Supervisor Crystal Coleman joins Club Nepo

In November 2024, Byrd Street reported on the two Orange County supervisors who got their relatives on the planning commission. Those two appointments are still in place: Jordan Marshall has a spot thanks to his uncle, Supervisor Keith Marshall (District 3), and Brandon Van Hoven owes his father, Supervisor Ed Van Hoven (District 2), for his appointment.

Adding to the coziness, Marshall’s wife, Deanne Marshall, serves on the county’s Health Center Commission.

Byrd Street has no reason to think these nepo appointments are doing a poor job. Jordan Marshall and Brandon Van Hoven have distinguished themselves as very capable planning commissioners. But surely Supervisors Marshall and Van Hoven could’ve tried harder—maybe attended a neighborhood church service or contacted the leadership of local civic organizations—to find someone who doesn’t share their DNA to serve on the commission and receive the token paycheck that comes with the role. And surely they knew they were nicely positioning their relatives to run for elected office someday.

Now, Supervisor Crystal Coleman (District 4) has joined the nepotism club. It seems she very much wanted her husband, Jamie Coleman, on the newly created Parks and Recreation Advisory Committee, but she couldn’t nominate him, because (she insists) they maintain separate households in different districts. So nepo enabler Marshall came to the rescue and nominated her husband to represent District 3, where Jamie Coleman lives.

During the board’s April 28 meeting, she declared herself exceptionally qualified to serve as a board liaison to the new committee—never mind that her presence alongside her husband could make the other committee members uncomfortable and raise questions about conflicts of interest. She engaged in some testy back-and-forth with Board Chair J. Bryan Nicol (District 5) and Supervisor Jason Capelle (District 1), both of whom objected to her being a liaison for this particular committee.

In the end, the board unanimously passed a slate of nominees, including Jamie Coleman. The unanimous vote was in keeping with board tradition—that is, to approve a whole slate out of respect for each supervisor’s wishes. The board also unanimously approved Capelle, who came up with the idea for the parks and rec committee, as one of two board liaisons. Crystal Coleman's nomination as the other liaison passed 3-2, with Nicol and Capelle opposed.

To be fair, this new advisory committee won’t have the same level of influence as the planning commission, which weighs crucial land-use issues and currently is helping to fight the proposed Valley Link transmission line project. But because of that, one has to wonder why Coleman, a hard-working, kindhearted and accessible supervisor, would put her political capital on the line to get herself and her husband on the same committee. Call it an unforced error.

When I talked to her on the phone about this matter, I asked her to remind me who had been appointed to the committee besides her husband. She couldn't remember anyone else, not even John Madison, whom she nominated to represent District 4. Hmmm.