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Amador County Grand Jury • 2025-2026

City of Ione: Reading the Tea Leaves🗄️

56 pages
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Findings 60 findings

F1 Page 60
The Council failed to hold public hearings in May 2025 and ensure a timely fiscal year 2025-2026 budget was adopted in June 2025 (per adopted financial policy), highlighting a significant failure in governance, financial oversight, and attention to fiduciary responsibilities.
F2 Page 60
The city manager and finance manager failed to present the draft preliminary fiscal year 2025-2026 budget to the Finance Committee for its review and recommendations, violating Financial Policies.
F3 Page 60
The Council authorized expenditures and approved contracts without following adopted Financial Policies.
F4 Page 60
After nine months of employment, Council approved a significant city manager pay increase and augmented benefits, substantially exceeding the City’s adopted Fiscal Year 2024-2025 Salary Schedule with no proposed budget adjustment to cover this expenditure, violating the City’s Financial Policies.
F5 Page 60
Council approved an enhanced severance and benefit package for the city manager to minimize turnover.
F6 Page 60
The Finance Committee has not met since July 2024, at a time when oversight and advice on the City’s financial record keeping and budget matters have been critically needed.
F7 Page 60
The City has experienced a multi-year breakdown in audits and resulting financial statements, with significant reporting delays from fiscal year 2018-2019 through fiscal 57 year 2021-2022 and a complete failure to report thereafter, violating its own financial policies and protocols.
F8 Page 61
Years of Council failure to ensure the City’s financial audits and financial statements are completed annually creates a critical vulnerability to waste, fraud, and abuse, indicating a severe systemic failure and breach of fiduciary duties.
F9 Page 61
The Financial Transactions Report due to the State Controller’s Office contains unaudited financial data.
F10 Page 61
Incomplete implementation of recommendations from prior audits slowed the completion of subsequent audits and caused a number of internal control exceptions.
F11 Page 61
Ongoing significant deficiency and/or material weakness in internal controls related to financial transactions resulted in the auditor issuing a fiscal year 2020-2021 modified audit opinion (financial statements may not be entirely accurate or reliable).
F12 Page 61
Chronic delays and a failure to finalize financial audits since 2021 have severely compromised the City’s fiscal transparency and its ability to borrow funds.
F13 Page 61
Council approved expedited bookkeeping and audit services because it was in the City’s best interest to bring the backlog of audits current as quickly as possible.
F14 Page 61
Outstanding audit recommendations related to significant internal control weaknesses described in the fiscal year 2018-2019, 2019-2020, and 2020-2021 audit reports resulted in a decision to suspend formal audits for fiscal years 2021-2022 and 2022-2023, and replace with remedial, contracted bookkeeping services performed by an auditor, a material deviation from established municipal financial protocols.
F15 Page 61
Neglect of interfund loan repayments since 2015 highlights a fundamental governance breakdown masking financial accuracy resulting in lack of transparency.
F16 Page 61
Despite adopting a Debt Policy in 2018 with a policy goal to reduce the City’s sizable unfunded liability for OPEB, no action has been taken to address the unfunded debt obligation.
F17 Page 61
The finance manager performs current duties in addition to daily transactional personnel functions and other operational tasks, which may lead to burnout and errors.
F18 Page 61
High turnover in the city manager and finance manager positions impacted fiscal transparency, delayed the completion of audits, and the City’s ability to qualify for loans.
F19 Page 61
High turnover in the city manager, finance manager, and other City staff positions leads to serious losses of institutional knowledge that hinders City operations. 58
F20 Page 62
The Finance Department has relied upon a retired annuitant for multiple years to complete outstanding audits, indicating a failure to address the underlying staffing shortage that can significantly impact operations.
F21 Page 62
Morale of City staff has greatly improved since the hire of the city manager and finance manager.
F22 Page 62
The reliance on a retired annuitant to perform core functions over a multi-year period without a transition plan creates a dependency on one special hire, jeopardizing the retention of institutional knowledge.
F23 Page 62
The City does not employ a dedicated Human Resource position to manage personnel paperwork, benefits, enrollment, and workers compensation, creating significant legal, financial, and liability risks for the City.
F24 Page 62
The City lacks formal, written policies or procedures regarding recruitment, interview, selection, and centralized filing for personnel files.
F25 Page 62
The City’s recruitment and hiring process for the most recent city manager position was characterized by a lack of fundamental documentation of the hiring process.
F26 Page 62
The lack of a hiring policy, a dedicated Human Resources position, and adequate filing system contributes to an absence of administrative oversight.
F27 Page 62
Council updated its Protocol Manual, replacing the prior version dating back to 2008.
F28 Page 62
The Council and city manager have frequently bypassed or inconsistently applied established administrative and operational policies.
F29 Page 62
The city manager frequently made decisions based on expediency over adopted City protocols, bypassing necessary financial oversight and the intended role of advisory bodies.
F30 Page 62
The city manager presented a contract previously signed by the city manager, city attorney, and city clerk without Council approval, eight months after services started, violating City policies.
F31 Page 62
Failure by Council and the city manager to address documented policy violations fosters an attitude that compliance is optional rather than mandatory.
F32 Page 62
The public appreciates the tangible results and overall progress of city projects such as improvements to Howard Park infrastructure and completion of the amphitheater at Picnic Hill.
F33 Page 62
The city attorney performs tasks—without Council direction—that could be handled by internal staff or a Council subcommittee, i.e., revising the protocol manual. 59
F34 Page 63
Despite public and councilmember criticisms of rising legal fees and requests to review itemized attorney invoices, Council failed to provide rigorous, consistent, proactive scrutiny of monthly invoices. This systemic failure in oversight allowed expenses to exceed budgeted amounts without appropriate authorization or adequate justification.
F35 Page 63
There is a lack of transparency to the public and Council regarding spending on legal services, specifically general municipal and estimated cost vs actual.
F36 Page 63
There are no cost control measures in place to preauthorize or closely track high legal expenditures, and increased oversight is needed to control these expenses.
F37 Page 63
The city manager failed to uphold fairness and accountability by responding to verbal requests from some councilmembers to include items on future meeting agendas while requiring others to provide such requests in writing, in violation of agendizing rules contained in the 2008 Protocol Manual.
F38 Page 63
Staff reports are missing from many Council meeting agenda packets, a violation of adopted policy.
F39 Page 63
Information to be provided in staff reports, such as who requested the agenda item, fiscal impact, and the specific action the Council is asked to take, has not been consistently presented in the agenda.
F40 Page 63
The city manager fails to provide current financial data to Council as required by policy as part of Council meeting agenda packets despite numerous requests from councilmembers and the public.
F41 Page 63
A culture of non-responsiveness exists during Council meetings where the city manager and the mayor ignore repeated and frequent information requests from councilmembers and the public.
F42 Page 63
Council meeting minutes were not posted or provided to the public for September, October, November, and December 2025 (as of March 31, 2026).
F43 Page 63
The City demonstrates a high level of transparency by publishing Council meeting audio/video to the City’s YouTube channel within 24 hours of adjournment.
F44 Page 63
Oral presentations made during Council meetings typically do not include written presentation materials or staff reports. The absence of visual aids (e.g. PowerPoint slides or written handouts) makes it difficult for attendees and online viewers to fully comprehend, analyze, and retain presentation information and hampers transparency.
F45 Page 63
The city manager does not provide regular, comprehensive reports concerning all aspects of City operations to Council as required in protocol manual. 60
F46 Page 64
The Council lacks policy mechanisms and enforcement tools to detect or prevent serial "daisy-chain" violations.
F47 Page 64
The City has no formal, mandatory onboarding or ongoing training program for elected officials.
F48 Page 64
The absence of training, particularly on the code of conduct, meeting protocols, and financial management, contributes to continued lack of decorum on the dais and impacts City operations.
F49 Page 64
The City has kept inconsistent and incomplete training records.
F50 Page 64
The lack of financial training by elected officials and the city manager has contributed to a failure in exercising proper fiduciary control over City funds, exemplified by weak internal controls, poor file management, and inconsistent record keeping.
F51 Page 64
During Council meetings, the mayor has ignored councilmember calls for a Point of Order, violating City policy and causing disruption and conflict among meeting participants.
F52 Page 64
During Council meetings, the councilmembers frequently talk over each other, engage in arguments, use inappropriate language, or mutter asides that disrupt deliberations, without consequences, violating the adopted Protocol Manual and Code of Ethics.
F53 Page 64
During public comments, the public has requested the Council “do better,” “stop bickering,” and “do the job you were elected to do,” but the Council has failed to respond to these requests. The rampant lack of civility evident at most Council meetings undermines Council credibility and constituents’ trust in their local government.
F54 Page 64
Councilmembers have used print and social media to vent about alleged inappropriate Council activities instead of discussing the issues during public meetings, in part because the mayor cut short their opportunities to speak in public meetings.
F55 Page 64
Council’s open animosity, personal attacks, and demonstrated lack of decorum on social media and on the dais, fails to set an example of credible leadership and civility to the community.
F56 Page 64
When addressed, breaches of protocol are often treated with the most extreme measures (censure or litigation) rather than a progressive, tiered approach to corrective action, i.e. first using verbal warnings, written warnings, fines, or reprimands that would be much less inflammatory and costly.
F57 Page 64
A lack of decorum on the dais, constant bickering, and disrespectful language from councilmembers have turned public meetings into a public embarrassment, discouraging members of the public from engaging in City government. 61
F58 Page 65
There is no consistent process for tracking and reporting to the public the implementation status of approved Council motions.
F59 Page 65
Council and city manager do recognize employee and staff contributions during public meetings.
F60 Page 65
Council approved invoices for contracts the city manager had signed that substantially exceeded his authorization limit of $15,000 for non-emergency spending with no reprimand or consequences for the violation.

Recommendations 31