Opening the door -- and barely looking back

Lolita Harper

COSTA MESA -- The city won’t have Deputy City Clerk Mary Elliott to

push around anymore -- or perhaps it’s the other way around.

Either way, staffers are mourning the departure of Elliott, who is

touted as running a tight ship while livening up the office with snappy

remarks and witty commentary.

Elliott, a Costa Mesa resident, is scheduled to retire Friday after 29

years of working for the city. Grief regarding her departure is not

reciprocal, Elliott said. She said she can’t wait to “throw away her

alarm clock” and just relax.

“It is just time, you know,” Elliott said. “I’m 72. I want to have

some fun.”

City Manager Allan Roeder said he has had a wonderful working

relationship with Elliott and laughed about the times the two played

“good cop-bad cop” regarding late agenda reports. Both Roeder and Elliott

share responsibility for ensuring agenda packets are made available in a

timely fashion, he explained.

“And, yes, from time to time, she would crack the whip about late

reports, or sometimes I do that. It goes back and forth,” Roeder said.

Elliott laughed when she thought of her tough-guy reputation around

City Hall.

“I’m pretty quiet except when it comes to the workplace. Then I’m very

talkative, especially when agenda reports are late,” Elliott said. “Allan

teases me about it. He tells me, ‘We still love you even though you yell

at us.”’

That adoration was apparent when colleagues spoke of Elliott.

Traci Mabe, the city clerk’s office specialist, described Elliott as

loyal. Ruth Delaney, the administrative secretary in the department, said

Elliott is one of the most dedicated people she has ever met. Roeder

echoed her sentiment, saying Elliott’s most defining attributes are

consistency and hard work.

Elliott may at only 5 feet, 2 inches tall, but her presence at City

Hall is commanding. Her vast knowledge of the city is impressive and

overwhelming, her colleagues agree.

“The thing that impressed me the most about Mary was how knowledgeable

she was about the city,” Mabe said. “She knows everything about Costa

Mesa.”

While Elliott may know a lot about the city, not many people in the

city know a lot about what Elliott does. The deputy city clerk said she

has three essential functions.

The first is to ensure agenda reports are ready for the City Council

members and the public before meetings and to ensure the subsequent

minutes are reported afterward.

“The schedule is really tight,” Elliott said. “One week it’s agenda

packets, the next it’s the minutes. The deadlines are constant.”

Roeder said Elliott holds an extremely important position that is

often taken for granted.

“A lot of people don’t realize that for every hour that we spend in

the formal discussion of an issue in council chambers, there is probably

another five hours worth of work on Mary’s part, helping us get to that

point and all the follow-up afterward,” Roeder said.

Elliott is also charged with keeping all the original records and

documents for the city and ensuring the public has access to them.

“We are very public-oriented here, and that is good,” Elliott said.

“That is the way it should be.”

While she is willing to help residents, she can’t help but chuckle at

some of the requests callers have had over the years that have nothing to

do with the city.

People ask for everything from directions to phone numbers to Costa

Mesa businesses. The most common mistake people make is thinking the

Department of Motor Vehicles is run by the city, she said.

“They are a state agency,” she reminded.

Her best memories of her time at City Hall stem from the people she

has worked with over the years, she said.

“There are a lot of good, really good people here, who work hard to

get things done,” Elliott said.

She will miss her colleagues but not the job, she said. And she

promised to take time off from visiting her grandchildren, or working

around the house, or volunteering to come back to visit her friends.

Bill Morris, the director of the Public Service Department, may even

get a phone call from Elliott more frequently, Elliott said, if the

traffic light under construction on Wilson Street ends up congesting

traffic near her apartment complex.

“I threatened him that I will e-mail him every week -- or call -- if

that signal doesn’t work,” Elliott said, laughing.

* Lolita Harper covers Costa Mesa. She may be reached at (949)

574-4275 or by e-mail at o7 lolita.harper@latimes.comf7 .