These are the North Bay officials calling on Windsor Mayor Dominic Foppoli to resign
A growing list of elected officials across Sonoma County called for the resignation Thursday of Windsor Mayor Dominic Foppoli after four women came forward in a report by the San Francisco Chronicle and accused him of sexual assault in encounters stretching between 2003 and 2019.
The lawmakers who say Foppoli is no longer fit to serve in public office include state Sens. Mike McGuire and Bill Dodd, Assemblyman Jim Wood, all five members of the Sonoma County Board of Supervisors and Windsor Town Council member Esther Lemus, along with elected leaders in every other city across the county, including all eight other mayors.
Lemus, a deputy Sonoma County district attorney, was the first member of the Windsor Town Council to publicly call on Foppoli to resign.
“In order for our Town to continue to function properly, I request his immediate resignation,” she said in a Twitter post.
State Sen. Mike McGuire, D-Healdsburg, who serves as the assistant majority leader for Democrats in the Senate, said Foppoli had caused “tremendous pain and trauma with his appalling and disgusting behavior.”
“There’s only one option — he needs to resign immediately,” McGuire said in a Twitter post.
Assemblyman Jim Wood, D-Santa Rosa the allegations demanded immediate investigation.
“I stand with the women who have shared their painful and most personal experience of being sexually assaulted by Dominic Foppoli,” he posted on Twitter.
In interviews with The Press Democrat, Sonoma County supervisors Lynda Hopkins, David Rabbitt, Susan Gorin, Chris Coursey and James Gore all said Foppoli needed to step down.
“I think there’s no other choice, and he should deal with his own issues as they roll out and give Windsor the opportunity to move on,” Rabbitt said.
“Having a leader who behaves like that it affects us all,” Hopkins said. “It generates distrust. How can someone like that have that much power and rise to that much eminence in our community. That’s something that I think every leader needs to grapple with.”
Coursey said he hopes that District Attorney Jill Ravitch considers reviewing the alleged assaults to see if they should be investigated.
“He’s denying these stories,” Coursey said. “He’s got a right to due process, but on a political level, I think his position is untenable. These are believable stories. ... I think he would be doing himself and the community a favor to step down at this point.”
Gorin agreed with Coursey and also called for a criminal investigation.
“I treat these allegations very, very seriously and I would encourage the District Attorney to fully investigate the circumstances and if the allegations have merit to prosecute” she said.
On Facebook, Gore, whose district includes Windsor, said: “I endorsed Mayor Foppoli for his position on the Windsor Council. In learning about these stories, he should step down from representing the community that he has deeply hurt. I hold myself accountable for not digging deeper into his personal behavior before endorsement, and commit to doing deeper diligence in the future.”
Santa Rosa Mayor Chris Rogers was among the first to condemn Foppoli’s reported behavior on Thursday and call for his resignation.
“I understand that everyone in this country is innocent until proven guilty, but these allegations are credible, specific, documented, and horrifying,” Rogers said in a statement on Facebook. “I felt sick reading this article and had to take multiple breaks — I can only imagine how the victims felt and continue to feel.”
By Thursday evening, he had been joined by all seven other mayors, who in a joint, signed statement called on Foppoli to immediately leave office.
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