Santa Cruz County Grand Jury • 2020-2021

Honoring Commitments to the Public Review of 2016–17 Grand Jury Report Responses

Published: June 19, 2020 25 pages
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Findings and Recommendations 3 findings

F1
The Santa Cruz City Schools Comprehensive School Safety Plans provide a best practice and is a useful resource for parents and the public.
Related Recommendations (1)
R1
Continue to be proactive in evaluating voting systems that are safe, efficient, and available. The County Clerk responded to R1 with a pledge of future implementation: ​ ​ As new systems become available, we will participate in evaluating them. After 2018 and the implementation of the Vote Center model in a few counties in California, Santa Cruz will need to determine if we want to pursue a Vote Center model or the current polling place model. The type of voting model will impact our voting system needs. We anticipate putting together a voter advisory group in 2018 to assist us as we evaluate our options.
F2
The Naval Postgraduate School’s Center for Homeland Defense and Security provides an excellent resource for school administration with its K-12 school shooting database.
Related Recommendations (1)
R2
Once USB drives or other equipment have been connected to the County network, do not reattach to the offline vote counting systems. The County Clerk’s response affirmed that this recommendation already was implemented for future use: We have purchased additional USB drives and now have procedures in place to use a USB drive only once when taking data from our vote counting system and loading it onto the county network. Recommendation made to the Santa Cruz County Board of Supervisors:
F3
The Pajaro Valley Unified School District can improve its oversight and communications by following the The California League of Bond Oversight Committees (CaLBOC) Best Practices document on School Bond Oversight Committee Operations Standards.
Related Recommendations (1)
R3
Identify and budget requisite funds for replacement of outdated election equipment once it has been certified (state certified, federally qualified). ​ ​ The Board of Supervisors responded to R3 with a pledge of future implementation, ​ ​ adding “The Board understands the need for election equipment upgrades.” 2020 Status Update: Were commitments fulfilled? In October 2019, the County Clerk’s Office visited the Grand Jury to explain the new voting system operation and discuss various aspects of the election cycle - a presentation similar to several offered to the public at large to acquaint them with the new system. More recently, answering the Grand Jury’s request for a 2020 status update, Respondents provided the following additional information on improvements to Santa Cruz County election equipment and procedures: ● Two federally qualified and state certified systems were offered to the County by the California Secretary of State.[23] [24] ​​ ​ ● A Decision Group was formed, consisting of members from County Counsel, General Services, and Voter Accessibility Advisory Committee.[25] ​ ● Formation of the Voter Advisory Group (originally planned for 2018) was delayed; the Elections Department plans to assemble the promised Citizen Advisory Group in 2021.[26] ​ ● Of the two systems approved by the Secretary of State, Dominion Voting Systems was chosen, based largely on the long-established relationship of trust with the vendor.[27] ​ ● A Staff Memo written by the County Clerk, and with approval recommended by County Administrative Officer, was presented to the Board of Supervisors at a regular public meeting on June 25, 2019.[28] ​ ● June 25, 2019 Minutes indicate that the Board of Supervisors unanimously approved the voting system lease agreement.[29] [30] ​​ ​ ● Deciding to opt out of the Vote Center model, the Elections Department instead developed a hybrid model of traditional polling sites plus ten Voter Service centers - the hybrid system functioned smoothly and efficiently in the March primary election.[31] ​ ● Some modifications and refinements to this hybrid model are anticipated to further improve efficiency and accessibility for voters.[32] ​ In its update, the County Administrative Office (responding on behalf of the Board of Supervisors) simply confirmed that “New election equipment has been certified, leased, and deployed for use during the March 2020 Presidential Primary Election”,[33] providing ​ ​ a link to the Elections Department website “votescount.com” for more information.[34] ​ In conclusion, we find that three recommendations were made, and three responsive commitments were fulfilled. Based on the Decision Group evaluation of voting system options, the memo and presentation by the County Clerk, and the County Administrator’s recommendation, the Board of Supervisors approved the new contract and service agreement for the new voting system. The County Clerk completed all actions promised by immediately correcting a USB drive security vulnerability, and by evaluating available voting systems and efficiently transitioning to the updated system, successfully implementing its use in the Countywide primary election of March 2020. Report Title: Assessing the Threat of Violence in our Public Schools ​ ​ The 2016-17 Santa Cruz County Grand Jury investigated the readiness of our 10 public school districts, the County’s alternative education sites, and their respective law enforcement agencies to respond effectively to threats of targeted school violence. State law requires all public school districts and county offices of education to develop a comprehensive school safety plan. 2020 Status Update: Were Commitments Fulfilled? The Grand Jury reports and responses of 2016-2017 has been the primary source of information used to examine whether or not the respective agencies fulfilled their commitments to implement recommended actions.[35] In addition, a Santa Cruz County ​ ​ Grand Jury report was issued in 2018[36] to review and confirm the first step: the ​ ​ development and documentation of a comprehensive Countywide threat plan (‘The Plan’).[37] In that report, additional information about the Plan and the training was ​ ​ provided by the County Office of Education (COE). The 2018 investigation only looked at the COE and the Santa Cruz County Sheriff’s Office (CSO)’s compliance with their responses and the development of the threat assessment plan. It did not analyze or evaluate the agencies’ plans or preparations for physically securing school sites in a threat situation. This report takes that step. We reviewed the Offices of Education websites for publicly available information and documentation, and requested documentation from the boards and law enforcement agencies to confirm actions taken as outlined in the plans. Training materials were reviewed as well as training roster attendance. As one benchmark with which to compare, the similar report made by the San Diego County Grand Jury was reviewed for best practices and opportunities to further improve. In reviewing the 2019 report of the San Diego County Grand Jury ”School Safety in San Diego County - How Prepared Are We for Another Active School Shooting?”[38] we ​ ​ extract these key

Additional Recommendations 10

These recommendations are not explicitly linked to specific findings.

Conclusions 1

No Responses Found 3

Government entities assigned to respond to this report. No response documents have been linked in our database.

Santa Cruz County Board of Supervisors Elected County Office
Santa Cruz County District Attorney Elected County Office
Santa Cruz County Sheriff Elected County Office