In this special and historical moment in San Jose History, we present a recording of the June 28th ‘Special Meeting’ of the San Jose City Council. The purpose of this rare Special Meeting is to decide upon a course of action with respect to the recent indictment of current Mayor, Ron Gonzales. As always, the audio is being presented from a neutral point of view, and was recorded during the course of the City Council meeting.

A bit of background - A Santa Clara County grand jury recently indicted Mayor Ron Gonzales on 6 felony counts including bribery, conspiracy and misuse of public funds in connection with a supposely ’secret deal’ with garbage waste hauler Norcal Waste Systems to cover future payments not detailed in the original contract. This led to the Mayor to seek additional funds in the amount of ~$11Million a few years later.

Others that were indicted were both Norcal Waste Systems and Gonzales’ aide, Joe Guerra. At the arraignment hearing on Monday (06/26/06), all three did not enter a plea, but indicated they would ask the court to dismiss the charges.

The City Council is expected to ask the Mayor to resign, and if not, seek to explore ways to restrict his power as Mayor, including removal of his staff, reductin in salary, and removal of additional perks that the Mayor currently has.

As this is a long podcast, I have provided some markers:
00:00 - 42:50 Opening Statements and discussion
42:50 - ~1:10:00 Public Comments
1:10 - City Council Discussion

Final Count:
Motion to Resign by Cindy Chavez
Second by Chuck Reed

In Favor
Cindy Chavez
Linda Lezotte
Chuck Reed
Ken Yeager
Dave Cortese
Judy Chirco
Nora Campos
Nancy Pyle

Against
Madison Nguyen
Forest Williams
Ron Gonzales

Important links:
What is San Jose Charter Section 405?
City Council Agenda

Memos
Cindy Chavez
Cindy Chavez #2
Chuck Reed
Dave Cortese
San Jose City Attorney Rick Doyle
San Jose City Attorney Rick Doyle #2

What do YOU think of the Indictment of Ron Gonzales? Either call us and leave a voicemail, drop us an email, or talk about it in the forums at http://www.citizensanjose.com/forum/

Lastly, if you have material that you would like to have carried on this podcast, please contact us and we’d love to talk to you.

Audio recording provided by Citizen San Jose
Date Recorded: 2006-06-28
Recorded by Joe C
Phone 1*206*666*JOSE
email: Citizensj ‘AT’ gmail.com

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NOTE: There are occassional audio dropouts that were noticable and this was on the part of the City Hall systems (not us!) Sorry ’bout that!