The process to select a contracted city attorney – a crucial position in giving legal advice to Hollister officials – took an unusual path locally due to the specialized type of hiring.
The city council in December chose Hollister law firm L&G to serve as city attorney over five other firms that submitted bids. The move was an effort to save money, and officials have said it could save more than $100,000 a year. It followed the short tenure of a contracted interim attorney who had replaced former City Attorney Stephanie Atigh.
“This one is a little different for us,” said Bill Avera, the interim city manager.
He said that since the city attorney works directly for the council, the council members have the authority to hire or fire the attorney.
“They ran it through a standardized procedure,” Avera said.
But some residents expressed concerns about potential for a “conflict of interest” because L&G has represented local agricultural and business interests, including mega-developer DMB and the shelved El Rancho San Benito project. One of those residents concerned about L&G’s association to development projects at the county level is Hollister’s Marty Richman, a Free Lance columnist and editorial board member.
According to Avera, the city sent a Request for Proposals, or an RFP, to 20 to 25 different law firms in August. Most of them were either local or in the general region. The firms were given until Oct. 11 to respond.
Once the city received the proposals, Mayor Ignacio Velazquez and Councilman Victor Gomez, who were chosen to participate in a subcommittee to evaluate the proposals, sorted out the firms to consider.
“They put us back in touch with two firms they wanted us to have interviews with,” said Avera.
Those two finalist firms included L&G and Monterey-based Wellington. In the full agenda packet released to the public before the Dec. 16 meeting, the other proposals outside of L&G’s were excluded.
Public access not required
According to California Newspaper Publishers Association attorney Jim Ewert, the other bids are not necessarily open to the public.
“Generally, they’re filed under seal (other bids),” he said. “The California Public Records Act doesn’t require the disclosure of those bids.”
He did say, however, that the winning bid and all of its terms can be disclosed once it is awarded.
Councilman Ray Friend, who was the only member of the council to vote against L&G’s proposal, said although he felt he was “part of the process,” he wondered why other council members weren’t informed of the L&G choice before it was on the agenda.
“The problem I had is, we were supposed to agree with that choice,” he said. “It might have been courteous of them to bring into light who they had selected.”
Friend, however, said he wasn’t so sure a public review of the bids was necessary and that the process could then become “political.”
“Sometimes there’s a point where the five people who were elected to make that decision should make that decision,” he said. “If the public wants to do all this hiring and firing, then why elect the city council?”
He said he had received all six bids in a closed session with every councilmember. At that session, after reviewing the bids, the council chose the mayor and Gomez to serve on a subcommittee.
Gomez said he was selected to serve with the mayor because he was initially skeptical of contracting out the position.
“We were on opposite ends,” he said, referring to himself and the mayor.
Overall, L&G was chosen over Wellington because of price and the fact they were a local firm, he said.
“We felt like both of these firms had municipal experience,” Gomez said.
The mayor and Gomez met with representatives of both firms Nov. 25 to hear their proposals, Gomez said. He said the hiring process was new to the city.
“I think overall it’s going to be a new process for us,” he said.
Qualifications and cost
For instance, council members knew about the fees – on top of the qualifications – at the outset of receiving bids.
“When we’re hiring somebody based on qualifications, we’re not supposed to know what their fee is,” Avera said, in reference to normal hires.
Because council members directly hires the city attorney, their process is different, he said. Council members had open knowledge of the fees the entire time.
Two of the firms chosen as finalists – Best Best & Krieger and the Law Offices of Atchison, Barisone, Condotti & Kovacevich – replied that they had been notified by the city after not being picked. A spokesman for Atchison said the correspondence with the city wasn’t “anything out of the ordinary.”
