Mayor Sheng Thao to miss tie-breaking vote on lucrative city security contract tied to business associate of FBI target

OAKLAND — After a City Council vote ended in a rare tie, Mayor Sheng Thao was put in the uncomfortable position of having to break the stalemate on a lucrative security contract with a company whose CEO has close ties to a target of the FBI’s ongoing corruption probe.

But the mayor, who has been linked to the same FBI investigation, may now avoid having to weigh in after all.

Thao’s spokesperson, Casey Pratt, confirmed in an email that the mayor would miss Tuesday’s tie-breaking vote and send the issue back to City Council, adding “we believe in letting the legislatures legislate.”

The move allows Thao — who as mayor can break any tied council vote — to avoid green-lighting a multi-million contract with a company run by Ana Chretien, an East Bay businesswoman who has had extensive business dealings with Mario Juarez, a fixture in the FBI’s investigation.

The FBI investigation became public in June, when agents raided addresses tied to Thao and the father-and-son duo of David and Any Duong, who own the city-contracted trash recycling company California Waste Solutions.

Juarez, a two-time City Council candidate, longtime political operative and one-time Duong family businesses partner, has been a focus of the FBI’s probe and named in subpoenas sent to city officials. He and Chretien appear to have done business as far back as seven years ago, when the two bought and sold properties between each other in East Oakland. Often, those deals were done through little-known companies that each of them led.

As recently as 2021, for example, Juarez claimed to represent one of Chretien’s companies while securing a lucrative loan that’s since come under investigation by the Alameda County District Attorney’s Office. In another instance, Chretien appeared to become CEO of a company that Juarez started — one closely involved in a land deal bordering one of Chretien’s properties in Napa County.

A message by the Bay Area News Group to Chretien seeking comment was not immediately returned. She has previously declined to discuss her business dealings with Juarez.

Her company, ABC Security Service, was awarded the city’s security contract in 2018 and has patrolled City Hall, city libraries and senior and recreation centers ever since.

It’s been running on contract extensions for the past couple years, after plans to approve a new security provider fell through amid changing security needs and a desire to wait for a new, permanent city administrator to arrive on the job. Its most recent extension expired June 30, though the company’s security guards have continued to patrol city buildings.

Newly-public city documents suggest the company is owed millions of dollars in unpaid invoices this year.

City money for the company dried up months before the company’s contract ended in June 30, 2024, leaving it to rack up nearly $1.6 million in bills that the city must now pay. It also has continued to patrol city property since that contract expired over the summer, at the cost of an additional $1.6 million.

A council vote in July to extend the company’s contract through mid-2025 ended in unusual fashion, when councilmembers Nikki Fortunado Bas, Noel Gallo, Kevin Jenkins and Dan Kalb voted in favor, while Rebecca Kaplan, Janani Ramachandran and Treva Reid were either excused or not present for the vote. Councilmember Carroll Fife abstained, leading to a rare tie and the need for Thao to weigh in as soon as City Hall returned from summer recess.

That original vote called for an $8 million contract extension to run through June 30, 2025.

However, city officials now say they want the City Council to approve a different contract that would pay the nearly $3.2 million in expenses that ABC has accrued since early 2024, while clearing the way for the company to receive up to $6 million more to keep the company on board through the middle of 2025.

If approved, the contract would push ABC’s funding haul to roughly $28.6 million since it took over as the city’s security guard provider six years ago.

City officials plan to open up the city’s security guard contract to bids from new companies in the coming months, ahead of the 2025-26 budget cycle.

Little has been said publicly by the FBI since the series of June 20 raids at the homes belonging to Thao and the Duong family. Thao has repeatedly insisted she is innocent and not a target of the federal government. No arrests have been announced.

Before the raids, Alameda County prosecutors had charged Juarez in a felony case stemming from election mailers that Juarez allegedly orchestrated against Thao’s political rivals during the final days of the 2022 mayoral campaign. Juarez has since pleaded not guilty. His attorney, Ernie Castillo, has previously framed the charges by District Attorney Pamela Price’s office as “politically motivated and unfortunate.”

The Alameda County District Attorney’s Office also is investigating accusations that Juarez stiffed the influential Duong family out of a $1 million investment over a failed housing venture called Evolutionary Homes, court investigative records show. No charges have been announced in that case.