Redding City Council puts revenue discussion on hold 

Tuesday’s Redding City Council meeting at times resembled a martial spat; with frequent interruptions, rolled eyes, raised voices and ongoing recountings of previous perceived failings. 

City Finance Director Greg Robinett arrived at the meeting prepared to present numerous slides on the current state of the city’s revenue, including money coming from transient occupancy tax, sales tax and cannabis tax. But a majority of the council didn’t want to hear that presentation Tuesday night. 

A their Jan. 6 meeting, council members considered when to hold the revenue discussion during what’s known as Item 12, when the members can bring up future agenda items. At the time, Council members Erin Resner and Tenessa Audette both pushed for a meeting “as soon as possible” with Audette repeating the phrase “within the next two weeks,” something Resner seemed to agree with. 

Council member Dr. Paul Dhanuka also seemed broadly to agree with that suggestion during the Jan. 6 meeting but sometimes rephrased the idea of a couple of weeks as longer than two. Meanwhile, Council member Jack Munns deferred to staff on timing and Mayor Mike Littau rephrased the possible timing more vaguely.

The council did not vote on when to hold the revenue discussion on Jan. 6. Instead, the decision to put Robinett’s presentation on the agenda this week, Littau told Shasta Scout after the meeting, was done at the request of Audette who cited a little-known municipal code that appears to give her permission to sponsor an agenda item on her own. 

Tuesday night, Audette was the most vocal in the room as she sought to hold the line on deeper discussions on city finances, something she’s been concerned about for some time. But unlike previous meetings, Audette didn’t beef with the city manager or finance director. Instead, she got into it with her fellow council members, including Littau, Dhanuka and Munns. 

She found an ally in Resner, who agreed that the others were being too laissez faire on the timing of when to review how well revenue is coming in, as compared to prior projections. Resner also mentioned that conversations between council members about when to hold these discussions, seem to have been occurring outside of public meetings.

Resner has since released a statement expressing concern that Littau’s actions to communicate with other city council members out of view of the public might violate the Brown Act. Littau told Shasta Scout he did so on the advice of the city attorney, approaching some of the other council members but only to “poll” them about their meeting time availability, something he believes the Brown Act allows. Shasta Scout’s review of the law does not indicate any such exception to the law’s prohibition against serial meetings.

It all came to a head on Tuesday, as Finance Director Robinett stood waiting at the dais while the council remained deadlocked in a quarrel as the minutes ticked by. Last night, Dhanuka and Munns both supported the idea of moving the topic to a later meeting date, while Resner and Audette continued to push back, citing the need to quickly understand the city’s current revenue picture in order to solve urgent problems, including how to keep the Civic Auditorium open amidst a significant funding gap. 

Littau held his ground on delaying the discussion, saying that issues related to finances should be discussed in the presence of the city’s newly hired manager, William Tarbox, who’s due to start next month. Audette strongly disagreed, saying she was in contact with Tarbox who, she claimed, was watching the meeting online and hoped the council would hear the revenue presentation and begin their related discussions. 

The council bickered and debated for 25 minutes before finally voting to defer the presentation until a later meeting with Resner and Audette opposing the decision. Littau told Shasta Scout that the special meeting has been scheduled for Feb. 17 at 3 p.m.

Throughout the rest of their discussions on Tuesday evening, current unknowns about the city’s financial position held the council back on decisions ranging from whether to fund expenses related to an upcoming Redding-based Ironman competition to next steps with the Civic Auditorium. Those topics will return at future meetings where the council will face tight deadlines to make funding decisions in time to facilitate the needs of those involved with each project. 

Before the evening ended, the council also voted to move forward with minor changes to the city’s Audit Committee and made some final adjustments to the structure of a new Financial Oversight Committee that’s being formed in response to concerns about city finances raised by Audette last year. The final wording defining both groups will come back before the council for approval at a future meeting.

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