At-Large Supervisors, Two-Term Limit Urged

Orange County supervisors should be limited to two terms and be elected countywide rather than by district, the county grand jury said Thursday.

“The Board of Supervisors tends to take a narrow view of problems which may affect the county as a whole,” the grand jury said in a report reviewing the overall functioning of Orange County government.

“In the case of critical issues such as jails, airports and roads, supervisors in whose areas the problems are of lesser concern tend to play very little role in their resolution, exclusive of the final vote.”

The grand jury also said that, in general, “there has been insufficient urgency shown by the supervisors in addressing problems.

Election of supervisors by countywide ballot rather than district could help stop a “trend towards unmanageable crises and destructive confrontations” under the current system, the jurors said.

The grand jury said the supervisors should submit a ballot proposal to the voters on the question of limiting supervisors to two terms of four years each. There is no current limit on the number of terms a supervisor may serve.

Time in Service

Supervisor Thomas F. Riley has been in office 12 years, Harriett Wieder 8 1/2 years, Chairman Roger R. Stanton 6 1/2, Don R. Roth six months and Gaddi H. Vasquez two months.

There was no immediate comment from the supervisors.

The grand jury said a review of its 15 studies undertaken since last July showed a common trend pointing to “fundamental organizational deficiencies in the county.”

It said the conclusions in the report released Thursday represented a synthesis of its previous reports and were based on data from many sources.

The grand jury’s other findings and recommendations included:

- Consider reducing the number of executive assistants for each supervisor, now as many as six, and setting educational and experience standards for new assistants.

- Require all county agencies and departments to prepare short-term and long-range plans and integrate them with the next year’s budget proposals.

- Meet formally and regularly with elected agency and department heads.

- Review the effectiveness of the county’s Sacramento lobbyist, who is paid $168,000 a year, and the Washington lobbyist, who is paid $138,000 a year.

- Improve recruitment of minorities and women to the 74 executive management positions in county government. Just 13.5% of the executive management posts are held by women or minority group members, the jury said.