Pacific Grove mayor seeks to oust a member of the city's Economic Development Commission.

A member of the Pacific Grove Economic Development Commission and persistent critic of the city's Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Task Force, Mike Gibbs, is facing removal from his position after it was discovered that he sent an email to another anti-DEI resident in which he called the task force a “farce” and encouraged her to contact the current task force chair and a former member, suggesting she "poke the bear."

Gibbs ended his email sent May 18 to resident Carol Marquart with: “Let’s have at it!”

What Gibbs didn’t realize when he hit “send,” was that the personal email addresses of the DEI chair and former member were also included as recipients.

Gibbs was appointed to the EDC by Mayor Bill Peake in January 2023 to a two-year term, but now mid-way through that term Peake is petitioning the Pacific Grove City Council to have his own appointee removed from his post in the wake of the email.

The vote is scheduled for the next council meeting, 6pm, Wednesday, June 5. It takes at least four votes of the seven member-council to remove any member of a board, commission, committee or task force.

In an email chain obtained by the Weekly, Gibbs referred to the task force as the “DEI Task Farce,” and shared the private email address for Chair Kim Bui and former member Nadja Mark. When he added Mark’s email he said, “If you want to add her and poke the bear.”

After receiving the email, Mark wrote to Marquart directly.

“Please do not contact me…I have repeatedly asked Mr. Gibbs to not contact me. I am a private citizen. Mr. Gibbs inciting you to ‘poke the bear’ is tantamount to harassment,” Mark wrote.

“I apologize to Nadja Mark for the inadvertent email,” Gibbs said in a reply to all. “It was not a reference to Ms. Mark and was intended for another party.”

Gibbs says he intended the email for the DEI Task Force and not Mark, only saying that he "stands by" what he wrote in the apology, despite the fact he referenced Mark by name in the email and included her email address. 

"I just stand by what I said to Nadja. I stand by that email. I meant no disrespect, it wasn't intended that way," Gibbs says. 

In an agenda report to the council, Peake outlines that Gibbs disclosed the private emails of a task force member and former task force member without their knowledge or consent.

Gibbs contends they are not private emails, because Bui, as an appointed task force member, is a public official and her personal email is used for DEI business, thus making it public, not private. "So there's at least a cloud here," Gibbs says.

Peake contacted Gibbs within about two hours after the email exchange and asked him to resign, Gibbs says. "I said, 'Mayor, you have to check this out," Gibbs says, referring to his private vs. public email argument.

Peake also states in his report to the council that Gibbs' email includes criticism of the DEI Task Force, and that it "suggests taking action.” Peake adds, “such conduct violates the City’s rules and regulations governing the conduct of appointed officials.”

The report also states that the city’s regulations and policies allow the council to remove an EDC member “for any cause, including violation of Council policies, or for no cause, because members serve at the Council’s pleasure.”

Both Gibbs—who founded the conservative group PG Lives—and Marquart show up to nearly every DEI meeting to criticize the work of the task force, joined by a few other residents, in an apparent campaign to disrupt meetings.