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  ChevronTexaco Chairman Disses Richmond CM, Blows Off City Council
September 7, 2003
 

On August 22, 2003, Richmond City Manager Isiah Turner wrote to his fellow CEO, David O’Reilly, out at ChevronTexaco headquarters just over the hill in San Ramon, requesting a tete-a-tete between some unnamed Richmond City Council members and the chairman. After all, Richmond is the home of California’s second or third largest refinery, owned by ChevronTexaco. Perhaps the City of Richmond and the chairman might have something in common about which to make small talk. It appears that O’Reilly is at least aware of his company’s presence in Richmond, having recently contacted the Secretary of the Navy to complain about Richmond’s impending takeover of Pont Molate. 

Too busy, apparently, to respond to Turner himself, O’Reilly (or perhaps his secretary) passed on the request to his local representative, Gary Fisher, General Manager – External Affairs for the Richmond Refinery. On September 2, 2003, Fisher informed Turner, “Unfortunately, Mr. O’Reilly will not be able to meet with you.”  Fisher didn’t say, “maybe later,’ or “maybe some other time.” One would interpret his response as “Not, now, not tomorrow, not next year.”

Fisher, apparently unaware that the City of Richmond is not in the education business, did offer to discuss local issues, including among other things, “K-12 education.”

Copies of the letters are attached as PDF files.

o'reilly_letters.pdf

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