County Supervisors’ Mismanagement Loses Millions for Terrorism and Disaster Training Executive Summary From 2007

Conclusions 2

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  Elected officials at all levels have, as one of their most important duties, the continued safety of their constituent residents and the protection of both public and private property. The Grand Jury recognizes that its role is not to critique policy decisions by public officials such as the Board of Supervisors. In this particular case, therefore, it is not commenting on how the BOS decided to best prepare its first Representative government responders for recovery after acts of terrorism or natural is messy. However, the Alameda County Board of disasters. Instead it is questioning the contradiction that while Supervisors failed in managing this process. As almost all members of the BOS explicitly stated that they did not one supervisor put it, “If we want to terminate the Urban Shield program, their mishandling lose this grant, I will have nobody to blame but of the process by which the program was reviewed led inexorably myself.” to that termination, and the absence of any replacement program to provide this critical training to first responders. For years, the Urban Shield grant approval process had been contentious and controversial. BOS and ad hoc committee meetings were well-attended and boisterous. Representative government is messy. However, the Alameda County Board of Supervisors failed in managing this process. As one supervisor put it, “If we lose this grant, I will have nobody to blame but myself.” Challenged with the annual mandate to approve the continued acceptance of the DHS grant, the Board of Supervisors tossed responsibility to solve the many Urban Shield controversies first to a task force, then to an ad hoc committee. The use of ad hoc committees is a well-accepted practice and functions well so long as objectives and deliverables are clear and well-articulated. In this case, they were not. Selection of committee members was questionable at best. With few exceptions the AHC members confirmed their established biases with intractable opinions and votes. Most telling of all was the committee’s disregard of explicitly stated criteria in the DHS grant application. In meeting after meeting the AHC labored over recommendations destined to doom grant approval. The March 12, 2019 Board of Supervisor‘s meeting revealed a board confused by the AHC’s recommendations. Despite the year-long wrangling, legal counsel testimony, and ACSO input, 67
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  the BOS proceeded to adopt recommendations from an ill-conceived committee literally rejecting $5.6 million in vital preparedness and support money, leaving the county and Bay Area residents less safe. Of perhaps even greater concern is the fact that, in examining a subject as important as public safety, the Board of Supervisors did not rely on expert advice from relevant professional county departments. Instead, it mistakenly relied on unchallenged misstatements of fact and inherently flawed and poorly constituted advisory committees.

No Responses Found 1

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