My latest column… And that is what is so perplexing about Oliva’s self-inflicted demise. His story is not unlike those told in Hollywood true-crime stories that document the rise and fall of individuals who take advantage of the system. Oliva leveraged a complacent electorate and a disinterested and disengaged council to perpetrate an ingenious scam [...]

Breaking news. The City has released the separation agreement with City Manager Nelson Oliva. The agreement states that the termination is without good cause and that the City will pay Oliva a full year’s salary as stipulated in his contract. The City has also agreed to extend the due date of the interest-free home loan [...]

The City Council removed Nelson Oliva as city manager on December 21 — just two weeks after reinstating him to that position during an orchestrated meeting full of praise welcoming him back. Section 5 of the contract outlines the severance if the City terminates without “good cause“…

The City Council reinstated Nelson Oliva as city manager on December 7 (one week before new members were sworn in), and effectively erased the City’s ability to leverage the litany of controversial actions that had taken place during his tenure as cause for termination. Section 5 of the contract provides the definition of “good cause”… [...]

In April 2008, the City Council agreed to a contract extension with City Manager Nelson Oliva through June 2013. Section 6 of the contract states that if the city manager fails to perform his duties for 60 days, the council may terminate the contract… Charlie Long was hired as interim city manager and began work [...]

Breaking news. The City Council emerged from closed session and announced that a search for a new city manager will begin immediately. UPDATE (7:55pm) — Assistant City Manager Lisa Hammon just gave a speech detailing mismanagement and chaos at City Hall, then resigned in an effort to salvage her professional reputation. A great moment in [...]

Tom Lochner reports… “Hercules City Manager Nelson Oliva, recently returned from medical leave, said he has no idea why the city did not make a $5 million state-mandated payment to schools, but pledged the city will pay it in full by the end of the month. [...] Oliva said Sycamore North was supposed to get [...]

Paying debt with debt… “Both purchases were financed by bonds. The first issue, $15 million, is payable with property tax increments, and the second, $10 million, from proceeds of the lease of the property to Bio-Rad Laboratories. The second sale, in 2009, from the city to the Hercules Public Financing Authority, provided a needed infusion [...]

Tom Lochner reports… “Hercules City Manager Nelson Oliva, in the first weekly report since he resumed his duties earlier this week, says he sees no immediate need to change the course charted by former interim City Manager Charlie Long, and that the City Council has asked him to make no changes to ‘the matters that [...]

With two new councilmembers starting next week, councilmember Don Kuehne may be looking to avoid an ugly and largely avoidable political process by helping to implement change in short order… “In a response to Hercules residents that he e-mailed to Bay Area News Group, Kuehne said: ‘[...] Bringing Mr. Oliva back from medical leave is [...]

My latest column… In a stunning, provocative move clearly meant to send a stern message to dissident residents clamoring for change and transparency, the city council abruptly fired the interim city manager tasked with cleaning up the apparent mess left by the previous city manager, Nelson Oliva. Oliva was on indefinite sick leave until Tuesday [...]

Well, that was an interesting turn of events. Tom Lochner reports… The Hercules City Council on Tuesday terminated interim City Manager Charlie Long and welcomed back City Manager Nelson Oliva, as a gallery of supporters applauded. Many in the audience later took to the podium to denounce Long and praise Oliva, the City Council and [...]

The San Francisco Business Times reported in May 2009 — prior to the City Council’s approval of a $56m construction budget for the project — that the cost of the Sycamore North project was $70m. The city broke ground this week on the first phase of Sycamore Crossings, a $70 million retail and residential project [...]

The City Council approved the construction without demanding a full accounting of the funding stream…”Hercules City Council members, saying this is no time to lay blame, said Tuesday they were misled about the financing of the Sycamore North development, recently found to be running out of construction funds less than halfway to completion. [...] [Interim [...]

Another example of City Manager Nelson Oliva fleecing the city in the name of affordable housing… “In his weekly interim city manager’s report, posted on the Hercules Website on Friday, [Charles] Long says the project’s construction funds are ‘essentially exhausted.’ With Sycamore North about 45 percent complete, the agency will need to invest $21.5 million [...]

The city attorney remains a huge problem in moving forward… “We expect ethical behavior. In Hercules, nepotism and conflicts of interest have permeated city government. The two incumbents on the ballot Tuesday didn’t see a problem with using public money for no-bid contracts and insider mortgage loan deals. Fortunately, the two challengers did, and that’s [...]

Surprise, surprise, who was that waving signs at passers-by with Joe Eddy McDonald this evening? Embattled City Manager Nelson Oliva, that’s who. Oliva has recently been relieved of his almighty control at City Hall, albeit under the auspices of a true medical condition, and from the signs of it, he will not be returning in [...]

I was heartbroken reading this report by Tom Lochner, and I’m trying to figure out if it means… City Manager Nelson Oliva is/was full of shit. The City cannot keep its promises. No one knows what they are doing. I’m living in Fantasyland. But Hercules’ choice of a Big League Dreams site lies outside the [...]

Tom Lochner reports on the interim city manager’s first week… “Hercules’ new interim city manager, Charlie Long, said he will look at the performance of the city’s administration and its employees before getting into the nitty-gritty of the city’s numerous projects, with an exception: the development of the Hercules waterfront and an intermodal transit center. [...]

Tom Lochner reports… Charlie Long, the former Pinole city manager who reorganized a city administration mired in political squabbles and financial problems, is returning to West Contra Costa as interim city manager of neighboring Hercules. The Hercules City Council appointed Long on Tuesday, just four days after announcing that City Manager Nelson Oliva will go [...]

I’ve been advised of a strongly-worded email campaign making its way through Hercules. It is a character assassination of City Manager Nelson Oliva. The email references this blog on numerous occasions, describing it as a place to read the truth. This is my response: To let everyone know, I did not write this email or [...]

Tom Lochner reports on the outcome of the seven-hour closed session meeting… City Manager Nelson Oliva will go out on medical leave for at least three months, and will be replaced during that time by an interim city manager. The announcement came after a day-long City Council special closed session that included a performance evaluation [...]

The City Council emerged from closed session at approximately 7pm on Tuesday, September 28, 2010, and Mayor Kris Valstad announced that there had been no reportable action taken. During the closed session however, the Council had approved a political push poll that targeted likely voters, a $24.5k-contract with Strategy Research Institute signed by City Manager [...]

Another closed session special meeting has been called by the City Council. It started at 9am. Two items are on the agenda: a performance evaluation of the City Manager, and the discipline/dismissal/release of one public employee. UPDATE — Mayor Kris Valstad emerged from the closed session to report that the meeting would be approximately three [...]

The Times’ Editorial board did their homework this year. It’s all true. HERCULES CITY COUNCIL: Nepotism, conflicts of interest in city government must end; elect Myrna de Vera and John Delgado THE TWO incumbents running for re-election to the Hercules City Council seem deaf to the appalling nepotism and conflicts of interest that permeate city [...]

The City Council will again hold a special meeting to discuss the job performance of the City Manager in closed session — 4:30pm at City Hall. Any reportable action — including his resignation or firing — would come afterward.

The Los Angeles Times uses Hercules as an example in a report on easy money in the redevelopment game… Hercules, population 25,000, boasts a certain coziness that has little to do with its size or location on San Pablo Bay in Contra Costa County. In 2003, after a federal grand jury indicted its affordable-housing manager [...]

Myrna de Vera is one of two candidates for City Council to have a web presence (along with fellow challenger John Delgado), and her campaign website has a lot of information, including her biography and a detailed platform. And although the website is powered by Google Sites (eep), the platform is intriguing. To address ethics [...]

The agenda for tonight’s City Council meeting — 7pm at City Hall — is light, a further sign of the City Manager’s prolonged absence of late. The Council will continue its evaluation of the City Manager’s performance in closed session prior to the meeting. The City will increase the wastewater treatment budget by $250k to [...]

In a luncheon with local business leaders, Councilmember Joe Eddy McDonald described concerned Waterfront residents as NIMBY elites… “Earlier, McDonald chided what he called the ‘drawbridge mentality’ of some Hercules waterfront residents who have criticized the slow pace of development there. McDonald characterized the controversy as a ‘manufactured issue.’” Doesn’t McDonald realize that the Waterfront [...]

Tom Lochner reports… “A special closed session of the Hercules City Council to consider a performance evaluation of City Manager Nelson Oliva was adjourned Tuesday afternoon without any reportable action taken. [...] Oliva began his tenure as Hercules’ city manager in April 2007. The council renewed his contract in 2008 for five years and two-and-a-half [...]

The City Council has abruptly called a special meeting for Tuesday afternoon — 4:30pm at City Hall — for a performance evaluation of City Manager Nelson Oliva. But don’t get your hopes up just yet. Oliva is just as likely to receive another performance bonus as he is to be fired or reprimanded. Notice was [...]

This may surprise you, but it is true. In what is largely unique to the City of Hercules, the City Council is subservient to the City Manager — not by design, but because of the unwillingness of councilmembers to properly exert their authority. During Tuesday’s meeting, City Attorney Mick Cabral reminded the Council of that [...]

Candidate John Delgado addressed the City Council at Tuesday evening’s meeting, questioning the City Manger’s high pay (the greatest in West County) and delays in the Waterfront project… City Attorney Mick Cabral was directed to respond to the pay issue and he continued to spread the misinformation that City Manager Nelson Oliva’s base salary was [...]

I sent the following email to Councilmember Don Kuehne this morning, along with a dozen roses. (Okay, I made that second part up.) Mr. Kuehne- I voted for you. I studied your background and honestly believed that you would be my representative on the Council. I still hope for that ultimately to be the case. [...]

The reporting continues… “Hercules’ affordable housing contracts will go out to bid next year, and the ‘nepotism issue’ with the company that currently runs the programs has been resolved, officials say. But the company’s new owners have been slow to amend the public record to reflect the new situation and their new principal place of [...]

Some rather incoherent commentary from our humble elected officials (on three issues: Intermodal Station and waterfront development, affordable housing, and the City Manager)… Highlights include: Joe Eddy McDonald stating that there would be no delay in the Intermodal Station’s federal funding (but not mentioning the construction delay), plus stating that the surrounding development has nothing [...]

The City responded last week to the news that the Hercules City Manager is the highest paid executive in West Contra Costa County. The response was rather bland, but it did include footnotes. And it hasn’t garnered media attention. There was some news made however, or acknowledgment of an as-of-yet unspoken truth. The City outlined [...]

The salary represents a 10% raise over the previous year, you know, for a job well done… “Hercules’ Nelson Oliva was the highest-paid city manager in West Contra Costa last year, earning $278,568, according to salary records furnished by the region’s five cities. Oliva’s 2009 earnings consisted of a base salary of $219,999 and unspecified [...]

Tom Lochner reports on the City’s response… Hercules has fired back at last month’s scathing county grand jury report, calling baseless the jury’s findings that the conduct of city business, particularly the affordable housing program, lacks transparency and creates an “appearance of impropriety.” “Just because something looks wrong does not mean something is wrong,” reads [...]

The City has published its response — an 11-page letter signed by Mayor Kris Valstad (but likely written by the City Attorney and City Manager) — to the Contra Costa County Grand Jury’s scathing report released last month. Brief analysis to follow. UPDATE — The letter is testy: “The ‘appearance of impropriety’ is yet another [...]

Tom Lochner keeps digging… “[Mike] Sakamoto worked for an investment banking firm that underwrote a $60.6 million Hercules Redevelopment Agency bond issue. But that information is not included in public disclosure documents available at Hercules City Hall. [...] Today, Sakamoto, who served as city manager from early 2002 to April 2007, has several consulting portfolios [...]

The City will return to the negotiating table in renewed efforts to purchase the Hilltown property — currently assessed at $14.2m — in closed session prior to next Tuesday’s City Council meeting. The City has not yet officially released its intention to purchase the property, explain the possible purchase to its residents, illustrate why a [...]

Wow. The stench you smell emanating from the small city of Hercules is a conflict-of-interest cesspool that grows more putrid with each passing day. Despite warnings from residents, this paper and the Contra Costa County grand jury, City Council members continue to ignore the fetid flow, abrogating their responsibility to clean up the mess. The [...]

This is getting ridiculous, and is reminiscent of the real estate company that Ed Balico had no idea who was running (he was “just a broker”) — and Balico went to Sacramento to find out — only to discover it was owned by his son… “NEO Consulting Inc. D.B.A. Affordable Housing Solutions Group, the company [...]

Resident Bill Kelly took to the podium on Tuesday evening and blasted the City Council for failing to act prior to the grand jury releasing their scathing report on questionable transactions made by the affordable housing agency, a City subcontractor with deep ties to the City Manager… After Kelly’s statement, Mayor Kris Valstad said that [...]

The Grand Jury report released late last week concluded with five recommendations… The City of Hercules shall expand ethics and conflict of interest training beyond the minimum two hours required by the California Attorney General’s memorandum, Ethics Training for Local Officials, and avail themselves of additional resources. The Hercules City Council shall direct the City [...]

The Grand Jury report released late last week concluded with eight findings… Awarding agreements to NEO without competitive bidding does not ensure the City is administering its programs in the most cost effective manner. Since 2003, the City of Hercules has executed agreements with NEO, previously owned by the current City Manager. NEO currently employs [...]

This makes complete sense… “The Contra Costa civil grand jury is accusing Hercules of questionable practices and a lack of transparency in its affordable housing and business loan programs.” You can read the scathing Grand Jury report online. And a complete subject archive of the affordable housing scandal is available on this blog.

The City Council will approve the issuance of $37m in bonds at tonight’s meeting — 7pm at City Hall. The bonds will finance the planned switch to WCWD for wastewater treatment (leaving the Pinole facility) and expanding the City’s electric utility, HMU. The Council will also hold approve the yearly operating budgets for the Lighting [...]