O.C. CEO candidate takes page from Roeder

Paul Clinton

As he pursues Orange County’s top staff job, John Moorlach is looking

to a local role model for working with five elected officials who

usually have five different points of view.

Moorlach, a Mesa Verde resident who works as Orange County’s

treasurer, has put his name on the short list to replace Michael

Schumacher as the Orange County chief executive. If named to the

post, he’ll partly model his management style after Costa Mesa City

Manager Allan Roeder’s.

“You’ve got a model here in our own city,” Moorlach said Tuesday.

“You can have someone who works with five [elected officials], and it

can be a long-term relationship.”

In some ways, by vying for a job that, when politicized, can mean

short tenure, Moorlach says, he would be stepping into a sticky

situation.

The board fired Schumacher in January. It had hired him after

cutting loose Jan Mittermeier and, earlier, clashing with William

Popejoy.

The 47-year-old Moorlach, who submitted his name at the urging of

Supervisor Chris Norby, said he’s happy with his job.

Moorlach’s outspoken style won him kudos almost a decade a ago

when he spoke out about the county’s risky fiscal policies in the

months leading up the county’s 1994 bankruptcy declaration.

If hired, he said he wouldn’t alter that style.

“I’m a town crier,” Moorlach said. “I stand up when something

isn’t quite right.”

County Supervisor Jim Silva, who represents Newport-Mesa, was

traveling Tuesday afternoon and couldn’t be reached for comment.

After Norby approached him to submit his name, Moorlach said he

didn’t leap at the opportunity right away. But after weighing his

options, Moorlach said he called Norby’s office a week ago to get

into the race for the post.

Moorlach hasn’t submitted a resume or been interviewed for the

position. A San Diego employment recruitment firm is handling the

search, he said.

In March 1996, Moorlach ran successfully for the county’s top

financial post to replace former Treasurer Bob Citron. He won

reelection in 1998 and again in 2002.

Before his stint as the county’s treasurer, Moorlach spent 18

years at Balser, Horowitz, Frank & Wakeling, a Costa Mesa-based

accounting firm.