Richmond City Council
December 16, 2025

[Excerpt from an email sent by Kaelen Van Cura on her resignation from Richmond Arts and Culture Commission on August 1, 2024 to Richmond City Clerk Pamela Christian, Economic Development Director Nannette Beacham, City Councilmember Claudia Jimenez, Mayor Eduardo Martinez and Mayor’s Chief of Staff Tony Tamayo] … Agendas Because of the Brown Act regulations, RACC may only discuss topics at its public meetings that have been listed on the meeting agenda, which is posted 72 hours in advance of the meeting. Throughout my time on the RACC, only Chair Beaulieu and Arts and Culture Manager Day have been able to have their topics consistently added to the meeting agendas. This practice of preventing relevant agenda items from appearing on the agenda either by omission or outright denial, and thus discussion and/or decision-making on those items, is undemocratic. Most frequently, requests were simply ignored and the requester would find out about the omission when the final agenda was distributed, but other times agenda topics were denied via email by Chair Beaulieu. 1. Council Liaison Soheila Bana requested that a voting item be added to the October 12, 2023 agenda on October 6, 2023. The item was missing from the agenda. 2. My relevant, timely topic was denied by the Chair on at least one occasion (two weeks before the January 11, 2024 meeting.) 3. Commissioner Mehas had his requested agenda item denied (which had been submitted three weeks before the March 14, 2024 meeting.) 4. Commissioner Santos told me that she had her written agenda topics ignored and not added to the agenda.