Supervisors to Launch Search for New Administrative Chief

The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors said Tuesday that it will launch a nationwide search for a new chief administrative officer to replace Sally Reed, amid disclosures that the two front-runners from within county government don’t want the job.

The supervisors also decided in a closed session to appoint Reed’s chief assistant, Sandra Davis, to be interim chief administrative officer when Reed leaves June 1.

And, saying they have little time, the supervisors opted not to hire an executive search firm as they have in the past for such high-profile jobs. They plan to have all the candidates winnowed down to a list of five finalists by June 12, and to act quickly to appoint one before or soon after the new fiscal year starts July 1.

Reed announced earlier this month that she was leaving her $180,133 post, effective June 1, to take a far less lucrative job as head of the Department of Motor Vehicles in Sacramento.

For continuity’s sake--and because next year’s budget battles will just be getting underway when Reed leaves--several supervisors said they had hoped a longtime county official such as Davis, the assistant chief administrative officer, or Treasurer and Tax Collector Larry Monteilh was interested in the job.

Davis and Monteilh were both mentioned as immediate front-runners. But both said Tuesday they were content in their current jobs and that the timing wasn’t right to take on such a daunting task as being top administrator of the nation’s largest county, especially at a time when it faces a continuing fiscal crisis.