Exclusive: Paso Robles councilman made threats, spread rumors, school board colleagues say

The Paso Robles councilman at the center of an alleged conspiracy to oust city manager Ty Lewis has a history of antagonistic behavior in public office dating back to his time as a school board trustee, those who worked with him say, including bullying staff and colleagues, making threats and spreading lascivious rumors.

One former trustee who recounted intimidation by Bausch even went so far as to call him “kind of evil.”

Chris Bausch was named in a $2.275 million government claim filed against the city by Lewis, who alleges that Bausch harassed, intimidated and fabricated lies about Lewis to undermine and eventually remove him from his position as the city’s top administrator.

This included a rumor that Lewis went to sex parties, and according to three former school board members, it’s not the first time Bausch has been linked to that tactic.

He spread a similar rumor about a district employee in 2018, they told The Tribune.

Lewis’ claims about Bausch’s behavior also were familiar and unsurprising, according to several former school board trustees who worked with him for years.

Several said Bausch harassed them, spread misinformation and leaked closed session information to the media, namely the radio station KPRL.

Bausch was elected to the Paso Robles Joint Unified School Board of Trustees in 2012 and served there for a decade, only leaving his post in 2022 to take a seat on the Paso Robles City Council.

His tenure was marked with controversy, including voting against issues important to the LGBTQ+ community, voicing opposition to critical race theory and being censured on a 6-1 vote in 2017 for threatening fellow board members.

Bausch cast the lone dissenting vote in that action.

To better understand his leadership, The Tribune reached out to all former school board members and superintendents who served alongside Bausch to learn about their impressions.

Former trustees Chris Arend, Stephanie Ulibarri, Matt McClish, Kathleen Hall, Joan Summers and Field Gibson and former superintendent Curt Dubost spoke about their time serving on the school board with Bausch.

None recommended Bausch for public office, and all recounted negative experiences working with him.

Not one was surprised by Lewis’ allegations.

Hall and Summers feared retribution for coming forward, but said they hope it inspires others who’ve had similar experiences with Bausch to share their story. Ulibarri also feared retribution for speaking out.

Current trustee and candidate Nathan Williams, current trustees Joel Peterson and Dorian Baker, and former trustees Lance Gannon, Katy Griffin and David Lambert declined to comment. Former trustee and current candidate Tim Gearhart, former trustee W. Jay Packer and former superintendents Chris Williams and Kathleen McNamara did not respond to Tribune interview requests.

When reached for comment, Bausch refused to answer questions regarding his time on the school board and specific complaints from his former colleagues about his behavior, via email or on the record in person with The Tribune.

Former trustees and district employees recount Bausch’s alleged intimidation tactics

The most significant action the board took against Bausch occurred in March 2017, when his fellow trustees censured him in a formal action that serves as a public reprimand.

Documents cite alleged harassment and intimidation toward trustees and district personnel as some of the reasons for the censure.

At least six former trustees who served on the school board say they regularly witnessed that behavior from Bausch during his decade on the school board.

Former trustee Field Gibson served on the school board from 2010 to 2018 — alongside Bausch for all but two of those years.

During that time, Gibson told The Tribune that Bausch threatened and verbally attacked his fellow trustees to the point that some feared for their lives.

Former trustees Joan Summers and Kathleen Hall were on the receiving end of that behavior, they told The Tribune.

Summers said her first experience with Bausch’s intimidation tactics occurred soon after her election. The two were first elected to the board the same year.

She said that prior to the election, Bausch asked her to co-run together on a ticket, and she declined because she didn’t know him or his stances on policies.

After that rebuff, Bausch began responding abrasively toward most things she said, Summers recalled.

During her first weeks on the board, Summers proposed that trustees sit in on union contract negotiations on a rotating basis — not to participate, but to observe. It was something someone suggested at a conference she went to in San Diego.

But Bausch didn’t like that proposal, Summers said.

“He just lost it. He was towering over me — because I was sitting down — screaming,” Summers told The Tribune, adding that other male trustees had to intervene on her behalf.

During Hall’s first interaction with Bausch, he asked if she would back a “prayer in school initiative” he intended to propose to the board, Hall told The Tribune.

When she said no, he got up, walked out and slammed the door.

That incident was also the first of several interactions where Bausch questioned Hall’s religious beliefs, she said.

“I wasn’t religious enough to suit him,” Hall said.

During another incident, Bausch told Hall she was a “weak old lady,” and said he would “personally destroy” her, she said, a threat he later repeated to Summers.

Bausch then referred to himself as not the devil, but Satan, Hall told The Tribune.

According to the censure, on Dec. 1, 2016, Bausch approached Summers following a meeting.

“He was just inches from my face, and he said, ‘I have a gun with big bullets, and I aim for the head.’ And he walked away from me,” Summers told The Tribune.

That comment, combined with years of perceived threats, aggression and misconduct by Bausch, served as the catalyst for his censure in 2017.

Paso Robles school board members feared Bausch

Several trustees indicated that the comments made them fear for their lives.

“We actually took it very seriously because he tended to be erratic and out of control at times,” Gibson said.

Bausch denied these comments in letters to the editor to the Paso Robles Daily News in 2017 and 2018.

In a letter to the editor published on March 17, 2017, Bausch said he had apologized for remarks that were “incorrectly perceived” by board members as personal threats, intimidation, insults and bullying. He claimed the remarks were made in public and were not directed to individuals.

“I view the censure as the board’s attempt to reign in what they consider to be a renegade board member who in their opinion is not a team player; or who says things that they feel are inappropriate and embarrassing to the district; and asks hard questions that they feel are too aggressive,” Bausch said in the 2017 letter.

Despite that, Bausch’s volatile behavior escalated following his 2017 censure, both Summers and Hall told The Tribune.

The point of a censure is to get someone to stop their behavior, Gibson said, but Bausch wouldn’t stop.

Both Summers and Hall said they were harassed at meetings not only by Bausch, but by community members as well.

One of the residents who regularly attended meetings was Michael Rivera, a City Council candidate who is also named as a possible conspirator in Lewis’ allegations. Summers and Hall believed the majority of people who came to harass and yell at the board were supporters of Bausch.

They said the meetings became so volatile that a city police officer had to attend.

During this time, Summers said someone placed a bag of dog feces outside her house, and on another occasion, someone smashed a cement bench in her yard outside her bedroom. She then put up a fence around her house as a safety precaution.

Stephanie Ulibarri, who was elected to the board in 2018, told The Tribune she first met Bausch when she was running for election. He had invited her, Chris Arend and Lance Gannon over for dinner, where he told them they needed to elect him as board president.

She said she thought it was strange and felt like she was being “collected.”

When she won her seat, she instead voted for Joel Peterson, and Bausch wasn’t happy with her after that, she said.

After a meeting where she voted in opposition to Bausch’s vote regarding an “excessive” audit of the budget, Ulibarri said Bausch followed her out to her car and said, “I guess you don’t want that swimming pool after all,” a reference to longtime plans to build a pool at Paso Robles High School.

She said she felt physically intimidated and, after that, always made sure she left meetings at the same time as another male board member. She said she felt Bausch followed her to her car to reprimand her for not voting the way he voted.

“There are people who just really, really love him, really respect him, really think that he’s, like, a fighter. Honestly, I thought that too,” Ulibarri said. “ I thought, ‘Gosh, he’s great. He really stands up for everyone. Isn’t this wonderful? He’s really getting to the bottom of things.’ And then I got to know him, and I thought, ‘I don’t think so.’

“He is really kind of evil. He’s not a great person,” she concluded.

Ulibarri said Bausch would often squander progress by drawing focus away from educational issues and toward personnel matters or rumors, like excessive audits, accusing board members of wrong-doing and trying to overturn his censure.

When Ulibarri was elected board president in 2019, she said Bausch was unhappy and for two to three uninterrupted minutes used his time to speak on an unrelated motion to demean her and her leadership.

She said she just sat there, and afterward, a couple people in the audience told her Bausch was awful.

“I think he thought he felt pretty good about the way he had berated me, because that was a time, again, he thought he was going to be president.”

She said Bausch would often use his size to intimidate her and other people on the board.

Bausch was ‘always suspicious,’ former superintendent says

Arend, who served alongside Bausch in the years following his censure, echoed comments from his former colleagues, describing Bausch as “physically aggressive” and the most difficult person he’s ever worked with.

Bausch was “very aggressive, gets very just downright nasty, and it’s not a pleasure working with him. At least it wasn’t for me,” Arend told The Tribune.

Arend said Bausch was always concerned that someone on the board or in the district was engaging in back-channel communications or that he was unaware of something other people were talking about.

Curt Dubost, who became superintendent in 2018, also said Bausch was “always suspicious of what was being discussed when he was not present.”

Arend recalled one incident where he and Dubost were speaking about something unrelated to the school district and Bausch burst in and “got very aggressive, leaned forward and demanded to know what we were talking about.”

Arend said he “bellowed back” because when someone leans toward him in an aggressive manner, he doesn’t put up with it. He said he felt he didn’t need to apologize to Bausch for yelling in return because his reaction was warranted.

Dubost confirmed this incident to The Tribune.

Arend said he and Bausch were more distanced after the incident and didn’t have much contact beyond board meetings or events.

Arend said he never personally felt harassed or intimidated by Bausch, but added that he could handle Bausch’s attitude.

“I spent my career in the legal profession, so such behavior is pretty irrelevant for me,” he said.

Dubost said he felt harassed and bullied by Bausch during his tenure. He said on at least two occasions, Bausch organized a one-on-one meeting only for Dubost to arrive and find other board members and their spouses in attendance “for a specific agenda,” likening it to an ambush.

He said Bausch “clearly sought to embarrass me and other senior staff” in public meetings or forums. One on occasion, Dubost recalled, Bausch refused to let a principal respond to questions that had been asked of her “because she intended to correct him.”

“It reached the point where I did contact an attorney and was prepared to take formal action against him if the abuse of me and my senior staff continued,” Dubost said.

Bausch regularly leaked closed sessions, misinformation and rumors to local radio station, former colleagues allege

Bausch’s threatening behavior was not the only thing the school board felt he needed to be held accountable for.

Former trustees told The Tribune that he regularly spread misinformation and rumors about district dealings and employees — an allegation that matches the behavior outlined by Lewis’ in his claim.

Arend said he wasn’t sure if Bausch started the rumors, but he definitely spread them.

“If he gets somebody in his sights and he hears anything at all that might be less than honorable about the person, he’ll tend to spread it. At least that was my experience,” Arend said.

One of these rumors, Hall, Summers and Arend said, was that a district employee was attending sex parties — a story that Lewis said Bausch repeated about him this past year.

Arend said this rumor was “completely unfounded” and something he would be ashamed to have spread.

According to several of Bausch’s former colleagues, he would feed the rumors and then leak closed-session information to local media, namely KPRL.

“They’d play a cute little rope-a-dope,” Gibson said. “I would call up KPRL and say, ‘You’re just literally lying to the public. You’re making false statements about what’s going on. And I don’t care if you have a difference of opinion about things, that’s fine, then state your opinion. But don’t lie about what is happening.’”

Gibson said KPRL would typically respond that they got the information straight from a school board member.

“It was very obvious where it was coming from,” Gibson told The Tribune.

Ulibarri also said Bausch was a regular guest on KPRL and she suspected he often shared closed session information, misinformation or rumors with the radio station.

“To work with him, you have to know he’s going to slander you,” Ulibarri said. “We would hear stuff that had been in closed session that we weren’t supposed to talk about. Then, we would hear it the next day on KPRL.”

Ulibarri said she was not surprised when she saw similar allegations against Bausch in Lewis’ claim, which alleged Bausch was working hand-in-hand with Cal Coast News reporter Karen Velie to leak closed-session information and rumors.

“Karen Velie, I bet you are being used — not in a rude context, but it’s the best word I can think of — you are being used as a tool by him,” Ulibarri said.

Matt McClish, who was appointed to the board in 2017 to fill in Dave Lambert’s sudden resignation, said Bausch practiced “psychological warfare” toward former Superintendent Chris Williams and the board members at the time.

He said he witnessed Bausch glaring toward Williams constantly in meetings, and said Bausch would regularly start unfounded accusations against or about Williams. Often, these rumors would be repeated on KPRL, McClish said.

Censure documents detail other allegations

Bausch’s censure documents also cite several instances in which he allegedly spread misinformation to the media.

On May 9, 2016, Bausch submitted an article to the Paso Robles Press, in which he said he was told at an April 12, 2016, board meeting that he was off-topic and had his “right to question approval of the Facilities Master Plan taken away from him.”

Bausch wrote in the article that if he were allowed to continue speaking, he would have discussed several non-agendized items — which would have violated the Brown Act.

Bausch also spread misinformation in that article, the censure said, stating he raised $60 million through a bond and was able to obtain another $60 million from Sacramento. The reality was, the censure said, that the maximum amount the district could get in matching funds from Sacramento was $21.6 million.

In a submission to the Paso Robles High School Crimson Newsmagazine on Dec. 13, 2016, Bausch shared his Governing Board’s self-evaluation instead of sending his goals, as the student newspaper had asked. This self-evaluation included negative comments about the district and board members, which the censure said was an attempt to portray the district and board in a negative light at a time when Bausch was threatening litigation.

He also “used poor discretion” when he contacted a local radio station on Nov. 2, 2016, to make a statement about an employee on administrative leave and anticipated litigation, the censure said. The censure did not name the radio station, but former trustees identified it as KPRL.

According to the censure, Bausch also negotiated directly and “actively colluded” with a vendor who was bidding for a contract with the district in April 2016.

Emails obtained by The Tribune at that time show Bausch negotiating directly with Quintron, a video surveillance company.

The censure and emails show Bausch had a previous business relationship with Quintron, which created “a real or perceived conflict of interest.” This opened the district up to possible legal action and caused the project to be delayed by several months, the censure said.

According to a letter to the editor Bausch sent to the Paso Robles Daily News and published on Oct. 15, 2018, Bausch said he did not have a previous business relationship with the company but said the company installed a telephone system for one of his businesses through his landlord. He said his landlord had a relationship with the company.

“I will never relinquish and never waiver from defending my God-given rights guaranteed by the First and Second Amendments. No board has that power,” Bausch wrote.

Bausch continued to try to overturn his censure. When it was brought back to the board and was voted to be upheld, he threatened litigation. Emails obtained by The Tribune show Bausch was still trying to overturn his censure as late as 2019.

McClish said Bausch was a “master manipulator” and said he wished Bausch could use his “powers” to benefit the education of Paso Robles schoolchildren, adding that Bausch could have been effective at obtaining funding grants if he had wanted to.

Grand jury investigates school board budget crisis

According to emails obtained by The Tribune, several of Bausch’s complaints and allegations about board members and personnel appeared to be rooted in the district’s budget crisis — the second since 2012.

And while Bausch had legitimate complaints about the very real financial woes of the district, others were completely unfounded, former district officials told The Tribune.

Bausch regularly accused trustees and employees of wrong-doing, his former colleagues said.

One rumor Bausch spread was that former superintendent Chris Williams stole $500,000 worth of kitchen equipment and gave it to a brewery Williams had an investment in, Arend told The Tribune.

When the claim was investigated, Arend said, nothing like that was found. The head of the Culinary Institute at the school stored $2,000 to $3,000 worth of kitchen equipment in his garage, but Arend said the Williams rumor appeared unfounded. Dubost and Ulibarri also confirmed they heard this unfounded rumor.

Bausch also insinuated that some trustees and the superintendent were taking kickbacks — which several trustees and former employees denied — and constantly threatened to have members arrested or reported to the District Attorney’s Office and grand jury.

Summers said the board realized there was an accounting error regarding the culinary department, which led to the board voting for a forensic audit. The grand jury did eventually investigate the district’s finances and found that the district was in its second financial crisis since 2012. It issued a report in November 2020.

The report said the district’s reserves had decreased to less than 1% of the budget due to poor budget management cause by turnover in the financial department and trustees making decisions based on inaccurate or incomplete financial information.

Trustees’ desire to support programs pitched by Williams influenced their judgment, leading to a lack of financial oversight, the report said. Williams took much of the heat for the district’s financial crisis and stepped down in December 2018, leaving with a $113,409 settlement.

Dubost told The Tribune that while Bausch was correct about several financial issues prior to and during Dubost’s tenure, he also spread blatant misinformation.

“I, in fact, spent a large part of my first year as superintendent responding to the grand jury and researching a series of often bizarre allegations made by Chris,” Dubost said. “All of them were thoroughly investigated, and except for a misdemeanor violation involving food services, which was prosecuted by the District Attorney’s Office, all others were unfounded.”

Bausch issues statement regarding time on school board

When asked multiple times to answer specific questions via email, on the phone and in-person, Bausch refused to respond on the record.

He eventually provided the following statement, demanding it be published “in whole, without edits, in real time and not in parts.”

“Around 2016, after four years of the school board diligently building the Paso Robles School District’s budget reserve to over 10%, programs were being cut, maintenance delayed, and reserves being spent to balance an annual budget inflated by the lofty but unaffordable goals of the new Superintendent and his rubber stamps on the school board. It became difficult to hire new teachers.

“When the school board turned a blind eye to out-of-control spending, I spoke out. The superintendent and board president warned me to keep quiet and fall in line. Instead, I proposed using surplus property to build workforce housing to attract new teachers. I also warned about what I saw as shortcomings in Measure M-16. Complaints about me surfaced that were supported only by the flimsiest of so-called evidence fabricated to make me resign.

“Instead of exercising their fiduciary responsibility, the superintendent and school board believed it was their duty to get rid of me. When I refused to resign due to their threats to destroy me, the superintendent and school board were literally forced to censure me based only on hearsay, rumor and innuendo. When I filed a records request to see the evidence, I was told all of the information had mysteriously disappeared. None of their allegations would have withstood scrutiny in a true court of law.

“The SLO County grand jury report, “A Cautionary Tale,” corroborated my warnings and added new ones. The superintendent was forced to resign, negotiating a $226,000 payoff in the process, and the school board was systematically replaced by voters.

“In addition, Measure M-16 failed to live up to all its grand promises. Where did all that money go?

“Perhaps some might say that there are a few parallels with yesteryear’s Paso Robles School Board and today’s situation at the city. I will not comment here but, if necessary, a legitimate court of law will decide if that is true. As it should be, voters will once again decide who stays in office and who should be replaced.”

This story was originally published November 4, 2024 at 5:00 AM.

Sadie Dittenber

The Tribune

805-781-7814

Sadie Dittenber writes about education for The Tribune and is a California Local News Fellow through the UC Berkeley School of Journalism. Dittenber graduated from The College of Idaho with a degree in international political economy.

Chloe Jones

The Tribune

Chloe Jones is a former journalist for The Tribune