The following is from Ojai City Council candidate Paul Blatz:

In March 2010, Carlon Strobel, our City Clerk, submitted her resignation to be effective at the end of June.  The City Clerk’s position is an elected position and is independent from the city staff bureaucracy.  The City Clerk’s position is intended to be a “watch dog” position, overseeing city staff activities and working with citizens who feel they are aggrieved by any official act of the City.

In addition, the City Clerk is the official custodian of all City records, overseeing archival, retrieval, and the processing of public requests for records. The City Clerk is responsible for certification of records and for recording certain documents with the County of Ventura’s Recorder’s Office. Ojai’s City Clerk also serves as the Elections Official for the City, examining and verifying candidates’ documents, signatures and other legal requirements.

As you can see from the above, the City Clerk is there to protect us from too much power being vested in City Officials.  There must be a clear separation of these powers to assure independent over sight of our city staff.

However, there are two agenda items (Items #4 and #6) for the City Council’s June 8^th meeting in which our City Manager is suggesting that he:

1) Be appointed the “interim” City Clerk; and

2) Create a new Deputy City Clerk position to be appointed by the City Manager.

If the first proposal is approved, then there will be no one to be the “watch dog” in City Hall until a new City Clerk is appointed or elected.  With the length of time it has taken for the approval of the Skate Park and other projects, “interim” could literally take forever!!!   I don’t understand why it has taken this long to even begin looking for an interim City Clerk, to appoint new City Clerk, or call for a special election when Carlon’s resignation was submitted in March.

As responsible citizens, we must ask ourselves: Why do we need a Deputy City Clerk and why would the City Manager appoint this person when that person is supposed to be a watch dog over the City Manager?  Does this not create a conflict of interests?  Wouldn’t it make more sense to have the new City Clerk hire the person if its decided we even need this new position?   Looks to me like this is an obvious attack on the fundamental democratic principle of separation of powers within our city government.

Because of these two agenda items, I strongly encourage all of you to attend the City Council meeting on June 8^th and voice your opinion.

Thank You,

Paul Blatz

Candidate for Ojai City Council

Tagged as: city council, city manager