Group seeks trustee’s recall

Michael Miller

A group of Orange County residents is seeking to recall Coast

Community College District trustee Armando Ruiz, whose resignation

and subsequent reelection last fall upset many in the community.

Twenty people, including fellow district trustee Jerry Patterson,

Newport-Mesa school board member Martha Fluor and former Newport

Beach mayor Jean Watt, have signed a notice of intention to be filed

with the Orange County Registrar of Voters.

The notice claims that Ruiz deceived voters by listing himself on

the November ballot as an incumbent after announcing his resignation

four days earlier and that he wasted state money by taking full-time

pension pay for his part-time trustee job.

“He was basically, through a loophole in the law, able to make

himself entitled to a huge retirement,” Fluor said. “It may be a

loophole, but it’s just truly unethical in my opinion, with all

community colleges and public schools struggling with finances.”

On Wednesday, the Registrar of Voters said it had received the

notice of intention.

The petitioners aim to force a special election in the upcoming

months to recall Ruiz from the board. Ruiz, 62, was not available for

comment. He was served with a notice earlier this week.

The dispute over Ruiz began in the fall, when on Oct. 31, he

resigned from two jobs -- one a full-time position as an

administrator in the South County Community College District, the

other a part-time seat on the Coast Community College District’s

board of trustees.

By doing so, Ruiz made use of a state law that allowed officials

with two government positions to collect state pensions from both

jobs, based on the highest annual salary.

Ruiz’s pension, which reportedly topped $120,000, would have been

considerably less if Ruiz had retired from the jobs on different

days.

Ruiz ran for reelection to the board of trustees on Nov. 2 last

year and won.

Among the signatories on the petition is Bonnie Castrey, a

Huntington Beach Unified School District administrator who ran

unsuccessfully against Ruiz in November.

“People were calling in and congratulating me because people

thought he had resigned,” Castrey said about the November election.

“Frankly, I was really appalled that well-informed people didn’t even

understand the implications of him running as an incumbent and doing

what he had done. So it’s the whole issue of his unethical behavior

that caused me to look into recalling him.”

Brett Rowley, legislative analyst for the Registrar of Voters,

said that after his office receives the notice of intention, it will

give Ruiz a go-ahead to file an answer document.

Afterward, the proponents must gather signatures from 10% of

registered voters in the district for an official petition to put the

recall item on the ballot.

* MICHAEL MILLER covers education and may be reached at (714)

966-4617 or by e-mail at michael.miller@latimes.com.