Koester Moves Up Departure to September

Ventura County Chief Administrative Officer Lin Koester will retire in mid-September rather than work through the end of the year, he said Thursday.

Koester will leave four months early because the county expects to have a list of finalists for the top job by then.

The county is paying Los Angeles-based DMG-MAXIMUS consulting firm $25,000 to conduct a statewide search.

Koester, 58, is building a vacation home east of Portland, Ore., and said he wants to get to the site before winter.

He has said repeatedly that neither his decision to retire nor to speed up the date was triggered by last year’s 3-2 vote by county supervisors to merge the mental health and social services departments.

“Issues come up, they go, they’re heavy, they pass,” he said. “I’ve been doing this for longer than I want to say, but that had no bearing.”

Koester had opposed the merger, which has since attracted state and federal investigations.

“He’s not given that [controversy] as a reason, but certainly it must have affected him,” Supervisor John K. Flynn said Thursday.

Earlier this year, Koester let supervisors know that he planned to leave in mid-July, when his contract expires. With the merger audits ongoing, however, supervisors persuaded him to stay longer and December was named as a departure date.

Koester came to the county’s top job in 1995 on a 3-2 vote by supervisors after 16 years as Simi Valley’s city manager.

Supervisor Susan Lacey, one of the two who first voted against him, remains in office. She and her colleagues later voted unanimously to renew Koester’s contract.

Supervisor Frank Schillo, who describes Koester as a workaholic, said he was the perfect candidate to take over the job in 1995.

Other supervisors could not be reached for comment Thursday.

As chief administrative officer, Koester--who earns $154,000 a year--oversees a range of county government issues including the annual budget and management of county agencies.

Koester said Thursday that he doesn’t know whether his retirement is permanent.

“I may come back after I decide I’m tired of fishing,” he said. “My thoughts at this point are to relax for a year or two.”