Oxnard Expected to Raise City Clerk’s Salary by $1,800 : Government: Daniel Martinez threatened to sue when council switched from automatic to merit-based increases.

Oxnard City Clerk Daniel Martinez is expected to receive a $1,800-a-year pay hike Tuesday, ending threats of legal action and months of political wrangling.

At its meeting Tuesday, the Oxnard City Council will consider boosting the salaries of the city clerk and treasurer--an issue that brought allegations of undermining the independence of those positions.

“I hope that it brings closure to this issue,” Mayor Manuel Lopez said. “But I think it was kind of a problem that could have been avoided.”

Under Oxnard’s system of government, the city clerk and city treasurer each wears two hats and is paid separately for each.

For their duties as elected officials, the clerk and treasurer have been paid $3,600 a year. The council is considering raising that pay to $5,400 a year.

For their duties as department heads, Martinez earns about $43,000 a year while Treasurer Dale Belcher earns about $53,000. Those positions used to get automatic pay increases until the officeholder hits the top of the pay scale.

But those automatic raises stopped late last year when the City Council voted to switch to raises based on merit. That decision only affected Martinez because Belcher already had reached the top of the pay scale.

Martinez was converted to a pay-for-performance system, where any raise was contingent on job performance. Martinez threatened to sue, arguing that the pay raise was guaranteed by city law.

Nevertheless, City Manager Tom Frutchey conducted an evaluation and concluded that Martinez was too inexperienced to efficiently run the clerk’s office. Frutchey also recommended that Martinez’s automatic pay raise be denied.

Based on that recommendation, the City Council denied the automatic pay hike in April but agreed to increase the pay for performing elected duties.

For Martinez, it amounts to less than the 5% that had been guaranteed under the old system.

Still, Martinez said if the council approves the pay raise Tuesday, he will consider it a victory. He said he will drop his threatened lawsuit.

The fact that he will likely get a pay raise, he added, indicates that Frutchey’s scathing evaluation was off the mark.

“I’m still learning how to do things, but it doesn’t help very much when a lot of the policies are not in writing,” Martinez said.

Oxnard is one of only three cities in the county--the others are Ojai and Fillmore--that elect city clerks. Other cities appoint the clerk.

When the automatic pay raise was suspended, Martinez and his supporters expressed concern that the independence of the clerk’s elected position could be undermined.

His supporters also accused Councilman Michael Plisky of opposing the automatic pay hike because of lingering rancor over Martinez’s victory over former clerk Mabi Covarrubias Plisky--the councilman’s wife--in the 1992 election.

As the pay process was being reviewed, council members suggested that the council take another look at the ordinance that stipulates that city clerks be elected rather than appointed. That review is yet to be done.

Now, Martinez and council members say they are hoping to put the issue behind them.

“I think it’s important that they (Martinez and Belcher) get this adjustment,” Councilman Andres Herrera said. “I hope this puts the issue to rest.”