Twenty miles south of Fresno, a small agricultural city has earned a reputation across the Central Valley for instability and dysfunction.
City Council meetings often devolve into tense arguments among warring factions of council members, the mayor and residents.
The majority Latino farming town has made local headlines for its high-profile firings, lawsuits and a city hall embezzlement investigation scandal.
The city of 14,500 has cycled through six police chiefs and six city managers in the past decade. One former city manager was convicted by the U.S. Department of Justice this summer of perpetrating a multi-year pension fraud scheme .
Some residents and political opponents of the mayor fear the pile-up of lawsuits threatens to bankrupt the cash-strapped city — especially because the city hasn’t had liability insurance coverage for the past few years and any payout from the lawsuits would likely come from the general fund.
Like many small central San Joaquin Valley communities, Parlier struggles with systemic challenges, from a limited operational budget and high rates of poverty to an economy predominantly driven by agriculture and low voter turnout in mayoral and council elections.