PARLIER – The Parlier City Council is once again at odds with each other, this time over reimbursement — or the lack thereof — of travel expenses provided to Mayor Alma Beltran in connection to city business.
During the Jan. 16 council meeting, Councilmember Diego Garza asked to pull the check register from the consent calendar and discuss and vote separately on one specific check made out to Beltran for $353.98. Despite an explanation of the reasons behind the reimbursement, the council approved the check register without the specific check for Beltran.
A separate motion to approve the check made out to Beltran, made by Mayor pro tem Sabrina Rodriguez, failed to receive a second and therefore did not go up for a vote. This prompted Beltran to say she would take legal action against the city.
“That is my reimbursement for my flight, what I had to pay for (because of) city business, so my next option is to take it to civil court,” Beltran said. “I’ll take it to civil court. This is going to go to civil court because that is my right to (get) reimbursed for city business.”
Garza had requested to pull the specific check from the register because he said when he asked questions about that expense, it appeared to be for Beltran’s husband, not herself. Expenses accrued by a council member’s spouse typically would not qualify for reimbursement from the city.
Interim City Attorney Meggin Boranian, however, said that upon reviewing the situation, her legal opinion was that the expenses were reimbursable.
“It’s unusual, but I took a look at all circumstances and based upon my review of that and the law, I think in good faith that it’s reimbursable,” Boranian said.
Unique circumstances
The check was intended to reimburse Beltran for travel expenses she had to pay in September 2024. As a representative for Parlier and Fresno County on the San Joaquin Valley Regional Policy Council, Beltran attended the Valley Voice legislative trip to Washington, D.C. to advocate for funding, and brought her husband on the trip as well.
That same week, Beltran was scheduled to appear in court to represent the city in the wrongful termination lawsuit brought by former Police Chief Jose Garza. Although she was initially scheduled to appear in court on a Thursday, and would have been back in time, her court date changed. This forced both Beltran and her husband to fly back early, which cost two times the airfare, Boranian said.
It was that cost — not the initial cost of her and her husband’s flights — that Beltran requested reimbursement for. Boranian said while she was initially not clear on all of the circumstances, she determined it would not have been appropriate for Beltran to leave her husband at the destination she returned to Fresno from.
“The mayor was required by law to come back for a city purpose, for a court hearing, and because her husband was traveling with her, his out of pocket was actually the mayor’s out of pocket, because he had to return the same time she did,” Boranian said. “And because of that, and further examination of the circumstances, my best advice was that that cost can be reimbursed because it was city business.”
When Rodriguez’s motion to approve the check to Beltran failed to receive a second, Beltran said she would have seconded it, but she knew the rest of the council — Garza and Councilmembers Kathy Solorio and Janie Molina — would vote against it. Beltran said anything that has to do with her is always personal for the other council members, and started to bring up other issues before Boranian encouraged the meeting to move along.
Continued disputes
The Parlier City Council then spent the next 50 minutes debating whether or not the city should pay for Beltran’s “per diem” when attending the Fresno Council of Governments’ (COG) One Voice legislative advocacy trip to Washington, D.C. in April. The total per diem cost to the city, which is an allowance for meals, transportation and incidentals, would be $550 for the five-day trip.
Before Interim City manager David Cerda could provide his staff report on the matter, Beltran began listing off the resources and federal funding she has brought to the city through her legislative work on these types of trips. Beltran, who is the chair of the Fresno COG Policy Board, said Fresno COG is paying for her travel and accommodation expenses, and so all she is asking for is that the city pay for her meals.
Beltran reiterated her stance that residents and council members who took issue with the city providing her the per diem only had a problem with it because it had to do with her. To one resident who asked why Fresno COG was not paying Beltran’s per diem, Beltran said “it’s obvious that the problem was me and not the rest of the council, because you didn’t question that at all.”
The council previously voted to send both Rodriguez and Garza on the trip as well, and the city is paying for all of their expenses related to the trip. Garza said it wasn’t specifically the per diem he had an issue with, but that Beltran had previously “bragged” that COG was paying for all of her expenses.
“You’ve stated that, the community knows that, and now you’re asking for a per diem when COG pays for that?” Garza said.
Beltran said the only reason Fresno COG is paying for her other expenses to go on the trip is because “the city of Parlier would not pay for it.”
“They stepped in to pay for it because … they said we can pay for our chair because your city is not going to be willing to pay for it, then we’ll step up, because they still have to go out there and be the voice for the Valley,” Beltran said.
Garza said that Beltran was “putting out false information” and that any proposal for the city to pay for Beltran’s One Voice was never brought to the council. Garza said he wanted to be sure Beltran wasn’t “double dipping” by receiving a per diem from the city and receiving additional funds from COG.
Following more arguments between council members over the issue, Beltran clarified that in order for Fresno COG to pay for her meals, she would have to be with the executive director so he could pay for her. She said because Fresno COG does not provide a per diem in the way the city does, she didn’t think it would be fair to the executive director for her to have to “be tagging along with him all the time.”
With guidance from Boranian, the council eventually voted to approve Beltran’s per diem cost on the condition that Fresno COG does not also provide one.
