New IID directors irked their appointees were barred from vote

EL CENTRO — The two new Imperial Irrigation District directors are wondering why their appointees to advisory boards were not allowed to vote at Friday night’s Energy Council Advisory Committee meeting on ending the moratorium on utility disconnections.

IID directors JB Hamby and Javier Gonzalez each appointed two advisory committee members, but the four new members were told right before the meeting they could not vote because they had yet to be confirmed by the IID board.

While Hamby said he agrees this rule is in place, he pointed out the vast majority of the ECAC members have never been approved by the board but were allowed to vote.

Hamby said the sudden rediscovery of Board Policies G-11 and G-12 by the administration offices on appointments to board committees has revealed a lot of problems due to an apparent failure to implement board policy as written.

He said the problem does not appear to be a misalignment with committee bylaws as no apparent conflict in language exists.

Hamby said when he asked General Manager Henry Martinez and IID Attorney Frank Oswalt why these members were not allowed to vote, he was told they had yet to be confirmed by the entire IID board.

Gonzalez also was not happy with his appointees not being allowed to vote.

“Woops! Are we being treated differently?” he asked. “A double standard desperate treatment.”

After Hamby expressed his concerns to Martinez, he was told they understood his comments and request.

“Can you confer with Director Hanks and agree to add a special board meeting following the regular Jan. 19 meeting to address this subject?” Martinez wrote to Hamby.

At the meeting scheduled for 3:30 p.m., the IID board will decide what to do moving forward to resolve these issues.

Hamby said the established practice has been that the Water Conservation Advisory Board and ECAC Imperial Valley members have been appointed by directors without board approval.

At the special meeting Hamby said he is going to ask IID to follow the policy already in place, but make sure it’s not selective on confirmed members.

Eleven of the 15 appointees to WCAB, for instance, were appointed after December 2018. None of them have received board approval, Hamby said.

In a letter to Martinez and Oswalt, Hamby said that in advance of the Feb. 2 agenda item to resolve these issues, it will also be necessary for their offices to conduct a records search of IID agendas and minutes for all ECAC and WCAB appointees to demonstrate which members have actually been properly approved by the board and which are not valid advisory members.

He is recommending that both committees’ scheduled meetings be postponed until these issues are resolved and the validity of all appointments is determined.

“Director Gonzalez and my appointments cannot be stripped of voting rights while other unapproved appointments are allowed to sit,” he said.