Cone Won’t Apply for Job of Lawndale City Manager

Lawndale’s acting City Manager Paula Cone said Thursday she is taking herself out of the running for the $60,000-a-year city manager’s job.

Regarded as a likely contender for the top job at City Hall, Cone, 41, said in an interview that she will have surgery in a few weeks and has decided not to apply. She has worked for the city since 1969 and has been assistant city manager since 1981.

The city manager’s job became vacant last month when Paul J. Philips resigned amid criticism of his 4 1/2-year administration. After a series of closed-door sessions on Philips’ job performance, members of the City Council said they were dissatisfied with his administration of the Planning Department and the Neighborhood Watch program.

Philips resigned during one of the closed sessions in December. The resignations of Philips and Planning Director Nancy Owens and the firing of City Treasurer Ray Wood for losing $1.68 million in city money in a disastrous speculative securities investment has nearly depleted the city’s top management ranks.

(Lawndale on Wednesday joined several other municipalities in a lawsuit seeking to recover at least $8.4 million in losses and $16 million in damages from E. F. Hutton, First Investment Securities and six individual brokers who handled ill-fated investments. The suit was filed in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles on behalf of Lawndale, San Marino, Palmdale and its Redevelopment Agency, the Maywood Community Redevelopment Agency and the Three Valleys Municipal Water District in the San Gabriel Valley.)

Mayor Sarann Kruse said Thursday that the City Council will discuss seeking a temporary city manager to oversee city business during Cone’s absence.

“We are going to need somebody on an interim basis,” she said.

The council probably will try to hire a retired city manager or municipal consultant who is familiar with the South Bay area, Kruse said.

The city is conducting a recruitment drive to find a new city manager and has set March 18 as the deadline for applications, Cone said.

Cone declined to discuss her upcoming surgery or her reasons for dropping out of the competition. She said she may be off work for as little as two weeks, but wanted to alert the City Council on Thursday so it could prepare for a longer recuperation if necessary.