City’s Garofalo Probe Defers to D.A., FPPC

Huntington Beach city attorney Gail Hutton said Wednesday that she is turning over her investigation of possible conflicts of interest by Mayor Dave Garofalo to the district attorney and a state commission.

“As of today we have discontinued our investigation,” Hutton said in a statement. “We have sent the information we have collected to the Orange County district attorney’s office and the Fair Political Practices Commission to review as part of their investigations into these matters. . . . Any further investigation by this office would be unnecessarily duplicative and redundant.”

The announcement concluded by reiterating Hutton’s previous advice to the mayor to refrain from voting on any matters concerning advertisers in the Local News or the city’s annual Visitors Guide, two publications he has owned since 1994.

Garofalo has been under fire for voting on numerous issues affecting advertisers in the two publications. He has also been criticized for accepting VIP treatment in connection with his 1998 purchase of a home in Huntington Beach.

Late last month, Hutton launched an investigation into the relationship between the Visitors Guide, Garofalo and the Huntington Beach Conference and Visitors Bureau, which operates on an annual budget of $235,000 from the city. She also asked the Fair Political Practices Commission to rule on the propriety of the mayor’s votes on matters affecting advertisers in his publications, and on two transactions involving property owned by the mayor.

With Wednesday’s announcement, the matter now seems to be out of the city attorney’s hands.

“One of the things to keep in mind,” city spokesman Richard Barnard said, “is that, while Gail is the city attorney, she is carrying out all the business of the city in terms of legal activity. There is a limit to the amount of resources she has, and it’s gotten to the point where the amount of time it would take to do everything that needs to be done, given her staff,” is prohibitive.

“She felt that it was duplicative and made a determination that everybody’s interests would be best served if she handed things over to the district attorney and fair practices commission,” Barnard said.