INDICTED CITY OFFICIAL STILL ON THE JOB Mayor refuses to suspend top minority contract officer pending her trial -- "Appearance of complicity" by Chuck Finnie and Lance Williams San Francisco Examiner, June 19, 2000 On May 18, Zula Jones, a[n African-American] city official indicted in an ongoing FBI corruption probe, was arraigned in federal court on 16 charges of defrauding San Francisco's minority contracting program. Hours after pleading not guilty, Jones was back at work as chief contract compliance officer for The City's Human Rights Commission, leading a training seminar on the very same contracting program she is accused of abusing. That's the way it's been since a U.S. grand jury accused Jones and four business executives of an alleged scheme to steer millions of dollars in city contracts that were supposed to go to local minority businesses to a white-owned corporation from the East Bay instead. Jones is free while awaiting trial, and [African-American] Mayor Willie Brown has balked at putting her on leave from her $86,138-per-year job because he thinks she has done nothing wrong, according to informed sources. As a result, Jones still plays a key role at the agency she stands accused of corrupting: advising the interim director on important decisions, working alongside staffers who have been questioned by the FBI and the grand jury about her alleged wrongdoing. Her office is about only 100 feet from the one used by staffer Kevin Williams, who has claimed he was demoted as punishment for testifying before the grand jury that indicted Jones. Jones' boss, interim Director Virginia Harmon, said she won't discuss why Jones is still on the job, and several city commissioners also declined comment. But Jones' continued presence at work is prompting concern, and one critic is attempting to use a little-known provision of the city Charter to get The City to move Jones out of the HRC. Appearance of complicity charged Dawn Clements, a San Francisco investment manager, sent a letter June 8 asking the Civil Service Commission to put Jones on administrative leave until her trial concludes. "Ms. Jones' ongoing access to staff members as well as the department's records provides the appearance of complicity by The City as it relates to these allegations," Clements wrote. The Civil Service Commission says it isn't sure it has jurisdiction, but Board of Supervisors President Tom Ammiano said he thinks Clements has a point. "It is in the mayor's court, but I don't think he has shown a great deal of sensitivity to the situation," Ammiano said. "I do know that some sort of administrative leave until the matter is resolved would be reasonable." The City's minority contracting program - and the Human Rights Commission's role in running it - have been under FBI scrutiny for more than a year. Last July, FBI agents shut the commission's offices for a weekend while they seized records of 19 companies holding city contracts under the set-aside program. Indictments handed up On April 27, a U.S. grand jury indicted Jones along with three executives of the Scott Co. of San Leandro, Joseph Guglielmo, Robert Nurriso and Richard Davis, and the owner of a Hunters Point firm called Scott-Norman Mechanical, Alvin Norman Jr. Norman is African American, and the grand jury charged that Scott-Norman Mechanical was a phony front set up so that the Scott Co., which is owned by whites, could fraudulently obtain city public works jobs set aside for minority firms. After the Human Rights Commission certified it as a minority-owned business in March 1997, Scott-Norman Mechanical obtained about $56 million in city contracts, city records show. According to the indictment, Jones helped the other executives defraud the program. All have pleaded not guilty, and no trial date has been set. The defendants were not required to post bail, and Jones was back at work the day after she was indicted, commission staffers said. Witness says he was demoted Staffer Kevin Williams complained in an Examiner interview last month that Jones telephoned him shortly after she was indicted and accused him of "turning state's evidence" because he had testified before the grand jury. Williams said he had merely told the truth after being subpoenaed, but he claimed that Jones caused him to be demoted in retaliation. Jones' lawyer, John Keker, denied the allegation. Some HRC staffers said Jones' presence at work was particularly unsettling because she holds tremendous sway with Harmon, the HRC's interim director. Until April, when she was appointed interim director, Harmon was a contract compliance officer. Her boss was Jones. Under the city Charter, Harmon has the power to keep Jones on the job, reassign her or place her on administrative leave pending a personnel investigation and possible dismissal. Commission president's advice But, according to knowledgeable sources, the decision to keep Jones on the job was made by Mayor Brown, against the advice of the president of a mayoral-appointed panel of commissioners that oversees the HRC, Harry Low. Low and Harmon declined comment on the matter. According to a source familiar with the mayor's decision, Brown believes the federal government's case against Jones is weak and, absent proof of guilt, it would be unfair to remove her. Clements, the investment advisor who complained about Jones, is a member of a group that provides advice on minority contracting issues to HRC President Low and other members of the panel he leads. She also filed a federal lawsuit against The City last year, accusing the HRC of not enforcing rules to combat discrimination in the awarding of contracts to manage city retirement funds. Clements said her complaint to the Civil Service Commission is unrelated to her lawsuit, which, she said, was dismissed in January and is on appeal. "My objective in filing this complaint (about Jones' presence at the HRC) is to provide the public with notification of a serious management problem," Clements said. She said she believes the Civil Service Commission is obliged to investigate, which could lead to Jones' removal. Kate Favetti, the Civil Service Commission's executive officer, said she is unsure whether the commission has authority in the matter and is consulting City Attorney Louise Renne's office for help.
