Some Officials Regret Forcing Planner Stiles’ Resignation : Ventura: Commissioner was asked to choose between advisory post and accepting a city design contract. Council votes on conflict-of-interest policy today.

Two weeks after forcing a planning commissioner to resign his post in order to accept a city work contract, some Ventura City Council members say they made a mistake.

“We put the cart before the horse, basically,” said Councilwoman Rosa Lee Measures, who made the original motion ordering Curtis Stiles to give up his commission post to be permitted to design a downtown plaza for the city.

Measures and Mayor Tom Buford now say city appointees should be allowed to serve on city committees while the city is paying them to work on a contract. Councilman Jim Monahan voted against Measures’ motion last month and said he still believes Stiles should not have been forced to resign.

The council will vote today on what kind of conflict-of-interest policy Ventura should have regarding its volunteer commissioners, who staff advisory boards ranging from the Planning Commission to the tourism committee.

State law merely requires appointees not to use their post to lobby for city contracts or discuss or vote on a contract in which they have a personal stake.

Some council members, however, say they are worried not just about illegal conflicts of interest, but the public perception that city work flows more regularly to those with City Hall connections.

Thus, the council will consider a policy that goes beyond state law to insist that an appointee resign to accept paid work for the city.

“If somebody is going to volunteer for the city, great, but then they shouldn’t work for the city,” said Councilman Gary Tuttle, who said he will vote for the more restrictive policy. Councilman Steve Bennett said he also favors keeping city appointments strictly separate from city contract work.

Councilmen Jack Tingstrom and Gregory L. Carson could not be reached for comment.

Stiles, the former planning commissioner, said he hopes the council decides to stick with the policy outlined by California law. He added, however, that he would not immediately return to the Planning Commission if the council gives the nod to the more lenient policy.

“I’ve got too much emotion involved in this right now,” he said. “I’ll do it again, (but) some time in the future.”

The brouhaha began last month, when city planners asked the council to approve a $25,000 contract with Stiles, a local landscape architect, for the redesign of California Street Plaza.

The area is now a cluster of vacant storefronts at the south end of California Street, next to the beach promenade and across from the Holiday Inn. City officials hope to renovate the plaza as part of an overall downtown redevelopment project. Plans include a new restaurant with outdoor dining.

Stiles has said he offered twice to resign his city appointments--he also sat on Ventura’s architectural review committee--but city staff members repeatedly assured him that would be unnecessary.

But council members thought otherwise. After about an hour of debate, they said Stiles would have to make a choice between the committees and the contract.

“As of this evening, whether you say I have integrity or not, I feel humiliated,” Stiles said before resigning from the committees, turning down the contract on which he had already started to work and storming out of City Hall.

Profuse apologies from City Council members during the next couple of days finally persuaded Stiles to remain on the plaza project. Council members took a beating, however, from other city appointees who threatened to resign themselves and who spoke publicly of how such a city policy could prevent local experts from serving on city committees.

But Buford said it was a closer reading of the law that ultimately reversed his opinion.

“I don’t think everybody expects to do the right thing every time,” he said. “After looking at all the rules, I changed my mind.”