Del Mar Council Censures Councilmember Dan Quirk for Second Time 

The Del Mar City Council censured Councilmember Dan Quirk for a second time on Monday after findings from an independent investigation revealed he violated multiple City Council policies and the Brown Act. 

According to the investigation, Quirk discussed confidential information from a closed City Council meeting with several members of the public, a violation of the Brown Act. He is also accused of inappropriate behavior toward the city manager and city staff, as well as repeatedly interfering with the city manager’s job and the jobs and duties of city staff.  

The Brown Act is a state law that outlines how public meetings should be conducted. 

Del Mar follows a council-manager form of government, according to an April 15 city staff report. This means the City Council’s role is to set policy and not to engage in daily operational or administrative activities, and the city manager’s role is to implement the policy set by the council and to oversee daily operations of the city. 

The parameters of these roles are outlined in the “Del Mar City Council and City Manager Guiding Principles,” which the City Council adopted back in 2021. Quirk was on the council when those rules were adopted, but he has still repeatedly violated those principles and other policies, according to the investigation. 

City Manager Ashley Jones complained to City Attorney Leslie Devaney and the City Council about Quirk’s behavior multiple times, prompting the investigation, according to the city staff report. 

Quirk allegedly “coerced or pressured” Jones, city staff and other outside consultants on how to complete their work, the investigation found. 

It also found that Quirk made “disparaging” and “disrespectful” comments about Jones, other city officials and city staff. And he allegedly told multiple members of the public and some city officials that Jones and Devaney should be fired.  

The rules also state that members of the City Council aren’t typically supposed to engage directly with city staff. Any communication with staff is supposed to happen through the city manager. But according to the investigation, Quirk engaged with staff in an “aggressive and confrontational manner” on multiple occasions, resulting in staff reporting “feelings of being pressured or city staff bursting into tears.” 

When City Manager Jones was hired in 2021, those principles and policies establishing her role in the council-manager structure were part of her employment agreement. So, by overstepping those boundaries, Quirk was also violating the terms of Jones’ employment agreement, the investigation found. 

He also repeatedly violated several City Council policies and the Del Mar Municipal Code between December 2020 and November 2023, the investigation concluded. 

Quirk was made aware of his violations and has repeatedly been advised to follow the rules of the council structure, according to the investigation, but he continued to cross the line. 

“Councilmember Daniel Quirk’s self-interested, reckless and potentially malicious behavior not only poses immediate legal risks but also has the potential to compromise the city’s strategic objectives and erode the public’s trust in its leadership,” the investigator wrote in the report. 

The third-party investigation was conducted by Public Safety Consulting, Inc. The investigator, Betty Kelepecz, spent more than two months on the investigation and conducted 15 interviews with 13 witnesses, Jones and Quirk. She also reviewed over 800 pages of documents, according to the city staff report. 

The findings of the investigation were presented at Monday’s City Council meeting, and Quirk was adamant that it was biased and false. 

Quirk pointed out during the meeting that the city first hired a different investigator who was removed from the investigation after a couple of months because they were “unable to complete the investigation,” according to the city staff report. 

However, the first investigator did present a draft, which Mayor David Druker and other city officials reviewed. Quirk did not get to see that draft, but he believes the council removed that investigator because they didn’t agree with the investigator’s findings. 

Quirk also maintained that his communications to Jones and city staff were mostly questions he had about city projects and project costs. He repeatedly denied ever saying that Jones and City Attorney Devaney should be fired. 

“The majority of my communication to the city manager over the last few years was via questions I would email about things like the status and costs of our city-wide utility undergrounding project,” Quirk said in an email to Voice of San Diego. “If you read those you will find them pretty ‘boring,’ but indicative of a council member who is engaged and cares about his city and its residents.” 

Nonetheless, the council voted to censure Quirk again. He walked out and did not vote.

A lesson on censures: A censure is an official reprimand or formal statement of disapproval. It’s a way for a legislative body to publicly express an opinion on the conduct of one of their members. Sometimes, censures can include penalties such as loss of committee assignments. 

Because Quirk is an elected official, there is not much the council can do to discipline him besides publicly reprimanding him. 

As part of the censure, the council directed Quirk to refrain from talking about closed session items to anyone outside of those sessions and directed him to never engage in on-on-one discussions with Jones or Devaney. 

The city staff report notes that the censure is not an attempt to silence or censor Quirk, citing First Amendment free speech rights. 

This is the second time the council has censured Quirk. In December, the City Council voted to censure Quirk saying he made statements about the train and the tunnel to other agencies and the media without making it clear he was speaking for himself and not the city. 

The censure came after Quirk did interviews with news organizations criticizing SANDAG, the North County Transit District, the train tunnel and San Diego’s rail line in general. Quirk is very outspoken about his criticism of San Diego’s train system and the agencies that run San Diego’s rail lines. 

Councilmembers said at the time that Quirk repeatedly failed to make it clear he was speaking for himself, not on behalf of the city. 

Druker said at the time that city staff has often had to apologize for Quirk’s comments to multiple agencies and assure them that he is expressing his own opinion, not the opinion of the council. 

Correction: This story has been updated to correct that the City Council voted to censure Dan Quirk in a 4-0-1 vote. He left the meeting and did not take part in the vote. An older version of this story incorrectly stated that he was censured in a 4-1 vote.