Kreitzer Resigns From County Panel

Saying that his participation had become superfluous, Shlomo Kreitzer on Tuesday stepped down as an executive officer of the Mental Health Board.

Kreitzer’s resignation comes two weeks after the Board of Supervisors ousted the panel’s chairman, John Chaudier. Supervisors voted 3 to 2 to remove Chaudier, despite a recommendation by the 10-member advisory panel to reappoint him for a third term.

“At this time, I don’t believe the current management of the Behavioral Health Department wants the active involvement of the Mental Health Board,” Kreitzer told supervisors. “Nor do I think the majority of this board values the opinion of the Mental Health Board.”

Kreitzer, a retired clinical psychologist who worked at the former Camarillo State Hospital for 34 years, is the latest casualty in the county’s failed mental health merger.

Some members of the Mental Health Board believe Chaudier was ousted because he supported the county’s ill-fated attempt to merge its mental health and behavioral health departments. The 9-month-old merger was dismantled in December, after federal officials determined that it violated organizational rules.

Several state and federal audits followed, one of which uncovered nearly a decade of faulty Medicare billing practices. The county settled that matter for $15.3 million.

Several officials who had supported the merger have since quit, been forced to resign, or have been reassigned.

On Tuesday, Kreitzer said the failed merger was not to blame for the worst financial fiasco in county history. He noted that the faulty Medicare billing practices were ongoing years before the merged agency was established in 1998.

After Kreitzer quit, a few other members of the Mental Health Board said they were also considering leaving the panel in protest of Chaudier’s ouster and Kreitzer’s resignation.