ORANGE : D.A. Reviewing Panel Appointment

The Orange County district attorney’s office is reviewing a complaint that the City Council acted improperly in appointing Mark Murphy to the city Planning Commission last month.

The review is the second this week by the district attorney’s office concerning the Planning Commission.

On Monday, Chief Assistant Dist. Atty. Maurice L. Evans said his office was also considering a complaint that Don Greek, a City Council candidate and former planning commissioner, violated state conflict of interest codes while serving on the commission.

Murphy, who replaced Greek on the commission, was appointed by the council Sept. 18 despite the protests of residents who said that Murphy had missed the Sept. 4 filing deadline.

Following an investigation by the city attorney’s office, the council voted unanimously to confirm the appointment. Mayor Don E. Smith told residents at the time that Murphy’s resume had been “lost in the shuffle” but had actually been on file for months.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Donna Crandall said her office had received a request to “look into that particular appointment” and the procedures that led to the council’s selection.

The complaint filed with the district attorney alleges that Murphy’s resume was not received by the city clerk’s office until Sept. 7, three days after the filing deadline. The complaint also states that a City Council agenda made available to the public on Sept. 6 already listed the appointment of Murphy, though his resume was not received until the following day.

Dale Rahn, a Planning Commission candidate, was one of the residents who protested the selection process. “If we were in a competitive bidding situation, his bid would’ve been thrown out for being late and delinquent,” Rahn said.

But Murphy contends that the city clerk’s office has kept a copy of his resume in its “skills file” for some time and called the complaint a “classic misunderstanding of the process.”

“It’s no different than any other position that I’ve been appointed to,” said Murphy, who has also served on the city’s Centennial Commission and the Community Video Advisory Board. “All I know is that I followed the rules.”

City Clerk Marilyn Jensen said candidates for appointed positions are often pulled from the skills file and that Murphy, who is a senior sales representative for the Apollo Systems Division of Hewlett-Packard in Irvine, was not required to submit an updated resume to be eligible for the post.

When Murphy did submit an update, it was “buried under a stack of papers” in the city manager’s office until it surfaced Sept. 7, Jensen said.

Residents who protested the selection process complained that not all candidates were considered equally and that Murphy’s appointment was a reward for serving as campaign manager for Councilman Gene Beyer, who is running for mayor.