4 Vie for Social Services Director

Three managers in Ventura County’s Human Services Agency are on the short list of candidates vying to become county government’s next social services chief.

Four finalists will be interviewed by the Board of Supervisors at a special session Wednesday. They include three in-house candidates: Ted Myers, who runs foster care and child protection services; Bruce Stenslie, director of administrative services; and Barry Zimmerman, manager of welfare-to-work programs.

Supervisors are expected to select a replacement for agency director Barbara Fitzgerald as early as next week. Fitzgerald, 57, will retire April 16 after 34 years with the county.

A statewide recruitment netted eight applicants for the $130,000-a-year job, said Barbara Journet, the county’s human resources director. While the lackluster response was disappointing, the finalists are all qualified for the position, Journet said.

Word spread through the grapevine that several in-house candidates were being considered and that tends to discourage some outside applicants, Journet said.

Others were put off by the high cost of housing in Ventura County, she said. And a few said they were concerned about the shaky economy, the state’s $34-billion budget gap and possible funding cuts to local government, Journet said.

“They said that they are just not going to make a move at this time,” she said.

The job’s responsibilities include overseeing a social services agency with a $151-million budget, 1,050 employees and wide-ranging programs to serve the poor, aging and disabled.

Supervisor Steve Bennett said he will be looking for someone who can “motivate a large number of people and try to maximize services with shrinking budgets.”

Those qualities could describe Fitzgerald, who is credited with turning around an agency rocked by internal squabbles and plunging worker morale.

Fitzgerald moved the welfare division from one that hands out checks to a job-training department that helps recipients find jobs.

She inspired worker loyalty by setting up an in-house college program that helps lower-level clerks and secretaries earn degrees in social work.

Stenslie said he would attempt to follow in Fitzgerald’s footsteps. Stenslie, 45, came to county government eight years ago after a stint in the nonprofit community.

He started in a jobs program before transferring to the county executive’s office and then the social services agency.

He is in charge of administrative functions for the Human Services Agency. Stenslie is a former executive director of the Candelaria Indian Council in Ventura and Oxnard.

He lives in Ojai with his wife, Julie, and their two children.

Zimmerman, 37, worked as an accountant and controller for several private businesses before joining the county seven years ago. In one job, he audited defense contracts for the federal government.

He is in charge of the county’s welfare-to-work programs, which operate out of neighborhood hubs across the county. Zimmerman said he is drawn to the complexity of government and the chance to serve the public.

He and his wife, Carol, live in Ventura, where they are raising three children.

Myers could not be reached for comment.

No information was available on the fourth candidate.