Moving on out, up

SANTA ANA — John Moorlach is Orange County’s longest-serving elected official who’s now in office. And at 6-foot-5, he’s probably one of the tallest.

When he’s sworn in as the 2nd District county supervisor on Tuesday, he’ll represent Costa Mesa, where he lives, as well as Newport Beach, Huntington Beach and 10 other cities and unincorporated areas.

Moorlach, 50, is a big man taking on a big job.

He’ll be diving into a contentious annexation struggle between Costa Mesa and Newport Beach, and he’ll help to decide the future of the county’s redevelopment areas, including Santa Ana Heights.

But the first thing Moorlach plans to tackle is county pensions.

“I certainly want to make sure that we can pay our retirement benefits when they’re due,” he said Friday, in between moving loads of boxes to his new office. “It’s a long-term proposition and we just have to hope that our economy is always growing.”

But the real estate market has already showed signs of cooling, and economists are predicting a more widespread slowdown next year, Moorlach said. That could force difficult choices on county leaders.

This budget year, a real estate boom fattened the county’s coffers with an extra $96 million in property taxes, but employee pension contributions also rose by $78 million.

“We proverbially dodged the bullet this year,” Moorlach said.

In his new position, which he was elected to in June, Moorlach also will have to fight the perception that he’s the enemy of employee benefits.

“For me, I think, the unions have tried to vilify me, so I have to let the employees realize that I’m there to make sure their benefits are protected and we’re looking at the overall financial perspective,” he said.

Misconceptions about him are a familiar battleground. When he first ran for treasurer — and lost to incumbent Robert Citron — in 1994, he was predicting a financial disaster that hit later that year.

No one listened, until Citron’s risky investments bankrupted the county and Moorlach was appointed to replace him.

“Everybody thought I was this mean, nasty kid going after sweet, little old Bob Citron,” Moorlach said. “It took awhile for my staff to appreciate what I was trying to do.”

They ultimately came around, and so have many of his co-workers over the years. Maybe it’s because he’s always ready with a joke, or his big personality.

At his going-away party in the treasurer’s office Thursday, someone commented that he knows every employee in the department by name, said Brett Barbre, a spokesman for the treasurer’s office.

As a boss, Moorlach would give new employees a card and a bottle of sparkling cider on their first day, Barbre said.

“He wrote on my card, ‘Let’s shake up the county. Let’s get some stuff done.’ ”

As a supervisor with a vote on budget issues, Moorlach will be in an even better position to make changes, Barbre said.

“He’s a classic policy guy,” Barbre said. “In politics you have process guys and policy guys. Process guys are only interested in control, and policy guys are into outcome, let’s do something good.”