Opponents want trustee to resign
Michael Miller
A coalition of school officials and other citizens stood up at the
Coast Community College District Board of Trustees’ meeting on
Wednesday to demand the resignation of board member Armando Ruiz.
The trustee, whose retirement and subsequent reelection last fall
led many to question his honesty, sat quietly on the panel as members
of the public rose to confront him. Most of the speakers were
signatories of a petition last month that sought a special election
to recall Ruiz.
Ruiz offended many in the community last October when he retired
from two state jobs -- a full-time counseling position in the South
Orange County Community College District and a part-time seat on the
board of trustees -- on the same day. By retiring from the two
positions simultaneously, through a state law, Ruiz was able to
calculate both pensions according to the salary from his full-time
job. Reportedly, the move boosted his total pension to more than
$100,000 a year.
Four days after leaving both positions, Ruiz ran for reelection to
the board of trustees as an incumbent and won. Although the action
was legal, many accused him of defrauding voters and double-dipping
into the state pension fund.
The trustees’ meeting on Wednesday, which was called specially for
a budget discussion, gave Ruiz’s opponents an opportunity to address
him in person.
“Unlike any other elected official, we are termed trustees, and
‘trustee’ is on your name plate,” said Martha Fluor, a board member
of the Newport-Mesa Unified School District. “Do the right thing.
Apologize, resign and forfeit your ill-gotten retirement.”
Jean Forbath, the founder of Share Our Selves in Costa Mesa, asked
Ruiz to “save the taxpayers and the district the pain of a recall
election.”
Ruiz was not available after the meeting to respond to the
comments.Last month, 20 individuals -- including Fluor, Forbath and
fellow coast district Trustee Jerry Patterson -- filed a notice of
intention with the Orange County registrar of voters, seeking to
circulate a recall petition. An attorney for the signatories
delivered the notice to Ruiz on May 22.
The petitioners, in their notice of intention, claimed that Ruiz
deceived voters by listing himself as an incumbent on the November
ballot and that he wasted state funds by taking full-time pay for his
part-time trustee job. In addition, the filing labeled Ruiz “the
district’s junket king,” claiming that he has charged taxpayers
$107,000 for travel expenses.
On May 31, Ruiz filed a furious response with the registrar of
voters, calling the signatories’ plan a “deceptive recall” and
painting Patterson as “an angry man who wants to grab political
control.”
Responding to the notice, Ruiz argued in his written statement
that he did not retire from his two jobs through a “loophole,” but
took his earned retirement from the other district where he worked.
He did not mention the issue of his pension from the Coast District.
“My retirement is not costing the South Orange County Community
College District or the Coast Community College District any money at
all, because they’re no longer contributing to my retirement,” Ruiz
said Wednesday before the meeting. “The state of California is paying
my retirement.”
He also claimed that he followed the Orange County registrar of
voters’ instructions in running for reelection and that his travel
expenses had gone toward trips to advocate for college programs. A
genuine waste of public money, he argued, would be the recall
election, whose cost he estimated at $850,000.
“I think people, if they read my [response] statement, will
realize it’s sour grapes on Jerry Patterson,” Ruiz remarked. “Eight
hundred and fifty thousand dollars that will be taken away from
classroom education is wrong.”
At the meeting on Wednesday, a dispute arose over another charge
in Ruiz’s written response. Ruiz claimed that Patterson had attempted
to defeat him and board member Paul Berger, who died in January, in
the last two elections. Patterson vehemently denied the charges,
saying that he endorsed Berger in his last reelection.
“Mr. Ruiz has crossed the line of decency and fairness in his
completely false and untruthful personal attack upon me,” Patterson
said.
Responding to the second point on Ruiz’s statement, Patterson
denied his colleague’s claim that Ruiz was “instructed” by the
registrar of voters to file for reelection as he did.
“What do you suppose the registrar would have told Ruiz if he
said, ‘I am the incumbent now, but plan to resign as the incumbent
before the election?’” Patterson asked.
Suzanne Slupsky, the county’s assistant registrar of voters, said
Ruiz had done nothing wrong by listing himself as an incumbent on the
November ballot. According to county law, candidates may list an
occupation or vocation that they held in the 12 months prior to
filing paperwork to run for office. Ruiz identified himself on the
November ballot as a “governing board member” of the coast district.
“There’s no statute that prevents someone from doing that,”
Slupsky said.
* MICHAEL MILLER covers education and may be reached at (714)
966-4617 or by e-mail at michael.miller@latimes.com.
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