Yuba County supervisor bucks second misconduct probe. ‘This is all just to smear me’

A new investigation into a Yuba County supervisor detailed more accusations of workplace misconduct but, unlike the first one, did not lead to repercussions.

Supervisors on Tuesday approved the findings of a second investigation, which reviewed new claims that Supervisor Seth Fuhrer had made inappropriate comments to a county worker in November, and allegations that he had retaliated against a county department head who participated in the first investigation.

Brooke Kozak, a Shaw Law Group lawyer the county hired, said that interviews and evidence substantiated the complaints of inappropriate comments, but not the claim of retaliation, according to the law firm’s report.

Fuhrer voted against accepting the report and motioned to rescind the resolution supervisors approved in December, which censured Fuhrer and came with a suite of actions, including blocking him from becoming board chair.

“This is all just to smear me and limit my political leverage to try and push forward projects for my district and to attempt to bring the county spending in line,” Fuhrer said in an interview. “There is no actual consequence instead of actually making me look bad.”

In December, supervisors directed county staff to create a code of conduct for supervisors. When faced with a drafted code of conduct in February, supervisors opted against it, and instead formed a committee to decide what to do with the proposed ethics code.

Supervisor Jon Messick, who was on the committee, said in an interview that the proposal will not be presented to the board.

“We’re not going to have a code of conduct more than we already have,” Messick said. “If the voters don’t like our conduct, they vote us out. That’s how we want to keep it.”

Supervisor Andy Vasquez Jr. said Tuesday that supervisors should still adopt a set of ethical guidelines.

“It’s created a problem within our board of supervisors as far as morale and things,” Vasquez said. “I think we owe it to the workforce of Yuba County to provide a safe environment.”

Second investigation findings

Complaints filed with county human resources in November accused Fuhrer of making inappropriate comments at the Summit on Ending Homelessness in Yuba City, where he allegedly told county workers that he “wanted to build a sanitarium to lock up ‘crazy’ people and chain them to their beds,” according to the report.

A county worker apparently told Fuhrer she did not like his idea of chaining patients to their beds in a sanitarium.

“What? You don’t like chaining people to beds?” he allegedly said.

“No.”

“I feel bad for (your significant other),” he replied, according to the report.

Fuhrer said Tuesday that the woman he spoke with and her significant other are friends and that they did not file the complaints. He said people who witnessed the conversation complained to human resources.

“To be clear, this complaint doesn’t have a victim,” Fuhrer said. “It certainly isn’t my long-term friend. It’s someone who’s fetching approval with administration by harassing me with these stupid accusations.”

It’s unclear from the report who filed the complaints and Tiffany Manuel, HR director and risk manager, declined during the meeting to more specifically clarify who the complainants were.

That incident occurred before the first investigation into Fuhrer was completed. Another complaint came in February from someone claiming that Fuhrer was retaliating against a county department head because of that person’s role in the first investigation.

The investigator found that claim, which was based on Fuhrer’s communication patterns with the department head, was unsubstantiated. Part of the action against Fuhrer in December barred him from direct communication with county workers and instructed him to communicate through County Administrator Kevin Mallen.

Fuhrer’s response: ‘A wild goose chase’

“It’s hard to know where to start because there’s so much garbage about this process it boggles the mind,” Fuhrer said as he launched into a roughly 10-minute response that ended with him motioning to rescind the board action from December, which went unsupported by the board.

He went on to describe the investigation as “a wild goose chase,” an “ambush process” and “stupid.”

The first investigation and subsequent censure in December backed accusations against Fuhrer of making inappropriate comments and being involved in other questioned workplace incidents over the past couple of years, based on complaints by county workers and conference attendees.

Fuhrer at the time characterized the investigation as “harassment” and “abuse of power” against him, and said its purpose was keeping him from becoming board chair, as his turn in the board’s rotation was next.