NEWPORT BEACH : City Manager Wynn Planning to Resign

Saying his job “isn’t fun anymore,” City Manager Robert L. Wynn plans to resign at the end of this year.

Wynn’s departure brings to a close a public-administration career that has spanned 35 years, 20 of them in Newport Beach.

“It isn’t what it used to be. More and more people are becoming critical of government, critical of authority,” Wynn, 60, said. “Look at all the claims (seeking money from the city) we get. When I first started, if we got a claim a month it was a conversation piece. AQMD requirements . . . all of that just kind of added up to: ‘This job isn’t fun anymore.’ ”

Wynn said he told the City Council during a closed session earlier this week that he planned to leave the post but would not make a formal announcement until next month.

“He’s going be tough to replace,” Mayor Phil Sansone said. “It’s going to be a tremendous loss. He’s a tremendous city manager.”

Kevin O’Rourke, president of the Orange County City Managers Assn., called Wynn “an institution” and a “great mentor.” He said the organization could always count on Wynn’s dry wit to help ease difficult situations.

After Wynn’s announcement next month, the council will begin working with an executive search firm to find a replacement, Sansone said.

Wynn said that he had been thinking of resigning for the last six months to a year and that he has no plans for another position.

However, he said he has been talking with UC Irvine and Orange Coast College about teaching local and state government classes. “I have no known plans other than I just want to do something different,” he said.

Wynn became Newport Beach’s city manager in 1971 after leaving the post of city manager of Imperial Beach. Before that, Wynn was city manager of Coronado for four years.

He cites the efficient city organization as one of his proudest achievements at Newport Beach.

Under his organizational style, the city’s 700 employees in 12 departments answer to the city manager, who reports to the City Council.

Twenty years ago, Wynn said, the system was quite different.

“When I arrived, there were four executive assistants in the city manager’s office. It just added to the bureaucracy,” he said. “Without that middle management, it’s cost-efficient and the communication is faster up and faster down.”

Sansone said it is Wynn’s low-key demeanor, sense of humor and sound financial planning that will be missed most at City Hall.

“He has a very, very good rapport with everybody. Nothing visibly fazes him, he can take complaints and not show frustration,” Sansone said. “And as a financial manager, I don’t think he has an equal in the state.”

Sansone said the city was close to operating in the red when Wynn was hired. “In a relatively short period of time, he got the budget balanced and hasn’t presented an unbalanced one since,” Sansone said.

Although he is looking forward to the change, Wynn said he has mixed emotions about leaving.

“I have a great deal of respect for the current City Council, a great deal of respect for my department directors,” he said, “but I just think that every once in a while . . . a change is good.”