Manuela Albuquerque

After representing the city of Berkeley for 22 years, Albuquerque decided to leave the legal profession. But even in her time off, she found herself volunteering to write amicus briefs and immersing herself in city representation issues. So she came back to the work.

She now represents multiple cities in the Bay Area on a variety of issues, including the First Amendment, charter city powers, tax issues and rent control. "One of the dilemmas of being a city attorney is that every single problem of the city is a problem of yours," Albuquerque said.

One of those problems for the city of Redding was whether the city could contract out work for its call center that handled customer service calls for the city's many utilities departments. In January, a labor union representing Redding Electric Utility workers filed suit against the city in Shasta County Superior Court, alleging it broke a contract with the employees and illegally outsourced their work to an Oregon-based company.

Albuquerque successfully defended the city in that suit, SEIU v. Redding, in May, and through a thorough analysis compiled by the city itself, was able to prove that the city simply could not handle calls during peak hours because of unavailable staffing.

Albuquerque said she is happy with the outcome, as it shows that one blanket rule cannot be applied to every municipality in the state.

"Sometimes it's much more beneficial for a city to provide a certain service in-house, but that judgment has to be made based on the community," she said. "That's the basis for local government. It should not be a set of rules that has to be forced down every city's throat."

- DAVID RUIZ

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