MCE's board voted to accept most findings from a county grand jury report that concluded the agency's board had repeatedly failed to govern it, while extending two key reform deadlines over public objection.
Mayor Eduardo Martinez and Councilmember Cesar Zepeda, listed in city records as Richmond's member and alternate on the 34-member board, did not attend. Their absence came as the board addressed findings that directly affect the rates Richmond customers pay for their electricity.
The Marin County Civil Grand Jury released its 49-page report June 16, and the board's approved response, adopted at its August 20 meeting, agrees outright with 9 of the grand jury's 14 findings and partially agrees with 3 others. No finding was rejected. MCE Founding CEO Dawn Weisz left the agency on June 17.
Richmond’s electricity provider under fire after grand jury report, CEO departure
The public agency that provides electricity to most Richmond residents lost its founding chief executive last week, one day after a county grand jury found that the agency had been mismanaged for years and that its board had repeatedly failed to oversee it. Dawn Weisz, who co-founded MCE in
Soren Hemmila
The board conceded that it had not always played an active role in key agency decisions, that management had at times withheld information the board needed to govern effectively, and that energy contracts were repeatedly signed by the wrong officials and without required prior committee consultation. The board also agreed that the 2023 process for stripping itself of authority to approve the hiring of a general counsel lacked sufficient transparency and may have violated California's open meetings law.
Acting CEO Vicken Kasarjian, who took over after Weisz's departure, told the board he plans to start fresh.
"I am intending to bring to the board our mission and vision statement, which will begin with a blank sheet of paper," Kasarjian said. "The board needs to be fundamentally engaged in approving the vision and the mission. From that, everything will fall. That's our bedrock, and we haven't done that."
Kasarjian also committed to ending the practice of presenting condensed budget summaries. "No more summaries," he said. "Every item."
Despite the broad concessions, the board extended two deadlines over public objection. The grand jury had recommended the board review the value of costly renewable energy contracts and consider hiring an outside auditor to review the contracts behind a $200 million cost spike in fiscal 2024-25, both by December 31, 2026. The board pushed the contract review to September 30, 2027, and the auditor question to March 31, 2027.
Dan Segaden of the Marin Conservation League challenged both extensions during public comment.
"You're spending a lot of money every week," Segaden said. "To step back to September 30, a whole year before you evaluate this, that just seems a bit crazy to us."
The agency's special governance counsel, Bethany Burgess of Aleshire and Wynder, led the board through the draft response, with her partner, Floy Andrews, who also attended the meeting. Aleshire and Wynder served as Richmond's city attorney until recently.
A governance assessment by Sacramento consulting firm Leading Resources Inc., hired for $96,000, is expected to produce restructuring recommendations by late September. A permanent CEO is unlikely to be in place before early next year.
Richmond residents are enrolled in MCE's standard Light Green plan by default and are currently paying about $211 more a year than equivalent PG&E customers, according to MCE's own published rate comparison. The gap is steeper for small businesses: a typical small commercial customer on MCE's standard plan pays $532.40 a month, compared to $480.88 under PG&E, a difference of about $618 a year.
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