Tulare Public Cemetery District Board Chair Steve Presant opened the board’s May 22 meeting at 5:33pm – and adjourned it in the same sentence, leaving the meeting room with vice-chair Charlie Ramos shortly thereafter.
“It’s 5:33, and the meeting is called to order – and, I’m adjourning the meeting,” Presant said.
The meeting-that-wasn’t came after new restrictions were placed on the amount of people able to attend. At the board’s April 24 meeting, members of the public were told only 19 people could participate in the district’s small meeting area.
The restrictions came after trustee Patricia Hitlin, who was not present at the May 22 meeting, had called the Tulare Fire Department after a contentious meeting on March 27 to confirm the room’s capacity.
The district was told the room could only hold a total of 26 people for safety reasons: 19 members of the public, five board members, and two administrators.
A little bewildered, the people who arrived to attend the district’s April meeting who didn’t fit in the room waited outside the door until someone left. Then their turn was called to enter and give their public comment.
At the May 22 meeting, about 24 members of the public attended. This time, the crowd refused to leave.
Present told those assembled that they couldn’t exceed the size of the room. An officer from the Tulare Police Department was present outside the meeting, but did not act in any way to disperse it.
“I have an officer out there that claims that I can’t do anything about that,” Presant said, referring to the capacity limit in the meeting room.
Former district trustee Alberto Aguilar said that he talked to the officer prior to the meeting.
“I explained to [the officer] the laws, the California State Constitution guarantees us to go ahead and attend meetings and participate. It’s also covered in the Brown Act as well,” Aguilar told the public.
The officer concurred, repeating the same to Ramos outside the meeting room.
Aguilar and others asked Presant to move the meeting to an open area outside the building – where meetings have been held in the past.
District trustee Xavier Avila applauded the officer’s restraint, and told Presant that he needed to provide a room big enough to accommodate the public.
Present told Avila that there was “no requirement for that,” and headed for the door alongside Ramos.
“You are going to do this every time? Adjourn the meeting?” Avila asked Presant.
“How many times have we had the meeting right where you are standing,” Aguilar asked as Presant stood at the door.
Although Ramos and Presant left the meeting, Avila and Trustee Michelle Lima stayed at the dais to hear the public’s comments.
Not the first abruptly adjourned meeting
This wasn’t the first time a meeting had ended before any business was conducted, but it might be the quickest. The board’s March 27 meeting only lasted about 45 minutes.
According to former Trustee Vicki Gilson, the situation at the March meeting became heated during public comment and continued into the trustees’ comments.
Board member Xavier Avila criticized the condition of the cemetery grounds and asked for Presant’s resignation.
The public reacted positively and, according to Gilson, Presant said he was going to call the police or shut down the meeting.
After a ten minute break, Presant tabled regular meeting agenda items and took the meeting into closed session.
Keep canceling meetings or change venue?
After news of the new capacity limit broke in April, Tulare Council Member Jose Sigala offered the cemetery board use of the Tulare Public Library’s Olympic Room, the Tulare Senior Center, or the Tulare City Council Chambers for their meetings.
“Let me know if your board would be interested in meeting at a bigger location,” Sigala wrote on April 23 in the Facebook group Caring Cause, which focuses on discussion of the cemetery’s conditions and management.
He attended the May 22 meeting to repeat his offer, and to encourage the public to voice their concerns about the cemetery district’s board at the next Tulare City Council meeting.
The cemetery district’s board has met in different venues, without problems, in the past. They have met outside the small building under an awning, at the Tulare First Baptist Church, and at Evolutions Gym – all at no cost.
Lima told the Voice that if the district’s usual meeting room can’t accommodate the public, they need to find a different facility.
“I’m going to recommend it,” she said.
Lima said that she chose to stay at the meeting to hear the public.
“Because I’m at the meeting to hear the public. I do a lot of public service and I care about the public’s opinion so I stayed,” she said. “I’m there to make the cemetery beautiful. My son is in the North Cemetery.”
Andrea Clark, whose father is buried at the cemetery, tried to squeeze in her comment to no avail before Presant closed the May meeting.
After Presant and Ramos left, she followed them outside and spoke to Ramos for about 45 minutes outside the meeting room.
When Clark asked why Ramos didn’t find a different location for the meeting, Clark says Ramos responded that “They can’t remove me from the board.”
“Maybe we need a fresh start and we should remove the entire board,” Clark says she told him.
Clark claimed Ramos just stared at her and did not respond.
Adjourning the two meetings without conducting business has caused a backlog of important issues.
One of the agenda items for the May 22 meeting was a resolution to allow a grieving family whose infant is buried in the cemetery to place a headstone at her grave. Their baby girl died in 1997, but the family at the time did not have the finances to pay for a headstone and wanted permission to place one now.
Because of the size of the headstone, a variance was needed, Avila said. He told the public he would have voted in favor of it.
Avila believed that Presant knew more than 19 people were going to attend the May meeting.
“Steve had every opportunity to change venues or have the meeting outside like we have had in the past, but he wanted to purposely restrict access to the public. He didn’t want to hear the people. As a public servant I believe a governing board should make every effort to provide access to everyone,” Avila said.
Present said that the board is now considering another location for its next meeting.
“Yes, we are considering another location for the next meeting,” Presant told the Voice.
He said he thought it was a better idea to just adjourn the May 22 meeting “and make plans for other accommodation for the next one.”
Are concerned constituents cultists?
At the April 25 meeting, Ramos accidently recorded himself on his phone before the meeting started.
(Some members of the board, and public, stream board meetings on Facebook Live, though the district itself does not have an official stream or Zoom link for meetings.)
“It’s almost like we are addressing a cult […] it’s the connotation, like Charles Manson is speaking and he’s gotta say the truth,” Ramos is heard saying on the recording.
Some who live in the cemetery district have asked Ramos to resign.
Clark said she spoke with Ramos about his comments and told him that “concerned citizens are not a cult.”
She said he was being disrespectful and that he was not conducting himself as should a public servant.
Ramos said his comments were specifically about three people – and that two of them, Linda Maloy and Vicki Gordon, were wearing shirts stating “Ask Me About My Cult” mocking his comments.
Clark said Ramos said they were stirring the pot.
“But so are you,” said Clark, “and you are a public official.”
The next scheduled Tulare Public Cemetery District meeting is set for June 26 at 5:30pm, though a location has not yet been announced.