No action taken after two-and-a-half hour Closed Session Antioch council meeting on unidentified city employee
Saturday, January 18th, 2025
Following residents’ racially-charged verbal attacks on new mayor, council members
City Attorney Smith not in council chambers after closed-door meeting
By Allen D. Payton
After being blasted in their public comments by a few residents, during a special Friday night Closed Session meeting on Jan. 17, 2025, that lasted two-and-a-half hours, the Antioch City Council took no action on the performance, discipline, dismissal or release of a City employee. The council only hires the city manager and city attorney.
District 1 Councilwoman Tamisha Torres-Walker was absent from the meeting. Torres-Walker also missed the council’s regular meeting on Tuesday night, for which she was sick. Administrative Analyst Vincent Manuel sat in for City Clerk Melissa Rhodes who was also absent.
Prior to adjourning into Closed Session to discuss, several members of the public, most of whom are regulars at council meetings, spoke during Public Comments. Although the city employee was not identified the speakers assumed the focus was on City Attorney Thomas L. Smith and many defended him. The residents used racist and racially-charged terms and phrases, while holding signs that read, “Ron the Con”, “Don the Con your racism is showing”, “Justice and equality for all city employees” and “We won’t go back.”
Public Comments
“I’d like to thank the city attorney for doing his job for so many victims of the Antioch Police Department…that some of you leaders left behind, one of them sitting here, tonight, that they had to clean up,” said resident Katherine Wade. Then directing her comments to City Attorney Smith she said, “For us to be here, tonight calling out for your termination, tonight. This is their mess, not yours. For them to attack you like that hurts my feelings. For you to sign checks for what the police did to our people they should be writing checks to boys’ and girls’ clubs.”
“Ms. Scott you had to clean up all this mess,” May said to the city manager. “For them calling to do an evaluation maybe there should be a recall on them.”
Another speaker, Eddie Garrett said, “Don Freitas I believe you was mayor, prior, here. Louie Rocha. All y’all had some chaotic in Antioch. For you to say you want evaluations here, in Antioch when the police haven’t been evaluated.”
To the city attorney he said, “Thank you how you behave when those on the city council feel like they can talk to you any way.”
“The racism is basically there,” Garrett continued. “We had Tamisha, we had Lamar. Anyone who was African American who ran for this position was attacked. All we hear in Antioch is, ‘we gotta bring Antioch back’, ‘we gotta make Antioch great again.’ That means white.”
“Why does this have to be in Closed Session? Where’s the transparency? Who’s running what? You need to be evaluated, Don Freitas. I have reached out to you, numerous times but you haven’t reached back,” Garrett stated. “Louie Rocha, I have reached out to you, numerous times but you haven’t responded. You need to be evaluated.”
“It’s so obvious what’s going on, here. How can you come in here and take away the best parts of our city? Thomas has been a lifesaver to this city,” the next resident said. “When I saw Donald Trump flags, when I saw Confederate flags. Your flags were on the same lawns. You’ve already put in place the pawns that you want to sacrifice. The next ones aren’t going to come in and sweep the floors. That old time stuff is over.”
“You’re not the mayor anymore. Quit talking to him like that,” he said to Freitas. “Quit acting like the mayor.”
Resident Tachina Garrett approached the podium singing part of the song, “Lift Every Voice and Sing” also known as the Negro or Black National Anthem. She spoke of “shenanigans. Ron, you’re part responsible. Don, you’re part responsible. You two have held positions. We are seeing right through this screen. We’re not going back no matter who you are.”
“Thomas, stand your ground,” she said to the city attorney. “You have done your job.”
“Based on your history, it’s the same playbook,” resident Patricia Granados said. “On your first day you listed the five things you wanted, including officers in the schools. You need to be held accountable.”
“That’s what your voters and your people represent…who are terroristic,” she stated.
“You want to fire the city attorney. You want to fire the city manager,” Granados continued. “Thomas deserves a record for the lawsuits he’s dealt with. Those officers that were all in the text threads that were blinded that didn’t speak up.”
However, as previously reported, during the new council’s oath of office meeting on Dec. 10th, Freitas asked for immediately providing City Manager Bessie Scott with goals and objectives for her to be evaluated on, six months following her start date on Oct. 7, to be in compliance with her contract. It was supposed to be done by the council within 30 days, he shared. Freitas then stunned the audience when he called for the termination of the city attorney. He inadvertently said “city manager” but corrected himself after being questioned about it by Torres-Walker. (See video of Freitas’ comments)
“We’ll never forget, Ron Bernal, that you retired” before the text scandal investigation was completed and “Louie Rocha, I heard about terrorist actions against students” when he was principal of Antioch High School,” Granados said.
“We’re here to stay, we’re going to call you out,” she concluded.
Antioch Police Oversight Commission member Leslie May spoke next saying, “I’m here representing myself and Reimagine Antioch” then read verses from the book of Proverbs in the Bible. “I’m a Christian. I can’t stand a so-called Christian who runs to Christianity when they get their behinds in trouble.”
“When Lamar Thorpe came from that meeting with Diana Becton…he let one of you resign and not be fired,” she said, speaking of Mayor Ron Bernal.
However, Bernal retired at the end of December 2021 and the meeting between former Mayor Lamar Hernandez-Thorpe, then-City Manager Con Johnson and District Attorney Diana Becton happened in March 2022, three days after the then-mayor’s arrest for DUI. (See related article)
“God does not like it when someone shows you mercy and you plot…against them,” May continued.
“When I see white men pitting two Black men against each other. We have the field ni**er and the house ni**er. The light ni**er against the dark ni**er. You’re dividing people,” she stated. “You say what you want to do about Monica. You say what you want about Tamisha. You smeared Lamar’s name. You could not stand him because of the color of his skin. You are a disgrace. And as of tonight, I’m praying Psalm 109 over all three of you. I’m going to my bad knees on you three tonight and I’m praying for your strength. But I’m telling you it’s not over. Indictments are coming.”
Local homeless advocate Nichole Gardner spoke next saying, “I know. I’m sick of it, too, Ms. Leslie. I don’t know how this even came about. I’ve been going to meetings for six or seven years. After dealing with the election, he was not on the radar. We were talking about mayors and city councils. I don’t know what made you decide after talking about unifying the community, that was the first thing you decided to do.”
“I wanted to speak to you, Thomas,” she continued. “I remember seeing you speak to the council ‘we didn’t want to criminalize homelessness,’ and you literally jump-started my homelessness work. I want to thank you for that.”
“I must say I am cool with the mayor. We’re friends. Even up here I didn’t agree with the mayor when it comes to Thomas. He knows when to bite his tongue,” Gardner stated. “If you could be more transparent maybe you could explain yourself. But right now, it looks like racism. It just doesn’t look right.”
“Is it racism or is it actual action? Because we often get confused over someone’s skin color over actions that happen here, in East Contra Costa and Antioch. Which it kinda sounds like,” said Gavin Payton (no relation to reporter/publisher). “The people need to know the actual facts. The voters are the ones who have the final say so…who they want to see in office. Let’s make sure it’s actual facts. If it’s something else, then we’ll have to rely on the voters to take retaliation.”
“When we speak up that’s when people get scared. The people sitting behind me aren’t scared. Neither am I,” he continued. “We’re tired of being sick and tired. We’re tired of having your dogs on us, we’re tired of being hosed down. We’re tired of young men hanging from trees.”
“Now you want to put police officers who were part of the text message scandal into our schools…when they just killed our babies,” Payton added.
Closed Session
Before adjourning to the closed-door session, which is required by state law for personnel matters, City Manager Bessie Smith then said the Closed Session was for “public employee performance, dismissal, release.”
Report Out
Following the conclusion of the Closed Session at 9:06 p.m. Bernal reported out saying, “There was no reportable action.” However, Smith was not in attendance after the council returned to open session.
The council then voted 4-0 to adjourn the meeting at 9:07 p.m.
Following the meeting when asked about the closed-door meeting Bernal further clarified, “Nothing to report now as the city council didn’t take any action.”
Smith’s Background
Smith was hired in February 2019 on a 5-0 vote of the city council as Antioch’s first African American city attorney. He worked for law firm, Meyers-Nave, which was hired many times by Smith’s office, including for the defense of the lawsuit by the natural gas pipeline owners. While at the firm, Smith’s practice areas focused on Municipal and Special District Law, Labor and Employment, and Public Contracts. His senior management experience includes managing four departments across all offices of a global corporate law firm with more than 500 attorneys.
He started his professional career as a business analyst for McKinsey & Company in New York.
Smith earned his law degree from Harvard Law School, a Master’s degree in Public Policy at Harvard Kennedy School and a Bachelor of Science in Education, graduating magna cum laude from Seton Hall University.
At the time he was hired, Smith was a member of the Oakland Police Commission and served as its chairperson.
