SACRAMENTO, Calif. (CN) — The Sacramento City Council on Tuesday unanimously chose Shoun Thao to fill the seat of former Councilmember Sean Loloee, who resigned in January under the cloud of a federal indictment.
Thao will serve as the District 2 councilmember until Dec. 10, when the winner of the November election will take the seat. He’ll be sworn in at the council’s next meeting.
“District 2 deserves nothing but the very, very best,” Councilmember Mai Vang said before the vote.
The six candidates who applied for the position knew it would be as a caretaker. Mayor Darrell Steinberg, after Loloee’s resignation, suggested the council appoint the winner of the March 5 election, if a candidate garnered over 50% of the vote. If no candidate surpassed that threshold, Steinberg suggested the council appoint a caretaker.
Roger Dickinson and Stephen Walton will face off for the District 2 seat at the November election.
The council’s Personnel and Public Employees Committee interviewed the six candidates. It then recommended three to the full council: Raquel Shipp, Timothy Smith and Thao.
Interviewed publicly Tuesday by the full council, the three candidates talked about the need to restore trust in the District 2 seat, engage the community and focus on homelessness.
“We need to bring the district together,” Thao said. “To bring the district together, you need someone who’s lived there.”
Thao’s parents, who were refugees of the Vietnam War, moved to Sacramento in 1995. Now director of the nonprofit Hmong Youth and Parents United, Thao worked for the city of Sacramento for seven years. He served as a council representative and managed projects within the district.
“This is me here saying, I’m going to fight for my district,” Thao said.
Shipp is the cofounder of the Sacramento Youth Center, which serves 350 youths a year with programs and drop-in services. Smith has decades of experience in public-sector organizations and as a consultant to governments.
The process to fill the empty chair stems from a mid-December federal indictment against Loloee, 53. He and Karla Montoya, 42, initially faced accusations of conspiracy, obstruction of Department of Labor proceedings and possession and use of false immigration documents.
According to prosecutors, many of Loloee’s employees at his Viva Supermarkets stores did not have authorization to work in the country. He and Montoya, the prosecutors say, didn’t pay overtime and tried to interfere with the federal investigation.
Prosecutors added additional charges and defendants in a new indictment last week.
Mirwais Shams, 36, and Ahmad Shams, 29, both of Sacramento, are accused of conspiracy to defraud the Internal Revenue Service. They also are charged with filing a false tax return. Ahmad Shams has two perjury counts.
Prosecutors say the Shams distorted employee data, lowering Loloee’s payroll, overtime obligations and overall labor costs.
The new indictment also added more charges to Loloee: conspiracy to defraud the IRS, willful failure to collect or pay over withheld taxes and three counts each of filing a false tax return and money laundering.
All have pleaded not guilty. Loloee has vehemently denied the accusations.
After the December indictment, Loloee said he intended to remain on the council, an assertion he repeated weeks later when Steinberg publicly called for him to step down.
Days later, on Jan. 4, Loloee resigned, starting the process to fill his empty council seat.
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