Huntington Beach city attorney clashes with City Council after age discrimination case settled

Tuesday night’s Huntington Beach City Council meeting featured the sudden resignation of Mayor Pro Tem Tito Ortiz, but another oddity took place just minutes before that.

Huntington Beach City Atty. Michael Gates took the rare step of speaking before the council during public comments.

The move came in the aftermath of the city recently settling a $2.5-million lawsuit that alleged age discrimination, naming Gates and the city itself as defendants.

Neal Moore, 75, a former senior deputy city attorney who resigned in 2018, was paid $1.5 million in the settlement dated May 21. Scott Field, 64, a current senior deputy city attorney, was paid $1 million. Officials said the case cost the city about $1.5 million fighting the complaint, which originated in 2019.

In the lawsuit, Moore and Field said that Gates had made a concerted effort to push out older and disabled attorneys since being elected in 2014. The lawsuit said that Gates assigned older attorneys unachievable tasks and unrealistic deadlines, subjected them to unwarranted scrutiny and falsely accused them of poor performance, among other accusations.

As is standard with cases against the city, talks were done in closed session, unseen by the general public. Council members Dan Kalmick and Mike Posey had introduced an item for Tuesday’s agenda that would require Gates to perform an analysis of the settlement agreement, including all costs incurred, but that item was pulled from the agenda Friday.

“Records show that City Council was consulted about the lawsuit in closed session 10 times over the course of two years,” Gates said during his public comments Tuesday. “While of course, I’m not going to reveal any closed session discussions ... clearly council conferred on this lawsuit repeatedly.”

Gates criticized Kalmick and Posey for “bringing this lawsuit back to center stage for more public scrutiny,” and claimed it was a political stunt.

The settlement will be paid with insurance money as it is funded by the Big Independent Cities Excess Pool Joint Powers Authority, Gates said. Outside counsel was used for the case, Gates said, but was approved by the City Council. He is only authorized to spend $100,000 on outside attorneys without the council’s approval.

Huntington Beach City Atty. Michael Gates addresses the City Council on Tuesday.

(Scott Smeltzer / Staff Photographer)

Kalmick said Wednesday in a phone interview that there was no war waged against Gates or the city attorney’s office. He noted that he has been on the council for six months, not two years.

“Events have occurred, and I don’t have enough information about what’s happened in the past,” he said. “I’ve been briefed once on this, and it was like pulling teeth to get other information. We had outside counsel that was running this ... I asked to have the conversation in closed session, and it was not met kindly by Mr. Gates, to say the least.

“I hadn’t seen the settlement, and the settlement was agreed to. I don’t know the process because no one’s explained it to me, and I’ve asked ... I’m reacting to the situation. I’ve been trying to understand better how this lawsuit was resolved, and how we spent $1.55 million to defend a discrimination case that we’re never getting back. I’m trying to get to the crux of why we spent so much money on this and why there wasn’t an offer to settle early on, especially since our insurance company picked up the tab for the $2.5 million settlement.”

Later in Tuesday’s meeting, Gates again clashed with the City Council over the size of his office in discussions over the 2021-22 fiscal year budget. Council members including Kalmick and Mayor Kim Carr discussed taking away one of Gates’ two chief assistant city attorneys to help fund a new deputy director of homelessness and behavioral services position.

One of the chief assistant city attorneys left about six months ago, Carr noted, and the position has not been filled.

“We have a department that has a total of 11 people but three managers,” Carr said. “My concern is that we have this org chart that really doesn’t work now ... I’ve been opposed to having two chief assistant city attorneys since 2019, so I think I’ve been very consistent here.”

After discussion, it was decided that one of the positions would instead be downgraded to a senior trial attorney position as opposed to removed entirely, saving the city about $14,000 a year.

Gates said he has already streamlined his office from 15 to 16 employees when he was elected to the current total of 11.

“It feels like a full assault on what we’re doing in the city attorney’s office,” Gates told the Daily Pilot Wednesday. “We do fantastic work, and we’ve really turned the office around over the course of the last six years ... These attacks by council are meritless and purely political. Any attempt to undermine what we’re doing or take resources away is nonsensical, and it doesn’t serve the public.”

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