In a follow-up article from the Los Angeles Times, an official from the Santa Monica-Malibu Unified School District confirmed that its conflict-of-interest of investigation now involves three current board members: Maria Leon-Vazquez, Ralph Mechur and Oscar de la Torre.
The newspaper’s initial investigation, published on Nov. 10, found that Leon-Vazquez’s previous votes may have violated conflict-of-interest laws. The board member had voted to approve six-digit contracts with companies without disclosing that her husband—Santa Monica council member and former mayor pro tem Tony Vazquez—had ties to those businesses.
Mechur is an education activist and owner of architecture firm Ralph Mechur Associates. He served on Santa Monica Planning Commission from 1987 to 1995 as well as the Santa Monica-Malibu Education Foundation Board of Directors from 1989 to 2007.
Previously, he served on the school board in 2008, 2010 and 2015.
For his 2007-8 appointment, Mechur was elected through a unanimous vote of the school board. In 2015, Mechur was nominated with a 4-3 vote; his supporters included de la Torre, Jose Escarce, Richard Tahvildaran-Jesswein (who is current board of education president) and Leon-Vazquez. Prior to the actual vote, de la Torre had supported Malibu parent and education activist Jennifer deNicola.
In Sept. 2016, school board elections were cancelled due to a lack of qualified candidates. Jon Kean, along with incumbents Mechur and Leon-Vazquez, were pulled into the three open board seats.
In a statement from the same month to The Malibu Times, SMMUSD School Board member Craig Foster—who is still Malibu’s only representation—said, “The cancellation of the school board election due to an inefficient yield of new candidates was a direct reflection of the political situation in Santa Monica, which makes it very, very hard to make non-incumbents win a school board election.”
The district investigation is currently looking into Mechur’s involvement in Leon-Vazquez’s home remodel. According to the LA Times, the remodel took place between 2001 and 2005—three years prior to his school board appointment.
He also worked on a facility for nonprofit Community Partners and the City of Santa Monica in 2001. De la Torre was an employee of the nonprofit at the time, though he told the LA Times he was not in a position to approve Mechur’s contract.
In an emailed statement from November, SMMUSD Superintendent Ben Drati said, “The district and our board of education recognize the importance of avoiding conflict of interest. At this time, we are in the process of gathering information and facts related to the board’s and Maria’s votes.”
At that time, an updated statement on the district’s website confirmed that the district would be working with outside legal counsel to further investigate the issue.
