Click here to read Why Oakley’s city attorney was forced out: Part 1.


City attorneys are hired by a council to represent a city, not any individual councilmember. As controversial issues arise, the attorney must occasionally advise councilmembers that their intended city actions are limited or even illegal, advice that the council is free to ignore and direct the attorney to ignore.

To protect the public, there are legal restrictions on councilmembers and planning commissioners, and when violated, the attorney must explain why they must stop doing something or suffer the consequences. Non-attorney councilmembers commonly misunderstand the attorney’s role, seeing the attorney as an obstacle to their desires. They wrongly believe the answer is to remove the attorney, which takes only three councilmember’s votes; i.e., they “shoot the messenger.”

The Oakley City Council decision to force the city attorney out occurred at its late January, ’09 council meeting. At this meeting, the city attorney Alison Barrett-Green was given her first and only review; thereafter she was on leave. In February, she was replaced by Bill Galstan and her severance agreement, approved in March, was backdated to Feb. 1. Only four of Oakley’s councilmembers were present. Councilmember Connelly was sick. The other four – Anderson, Frazier, Romick and Rios – didn’t bother to continue the matter for Mr. Connelly; they wanted the city attorney out immediately.

Not once, from her hire until early December, ’08, did I hear a single complaint about her work. However, during the past year, there were a number of contentious issues that the city attorney dealt with.

Three issues stand out: The first was who would get free land and half a million dollars of grant money to build a day care center in Oakley. The terms of the two grants were purportedly handled separately but in fact no applicant would take the land with city restrictions and no money. Additionally, the terms made it impossible for local businesses to seriously compete. Councilmembers Anderson, Romick and Rios strongly favored a Brentwood business that would operate nights as a church. (Press readers may recall several stories about contentious council meetings.) However, the California Constitution does not allow a city to give taxpayer funds to a church. When the city attorney wrote an opinion stating the law, it stopped the money grant and thereby a potential lawsuit against the city – at the cost of making these three councilmembers quite angry with her.

A second issue concerned alleged Brown Act violations by some Planning Commission members talking about agenda items prior to their meetings. The city attorney had the duty of reminding the commission members that they could not engage in this type of activity. One of those commissioners, Mr. Frazier, thereafter became a councilmember, her boss, and was at that January meeting.

A third controversial issue was the city attorney’s review of city staff’s multi-year handling of the public housing project behind Raley’s. A single staff member pushed this project from the beginning with the strong support of councilmembers Anderson, Romick and Rios, resulting in six four-story public housing units to “help” develop a retail site.

Unfortunately, the city got only public housing; no retail. Worse, staff members said they believed the agreement forced them to allow up to 17 buildings on the site, and in February, ’08, without council approval, they permitted two more buildings. Thereafter, the city attorney reviewed it and reported back with a plan to stop additional buildings. She pointed out that the city has no legal requirement to build a single building, only to rezone land for it.

Since her departure, the council has reverted to approving more buildings. I predict the developer, with Councilmember Anderson and Romick’s support, will ultimately be allowed to build all or most of the 17 buildings.

The city attorney’s work on each issue was always thorough, honest, ethical and legal. However, that put her in a position contrary to some councilmembers. Her record undoubtedly convinced some; they did not want her around to examine future problems. For example, two of these councilmembers each took $2,000 in November of 2008 from a Brentwood company. Now an officer of that company is seeking to put a major industrial use next to yet another undeveloped retail site. (That is another article.)

Summing up, these four councilmembers forced the city attorney out simply because she was doing her job for the taxpayers. They have lost a valuable city employee, increased the likelihood of future ill-advised council actions, sent a message to prospective future employees that Oakley can’t be trusted, and sent a message to staff to say only what the council wants to hear – or else! Councilmembers Anderson, Frazier, Romick and Rios had the power to remove the city attorney, but it wasn’t right and was extremely bad judgment.

Brad Nix is a former Oakley Councilmember who represented Oakley for 10 years on regional transportation committees and has practiced law for 27 years.