Emeryville. He came to the Berkeley Tenants Union and he started to start an Emeryville Tenants Union. Because, you know, Emeryville is full of apartments and yet the tenants don't have any protections. No protections. I've had one time with a mayor, well, before she was mayor, on X or Twitter, I asked her a comment and I started asking questions around some issues on housing and I got shot down and very rudely dismissed. I was told to go protect some parking lot, some parking lot. I have photos of that because I saved them because I thought I was like, oh my gosh, I could not believe that I was spoken to that way. So there is a lot of animosity and it's been created because as a person who's really finding for tenants' rights, and I see how this has been people who are being supported by organizations that don't believe that tenants as consumers in the rental housing market should have any protections. We are consumers, and I very much support the council member in his efforts to provide tenants with protections because we are consumers in the rental housing industry. So please, we need these type of people, tenant advocates to be on all city council members of city councils because tenants are not being protected because too many of the city council members are bought and paid for their campaigns are financed by organizations that do not, corporations that don't believe in the government. Thank you for your comment. Thank you. Thank you, fellow. Thank you, fellow. Hello, my name is Ilana Alarbock, and I have been a long time resident of the East Bay. I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm power. He is a leader who is righteous in his commitment to the people, to all the people, to make the people better, to make our lives better, to help people. You have heard the people come up tonight who he has helped on his own time. Mothers, seniors, disabled people, and I'm sure there's many, many others. There's many in Berkeley where I live who he's helped including myself and my family. And so this is the type of leader, an upstanding, honest, respectful and respected leader. You talk Madame Mayor about in what you're accusing Council Member Price Force of the disrepute to the city. Well this is the city, this is the community back here and we stand behind by far Council Member Price Force. The details were about you berating him, Madam Mayor, at a closed session meeting. And so that is what I understand was, he was disclosing and making public that behavior, that was not part of that, it was outside the code of ethics. And I'm grateful that the city of Emoryville does have a code of ethics, which we in Berkeley don't have yet. But everybody needs to be held to the same standard. You're the council member to your right, Madame Mayor. There was a video that I saw of a friend of his that punched out someone who was talking, who was asking about names, really horrible names that he was mayor of some time. Thank you for your comment. Thank you for your comment. Thank you for your comment. I'm getting time. Would you come to the podium please? See if my... Thank you. Madam Clerk, the time please. Thank you, City Clerk. Yes, so that who use terrible a terrible name calling of council member pry force. And then one of his friends or, you know, I don't know, punched out, I guess it was you. I mean, it was him. Because he, and this was all caught on video. We don't have the only people who are here who are saying censure him besides you and maybe you council member bowters are the people who stood for the recall of one of the most inspired and progressive and transmutational transmuting our criminal injustice system to something that's restorative and has set the foundation. And so all those 374,000 votes that they got was because of the money that was spent and the fear mongering that happened and that influenced this authoritarian fascist move towards imprisoning more people. And imprisoning who gets imprisoned? Black and brown people, of course. People who look like Council Member Priforce. So what I'd like you to do is this is a man who has inspired people to public service. This is the kind of leadership you all should be proud of to sit up there on the dius with you. And so I ask, I really ask and plead with you that you let this go. Please, let's come together. There are new council members who will be joining this body. We have a president coming on board in January that we all need to unify Protect our most at risk Immigrant and people who are most at risk of this new regime coming in into Washington DC and put this petty nonsense behind us. Thank you Thank you for your comment. Let's speaker please My name is Austin Tam. I'm on the Alameda County Democratic Central Committee and California Democratic Party Executive Board. And I want to thank you, brother Kalima for last name, sorry, for all you do. And I've learned so much about you. And what is happening is shameful. It is like he's on trial. He's like being crucified. This is shameful. I cannot understand. This is shameful. This is shameful that instead of working on passing issues in your community. And rather than go, why don't you attack it instead of going against MAGA and Trump and then segregationist? You want to go against your own person own own colleague Someone who's a damper kind of colleague of progressive we can all disagree at times and stuff But this is this is ridiculous and shameful Majority of you guys were just elected or reelected. I'm sorry Unfortunately reelected in November. I forgot what day, November, whatever it was called. And this is what you start out with. I do not understand, I cannot comprehend this. Can you guys help me understand this? This is beyond shameful. If Trump and his insurrectionist was coming down, we would be doing this. This is a bad precedence. Okay, so what's gonna to happen next is like, if someone has the majority on this council, so we're going to say essential, Courtney was essential, this essential, essential, essential, I don't know the rest of the names, but are we going to do that? That's going to set presidents and open the Pandora's box. We have more pressing things. We can't even think about humanity, disagreements. We have disagreements in families. Do we try to censure and recall? And do we censure and recall people in our family? We can't recall them, unfortunately. But you know, but I'm just, you need to speak out of love. We're speaking out of compassion tonight. That's what we're speaking out of. And this is not a circus. But what is circus is essentially in this one. Thank you for your comment. Thank you for your comment. Any other member of the public was going to make a comment can do so now for two minutes. My name is Bridget Akunya. I'm a public health educator, can do so now for two minutes. Hi, my name is Brigid Akunya. I'm a public health educator, longtime resident in the Bay Area. I wanna say that Kalima is an inspiring fierce person. And like others have said, this is what we need, especially now. And I wrote some notes in response to others, but I really think it comes down to this. I don't know you, Courtney, but you need to let this one go, because Kalima is appreciated, respected. Sometimes you get into disagreements, but don't let what I would consider to be obvious, trumped up, charges hiding behind a gavel and a days like this. It doesn't make you look good. It's not your strength. It's not your strength. It's not your strength. Step up. Step up. Higher. We need you to step up. Let the grudge go. Listen deeply. Listen deeply. Listen deeply. We all need to be represented. There is a lot going on. People are on the streets. Are suffering? You know this. Courtney, you know this. Find it in yourself. Let it go. You don't want this to be your legacy. You don't. We are all witnesses to this. It was obvious in what you read. It was so lengthy and so tedious. It was obviously a grudge. Doesn't make you look good. I want to see better from you, Courtney. So thank you for listening. And I'm really appealing to you to step up. Thank you for your comment. Any other member of the public wishing to make a comment can do so now for two minutes. Good evening council. Also peanut gallery please respect me as I respect you. I'm Alexis Gold and I'm here today to speak in support of the center of Council Member Pry Force. As a resident of Emoryville, I find Council Member Pry Force's behavior to be unacceptable for an elected public official. I spoke in favor of the code of ethics when it was enacted for many of the same reasons I'm here today. My husband has been the target of many character attacks by Councilmember Pry Force during city meetings as was cited earlier in his charges. Councilmember Pry Force has derogatorily referred to my husband as the troll of Emeryville. Attacked his application for a committee position and described it as I quote, piss poor during a city council meeting. Wrote disparaging orders. Interrupt the speaker. Do not interrupt the speaker. And he even attended a B-PAC meeting where he threatened the members of the committee to attempt to change my husband's behavior. And after all of this finding out that Councilmember Pry Force has refused to sign the very code of ethics that he advocated for and even voted in favor of adopting, disturbs me to my core. His refusal to shine signs shows that he is unwilling to take accountability for his unprofessional behavior and has zero intention of being an ethical member of our city government. Thank you. Thank you for your comment. Madam Clerk, you have a time. I'm Sam Gold and I'm here to speak in support of the censure of Council Member Pryor's. His open dismissal of fair election practices and lack of transparency go beyond negligence and challenge the public's trust in our government. After failing to disclose his campaign finances for over a year and a half, Councilmember Pryor Spiral DeForm signed under penalty of perjury in the state of California, showing he collected contributions without disclosure of donor occupations. State law requires all money collected in this way be returned within 60 days, but instead he used it to fund the races of two candidates that promised to appoint him as mayor, as he openly stated, will seek endorsements for his fake mayoral campaign. He proceeded to not disclose any contributions to these candidates despite their campaign literature, prominently featuring his FPPC ID, an emery rising redirecting to his personal website. Financial transparency should be the minimum we expect from our city council, and the fact that he has not disclosed these spending, even when facing center, shows that he believes he is above the law. You're talking about dark money and politics. You can see it right here. Thank you. Thank you for your comment. Thank you for your comment. Quiet in the audience, please. Quiet in the audience, please, in the audience please for the next speaker. Madam Clark. Hello, I'm sorry, but I don't really know what's all going on, but I'm just here to talk about Kalima and what he means to the community. And so I wrote some things down. And the first one is that carelessness to others brings ruin, care to others. We build for the better. So for me, I can't see anyone limiting this man's power. Right now, the nation of people are spoken. They have forgiven the transgressions of the high in the highest office and now we have a standard of equality and it's a legal president that said right now. Kalima has sacrificed his time and his energy to protect the North community while asking for little. He has been the voice and his energy to protect and assert the community while asking for little. He has been the voice of the community to make matters of safety well being heard by a cooperation with death, by cooperation with deaf ears. You know, for me, it's a consistent commitment for what he's done to our community because he's been there for me personally. He's been there for me and my sister when my sister died. No one else in the community except for one other person was there. And then there was an instance that happened only a couple of weeks ago when there was a buyer and there was no no security no personnel no managers no nothing and He was the only one late at night One o'clock in the morning Helping to organize all of us to safety to make sure that we knew where to go and what to do. Thank you. Thank you. Any other member of the public wishing to comment? Can you still now for two minutes? Hello. My name is Michael. I'm a resident of that and Rivel unlike some of the people that I've spoken before. I look at you. I'm going to remember your names and faces. I'm not going to bother pronouncing them or mispronouncing them, except for Kalima Priforce. That's how you pronounce his name. You stood there, all of you, and in an ultimate show of disrespect, didn't bother to correct some racist people who deliberately mispronounced his name several times. So you should all look at a mirror. You may have been accused. You, Mr. Bader's have also been accused. Sorry, Mr. Bader's I apologize. I've also been accused of unethical behavior. You can't investigate yourself. You're not, at least you're not willing to because you have a majority in support. So why not have an independent ethics committee? I support KleeAN in that. Lastly, I wanna say you like to use your gavel as a means of aggression. This is America. We have the First Amendment. I don't know what violates your harassment policies. I'm sure none of you do either. Apparently, all of you, at least you two that I'm looking at, Council Member Bouders and Mayor Walsh, excuse me, Welch, seem to have be able to bully people and not know that you're doing it or your confident, the majority will support you. I ask you to look in the mirror. I'm gonna remember all of you for the actions you take today. Thank you for your comment. Any other member of the public wishing to make a comment can do so now for two minutes? All right. Mayor Welsh, council members of the Emory Bill. Thank you for having this hearing today. I'm here to state I stand for Councilmember Kaleema Prifors and request an independent ethics commission who can be impartial in their decision making. You cannot be impartial because your feelings have been hurt. So your decisions will be biased and so on with your supporters. Anyone who is elected a member of the Democratic Party on the Central Committee that is a guest, Kalima Pryor's please stand up and come to the front. Against him. That's elected. Remember of the delegate or a delegate of the California Democratic Party or the Central Committee against Kalima Pride Force. Please come up here and stand with me. Those who are for Kalima Pride Force and support him, that is a member just like me, a California delegate, representing Amriville, Oakland, and Alameda, please come up and stand with me. I think Emeryville, Alameda, and Oakland represent 500,000 people, about 520,000, together collectively. Anyone else that is a former elected that stands with Kalima, pry force, please stand up. Come on up here. Any community members that stand for Kalima, pry force, please stand up. These are former elected. And also the residents, the majority of people here Thank you for your comment. Thank you for your comment. Thank you for your comment. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. These are former elected. And also the residents, the majority of people here are here to stand and support Kaleema. Councilmember Kaleema, because he has done nothing wrong. Who has been censored in hand? Thank you for your comment. Thank you for your comment. Thank you. Thank you. You must come to the podium. There we go. If him another two-meters, Madam Clerk. Thank you. So these are the people that Kalima Pride Force represents. The only time people were censored were because they were against the war in Vietnam. There were against the World War I. There were standing, there were against authority who was doing wrong and enslaving people. This is where censorship started. And we're seeing the same thing today. Anytime you try to tell the truth, whether it's on Twitter or Facebook, what happens to your posts? They get deleted and removed and you get attacked. That is censorship, that is fascism. The founding fathers being a political person, a council member, a representative of elected body, has discourse. They have the right to represent their community and people and tell people the truth. The only people that want to censor an individual or another council member elected people is because they don't want to hear the truth. And if that's what you're trying to do, it's not a good look, as one person said before. So I encourage you and beseech you to not vote on this item. I encourage you to start an independent ethics commission, because that is the right and proper thing to do. We all here, this is the community standing for representing Emoryville, Oakland, the East Bay, Berkeley. And we are here to stand with this young black man that's representing the people. Now if you're saying all those things that you guys mentioned this room will be filled with people in opposition, person to mouth, but it's not. It's not. What I see here is a room filled with people that love, support, and stand like they're standing now with Kaleem McPrice. Pride, pride for us. Thank you, Kaleem McPrice. Thank you for your comment. Thank you. Thank you. Any member of the public wishing to make public comment can do so now for two minutes. Just because you brought up Trump and accused Kalema of being Trump like it. I think what a lot of us are really scared about with Trump coming back in is that he's going to pursue petty personal and political vendettas against people who stood up to him or share a different feeling on some issues. Basically that stood up to him and wrankled him and bugged him because they wouldn't buckle under to whatever position was put in, they were, Trump was putting forward. I think what's happening here as the woman said, it's obvious, just let it go. You gotta let it go. You guys lost, you backed her, she didn't win, Kaleema's slate won. But at any rate, if you want to get rid of Trump in the city council, don't pursue a petty personal vendetta. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for your comment. Any other member of the public wishing to make comment can do so now for two minutes. No the way to the podium. Okay, so I think what we heard here allowed and cleared tonight is Council Member Pride Force is a progressive. And then the four other council members are something below progressive, more conservative. But the people of Emory of Emory of our progressive, and we know that because we've seen how they voted over the years, and we've seen how they voted for Council Member Pry Force in huge numbers. He beat the pants off of Courtney Welsh the mayor in the election. Yeah, yep. Sorry, she's shaking her head. Please keep the bombats in theatrics down to a minimum mayor welch. So this is from mayor Welsh from a couple of years ago. This is a direct, this is from her, this is from her Twitter account directly, where she called me a fuck boy. You can see it right there. Fuck boy. See that right there? Okay, this is one of the many insults, a name calling Mayor Wells has done directed against me and other people. So and she's done it before our ethics code of ethics and code of conduct and she's done it after a code of ethics and conduct. She called me a racist, she called me a liar, she called me a misogynist and all of that is against our code of ethics. The same law that Councilmember Pryphoris, you are censoring and sanctioning him for right now, but you may have, well, our guilty, more guilty than Mr. Pryphoris. If you're going to have a law, you are constrained as well as council member pry force and everybody else. You're not above the law, Mayor Welch. You can't call people, fuck boy, racist, liar, misogynist and not violent. Thank you for your comment. Thank you for your comment. Thank you for your comment. Thank you for your comment. Thank you for your comment. Any other member of the public wishing to make a comment can do so now. Excuse me. Excuse me. Excuse me. Excuse me. Excuse me, excuse me, excuse me, excuse me, excuse me, excuse me, excuse me, and everyone please return to their seats. And everyone return to their seats, please. Thank you. But any other member of the public wish to make comment? Seeing and hearing none, public comment is now closed. Members, I turn to you for deliberation on the item. I'm going to ask you a question. Vice Mayor Moore. As we've just seen and heard, Member Price Force is very passionate, and his words clearly resonate with many people in this room. Unfortunately, in this instance, Member Price Force's actions do not match his words. The ethical violations described in the resolution are factual and quite serious. The behavior described is corrosive to the function of this council and the government of this city. Member of the Pride Forces fond of talking about how open and transparent he is, but not disclosing your source of income, who is giving money to you for political purposes, how much you have received, how you are spending it, as we are all required to do by law. That's what we all signed up for, okay? This is not open, it's not transparent. It casts a shadow when he votes on items before this council. This is a basic concept to prevent political corruption that I'm sure everybody in this room can actually agree with. I implore member pry force to match his actions to his words and provide the information being sought by the FPPC investigation so that this council can carry on the city's business without further distractions. Thank you vice mayor. Any other member wishing to make a comment? Member Carr? I am one of the people who has been required to file my FPPC forms like the rest of the council members. I know that the FPPC has an open case against member pry force yet time and again I have not seen when I checked the city's website his four sixties have not been filed. And he has used his FPPC numbers on materials that indicate that he is running for mayor. People have called me to determine if there is such an office in the city. So due to the disinformation, as well as the lack of compliance with the FPPC forms, I do think that at least this hearing is warranted. I would very much like to see Council Member Pry Force file his forms. And if he does so, I would not be inclined to go forward with the censure but I would need some assurance that they are filed within 30 days. I would like to know this isn't about infighting, this isn't about disagreement. You can't disagree about the FPPC laws. You can't disagree about that. You can't disagree about the Brown Act. He was told by the city attorney by sharing an email, the contents. If you share this, you are violating the Brown Act. That's where the issue is. Said something about Brown Act. That's where the issue is. Said something about me, that's not where the issue is. The issue is what's the violation of the Brown Act. The issue is the violation of the FPPC laws. And I'm very surprised to hear the tide has changed towards being transparent and compliant about financial contributions to campaigns because we heard a few people bring up financial contributions to campaigns. PG&E or tenets organizations that are against tenants rights. This is the thing. You can disagree with who contributes to a political campaign. If you feel like that organization doesn't have the best interests of heart when it comes to the community and you don't wanna vote for that person or support that person moving forward, that's absolutely fine. That's your opinion to make. That's your opinion to form. But the thing is you are allowed to form that opinion because we were transparent about who gave us funding. He has not given us that opportunity, unfortunately. If he has proof, he can, if he can share it, if he has proof, he's not being silenced. This is why we're here. He has an opportunity to speak. He still has an opportunity to speak. No one is silencing him. He can sit here and he can defend himself. He can present materials. He can present proof that he has not done these things. He has not said that. He has not said I did not violate the Brown Act. He did not say I have turned in my FPPC forms. He has not said any of that. And I understand that members of the public have had very positive interactions with Councilman Price Force. And I'm very happy for that. I'm very happy that he has helped you in different instances. I'm very happy that you have a positive relationship with a local representative. But that's not what we're talking about today. That's not what we're talking about today. That's the other problem. That please, please. We, excuse me, I'm speaking. I have allowed everyone else to speak. I am speaking. We are here about very specific violations that are not reflective of how we are I'm not going to wait until everyone's done. So that there's not a whole lot of back and forth and because we're not going to wait until everyone's done. We're not going to wait until everyone's done. We're not going to wait until everyone's done. We're not going to wait until everyone's done. We're not going to wait until everyone's done. We're not going to wait until everyone's done so that there's now a whole lot of back and forth and because people need to go home, they need to feed their kids and so I'll let you all go and then I'll go. Thank you. Thank you Madam Mayor and thank you to everybody for coming out and participating. And I would, I would align my comments with comments that have been made about being supportive of people in local office. It's very hard to be a public servant. Being public servant is a sacrifice for a lot of people. It's more challenging for some people than others. And there's reasons why we have inequitable representation in government at times. So I'm happy to hear that Council Member Pryorce has the support of many members in the community. That's a positive thing I think. What I am hoping to hear tonight is some accountability from Council Member Pryorce for the things that the mayor has outlined in her notice for this event. When we undertook the council code of ethics a couple years ago, before, actually, before almost every member of this council, but me was on this council, we agreed to agenda that item and send it to our committee to work on. And we had several committee meetings about it and we developed this ordinance that we brought to the city council. And at the city council there was discussion and there were some amendments that were sought by member pry force and other people we accepted and approved all those amendments. And in the discussion a couple members of council had a bit of a back and forth about concerns, about the conduct of people. And at the time I was serving as mayor and my comments were to not weigh in on the personal disagreements that were coming out through that discourse, but to focus on the fact that this is supposed to be a tool that the community has as a last resort, that it's supposed to be a tool to help deliver transparency and accountability. And that the purpose of the tool is to serve largely as a reminder to each of us who seek and obtain public office of our duty, legally, fiduciary duty, ethical duty, moral duty, and our common duty to one another in the community for how we are going to conduct ourselves. And that spans a number of things that includes things that the mayor has mentioned adhering to the laws and rules that govern how we comport ourselves as members of the council. That relates to how we conduct our financial affairs in a transparent and accountable manner. And that also relates to how we treat members of the community and members of the council. I agree that I have not heard facts stated that contradict the things that the mayor has alleged at this point. I'm obviously still listening and open to hearing those things. And I just share my personal experience, which is, it's a rather hard thing to listen to and believe that people here are here for the right reason when the things that they're saying are repeated false statements that the person who we're trying to bring forward as a member of this council with us have made and disseminated and repeated many times over as a person who has sat quietly and is not engaged in any of the online disinformation that has been shared repeatedly over the past couple of years about the city, the staff, and our community members. It's been a very challenging experience for someone who has served on the council for many years to be here in my last council meeting for this reason and As I said at the council meeting when we adopted this The purpose of this is not to create the rules for a game The purpose of this is to remind each of us What our accountability is to one another in the public? But it exists for the purpose for us to hold one another accountable, when as individuals we refuse to do so ourselves. I don't love the idea of censure as a remedy. I don't believe that it is the first thing that we need to do, but we do need to comport ourselves in a way that complies with all the same rules and obligations and transparency requirements that everyone else up here is willing to abide by. Any other member of the City Council wishing to speak. Actually, I feel like, for being yourselves. Some of you have a packet that we have just distributed around, and this packet is really important. Yes, thank you. And the reason why and you're all, it could you save some of them for my colleagues? So the reason why this is important is because we are a nation of laws. And seeing that we have two attorneys on our council, that it's really important that as a nation of laws, that procedure and process is important. I have the resolution for a censure here. When this meeting opened up, resolution for a censure here. When this meeting opened up, was this resolution for censure red? No, it wasn't. It was a statement, right? Like you're like, you noticed the whole Trump thing and everything, right? That that was added and all this, it was a statement. It wasn't and then and then Councilmember bothers then changed it to notice because he probably noticed that it wasn't an actual resolution. And so here it is is that we have a statement that was read in a public meeting, was I sent that statement? Was that statement provided to me? No, it was not. It's a very quick answer. So this is important, especially as my colleagues who sound pretty determined to already make their vote. This is really important because it opens the city to litigation. And the city being open to litigation is going to be determined a couple of things. And it's really important because those, that's why I shared that those, your comments are really important. The things that you say are really important. What I say is very important. What they say is very important. What's not said is also important. What's not done is very important. So let's go over to charges. Right? The first charge is that I revealed confidential information about a closed session meeting. Now according to the resolution, because I can only respond to something that I have actually read prior to this meeting, I cannot respond to new evidence. This is important because the mayor shared evidence of that I sent this to this person, that person, that sort of thing. And this is really important because in the resolution, there was a lot of that I sent this to this person, that person, that sort of thing. And this is really important because in the resolution, there was a lot of that. There was a lot of council members spoke to this person or that person said this and that person said that. Now outside of this body, in that process, when people are reviewing what's happening here, and this is really important is because it doesn't matter what race and color my colleagues are. When someone's civil rights are violated, it just means that there is some sort of unfair treatment. And that is something that I believe will be in discussion, which is bias. Has those who have made this vote have they exercised some sort of bias that makes them unqualified to make this vote, which is one of the reasons why I'm pushing for Independent Public Ethics Commission. Now, on the first page is a statement from a member of Emeryville community, Kathy Kenney. If you can share that, be great. Council Member Price Force, I'm writing to request that you consider my input regarding an interaction with the Emeryville city attorney. During a phone call a couple of months ago, I shared with Mr. Kenney my concern that some of our city officials have developed a dangerous pattern involving the public display of personal attacks, vulgar language, and unprofessional antics, rather than legitimate political discourse. I express my opinion that these behaviors present an embarrassing distraction from the work our city officials were elected to perform and create a loss of public trust. I asked for this assistance in addressing my concerns. Unfortunately, his response downplayed the seriousness of my concerns as he relied on what aboutism, rather than active listening for problem solving. He implied that nothing could be done because council members have free speech in this country. And Shadecidae considered the tweets in public comments made by former President Trump. He explained that elected officials in Emoryville are not held to any standards of conduct and refer me to the city website where I could report a concern. Rather than reporting my concerns to see clicks fix, I'm turning to you. Thank you for considering my input. That's for addressing my original concern. I implore to City Council to see if the consider creating implementing and enforcing a graduate of the CIS, I am a graduate of the CIS, I am a graduate of the CIS, I am a graduate of the CIS, I am a graduate of the CIS, I am a graduate of the CIS, I am a graduate of the CIS, I am a graduate of the CIS, I am a graduate of the CIS, I am a graduate of the CIS, I am a graduate that the council member, my colleague, I think she's pointing to Mayor Welsh, council member at that time, that not only is she uncomfortable with her behavior online, and it's going to be really interesting because I'm sure that during a discovery process, they're going to ask how many letters like these has the city received about my behavior or anything that I've said online. Because timelines are important. So we have now a code of conduct and this existed prior to the code of conduct. Now once again, the question will be around bias. And why is bias important? Because if you go to page three, which states the Brown Act, the California Government code, 54963. It's really important, my colleagues, where it says that a local agency may not take any action authorized by subdivision C against a person. Up until then, then is talking about, oh, you can't reveal what happens in close session. A person, nor shall it be deemed a violation of this section for doing, oh, I'm sorry, as to the requirements of the section or otherwise have been given notice other requirements of this section. Now, this is really important because also it says, express in an opinion concerning the propriety or legality of actions taken by a legislative body of a local agency in closed session, including disclosure of the nature and extent of the illegal or potential illegal action, which means that the first charge that is in the resolution and then once again, I have not seen anything other than the resolution from you and from this council. I cannot respond to a statement that I have not received that was not written to me. That according to that resolution, which means that forming an opinion like saying that I believe that what happened in closed session is unfair. According to the Brown Act, it states that I cannot be prosecuted or a local agency or censored because I have an opinion. This is really important because the Brown Act has a very small window for whistleblower. That window is, you can darn have an opinion. You could even say that something had happened in closed session is illegal. You can say that because it's still been we considered an opinion. Now I cannot reveal the details of what that is, but for something like that to slip past you, that I believe is going to come to question. Now, why did it slip past you? In Emoryville, we don't have a big team. You don't have a big staff. And so we have consultants. We consult out a lot, especially when it comes to some of our legal concerns. If you look at page seven of our staff report, no, actually it's page seven. So I received a staff report and it says, okay, this is what's going to happen. And it asks, what is the fiscal impact of this censor? It's none. We didn't pay anybody. We didn't invite any expertise. Anyone who could probably inform the city attorney that, hey, look, no, there's an issue. Do you know there's a whistleblower protection here that he can form an opinion? And that is an issue, especially given Kathy Kenney's comment about how she felt that you defended that behavior. Now, I want to make it very clear that the city attorney is just doing his job. He's given direction, direction. And a lot of the direction, and I could ask you, because you're not getting a direction for me, you must be getting a direction from members of my colleagues, who you're getting direction from. But I won't. That's not, I don't think that's really important. But what is important is that the city attorney is receiving direction from my colleagues, or at least one or two of my colleagues. That is going to be a part of the discovery process. Now, should it be discovered that in the discovery process that Mayor Welfth, for example, who just when I was running for office, worked with Diane Martinez, then Councilmember, and Ali Medina, then Councilmember, which means that I'm not an elected official yet. I'm just in a constituent, like, like, like, you know, like many of you, constituent, which means I'm vulnerable to the actions of elected officials. That, what Quest was made for me to provide to sign a collegiality pledge, a collegiality pledge, meaning that when I go into office that I will act a certain way. Now this is important because I can disagree, I can disagree with the recall and, you know, maga and Trump and those sort of things. But the things I'm raising is about what if you're in my seat? What if you have just become elected official? But before you become elected official, you don't know much. And so those who do know, come to you and say, well, in order for you to get my endorsement, you have to sign this collegiality pledge. That is important because even though the collegiality pledge has not been considered a serious issue here in this body. What would it look like once litigation happens? What would it look like? Would it look like the person who asked someone to sign a collegiality pledge is acting in a way that's non-biased. You know, the second charge is around FPPC. And I would tell anybody who's new in politics, fill out your FPP stuff, turn it on time. You know, it's not like a college paper where you, you know, you're like, okay, Professor, can I, can I submit this a little bit, you know, like, you know, like, submit it on time. And I can eat that. And that's, and that's the thing is this like, is, is, I didn't submit it in time. But here's the thing. The FPPC know why I have not. Manel Clark, when I submit my paperwork to you to provide to the FPC, you have access to that paperwork and then you provide that to the FPC. When the FPC is making, is doing an investigation, do they provide you with any documentation that I may be providing to them? Do they provide to you us to that in the nature of that investigation? No. And the reason why is because the FPP seat is a state organization. It's a state body. And so when we take an oath of office, we are taking an oath of office for our jurisdiction. And therefore, when you begin to create, you know, criminal charges and censor charges and sanction charges, whatever, for something that happens out of your jurisdiction, that's problematic. And because the FEPC has information, they have documentation, they have a history of emails and exchanges, and might go back and forth with them. That's the reason why it's still an open investigation. Even two years later, it's because they're considering all the paperwork that I've provided to them. Paperwork that you would never have access to. Why? It's because it is outside of our jurisdiction as council members. So you are making a judgment based upon information that you would never have and never and never getting access access to because the FVBC would tell you. Now FVBC has several steps that they recommend that you make. You know, sometimes the situation is like this. So I have to ask the city attorney, have you communicated with this FVPC and have they provided a statement about my particular situation? In response to your question, Councilmember, I have no, I have not. None of them. Okay. So, so here it is, is then, but have they been communicated with? May I ask that? Councilmember, with. May I ask that? Council member Price Force it's not my role to communicate with the FPPC, participate in their investigations or to file any paperwork. There you go. So how's it not his role but it's theirs? And this and once again this, this is very important because in terms of like, you know, I'm Haitian. And I want to thank the National Haitian America, elected officials network, Salkpase, to my brothers and sisters out there, to my family out there. When you're a Haitian, you know, there's like a lot of immigrant families. You know, really there's only three things that they want you to be. A doctor, a lawyer, an engineer. And so I am a failure to a lot of patient parents and families. And so whenever I show up to you know especially events I have to explain what I do. Like I remember running Kino last. I had to explain what being a tech entrepreneur was and they're oh you you are not the doctor? No you're engineer. You're engineer. Who do you work for? I was like no I'm not you know, tech entrepreneur was and they, oh, you, you are not the doctor? No, you're, you're engineer. You're engineer. Who do you work for? I was like, no, I'm not, you know, I, I work for myself. You know, so the National Haitian American elected official network has a lot of lawyers, a lot of lawyers that I have access to and have been preparing me for this discussion. And I mean, and I'm just mean like personal injury lawyers and you know, I mean lawyers who look at ethics, who are who have not only just been in office but they have seen how let litigation go wrong against a city when they don't act right or county when they don't act right. And you'd be surprised how little, especially for you, those of my colleagues who are attorneys, how the little thing can make it seem that there is reckless abandon. Love that term, reckless abandoned. Us to what kind of risk you are providing to the city, you are putting the city in. Emoryville, our vacancy rate is very high compared to the rest of the region. In terms of our businesses, a lot of empty storefronts, these spaces, some mentioned that. We have a budget shortfall. 11.8 million, I believe, are consultant shared. Our home values have also slipped worst in the region. Hand the city afford a litigation, especially one around civil rights. That's what you have to determine. That's what you have to figure out. Well, one, did the city violate the Brown Act, right? Two, has the city been acting out of jurisdiction? I want to go to Sam Gould. You hear from his wife, you hear from Sam. So I like to share some communication from Sam Gould. Because several times the mayor has said that, oh, well, the problem with climate privacy in Sam Gould is that climate privacy does not agree with something that Sam Gould said, you know, this is agreement or Mr. or climate privacy was said something about the city, that sort of thing. So I have a comment, it's on page nine. This is from Samgool. Kalima. Now, the entire time I'm here. I remember I played a post of the comment and I believe it was an article about our vacancy issue. And then Samgoode responded, and I then shared with him some issues that we have in terms of our black homeownership rates in Henryville. Kalima, and I think this is a report because this is prior, he was just was just, he just joined the committee. The committee met a member by now. Yeah, he was a committee met by now. Yeah. Yeah. With these comments, yes. You know, you hear and you know why? And they're saying that's not true. Because these comments then lead to emails with timestamps. Yeah. Actually, this is stupider than I thought. This is a graph of percentages over time. So obviously, if new apartments get built with people moving, we disagree on a lot of things, council members. But have I ever called you stupid? No, I would never call you that. Would you be okay with a committee member calling you stupid? And then here's the thing, when a committee member does do that and you ignore them, you hope that it just goes away. Kaleema, I can't stop thinking about how bad this graph is. So sorry I keep spamming. So here it is, Sam, you are admitting to spamming me. Are you trying to tell me that 2019, you know, he goes into this thing or whatever. Now, once again, I ignore Sam Google. I'm dying laughing at this. So he just keeps going. So now let's go into the actual communication. Where I say, hey Paul, I'm attaching a communication. I mentioned between Sam Gould and I on next door. This is April 19th, 2023. It highlights my concern that he may not represent Emoryville and Ways are becoming of a committee. As you can see, when I decide to no longer engage with him, he kept pressing on in a way that was disturbing. I don't think this should disqualify him. And I think I said this because you were, I remember you were applying. So correction, you were applying to be a committee member, so your application was already in. Right? So this, this, this qualify him, but I think he needs to hear from you on how he should and shouldn't communicate with a council member and that he represents Enriville now in his online communications. So Paul says, I, Kalima, I'd be happy to talk with him about the quorum. I don't have his contact information though. Could you send it if you have? If not, I can catch him at a B-pack. Why would he catch you at a B-pack if you weren't already involved in city government in some sort of way? Okay. So then comes, so that's April 19, 2023. Then comes another communication. April 19, 2023. Then comes another communication. June 5, 2023. Hi, Kalima. I'm sorry to hear that he's been commenting on your posts. I will talk to him about being polite and I remind him that he's, of course, he's able to express his opinions as an individual and that doing so thoughtfully is important. Hopefully that will calm it down and there won't be a need for more back and forth. Thanks for letting me pull. Alright. I'm gonna say, hey Paul, Sam Gould has popped up again in social media making comments on items I've posted. Right? And so there is this communication between myself and Sam Gould. And this is really important because, you know, elective officials are a little bit different in terms of how we interact with the public. But this is still, I believe according to the California cities, this is still a workplace environment. They still consider this a workplace environment. And so if someone is messing with you, who you work with, and you go to someone who you feel should be handling it, and they don't handle it or their behavior, they don't do anything about it, right? If the work environment works right, right? Then HR or other people step and they actually do something about it. If it doesn't work right, then you have to handle it yourself. And so that's what I did, because I'm from Brooklyn. And so I go to the beat pack meeting and I talk about the CORE. And it's really important because I talk about the CORE and according to, and I believe the minutes of that BPAC meeting are here, regular meeting. It's the page number is enlisted, I apologize, but it says Monday, July 10, 2023. And it says public comment will receive from Klimapri Force and John Botters on the courtroom. Evidence. There's no evidence. There's no evidence. There's no witness statements. No statements whatsoever. And so this entire and I'll wrap it up. This entire thing, whatever this is, has been done without providing no evidence to me prior to this meeting. No statements, nothing, right? Our law enforcement work hard, but even in the minds when they're dealing with a perk, they know that the process of how to handle someone is important because when it hits the court, they don't want somebody who hurt the public to just get away scot free simply because the process was somehow circumvented or if there's any evidence of bias. And so what you all saw today. I mean, think about it. Think about a court of law hearing the council member compared me to Trump. And that not be some sort of sign that bias is, you know, I can go on and on and on. You know, I only have a budget. And so, you know, these charges are ridiculous. They're ridiculous because even after the court of ethics was formed, Sam Gold in January 2012, I mean January 12th, absolutely pathetic and elected official was celebrating someone being run out of office with death threats posted on the front door of their house. Pride force has absolutely no shame. Where's the code of ethics? So you know and I have several other examples, but this is one of my favorites and it comes from May or Welsh. Now you also Brian Donney used to have know, of the F boy comments, right? But I mean, you know, Council member Welsh says, what we could say, well, this happened before the, the, the Coda Ethics, right? And this is also another issue with the Coda Ethics called Statute Elimitations. Because my paperwork for the FPPC was submitted prior to my receiving this censure. Also very interesting that a court wants to know, why did they wait until election night to do the censure? Could it be that they were running for office and they were worried about how a censure and sanctioned would be perceived by the public, thus making a censure political in nature? I mean, you just need, you don't need a whole lot for litigation, you don't need a whole lot. But it's interesting that in terms of the stue of Elimitation, so not only there's that, but also during several charges, it just seemed very interesting that many of these existed prior to either the code of ethics being formed, but during the Dakota ethics, Mayor Welsh, this is the fourth of April. Berkeley, this is in response to, cause I mute all of them on social media. Cause I don't wanna hear, see some of the stuff that they post, but it's also a brown neck. I don't want to hit like or something at the post and that sort of thing. You know to protect myself. So I don't know what they say. So I posted about the fact that I was at an event that was supposedly progressive and that sort of thing. No black people. All right. Ilana, you were at that event. supposedly progressive and that sort of thing, no black people, right? Ilana, you were at that event. And Council member Welsh says, Berkeley lost a lot of its black population due to the bad housing policy. Here it is, kicker. You and your fellow segregation forever, ballot measure buddies support. I'm from Brooklyn, yo. You don't call my friends segregationists. You didn't look like segregationists? But here's the thing, you didn't just say that they were segregationists. You said, I'm a segregationist. Fourth of April during the while the code of conduct is active. Now you may say well the difference Kalima is that the code of conduct you know you have to go through a process where someone accounts for them has to complain, you know, file, and that sort of thing. Brian Donnelly, you filed complaints. How was that received? They ignored it. They ignored it. That's why I think a complaint against the mayor. Yes. Council, it's not. Council, it's not. It's not. It's not. It's not. It's not. it. Okay. Can you see? I mean, just think about the people of Emoryville for once. What you're bringing our city into, we are already struggling financially and then you have the audacity to put us in some sort of legal jeopardy. You're not thinking about the city. You're thinking about yourselves. So I dare you. I dare you to censor and sanction me. And then say to the people of Henryville that you're thinking about them. I'm going to go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, ready, go, ready, go, ready, go, ready, go, ready, go, ready, go, ready, go, ready, go, ready, go, ready, go, ready, go, ready, go, ready, go, ready, go, ready, go, ready, go the the the the the the the the Thank you. Mayor Richman. Member of the House. Thank you. I have a couple of questions for the city attorney. Councillor Member of the House. Thank you. The first is does the release of closed session discussions rise to a level of whistleblower status? Not in this instance. No, it does not. Okay. And then in the case, just like the status of the law, if you could summarize from these statements by elected officials that have not been authorized by a full council, that come from a closed session, what is the status of that? So I believe what you're referring to is there was an email exchange that Council member Price Force referenced about a member of the public emailing me about the conduct of council members in statements they made publicly. And there is US Supreme Court precedent that involved Donald Trump in which the court held that the statements outside of public discourse or outside of a council meeting that have not been authorized by the full council, attacking other folks or other individuals or other elected officials does not incur any type of civil liability to the city or any other political entity. That's because the city cannot control the speech of elected officials, and if they choose to engage in certain type of speech against other elected officials in the public realm on Twitter, or they're kind of social media sites, that the city does not incur liability as a result of those statements. I have no other questions, Madam Mayor. I smell your more. So I did not hear anything that contradicts or even addresses the statements of the resolution. I heard discussion about being singled out to sign a collegiality pledge related to a political endorsement. This is mine. This is the one that I signed. I'm not sure why that makes anybody special. I heard grievances about online comments. I heard legal threats to the city. The FPPC financial disclosure forms are posted publicly and they are either missing or woefully inadequate in the case of member pry force. the committee. The committee is a position that will be the position that will be the position that will be the position that will be the position that will be the position that will be the position that will be the position that will be the position that will be the position that will be the position that will be the position that will be the position that will be the position that will be the position that will be the second. I have some questions of the city attorney. Yes. Thank you Mayor. The questions I have are was the draft resolution served on or provided to council member pry force? Yes. The resolution the draft resolution before it was published in the agenda on November 26 was provided to Council Member Price Force on November 20th. And was he provided an opportunity to provide a rebuttal statement to everything that was laid out for the public in the resolution. Yes. Councilmember Priforce was informed that if he would like a statement or any other written communication to be posted along with the agenda item on November 26th that he was entitled to provide it to the city by November 25th, then we would include that along with the agenda packet. Has council member Priforce been advised that he has the same access to the city attorney as the rest of the council members? Yes, the city attorney serves at the pleasure of the city council. We provide legal advice to all members of the city council individually. We can answer any questions they have and I treat that as confidential. I have some questions of the City Clerk. If you will allow a Madam Mayor, thank you. Yes, please go ahead. Was Council member Prive was provided the OTAB office? Yes. At that time was, did he take the OTAB office. Yes. At that time was it did he take the OTAB that he will fully and faithfully discharge the duties upon which she is about to enter as a council member for the City of Emeryville. Yes. And does that include filing the FPPC forms as all council members do? Either the city clerk or the city attorney. I'm sorry, I don't understand the question. Does that include filing of the FPPC forms? Let me ask it another way. Would I can clarify? way. If a council member does not file an FPPC form in the manner that they are required to do, who reports the council member to the FPPC? I do as the elections official for the City of Emeryville. Thank you. I second the motion. Madam Clerk, we have a motion and a second. The roll, please. Council member Bouters. I just was a point of procedure. His hand. I'm a member of the prior force. Thank you. And so the the the brown act violation being, you know, this sort of communication between me and this person. During the resolution, I mean, in the resolution, the there wasn't an issue of naming Mia Esperanza Brown and Calvin Dillahunti. Why is it that the person who received this communication because I haven't gotten any evidence? What is their name? I'm sorry, I think you'll need to speak with Mayor Welsh regarding the resolution. Yeah. Devon Murphy, council member from the city of panel shared it with me. Got it. Okay. Thank you. I, um, So for us to have a proceeding and I not receive not just this evidence, but other forms of evidence that were pointed, other statements that were made during for the draft resolution, that it goes both ways, that the city also has an opportunity to provide evidence. And that's something that's really important. Without that evidence, then I cannot respond to something. I cannot respond to hearsay. And that's really important, that if I am going to address something, I need to have all the facts in front of me, because that was actually mentioned earlier, was about facts. I don't have that information in front of me. So once again, so without any information, no witness statements, and without confidential information, in terms of closed session, what is that confidential information? It looks like the decision has already been made, right? But it's just really important that they're making a decision that once again, as I shared, harms every bill. So you guys can continue. I won't stop. I was just wondering if you would like to ask if you would like to ask if you would like to ask if you would like to ask if you would like to ask if you would like to ask if you would like to ask if you would like to ask if you would like to ask if you would like to ask if you would like to ask if you would like to ask if you would like to ask if you would like to ask if you would like to ask if you would like to ask if you you did tell him that he would be in violation of the Brown Act, correct? You know, again, this confidential communication, but if the council would like me to waive that disclosure, I'd be happy to do so. In a order. Yes. Doing that in an open session, does that waive everything about the meeting or it will only waive the communication? If you want to limit it to the communication at issues, since that seems to be the point that you'd like to make, we can limit it to the communication regarding the violation of the Brown Act. Grant's in the question. Members, is there a majority support to waive that confidentiality of that communications? Yes, I'll. Yes. yes. Okay. Yes, I provided advice that the under state law confidential information means a communication made in closed session that is specifically related to the basis for the legislative body of a local agency to meet lawfully in closed session. And as a result, council members, the city council may not without the authorization of the entire city council disclose information obtained during the closed session or the substance of the discussion that occurred in closed session. Close session. Only the city council acting as an entity may determine whether to disclose information obtained in closed session or the substance of the discussion. Unauthorized disclosure by a member of the City Council or staff person attending the closed session violates the law and may potentially lead to disciplinary action. And I cited California Government Code Section 54963. Thank you. Member. Thank you. Thank you. I just have a couple of other questions for the city attorney. Just to clarify, this is not a judicial or quasi-judicial proceeding of any kind. Correct. This is not a civil trial. This is not a criminal trial. The only requirement is that the council member be provided to process and an opportunity to respond to the resolution that laid out the various factual allegations and we the council member has been provided two opportunities to do so tonight both with providing a statement to the council is also afforded the opportunity to provide a statement when the agenda was was published and the Councilmember is also entitled to participate in the deliberations tonight on the Central Resolution. I follow up question is through respect to the resolution that you produced with the mayor and sent to Councilmember Prime Force and was noticed publicly. What I'm hearing is an allegation about the factual allegations and I guess my question is that the items contained in the resolution are sufficient to provide the notice as to what is being brought and that every single detail about the facts behind those things is not necessarily need to be in the resolution or provided in advance as part of sufficient notice correct. Correct. There's no entitlement to discovery or other type of evidence other than what was provided for in the resolution that's consistent with state law for these types of matters. Thank you for answering my question. I have a question. So when, oh, go ahead. No, I called on question. So when, oh, go ahead. No, I'll call it on you. Thank you. So when the city attorney provided a statement about the brown act, which was the advice that we were given, and I think it's really important. So according to the League of California cities, we are supposed to receive an ethics, I believe course. That is required. I believe it was within two years of being a council member. Are you aware of that? That may be through the League of California cities that they offer that to elected officials. Okay, and that's up to them, whether or not they choose to attend those training sessions or not. Okay, got it. Okay, so then, so just a quick show of hands of those who did receive that kind of training. No, okay, yeah, because I didn't receive that kind of training. So which means then you then advised me to, because I had an issue with what occurred in, in closed session, you advised me not to send that information out to the public. Now, the timestamp of when you advised me and then, and now that we know that it's, it's a, Devin Murphy, when did Devin Murphy receive my communication? I don't know what transpired with Devin Murphy. I don't know when that communication was made. Got it. All I was just informed was that the discussions regarding the closed session were publicly released. Got it. OK. So then you said you were informed. You were informed by home. You said that communication is now open, right? You can share. So I believe the mayor is indicated that she was aware of this public release of the closed session discussion. OK. Great. So then Madam Mayor, when did Devon Murphy that she was aware of this public release of the closed session discussed. Great. So then Madam Mayor, when did Devon Murphy receive this communication? Was it before or after the council that the city attorney gave me? I have no idea. You have no idea. Okay. So then, and I think that that's what's important is that even though you don't consider it as sufficient information, when I'm just now hearing about this and learning about this on, you know, at this meeting, and then there's still missing information, inaccurate information. If I don't have that information, then my colleagues also don't have that information. And so there is still incomplete information. There is still something that we are not aware of because you're making a decision based upon this particular charge, but it sounds like all the facts aren't in. I'm not clear how you would like me to respond to this. This is not the city attorney's resolution. We are not making the factual allegations. This is something that was requested and brought before the council for consideration. Oh, it's a great observation. So the resolution was then not, it's not the city attorney's resolution. We are asked to review resolutions. We don't prepare the resolution. The mayor brought the factual allegations and asked that they be brought before the city council for consideration. Got it. Got it. This is not an action that's being brought by the city attorney's office. Got it. But on this draft resolution, it was only your signature that was on that draft resolution. Correct. It was as to form legal. Again, this is not a criminal or civil proceeding. You're not entitled to discovery. There's no requirement of discovery. The allegations were set forth on violations of the Brown Act. And that's what the Council is considering tonight. So you received a resolution. When you don't have all the facts in that information, you will just, you'll sign a resolution. Even if you don't have a fact. I was, I was made aware of the public disclosure of in violation of the brown act. Yes, but you didn't have all the facts. Because I actually went to facts, but you didn't have all the facts because I actually some went to facts, but you didn't have all the facts. You didn't have all the information. I'm not sure I understand. I was made aware. So I'll ask you the question again. When did Devin Murphy receive this communication before it was it before or after you advised me? Again, I did not I don't follow Devin Murphy's Twitter account. Okay. I'm aware that there was a public release of the Brown Act, of the Brown Act discussion that was made publicly. So if you'd like me to check my file, I can let you know when I received that information, but I did receive information that there was a public disclosure of the closed session discussion. Well, it doesn't matter when you received it. The matter is because, as you said, that the resolution was brought to you by Mayor Welsh, and it was Mayor Welsh who received the communication from Devin Murphy. So Mayor Welsh is the one who should have that information and provide that information to you as to when did Devin Murphy receive said communication from me. And was that before or after your council? Yeah, I mean, if we want to back up a second, I mean, all council members have already been informed about the confidentiality of closed session discussions. That is a brown act requirement, just as public meetings are to be conducted in compliance with the brown act. I believe all council members are aware, discussions that occurred during closed session are treated as confidential. Yes, however, in the resolution that I was received, I received in that resolution, it made mention of the communication that I made to the public about what occurred in the Brown Act, but I don't know whether or not that communication is based upon an opinion or actual confidential detail information because I do not have that information in front of me. Now, member bowters has said that I don't need to be provided with sufficient information. Can you see why we need an independent public ethics commission? Because this is bananas. This is ridiculous. And that we need sufficient information for the public to be able to make a decision. And so then communication is happening that I'm not privy to, right? They're still facts that they haven't revealed to me. And yet for any member of this council to make a vote based on that, there are juries that would not conflict based upon what's happening here. And so I do not know what the model is that they're using. Yeah, and so, um, so I just wanted to make that very, I just wanted to make that very clear, um, and, um, and you, you know, it's time for us to, to all go home and I'll let you all proceed. Thank you. Amber Bowdres. Do you have, I'd like to ask Council Member Priya Force one question. Did you or did you not send an email with confidential brown-act communications to Devon Murphy. I do not know what is confidential information because I was not shared with me what is confidential or detailed information because, as I said, according to the Whistleblower Act, I can share my opinion about what happens, but I don't know exactly what is confidential or detailed information. And just to be clear, again, the law is clear that there's no Whistleblower Act ensuring close-action information, correct? Not in this instance, that's correct. Okay. And I will make it clear that the Bronek actually does say that my opinion can be shared about what happens at a closed session. And so, for example, being yelled and screamed at in a closed session. If I go to Devon Murphy and I say, hey, I'm yelled and been yelled at and screamed at, is that a violation of the Brown Act? According to the Brown Act. I would just say as an elected official, you are not subject to the traditional rules that apply to unlawful harassment that would apply for to city staff. You are an elected official, so you're treated differently under the laws for workplace harassment. But that's very different because the legal counsel that I received is that there's a difference when you're an elected official between legislative actions and when they consider us administrative actions. And so legislative actions and what they consider as administrative actions. And so, legislative actions, elected officials, do have some level of immunity from. Administrative actions, the things that we do that don't have to do with passing a law. Those, for example, that some things that happen in closed session, we do not have immunity from. Is that correct? I'm not clear what you're asking. Are you saying that as an elected official? As an elected official? Yeah, our custom members immune from litigation based upon administrative actions that are non-legislative. Between each other? Between each other, between the public, any administrative actions? So I would just say that council members that may have a disagreement between one another are not subject to workplace harassment rules. That is outside of what state law provides for workplace harassment. Okay. Yeah. Excuse me, excuse me believe that, yeah, it brought to the court of law. Many people will feel the same way. Whether it's a judge or a jury, many people will feel the same way. There are certainly maybe other rules that apply, but certainly, but not workplace harassment. City officials in their discussions among when each other, among each other are not considered employees of the city and the typical workplace harassment rules do not apply. Okay, and I think that's very important because then your statements would be evaluated, should just go to the litigation. Okay, thank you. I'd like to make a substitute motion. I'd like to make a motion to approve the resolution with an amendment to add a whereas or a resolve clause. It is hereby for the resolve that the city clerk is instructed to mail copy of this resolution to every address in the city of Emoryville. That's my motion. I'll second the substitute motion. Call the question. Madam Clerk. Doesn't matter at this point. We'll go east. Madam Clerk, we have a wit quiet please. Madam Clerk, we have a motion. A second the roll please. On the substitute motion, council member bowters. Aye. Council member Carr. Aye. Council member Prifors. May. Vice Mayor Moira. Aye. And Mayor Welch.