A former Pedal Ahead manager makes the allegations in claims filed this week with SANDAG and the state air resources board.
A former manager at a nonprofit that promotes electric bikes with millions of dollars in public funding is accusing the organization’s founder of falsifying participation data and using public money to direct business to his own for-profit company with a similar name.
The allegations are included in a pair of legal claims filed this week by Rodrigo Rodriguez, who was hired in 2022 to work for the nonprofit Pedal Ahead e-bike project funded by the San Diego Association of Governments and the California Air Resources Board.
“Mr. Rodriguez witnessed waste, fraud and abuse consisting of actions by Edward Clancy (Clancy), the owner and chief executive officer of Pedal Ahead in connection with how Pedal Ahead performed the SANDAG and CARB contracts,” one of the claims says.
The legal claims, which are required before a plaintiff can proceed with a lawsuit against public agencies, were filed late Monday. They name SANDAG saying that the nonprofit was serving as an agent of of the organization.
The San Diego Union-Tribune reported Sunday that Pedal Ahead was the subject of multiple investigations, including a criminal probe opened earlier this year by the California Department of Justice.
Rodriguez said he was hired by the Pedal Ahead chief executive to manage the program, a publicly funded effort aimed at cutting greenhouse gas emissions by encouraging people to give up cars in favor of electric bicycles.
The claims against the regional planning agency known as SANDAG and the state air board accuse Clancy of telling Rodriguez to overstate enrollment in the pilot project, the number of bikes placed into service and the number of miles ridden by enrollees.
SANDAG officials said they do not comment publicly on legal disputes. CARB did not respond to a request for comment on the allegations. Both claims note that no one at either agency is accused of doing anything improper.
Clancy also did not respond to multiple requests for comment on the claims.
The claims seek tens of thousands of dollars in back pay, because Rodriguez said he was working as an agent of the two government agencies when he stopped getting paid after April 2023. They also demand attorneys’ fees.
Rodriguez said he is owed just over $40,000 for his SANDAG work with Pedal Ahead and about $58,000 for his efforts on behalf of the state.
According to the claims, in addition to misreporting data to both SANDAG and CARB, which earmarked more than $30 million to the nonprofit created in 2020, Clancy reissued dozens of bikes to participants who did not meet program objectives such as riding 100 miles per month.
By awarding the same bike to different people, Clancy made it appear that more riders were enrolled in the program than were actually participating, the claims said.
The claims also allege that the nonprofit avoided costs like geolocation equipment – which impeded an assault investigation.
“SANDAG was charged for GPS tracking, but the funds were not used for the stated purpose,” one claim said.
“When a participant was sexually assaulted, the GPS information was not available immediately because the GPS subscription for the bike involved had not been purchased,” the record added. “Up to 80 percent of the GPS subscriptions were not obtained.”
Rodriguez says that while he was working for both government entities, Clancy repeatedly sent him to make sales presentations for Clancy’s for-profit business Pedal Ahead Plus.
Clancy also hired former San Diego County Supervisor Nathan Fletcher as a Pedal Ahead Plus salesperson in order to generate contracts for the for-profit venture, the claims say. Rodriguez said he was told to advise Fletcher about details of the publicly funded e-bike program.
“Clancy repeatedly directed Mr. Rodriguez to brief Nathan Fletcher while he was a salesperson for Clancy’s for-profit business (Pedal Ahead Plus) throughout the Los Angeles region,” the claim says.
Fletcher said he never worked as a Pedal Ahead Plus salesperson.
“I don’t know anything about this individual’s claims but the mention of me is false as I was never employed or compensated by Pedal Ahead Plus and only provided informal advice to a friend who had a business idea,” Fletcher said in a text message Tuesday.
“Four years ago I joined with several other groups in helping secure funding for the launch of the nonprofit Pedal Ahead but I had no role in the CARB or SANDAG funding,” he said.
Fletcher awarded tens of thousands of dollars to Pedal Ahead while serving as San Diego County Board of Supervisors chair, records show. He also served on the state air board until Supervisor Nora Vargas succeeded him in early 2022.
The former county supervisor resigned from public office in May 2023, about six weeks after he was accused of sexual harassment and assault in a civil lawsuit.
Fletcher acknowledged having an inappropriate relationship with a public-relations specialist at the Metropolitan Transit System, where he also served as board chair. But he strongly denied the assault and harassment allegations. Earlier this year he filed a defamation lawsuit against his accuser, Grecia Figueroa.
Fletcher is not the only high-profile San Diegan referenced in the claims.
According to the documents, business leader Phil Blair worked closely with Clancy.
Manpower, the job-training and workforce company Blair co-founded years ago with business partner Mel Katz, provided payroll and other human-resources services to Pedal Ahead.
Among other things, Blair accompanied Clancy and Rodriguez on a trip to Northern California to recruit new business for the for-profit side of the e-bike enterprise, the claims say.
“During this trip, Mr. Rodriguez heard Clancy asking Blair to lend Clancy funds to hire Nathan Fletcher as a salesperson for their for-profit business (Pedal Ahead Plus),” the SANDAG claim says.
Before Clancy and Blair planned a trip to Europe, the Pedal Ahead founder asked Rodriguez to arrange female companionship for them while the two men were overseas, the claims alleged.
“Clancy directed Mr. Rodriguez to locate women in Amsterdam to coincide with Phil Blair and Ed Clancy’s trip to Amsterdam,” the documents say. “Text messages evidence this fact.”
Blair said he knew nothing about the allegations. He said his company placed Rodriguez on paid leave as soon as he raised concerns about Pedal Ahead, and extended that status more than once.
“Mr. Rodriguez indicated he did not want to return to work at Pedal Ahead, so Manpower offered to help him find a position with a different Manpower customer, and it offered resume review and interview coaching if Mr. Rodriguez preferred to find a job on his own,” said Blair, who writes a column for the Union-Tribune business page.
“Those offers remain open to Mr. Rodriguez,” he said.
The Union-Tribune report Sunday noted that Rider Safety Visibility, the formal name of the nonprofit organization Clancy founded four years ago, was the subject of multiple investigations.
In addition to the criminal probe that is underway by the state Department of Justice, Pedal Ahead is the subject of an internal investigation by Air Resources Board officials, records obtained by the Union-Tribune show.
According to the state, Pedal Ahead has received barely $1 million of the $31 million designated for e-bikes so far. The organization’s public tax filings, however, reflected much less revenue for 2023, a declaration Clancy said he planned to amend.
Meanwhile, SANDAG closed its review after four months, telling Clancy in a letter last Thursday that it would finish out the last months of its two-year pilot program with $3,600 monthly payments.
Clancy has a history of promoting bike races and political consulting, including helping elect Bob Filner to the San Diego mayor’s office a dozen years ago.
Clancy also wore a wire for the FBI when it was investigating Filner and former District Attorney Bonnie Dumanis for accepting political contributions from a Mexican business tycoon who was not legally permitted to donate to American political campaigns.