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Politics

San Diego County Grand Jury Wants Accountability

The Charles C. Dail concourse entrance of San Diego City Hall is picture in this undated photo.
KPBS Staff
The Charles C. Dail concourse entrance of San Diego City Hall is picture in this undated photo.

What is the county grand jury?

  • The grand jury is made up of 19 citizens who investigate government programs operated by the county, cities and special districts.
  • A new grand Jury is chosen each year by July 1.
  • Superior Court judges nominate members to serve one-year terms.

Source: County of San Diego

The San Diego County grand jury wants to make sure the recommendations for changes and improvements that it makes for various governments get done and aren't just ignored.

To accomplish that, the grand jury wants to create "implementation review committees" for the San Diego County Office of Education and the city of San Diego. This year's grand jury foreman, Gregory Ny, told KPBS the committees would be a way to ensure follow-through from an agency or school district that has agreed to make changes based on grand jury recommendations.

Q. What's an implementation review committee and why does the grand jury need them?

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A. We have no policing power. What we’re looking for is something similar to what the county has. For instance, if the different school districts say we’re going to implement a certain recommendation, that the implementation review committee follows up with them and verifies that they, in fact, did it.

Q. How long before you know whether or not your recommendation for implementing a committee is actually going to happen?

A. The agencies are required to respond in writing to us, I think in 45 days.

Q. So about in a month or so?

A. At least a month. And they will respond in writing whether they agree or disagree with the recommendation. So it’ll be interesting to see what the two agencies say they’re going to do.

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The grand jury would like the review committees patterned after one established for the grand jury itself.