More Mining of Jeff Gorell’s "Fools Gold"

Recently, our research team has been digging into Ventura County Supervisor (district 2) Jeff Gorell’s “Gold Team,” a project he promotes as a regional economic development initiative designed to bring jobs and innovation to Ventura County. But despite the grand promises, the only jobs we’ve been able to identify connected to Gorell’s efforts appear to have been outsourced to India rather than created here at home.

What we uncovered next raises even more serious questions.

Gold Team publicly presents itself as being partnered with local jurisdictions, specifically the cities of Camarillo and Thousand Oaks, using those affiliations to bolster its credibility and legitimacy. But after digging deeper, we’ve determined those partnership claims simply do not hold up. Following a recent public record request, we’ve confirmed with the City of Camarillo that they have no documentation of a partnership along with no documentation produced between current Republican city council members Tony Trembley, Kevin Kildee, or David Tennessen and Ventura County Supervisor Jeff Gorell’s office about Gold Team. There is no city council record that we could find where at least three members of the five-person city council approved the city as a partner of Gold Team. In fact, the only record that was produced was one between the city of Camarillo and Gorell’s office regarding Gold Team. It was an email about what Gorell accomplished in his first 100 days in office. Surprise surprise. A records request for City of Thousand Oaks also had no evidence of a partnership agreement. 

The County of Ventura is also not a partner, as Gold Team is not an officially sanctioned County entity. At the bottom of the web page, Tim McDougall is listed as the contact. McDougall’s email address is not a County issued email. We attempted to email McDougall with questions. He has not responded. The Gold Team webpage on the County’s website is a violation of Government Code Section 8314 that prohibits the use of public resources for personal or non-governmental purposes. 

Gold Team’s partnerships are so secret, even the cities and government agencies they allege to be in a relationship haven’t heard the news. It must be a stealth edition of civic collaboration.  Maybe Gorell can make the month of June an opportunity to partner with reality. And the law.