Sheriff-Elect Plans Shake-Up of Management

Orange County Sheriff-elect Mike Carona is moving quickly to change the department’s senior management structure as he prepares to choose his top assistants, a move that could allow him to install his campaign manager, attorney George Jaramillo, as second in command.

The Board of Supervisors will decide Tuesday whether to grant Carona’s request to abolish current requirements for assistant sheriffs, including that they must have served the department at least two years in the rank of captain. The new rules would require only that assistant sheriffs had worked for a law enforcement agency and be certified peace officers.

Carona, now the county marshal, said Friday he wants the flexibility to choose his own leadership team and to abolish the post of undersheriff. That job is held by Raul Ramos, a boyhood friend and longtime assistant to departing Sheriff Brad Gates.

But Carona said he wasn’t ready to announce whom he has chosen for the four assistant sheriff positions. He would not say whether one of them would be filled by Jaramillo, a former Garden Grove police sergeant who has led Carona’s transition team since the sheriff’s election in June.

Union officials said Friday they have met with Jaramillo and are willing to let Carona choose his own leadership, even if it comes from outside the department. Sheriff’s Department insiders have held management positions there for 54 years.

“We’re willing to trust Carona with his judgment,” said Augie Alvarez, president of the Assn. of Orange County Deputy Sheriffs. “If they can do the job, fine. If they can’t do the job, then he’ll be hearing from us.”

He said Carona spoke at the union’s general membership meeting in October--the first sheriff or sheriff-elect to do so--and got a standing ovation.

“He said all the right things,” Alvarez said. “We all want a smooth transition.”

Jaramillo made headlines in 1997 by filing a complaint against the Garden Grove Police Department alleging discrimination against women and minorities. Jaramillo, who is Latino, later settled with the city and was promoted to lieutenant before retiring and becoming Carona’s campaign manager. In July, Carona hired Jaramillo as a full-time employee of the marshal’s office.

Jaramillo angered many in the union earlier this year by filing a lawsuit on behalf of Carona’s campaign alleging that the deputies union and the Santa Ana Police Officers Assn. made illegal campaign expenditures for a rival candidate, Santa Ana Police Chief Paul Walters. A Superior Court judge ruled in favor of the Carona campaign, but the decision was overturned on appeal.

Jaramillo would not say Friday whether he will join the Sheriff’s Department. But he praised the union for its cooperation during the transition.

“The unfortunate part of the campaign was that everyone took their best shot and fought their best fight, and everyone got their nose a little bloodied,” he said.

If approved by the Board of Supervisors, the job qualification changes would take effect Jan. 4, when Carona is sworn in to succeed Gates, the county’s sheriff since 1974.

Carona also is asking supervisors to create a separate class of “at-will” employees so that he and other department heads could hire managers who would report directly to them. The new classification, which would include executive assistants in the county Board of Supervisors office, would offer annual salaries ranging from $26,940 to $90,336.

That salary range is needed to attract highly qualified employees, Carona said. In the Sheriff’s Department, civilian managers would be hired to take over certain jobs now held by $80,000-a-year lieutenants who also must be included in the public safety retirement system, which is more costly to the county than the civilian system.

For example, Carona said he plans to hire civilian public information, data systems and financial officers for the department.

Also on Tuesday, the Board of Supervisors will consider small raises for Dist. Atty.-elect Anthony J. Rackauckas Jr. and Auditor-Controller-elect David Sundstrom. Supervisors rejected raises in the past year for Dist. Atty. Mike Capizzi and Auditor-Controller Steve E. Lewis after unflattering job performance reviews.

The salary changes would raise the district attorney’s pay from $128,731 a year to $131,269--the amount paid to both County Counsel Laurence E. Watson and Public Defender Carl Holmes. The auditor-controller’s pay would rise from $106,683 to $109,242 a year, which is what Sundstrom now earns as the county’s director of internal audits.