Chief of staff steps down

County Supervisor John Moorlach’s chief of staff, Mario Mainero, will resign at the end of this month.

Mainero, who worked for Moorlach for about 2 1/2 years, will start teaching law full time at Chapman University, where he had taught this past year, he said.

Mainero cited personal reasons as a factor, saying his wife had concerns about his health and would rather see him in the classroom. The news “came as a surprise,” said Moorlach, who received the resignation June 29.

“I respect his wanting to leave, but if I had my druthers, I’d love to have him stay,” he said.

Moorlach didn’t say who would assume Mainero’s responsibilities, but said finding someone as sharp as Mainero will be challenging.

The professor’s quick legal mind was an asset to the staff and made discussions enjoyable, Moorlach said.

“Even if we had different opinions on various topics, it was never an issue of being upset about it. It was like, ‘This is a fun area to debate,’” Moorlach said. “We agreed to disagree agreeably.”

Mainero acknowledged that some of his opinions haven’t boosted his popularity of late. Mainero received flak mostly “because he was so visible,” Moorlach said.

In the future, the supervisor said he may rethink how much his chief of staff stands in the public light, but Moorlach never doubted the professor’s abilities, he said.

Mainero recently grilled Dist. Atty. Tony Rackauckas about the death penalty, voicing his opposition for an institution that he said imposes superfluous financial burdens on taxpayers.

Mainero said he was just “asking questions … apparently that’s not that popular.”

He also publicly supported Sheriff Sandra Hutchens in her decision to revoke hundreds of concealed-weapons permits, many of which were issued under former Sheriff Mike Carona, saying she had a legal duty to revoke those permits.

That step was also “obviously not popular either” for his career, Mainero said.

“I am not a politician,” Mainero said. “I’m not terribly interested in politics ... I’m much more interested in policy and in … data-driven or empirically driven evidence that supports the public policy.”

Mainero identifies himself more with the world of academia than politics, he added.

From August 2001 to January 2007, Mainero was a full-time professor of law and a director of the Academic Success Program at Whittier Law School in Costa Mesa, where he was also an associate dean for Student and Graduate Academic Support.

Since Mainero has been teaching at Chapman this past year, in addition to serving as chief on county staff, he has essentially been working two full-time jobs, he said.

“It’s really not a huge transition,” he said.

In the meantime, Moorlach’s transition may not be so smooth.

“I don’t know how I’m going to do it [without Mainero],” Moorlach said. “He was sort of a gift. … I’ll miss him.”