Perk Package for Torrance Officials

On June 23, 1992, the Torrance City Council approved a budget containing very controversial and questionable perks for city management. At the same time, rank-and-file employees were not given raises due to a “cost-of-living increase freeze.”

This package, which contained $347,000 in “administrative leave compensation,” was the proposal of City Manager Leroy Jackson and had the full support of Mayor Katy Geissert, who stated, “There are department heads that (sic) were recruited . . . based on that package.”

It’s no secret that the budget shortfall in industry-and-merchant-rich Torrance is due to a number of liability settlements against the city, administrative incompetence (the purchase of unusable equipment, a $6.4-million investment scandal, etc.) and poor planning. Now, when the very people responsible for the budget crisis are faced with a limited amount of dollars available, instead of giving them to the people who do the real work, they blatantly continue to line their own pockets.

I don’t know about the rest of the voters, but if the people who brought us the inept signalization on Hawthorne Boulevard, Paragon Cable, street sweeping on both sides of the street on the same day, and have had Carson Street torn up for over a year feel like leaving the city, I have no problem with that. Perks should be earned, and we would be hard-pressed to find a less-deserving city management team than that of Torrance.

City administration is not a country club. Jackson and Geissert have insulted the intelligence of every resident of this city, and should clean out their desks immediately.

JOHN S. SOET

Torrance