Build on the Successes

The challenge facing Ventura County’s Board of Supervisors this week as it welcomes a new member and begins a new year is to build on recent successes without falling back into old bad habits.

With Steve Bennett replacing Supervisor Susan Lacey, Christine Cohen replacing Auditor-Controller Tom Mahon and a yet-to-be-recruited chief administrator to replace Harry Hufford within a few months, it’s time to make the most of current momentum in a few key areas.

Voter rejection of Measure O--Community Memorial Hospital’s campaign to divert the county’s $260-million share of the national tobacco settlement into private pockets, primarily its own--did nothing to resolve a decade-long feud between Community Memorial and the publicly owned Ventura County Medical Center. The very real economic issues that first put these neighboring institutions at odds remain and are about to get worse as both face state-mandated earthquake retrofits that could cost millions.

There is a ray of hope in the fact that the two sides quietly have begun meeting to find ways to work together. That sort of cooperation is a far more productive course of action than further costly skirmishes in court or at the ballot box. We encourage the new board and chief administrator Hufford to use both carrot and stick to get these two stubborn institutions pulling in the same direction.

Hope, too, can be seen in Sheriff Bob Brooks’ offer to discuss revising the county ordinance that directs about $40 million a year from the Proposition 172 sales tax solely to the Sheriff’s Department, district attorney’s office, public defender’s office and Probation Department. Thanks in part to mandated annual increases greater than the inflation rate, in the five years this ordinance has been in effect, the budgets of these four agencies have ballooned while other county departments have languished. Resolving this unhealthy trend is another top priority for the new board.

In the year since he came out of retirement to rescue Ventura County from an embarrassing jam, veteran administrator Hufford has done a lot to put the county on a sustainable path. He trimmed his way out of a $5-million budget deficit, sought to limit end runs by department heads directly to individual supervisors and proposed a set of changes to strengthen the chief administrator’s office for whoever takes his place when he resumes his retirement April 1.

And that is the biggest challenge facing the board.

To keep county government moving on the positive course Hufford has steered, his replacement must be equally savvy, diplomatic and strong. A consulting firm has begun a statewide search for candidates, but no names have been made public.

“This job is supposed to make hard decisions and take tough positions,� Hufford told The Times. “This board needs someone who is willing to do that. It’s going to take strength and knowledge. This is not a place for beginners.�

No place for beginners, indeed. Fortunately, the Board of Supervisors begins this new year with a little momentum in key areas. We wish them well.