Fresno politician is tough on crime committed by poor people. By his own aide? Nope
Perhaps it’s time for the Fresno City Council to start meeting on Zoom again.
If only so five of the seven council members — Garry Bredefeld and a group he termed the “gang of 4” — don’t shank each other in the throat. Especially at a time when we need every last ICU bed.
Verbal hostilities between Fresno council members are a regular non-agenda item, but Thursday the tension and accusations escalated to new levels. Made for compelling daytime drama, until you remember they’re arguing on taxpayer time.
“I hope the public isn’t watching,” said Councilmember Mike Karbassi, one of the two noncombatants along with Council President Luis Chavez. “It’s not good to see.”
Sorry, Mike. We saw everything. And what we saw and heard felt unseemly. Beneath the conduct and decorum we expect from elected officials.
Even if the public tongue-lashing Bredefeld received from Councilmembers Esmeralda Soria, Miguel Arias, Tyler Maxwell and Nelson Esparza was richly deserved.
Typically it’s Bredefeld who lobs the first and loudest grenade. (Essentially his sole council function.) This time, Soria touched off 43 minutes of uncomfortable back and forth with prepared comments ripping Bredefeld for turning a blind eye to a staff member charged with multiple domestic violence felonies.
Daniel Gai resigned from his $68,000-per-year city job last week, but only after he plead no contest to to corporal injury, child abuse and endangerment, and three counts of assault by means likely to cause great bodily injury.
Although the charges against Gai were filed in May 2019, Bredefeld neither suspended his council assistant nor placed him on a leave of absence. For almost 2 1/2 years Gai was allowed to keep showing up to work, no matter how uncomfortable that made anyone else.
Soria is a reserved presence on the dais, rarely raising her voice. Thursday, she spoke loudly and forcefully, going so far as to accuse Bredefeld of “harboring a criminal.” Not sure I’ve ever heard Soria sound more impassioned.
“Garry Bredefeld over his tenure on this council has purported to be tough on crime and a supporter of domestic violence victims,” Soria said. “His hypocrisy is disgusting and laughable.”
“He’s only tough on crime when it comes to certain communities,” Maxwell added during his turn to pile on.
Bingo. Bredefeld is tough on crime, just as long as that crime is committed by poor minorities and not his like-minded crony. And, sorry, the “due process” excuse doesn’t wash. Do we let cops charged with accepting bribes stay on the beat until they get their day in court? Of course not. Why is this situation any different?
There’s more essential context to this story than has previously been reported: The victim in Gai’s domestic violence case isn’t some random Fresno resident; she’s a City Hall employee. That fact better frames Esparza’s comment about concerns he has fielded from female staffers over having to share work space with Gai and makes Bredefeld’s actions look even worse.
Bredefeld placed those women, his female colleagues, in that uncomfortable position. He did so knowingly for more than two years. And then has the gall to accuse the “gang of 4” of exploiting the pain of “innocent victims.” It’s shameful behavior for a human being, let alone an elected official.
Crying corruption is council member’s stock and trade
Of course, this is the type of behavior we’ve come to expect from the city councilmember for northeast Fresno. When Bredefeld isn’t pretending to know more about infectious diseases than health experts or inciting right-wing extremists, he gets his jollies hurling corruption accusations at his council colleagues.
Bredefeld has yet to unearth any proof that supports his claims — notwithstanding the Fresno County DA’s open investigation into pubic-meeting law violations related to Granite Park — but that doesn’t deter him.
Remember last year when Bredefeld cried corruption after the council awarded a no-bid trash cleanup contract around Chinatown to a firm co-owned by local political commentator Jim Verros?
Bredefeld accused Arias of “giving lucrative and overpaid contracts to friends” and former Councilmember Paul Caprioglio of “selling his vote” when in fact it was he and Verros, both Republicans, who squabbled on social media over Bredefeld’s uninformed, dangerous COVID-19 stances.
The guy can’t even play nice with people on his side of the sandbox.
Bredefeld has some $245,000 remaining in his campaign account (he ran unopposed for a second term). If he truly supports the victims of domestic violence as he claims, Bredefeld ought to listen to Soria’s suggestion and make a sizable donation to the Marjaree Mason Center.
I highly doubt Bredefeld does that, or anything productive with his three remaining years on the council. Rather, we should brace ourselves for more of the taxpayer funded verbal tussling on display Thursday.
If that’s how members of the Fresno City Council address each other in public view, imagine what goes on behind closed doors.
Don’t be surprised if council members add a staff position to next year’s budget: cutman.
