An utter waste of time, effort, goodwill and money
– that’s the impact of the scandal that’s enveloped Morgan Hill
City Hall.
Scurrilous gossip that two top city employees were having an
affair
– an allegation that both deny – turned into a bumbling,
Keystone Cops-style investigation, thanks to the bad decisions and
questionable intentions of local attorney Bruce Tichinin.
An utter waste of time, effort, goodwill and money – that’s the impact of the scandal that’s enveloped Morgan Hill City Hall.
Scurrilous gossip that two top city employees were having an affair – an allegation that both deny – turned into a bumbling, Keystone Cops-style investigation, thanks to the bad decisions and questionable intentions of local attorney Bruce Tichinin.
Although we can’t follow his reasoning, it seems Tichinin thought finding evidence to support the gossip would help his client in a land-use case pending before City Council; or he believed such evidence might help his client, Councilwoman Hedy Chang, defend herself against possible defamation and harassment claims made against her one of the two city employees. Chang denies authorizing the investigation.
Nevertheless, and apparently without a thought to the consequences, Tichinin hired an unlicensed private detective who clumsily followed the two city employees on a business trip. The man Tichinin hired was so incompetent that one of the employees noticed his bungling attempts at sleuthing and told City Council members about it.
City Council, for reasons yet to be understood, then decided in closed session to hire its own detective – a decision that has cost taxpayers at least $50,000 to date – to investigate the investigation.
City Council members then released the report in order to, as report co-author Larry Carr put it, “maintain the public trust.”
We’re not sure how secretly spending $50,000 of public money to investigate a private matter promotes the public trust.
One thing, however, is clear: It seems that no one involved in this mess has put the best interests of Morgan Hill taxpayers first.
That’s almost understandable behavior for Tichinin; as a lawyer his job is to put his clients’ best interests first, but he certainly doesn’t come out unsullied. Instead of blustering about how the surveillance he paid for was not illegal, Tichinin should publicly and profusely apologize to the citizens, the Council and the two employees.
Though he has enjoyed community leader status as president of IDI, the volunteer group in charge of the annual Independence Day celebrations, and has developed a reputation as the man who saved El Toro mountain from development, his arrogance in defending his indefensible actions thus far has likely squandered that goodwill.
Tichinin deserves whatever loss of reputation and money he suffers as a result of his ill-advised investigation.
But our lack of understanding doesn’t stop with Tichinin’s decisions.
We also can’t understand why City Council members believed the situation merited their time, attention and secret outlay of $50,000 in taxpayer monies. We’re disgusted that City Council never gave Morgan Hill citizens the chance to voice their opinions on that $50,000 expenditure.
The City Council and the citizens of Morgan Hill should look at the scandal through the lens of what’s best for the city. City Council members will have hard decisions to make and difficult votes to cast as a result of the rumor-mongering, ill-advised investigations and closed-door decisions of the past several months.
In November, Morgan Hill residents will elect three City Council candidates. The handling of this scandal will be an important benchmark for judging candidates.
