AVENAL, Calif.—City Councilman Ricardo Verdugo called the meeting to order, led the Pledge of Allegiance, and got down to business: naming a new mayor.
“I make a motion to appoint myself,” Verdugo said last week from a folding chair in an elementary-school cafeteria, looking out at dozens of constituents perched awkwardly on low kid-size benches. “And I second that motion.”
Verdugo’s yes vote made it unanimous—given he was the only council member present. The other four, including the mayor, were voted out in an April recall but refused to relinquish control of City Hall. The standoff had pushed Verdugo to find a new meeting place and launch what amounts to a rival government. It was the latest flashpoint in a power struggle gripping this dusty, furnace-hot Central Valley town—a fracas that has drawn in California’s attorney general.
A onetime California oil boomtown about 60 miles southwest of Fresno, Avenal has spent decades off the beaten track, known more for its pistachios and sprawling state prison than for political upheaval.
Then came the fire-station fight.
News traveled
The crisis, which has spawned lawsuits and public outbursts, arose over the city’s long-running agreement to get fire services from Kings County. Avenal Mayor Alvaro Preciado said the county proposed raising the city’s annual bill for that protection from $450,000 a year to $1.1 million.
County officials say they had talked publicly for years about the need for Avenal to shoulder more costs of that service.
“I said we deserve the right to look at other options,” Preciado recalled from his office, which was festooned with awards. With the help of City Manager Antony Lopez, he and other city officials set out to launch their own fire department.
Many Avenal residents were furious, saying it was done behind their back. “Don’t fix something that isn’t broken,” said Ginger Wallis, 50 years old, who lives at the base of a hill covered in flammable grass, her eyes flashing.
The cost of the new fire department—$1 million just in new equipment and other capital needs—also stunned many locals, who packed meetings in protest.
Soon, they gathered enough signatures for a recall, and Kings County put the matter on the April 28 ballot—drawing pushback from the city, which argued the county lacked authority to do that. But the recall passed in a landslide, and withstood a legal challenge by the city that went to a state appeals court.
Yet at a June 11 meeting, three of the four ousted council members voted to keep themselves in office anyway. Angry residents started yelling. “You’re worse than Trump!” a large man hollered, before he and others stormed out.
Recall organizers secured the California attorney general’s approval to file a lawsuit for the politicians’ removal; their case is pending in state superior court.
Recalls happen across America. But Avenal is in something of uncharted waters: officials in Kings County, who back the recall results, say they don’t know of another time in California when voters have booted four of five council members like this.
‘This chaos, this saga’
One recent afternoon at Avenal City Hall, Preciado, wearing a Panama hat and still calling himself mayor, said he would gladly step down—if the courts make him. “It’s sad,” he said of the brouhaha. “I’ve missed birthdays, anniversaries for this job.” He ticked off his accomplishments, including helping to bring in Taco Bell. “We almost brought in McDonald’s” too, he said.
Lopez, the city manager, said the four targeted officials are still fulfilling their duties, despite the verbal attacks from Facebook and elsewhere. “A lot of memes and pictures and what not.”
Tensions flared last Thursday, starting in a courtroom and ending in the Avenal Elementary School cafeteria.
Locals had requested an injunction to block city leaders from spending public money until the recall is sorted out. Residents drove 40 miles to a morning Superior Court hearing in the county seat of Hanford; the judge would later deny the injunction.
Back in Avenal that afternoon, they filed into the elementary-school cafeteria, passing a children’s ‘Voice-Level Chart’ on the wall before taking their seats for the rival council meeting. Verdugo, a retired prison guard and the lone councilman there, set about taking control.
Not everyone backed him. “Are you proud of the toxic actions…a lot of people who have been supporting the recall have done?” Frank Lopez, the city manager’s brother, said from the lectern during the public-comment period.
Dalila Barajas, who led the recall, fired back when her turn came. “Stop acting stupid!” Barajas spat, looking back at Lopez as spectators applauded.
When Verdugo appointed himself mayor, the audience whooped and clapped. The next day, the county Board of Supervisors put all four recalled seats on the November ballot—which would let residents vote in new leadership.
But a local man at that county meeting pleaded for relief sooner, telling the board that the sheriff should “go out there and get those four city councilmen out!”
“Without the sheriff,” he added, “this chaos, this saga is going to continue.”
Write to Jim Carlton at Jim.Carlton@wsj.com
