Given the consequences, Sacramento must investigate if city councilman lives in Granite Bay

Since Sean Loloee began his campaign to represent North Sacramento on the City Council, rumors circulated that he did not actually live in the district. Those rumblings grew louder when he took his oath of office in a virtual ceremony in December 2020 with a mansion-like backdrop, including high ceilings and an ornate white fireplace that did not resemble the type of homes found in the largely low-income area he was elected to serve.

The speculation about where he regularly resides was investigated through dogged reporting by The Bee’s Theresa Clift, who discovered a man and his child that said they rented the Hagginwood home where Loloee supposedly lived and is registered to vote. Three neighboring households told The Bee they’d never seen Loloee — to which he replied, “I don’t know my neighbors,” offering up an appalling response for someone whose job is to know their constituents, the least of which includes the people next door.

Loloee, a first-term councilman and supermarket owner, concocted a convoluted web of responses to The Bee’s reporting, suggesting his family, which includes two children, have either moved multiple times over the past two years, or that he doesn’t live in Sacramento at all. The latter possibility comes with serious consequences, including his potential ouster from the council and criminal charges for perjury and voter fraud.

Unless Loloee can produce a plausible explanation, the city must launch an investigation and make its findings public. If the worst scenario is true, Sacramento leaders must act swiftly to restore the District 2 seat and refer their findings to the District Attorney’s Office and California Secretary of State.

Loloee does not own any other properties in District 2, except the Hagginwood home he purchased just before his run for political office, public records showed. He claimed the lavish home in his swearing-in ceremony belonged to a friend in East Sacramento, and began attending virtual council meetings from his Natomas-area office after he invited speculation.

He said the $1.4 million Granite Bay home owned by his wife is a vacant investment property, and his family had recently been living in the Robla neighborhood until redistricting moved it into a different council district, although he declined to provide an address. Loloee told The Bee he had been living in the Hagginwood home “seven days a week” for the past four months, and that the man who spoke with Clift is a former tenant.

If that’s true, his Hagginwood property is cluttered with unregistered cars that appeared inoperable and meet the standard for several costly code violations — the kind Loloee told The Bee’s Yousef Baig last fall that he pursues aggressively to improve the curb appeal of his northeastern city district.

Constituents are right to be upset over Loloee’s shaky story and the urgent questions it raises about his ability to be an effective leader for a district in desperate need of a tireless representative. Neighborhoods like Del Paso Heights and North Sacramento that suffer from disinvestment and government neglect fall further behind when politicians with ulterior motives exploit their cynicism for their own gain.

Loloee owes his constituents and all of Sacramento clearer answers and credible evidence in response to The Bee’s reporting. District 2 deserves a committed leader who, at a minimum, lives in its boundaries, much less Sacramento. Instead, it has Loloee, who resists affordable housing and homeless services and could very well be living in a mansion in another county.