Unauthorized letter asking AG Bonta for “clarification” on appointed Central Basin Board members. The members are currently termed out and should not be on the board acting as CB agents and voting on CB items.
February 7, 2025
By Brian Hews • [email protected]
It’s gotten to the point at Commerce-based Central Basin Water [CB] where if certain board members disagree with California State law and have a majority and control of the bank account, the group will try anything to keep their seats and prized majority on the board.
The question is, why?
Los Cerritos Community News has obtained a letter from CB and the Central Basin Water Association [CBWA], a letter that was not agendized and voted on by either board at a properly noticed meeting, asking California Attorney General Ron Bonta, under the guise of “clarification,” to consider altering clauses in state bill AB 1794 related to appointed—not elected—CB Board member terms.
AB 1794 was passed in 2016 because of years of CB Board chaos and operational instability after Jim Roybal and Bob Apodaca took seats in 2012. For years the majority-which was three at the time-handed out sole-source contracts while firing General Managers who did not do their bidding.
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AB 1794 added three appointed (not elected) directors to the board, one director was appointed by cities inside CB boundaries, one by water purveyors inside CB boundaries, and one by large water companies inside CB boundaries.
The bill was supposed to bring stability to the board, but it has had the extreme opposite effect. Almost all of the appointed directors have brought chaos and corruption to the board while not finishing their four-year terms.
Of the nine directors appointed since AB 1794 passed, only one director has finished out their term, the remainder resigned, sometimes only serving one year and most leaving under controversy.
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Longer Terms
And the group of four attempting to change AB 1794 wants to give current and future appointed directors longer terms on the board?
The directors behind the letter, and those who are currently in the majority, include the GM of Golden State Water and President Nem Ochoa, who was appointed in 2024 and whose term is in question; Gary Mendez, who has zero water experience but was hurriedly appointed to CB Vice President mere weeks and one board meeting after he was elected; Joanna Moreno, an engineer at the city of Vernon who was appointed in 2024 and who defiantly remains on the board despite her term ending in December 2024, and Director Juan Garza who has issues himself that should cause recusal from some votes: Garza has a $50,000 California Franchise Tax Board lien on his home related to his company, Six Heron, LLC, which was filed eight months ago and remains open.
The majority is using attorney Victor Ponto to author the letter. At their January meeting, the group voted to hand out an additional $134,000 to Ponto and his company, Burke, Williams, Sorensen, with Ponto blowing through the initial annual budgeted amount due to “unforeseen legal issues.”
(In their December meeting, newly elected then-Director Gary Mendez abstained from voting, because “he wanted to see the billing,” consequently, the $134,000 was denied. At the January board meeting, when he was appointed Vice President, Mendez voted to approve the $134,000.)
The clarification letter has many observers scratching their heads. AB 1794 is very clear: Appointed directors serve four-year terms and then resign. After a director terms out, the replacement process starts in December, culminating with a nomination in February.
If a director resigns before the term ends, AB 1794 is again very clear, “A vacancy in an office of appointed director shall be filled in accordance with the [normal] selection process. The replacement director serves out the remainder of the term and then must resign their position.”
Appointed CB Director and the City of Signal Hill Engineer Thomas Bekele, who, like previous appointed directors brought major chaos to the board, verbally resigned on video during a board meeting in May 2024.
Vernon Engineer Joanna Moreno was nominated and replaced Bekele in mid-2024, knowing she would be off the board in December 2024 under AB 1794.
But the board majority, management, and lawyers at CB have covertly delayed the nomination process, which should’ve ended with Moreno’s replacement appointed “on the last Friday in February,” which would have been in 21 days from now on February 28, 2025.
As with other appointed CB Directors, Moreno has defied the law under AB 1794 while remaining on the board so that Ochoa, Mendez, and Garza can retain their majority and vote for a slew of contracts.
(The group recently voted to approve a five-year office lease far from the center of CB in the swanky Cerritos Towne Center, paying $3.05 per square foot for a 5,000-square-foot space. A quick check by LCCN of available office space in Commerce, immediately off Interstate Five freeway, found space at $2.7 per square foot, and in the city of Industry, LCCN found space at $2.4 per square foot.)
Knowing the legal pressure would eventually come to remove Ochoa and Moreno, the group concocted the AG letter scheme. Ponto and his assistant Zach Lopes drafted an unauthorized expensive six-page letter, asking for a “clarification,” subsequently arguing, using precedents and the Water Code, that both Ochoa and Moreno should remain on the board, in effect asking Bonta to alter state law AB 1794.
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Click on image to read letter.
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LCCN exclusively obtained the letter from sources; CB lawyers, in a questionable maneuver, refused to give LCCN the letter after a proper public records request writing in an email, “because [Victor] Ponto said it was a draft and not disclosable.”
The letter shows that the Central Basin Water Association is also involved in the scheme, asking for a “co-opinion” with Central Basin Municipal Water. According to sources, neither the CB Board nor the CBWA board approved the draft letter.
It is similar to what CBWA pulled in 2016, covertly lobbying for AB 1794 while violating federal and state reporting laws related to lobbying, as exclusively reported by LCCN in 2019.
That illegal lobbying paid off; three CBWA Board members, Dan Arrighi, Frank Heldman, and Mark Grejeda, were eventually appointed to the CB Basin Board. All three brought chaos to the board, with Arrighi and Heldman eventually resigning before their term ended.
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The letter must now be approved by both the CB Board and the CBWA Board, but there are numerous conflicts of interest; two glaring conflicts would be Ochoa and Moreno voting to send the letter to the AG.
It remains to be seen; other conflicts of interest have not prevented the group from voting on and approving crucial agenda items before.
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