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Hello. It like to welcome you to the Sonoma County Government Aural history program. We're very pleased to have you ever wonder if you please introduce yourself and then described what roles you have played in Cinema County government. My name is Evie Tee Lewis. I've warn a

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total of about 10 different hats in county government. I've been the county clerk, registrar of voters, clerk of the board, clerk of the Superior Court, civil commissioner of marriages, public administrator, public guardian, public conservative recorder and assessor um, of those roles. I've probably worn nine of

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those hats at one time for a period of about 3 to 4 years between 2001 and 2004. That's the career goes back 35 years, which is one of the reasons there's been such a variety of different offices that I've held have held most of them for

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quite a long period of time. Well, that's great. We'll get into further particulars of the of the of the yes, but if you would please tell, tell us what your most recent position has been. The most recent position and I'm still holding it currently is I'm

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the county's county clerk, which also means I'm clerk of the board, Civil Commission of Marriages and Register Voters, as well as county clerk in general law counties like ours. When you're elected to county clerk, you hold those other offices. Unless that been split off by other

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action of the board or by the Legislature. I'm the county's recorder. I'm the county's assessor, and then I'm also still the county's public administrator. At the end of my term, that particular responsibility will shift to the Human Services Department, following some legislation that we got through

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that allows us to make it in a point of rather than an elective office. I see is your successor in these combinations of positions other than that feature going to do roughly the same, my successor will pick up the same roles I currently have, other than

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the public administrator and one other area that I'm just looking at. When Janice Atkinson, who's who's been my assistant working in the elections department for close to 30 years, so she's she and I know each other very well when she takes over in January of 2007

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um, she will be acting as the county clerk Red Star voters. Ah, civil commissioner of Marriages. She'll be acting asked the recorder. She'll be acting as the assessor, so she'll be holding the bulk of those offices still of the core. Yeah. Would you would you want

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Please describe. Take them one by one. A bit further to describe more of the actual nature of the of the jobs you have. Okay, well, the you know, the the it's probably easier to actually go back and talk about some that I used to have and

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then talk about the ones that I do have a chronological a little bit easier to do it that way. At one point, back in the early Well, in fact, actually, from about 18 50 until about the late 19 hundreds, close to 1994 95 county clerks did

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just about everything in the state of California as faras local clerical support functions were concerned. They were one of the positions that existed even when none of the other current county positions did so we automatically became elected. We became elected the county clerk. When you became

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the county clerk, you did things like you issued marriage licenses and you you process passport applications On behalf of the of the federal government, you filed a variety of different kinds of licenses, and we still do Those that, like fictitious business name statements, for instance, filed

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a myriad a catchall of oddball documents that no one else files but that are required to be filed. They typically end up in the county Clerks office. So we have a ton of those. Ah, we process notary authorizations, for instance. Is it so that it's a

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catchall of a variety of different responsibilities? Ah, the county clerk also has, ah, since 1980 here in this county since 1982 but in the state of California has about as of about the mid eighties, became civil commissioner of Marriages. Are commissioner of civil marriage is so

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we actually got the authority to perform marriage ceremonies and a lot of the county clerks duel of that in the same office they do. The marriages and the the issuance of the licenses in those kinds of things in the same office is so that's one of

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the that's actually two of the hats, and that's to the core hats. Um, in most general law counties like ours in California, the Registrar of Voters is apart of the county clerks office. So that means that we conduct all the elections and that regardless of whether

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they're federal, state, county or district and in our county by contract, we also conduct him on behalf of all the various cities. Ah, we also. So we do everything from the preliminary issuing of the nomination papers or letting people know there's going to be election through

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preparing, mailing the sample ballots, processing all the absentees and counting ballots of the and then issuing the canvas. My office staff, actually the people who count the votes and issue the document that's called a canvass of votes that lets people know who won or lost. Ah,

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and within that context, we also will register all the voters, verifiable the initiative and recall and, uh, and referendum petitions that are out there. So it's a catchall file. All the campaign statements if it's related to elections, it's under the registrar of voters and that's one

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of the responsibilities in our county were were also clerk of the Board of Supervisors, were one of the few in the state that are still left in that capacity. Um, in most counties, as they've gotten larger, that particular function has been split off, and that's the

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trend. And that's the way most counties have gone. The clerk of the board actually serves as the support for the board, supervises the governing legislative body of the of the county and also is responsible for maintaining the agendas to maintain the record of the board, assuring

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that all the required legal notices have been taken care of before the board acts, assuring that when the board acts they they act within the government requirements of both conducting open meetings under the law as well as according to Brown act limitations under the law so

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that what they're doing is legal. It's appropriate all the appropriate notices have been given. They retain all the documentation that reflects the actions taken by the board all the way back to the beginning of the formation of the county. So if somebody needs to know what

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a Board of Supervisors did, what was the local law? That's the division of the department that actually takes care of all of that, and the staff there also serves as the secretary of support to the board members. So it's a variety of those different kinds of

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functions. The, uh, other responsibility that I used to have and clerks in California County clerks in California had that until this until the late 19 hundreds, like 1995 96 was the predominate area. Was clerk of the Superior Court in California. Um, county clerks used to serve,

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that is, that was one of the main functions. They were responsible for maintaining all of the records of the court attending court, taking all the minutes making sure again that the documentation that the court received in order to be able to make its decisions and decisions

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that were issued were appropriately received, filed, retained and were available, inaccessible to people who needed a record of what happened there. Particular court case attended court, handled all the monies on behalf of the court, received all the filing fees, helped to impanel Juries anything that's related

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to the Superior Court. When that when it was it just a it was just one of the local trial courts. It wasn't the only truck orders in today. The county clerks in the state served that capacity, and so I did as well. For 19 years, Um,

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that particular function shifted in 1995 in Cinema County, and now all of the can it works in the state of California are no longer affiliated with courts. There was a major court change in the late 19 nineties, early two thousands that that shifted that responsibility to

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the court executive officers. The whole structure changed significantly in the court sign. Um, that's four of the hats and then public administrator gain that in 1995 and the public administrators in elected office in California in a general county. And they handle the estates on behalf of

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people who have died and left no will or left no one within a family that could handle marshalling the assets and dispersing those assets to the people who are eligible to receive them. That's part of the responsibility of the public administrator, um, the public guardian function.

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We were responsible for helping Teoh, in some cases, conserve through the court system. People whose either were elderly and financially unable to handle their own finances, unable to handle their own personal care needs Typically elderly people who were beginning to become less capable of managing their

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own affairs in somewhere or other. No one else was able to step in and help those folks in a legal capacity to be able to do those types of things. And we petition the court and be appointed as the public guardian in in some cases in

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order to be able Teoh, help someone be placed in an inappropriate boarding care home or in order to be able to manage their finances for them so that they, they were able to live independently as long as possible, have a conservative or does the same type

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of thing. Only they do it on people who on behalf, people who are considered gravely disabled, people who have an impairment because of mental illness that prevents them from being able to take care of their own food, clothing and shelter again. Both of my court proceedings

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and both of them are proceedings that are done on behalf of of the more vulnerable in our society, and the role was legal role of being able to manage those particular people's finances or their their individual people, the individuals themselves, in order to be able to

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care for them. Those three functions, two of them have already shifted in January and July of 2000 for, um, I recommended to the board, and they went ahead and shifted those to the Human Services Department and the public administrator, which is consolidated with um, It will

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be shifting legally effective at the end of my term so that those three will not stay with my my successor. And those were functions that were that were mined for about nine or 10 years, then the other two. There's two more still out there ones. The

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recorder and I acquired that in 2001 and the recorders function basically maintains all of the land records for the county of Sonoma and also the vital records before this county cinema, for instance, birth, death and marriage records. They received them. They make sure that there's a

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permanent record of them, maintained and collects all the appropriate fees related to all of that, and then typically returned the originals either back to the submitting party or they returned them to. They ship them off to the state of California of their vital records, so it

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establishes the the property records, the land base of the of the county. So someone knows who owns what for purposes of lending or borrowing, or buying or selling, or any of the rest of that stuff. This other miscellaneous types of documents that they received. For instance,

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honorable discharges were filed for years and years and years with the recorder's office. So we but the bulk of the focus of the office is the land records side of things, huh? Then the final hat that I wear is the assessor's office, and the assessor's office,

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basically is the agency that is responsible for appraising assessing property within Cinema County, both real and personal, in order to establish the assessed value for purposes of property. Texas. That's basically their primary role. They also will be responsible for for managing the exemptions to certain to

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certain tax tax levels that are created as a result of state law. And do we have? We have a division, the business property division that audit certain kinds of personal property business, personal property for tax bases or a planes and airplanes, planes and boats and those

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kinds of things as well. But those were those of the various functions. It sounds very, very busy. We have it, we have it. I'm curious. Just the trend that you've described of certain, for instance, clerical functions spinning off her time. Is that what logic would seem

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to indicate really a function of the increased business load of those areas? Or has it been reconsidered that some of these things, for instance, sort of guardianship issues are better served by a department MAWR combination of both? Is it? It's a combination of both issues. One

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is is a lot of the traditional county clerk responsibilities as County's got larger, more complicated as demands escalated as rules regulations got. MAWR owners are more, more detailed, more complex in the business. The business load got bigger. Um, it made more sense to spend some of

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those off, and that's what happened in a lot of the state of California. And it continues to happen, and it will continue to happen. As times change, so does government structure. And who does what? The other part of it is sometimes a matter of who's where

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when, for instance, the public administrator, public guardian, public conservative functions came to me full because of timing, among other things, as well as a willingness to take him. At the time, the county was going through a fairly major reorganization in the middle of the 19 nineties,

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and one of the issues that they felt very strongly needed to be addressed included some of these offices where you had bits and pieces of similar functions in separate places, Uh, and that one of those that I ended up with was the conservative ship area you

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had. The public administrator and public guardian functions were with the district attorney at the time, and the public conservative functions were up a metal health. And there was a perceived on Eve, and I think, a very real need to try to get those functions together because

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so often the conservative ship functions particularly were serving the same people, and they had the same skill sets needed for the people who were in those jobs. And they had the same kinds of interaction with the same with the same outside agencies that we're providing service.

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There was this illegal prohibition against just simply putting them all together and sandwiching them somewhere else. And that is the public administrator portion of that organization by law in California had to be elected. And there were only four offices in the in the county that they

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could have been consolidated with under that prohibition. Under that requirement, one was where it was the D. A s office and the D A. Didn't want to take the public conservative and add that at that particular function to the role because of potential conflicts for them,

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one was the treasure, and it didn't make sense to put human service types of elements with the treasure. Um, one waas me as the county clerk. I could take them, and then the other was a standalone public administrator that also could do public guardian public conservative

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ships. It was at the time that we had just finished giving up the court system. We had just decided that the courts needed to be consolidated cleric Lee and administratively in order to save some money. And I was stepping out of the courts as the clerk

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of the court, and it seemed to be at the same time as we were looking at the reorganizational changes, though talked the board, you know, you're giving up the courts. So would you like to be p A? Put these together. Okay, We'll put. So we did.

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I went ahead and ran, but it had to be had to run for the office. So it had to be added to my titles. Took those. And as of the beginning of my term in 1995 I acquired those offices. And my role really was to take

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them, put them together into a single office, consolidate them, get some cross training going, tried it to create an organization that would provide the best, um, location and the best type of service to the probably were serving. And then I started looking for what would be

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the most logical place to actually put that group once it was together and consolidated. And it made sense to both me and the board as well as to the the human services agencies that stress really where it belonged. So what we did is we went ahead,

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and we, um we shifted organizationally and operationally all the function, the entire function lock, stock and barrel to the, um, human Services Department, effective July of 2004. I had to, by law, retained the public administrator hat the legal oversight of that because it's elected went of

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state Legislature. Now we got them to pass legislation that was specific to Cinema County that allowed us to appoint the public administrator once we got that true. Then we had some ordinance changes and effective at the beginning of that the beginning of the new term. On

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January the eighth, it will shift to an appointive position, and the appointed person will be the head of the Human Services Department, so it logically belongs there. But there were some bureaucratic limitations as to why I couldn't move there immediately. But it is there. It will

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be there. As of the beginning of very logical. It's exactly so. So we've done it for both reasons. Seen changes for both reasons that it's been a lot of what my career has been focused around. His consolidation, de consolidation, consolidation, de consolidation of Benetton of that

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kind of experience simply because of how long I've been here in the position, I've been in well back to the the issue of of the greater volume of business that comes county government and inevitably, the population growing as it is here, the very fact that you

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simultaneously where these three main hats. Do you think in the future that's going to be less feasible? Well, you know what I've seen State wide has been a, um it's it's an evolution and it goes around in circles. Let's put it this way for a loan

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period of time. The hats I wore, worst separate. I mean, there were Ford County, the public administrator. There were four separate people who were elected to each of those four positions. And, um, the That's been true. That was true. Also, in a lot of this state,

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over time we consolidated those positions. It made sense to try toe kind of coordinate and try to look at the best way to to to increase your efficiencies in the administrative arenas by consolidating staff. Be work, be more economical. And there was there was a similarity

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in some of the functions there. A lot of more basically, record establishment recordkeeping had public public record management types of positions. That that's that's one of the common elements, so it made a lot of sense in a lot of other counties. The same thing has happened.

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We've also seen over time as individual people have retired out or left some of those offices. There's been a review of those consolidations, and there have been some D consolidations in some counties. Ah, and some of that is because of timing. Again, the personalities involved in

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some of them is because, perhaps in a particular agency or particular county, they felt that it's more of a load. Then a particular individual may be able to effectively carry. So it's it's a it's a moving target. It's not in it changes over time. I would

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not be the least bit surprised if 15 or 20 years from now or whatever it is, you see a de consolidation of some of these offices and then a reconsolidation. That kind of stuff happens. The most common consolidation in the offices that I hold that has

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been around in the state for literally decades and decades and decades is a fairly new one for us, which is the county clerk recorder 50. Probably thing was like 48 or 50 out of the 58 counties have had County Clerk Recorder's as a consolidated office since

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the early 19 hundreds, at least. I mean, it's if not even earlier than that, so that one that one's been pretty stable and very, very, very common throughout the state of California. For us, it's new because we had it. We had the last independently elected recorder

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who served that function only in the state of California. And when she retired, when Bernice Peterson had been a long time recorder, retired, and 2001 at that point they went ahead and consolidated. But I'm sure the board will look at this every time. There's a change.

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In a sense, what that implies to me is that it's It's ultimately a function of the ascertaining of the strengths of the person who's going to hold the positions. And sometimes it's that the only thing keep in mind is the board doesn't get to choose who

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that person is going to be. That's done by the voters because these were the offices were talking about our elected. They did it fairly recently, for instance, when when Tom Ford, who was our long term tax book to treasure, retired in the term, there was the

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decision to go ahead and consolidate that office with the Treasure Tax Collector office with the order to Comptroller office. Both of those were independently elected. Then they became elected by with one person running for all of them at one time. And, um, it turned out that

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no one filed against the auditor controller, who now holds both both sets of hats. Somebody could have Gadd that might have cost some some issues because one of the advantages of doing it is when you've got somebody who's already in office, they know a good part

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of 11 of the organizations. When you add the other, its new stuff toe learn. But it's not a whole new arena to learn. Yeah, that's one of the downsides in one of the benefits and one of the questions I know we have later on in the

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program. If we get to it, deals with Cinema County and its idiosyncrasies. One of the one of the elements has made this kind of consolidation works so well for us is we've been very fortunate in our elected officers. They've been not only very stable, e mean

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they've been here a long time, but they've also been very, very capable people in a significant portion of the operation that they've been overseeing. So there's a significant amount of trust and confidence in them both by the governing body by the board but also by the

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public. So they've been returned to office, but often without opposition because And that's maintained the ability to continue functioning very effectively very efficiently. Despite the consolidations that happened. Consistent. High performance. Yeah. Yeah. Even if you were toe again. Realizing all of all the things you do,

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if you were to describe your chief challenges over time in this sort of constellation of positions you hold, you know what? I was the one we've just been just chit chatting a little bit about theirs. They're in some ways that could be very different. Even though

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they have some commonality with the record keeping and the record establishment of the public, the public record access portions of it. Um, when I'm in a position of receiving a maybe it maybe I'm working on something on the assessor side and I get a phone call

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about elections. It's a very distinctly different block of law. The issues could be very different. Ah, the nature of the work in some ways and the timeliness of the work in some ways can be very different. It's that mental shift for me that can that sometimes

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it is a challenge because if it's a typical day, I may get a call related to ah County clerk issue, followed five minutes later by somebody on elections issue, maybe an email on an assessor issue and maybe something about the trust funds administered by the recorder's

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office with CEO's office. So it's that mental shifting you've got to be pretty agile mentally to be able to do that or set up some very, very good, um, management techniques internally on how you handle that stuff. If you do, your staffs really break down the

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sort of you have a discreet group for assessor questions. You have a discreet group, you know they do. And part of that, one of the reasons for that is because of the physical layout. The ideal when you consolidate offices would be to be able to put

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everybody together in one big building right and be able to really take advantage of cross training, take advantage of a greater staff that could that could back each other up in the various areas, and that could learn each other's drops. Unfortunately, what we have is I

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have a county clerk function that is in one building two blocks away is a an elections function that is in a separate building. Ah, clerk of the board function that's in 1/3 building, and the recorder and assessor functions are predominantly in one building next door to

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each other. So by necessity they become the steak this great physically fit because the physical issues, um and that does mean that they become absolute subject modern experts in their particular arena. And one of the challenges is to keep them thinking of themselves as part of

00:26:10.440 - 00:26:25.760

a bigger organization. That is actually all of those things, that this is one element of it, that their particular focus is one element. But that's that big picture issue. But that's a hard one. Do you mean by big? Picture the things over which you oversee? Not

00:26:25.740 - 00:26:43.870

the whole of county. Correct, correct, correct. And there's and that's definitely always going to be a challenge until we can get to the point where we actually have far more physical intermingling than were ableto have right now. So it's forever looking at things isn't okay. We

00:26:43.870 - 00:26:57.410

need we need staff members to help with putting on absentees, for instance, and that that helps the blending a little bit. Because when I do that and I put out a notice to all of the offices, then there are people from county clerk that get over

00:26:57.410 - 00:27:12.510

and help their assessor people to go over and help There are. There are people from the recorder could go over and help. So that helps toe blend a. An ownership among the staff of this element versus or it's it's more than than us and them. Yeah,

00:27:12.520 - 00:27:31.240

and and that's definitely is definitely a continuing challenge because of the because of the physical layout and the the responsibilities are far more complex in every arena than most people know. So to become an expert in elections, for instance, does take 30 years and uh, to

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just know because it's far more complex than just simply issuing the ballot and getting it back. And it's a true with every single one of the arenas. So as government gets more complicated, there's more rules and regulations and laws to implement. That will be an ongoing

00:27:46.090 - 00:28:05.460

Yeah, but I'd like you to do some crystal ball gazing if you were to predict of the role of evolving technologies in evolution of functions. Do you have some of its already has And I'll give you a major a major indication Elections When I started in

00:28:05.460 - 00:28:23.410

elections in 1970 while I was in the county Clerks office in 74. But I actually got intimately Atmore intimately involved in elections in 76. When I became the assistant county clerk, we went on to work first computer system in 77. And before that, we were trying

00:28:23.410 - 00:28:40.080

to conduct elections in this county using a dresser graph place. When you're doing that, it's a very mechanical type of very labor intensive type of process. And to conduct an election, for instance, we would pull those address graft place, and we have a pile over here

00:28:40.080 - 00:28:55.250

on the corner. That was all the people who were registered and this fire district, this water district, this parking recreation district in this city, for instance, they may have been over here is another pile over here That was a different fire district of different school district.

00:28:55.260 - 00:29:07.580

Maybe. Maybe it was the unincorporated area and there was another pile over here that was a different combination of districts. These were all people who are on Lee eligible to vote on that. Come. These people were the only people of eligible to vote on that combination,

00:29:07.900 - 00:29:20.450

and the same thing was true here at San three, Mr. Over here. So when we were sending out ballots, we had to make sure that only this pile went to was used to address the ballots going out and the sample ballots going out to those voters.

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And this pile went to those voters. And this pile was for voters over here because they weren't voting on the same things. There were unique combinations, very unique combinations. While that by itself limited the ability to be able to, let's say, consolidate jurisdictions together limited the

00:29:38.070 - 00:29:53.720

ability to be able to hold an election which everybody went at one time unless the boundaries were all co terminus, which they were not, you couldn't physically do it right when we can convert it over to a computer system that we currently have, which we we

00:29:53.720 - 00:30:11.400

bought this one in 83 that have upgraded multiple times since then just managing the conduct in the production of elections. We have the ability now to, for instance, be able to produce an election where we could have 160 or 70 different versions of the ballot for

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our 240,000 voters and were able to do that and do that accurately because of the use of technology. You couldn't do it if you were still doing those addressing rough piles. You'd never be able to get enough tables big enough for one thing and be able

00:30:26.680 - 00:30:41.090

to assort them in a way where you were giving the right people the right the right balance. And that's a huge issue, much just a small example of what technology does. Um, the downside of it from for us, obviously is. It means that you're going to

00:30:41.090 - 00:31:00.060

see more complex elections because people know we could do it exactly. So, for instance, right now, we said we 116 170 ballot types is not unusual in a general election. In a primary, you've got seven parties, plus you've got nonpartisan plus you got cross over, so

00:31:00.060 - 00:31:20.660

you've got 11 versions of each of those, Um, so it's It's a very complex process, but it would be undoable without the automation same thing is true with with other elements of technology on one of my personal, UM hopes is to expand some of our regional

00:31:20.990 - 00:31:38.430

centers that we have, where we provide service directly to the public. Off the main site we established in the assessor's office and offsite office down in Petaluma. And because of technology, we were able to actually move the physical files, the building records of the people who

00:31:38.430 - 00:31:52.600

live down there down to Petaluma because we were able to image all of those files and have them available up in Santa Rosa. So if somebody came in in Santa Rosa wanted to look at a pedal in the file, we had access to it. But because

00:31:52.600 - 00:32:05.270

the physical records were down in peddling that we could actually open the pedal in my office to the public one day a week and they actually didn't have to drive up here or call us, you try to go online. Um, I'd like to expand that. There's

00:32:05.270 - 00:32:23.440

other legal limitations on why we're having some issues with doing that, but technology makes that makes that mawr possible. It makes it more possible to blend. We're putting onto our recorder's offices, public access terminals that that we have in the recordings of the section of the

00:32:23.450 - 00:32:39.420

quarters office where the public can come in instead of the terminal. Look up information. We're going to be expanding that to include not only recorder information but county clerk, fictitious business name information, for instance, and etcetera, mega by information. So it'll be a one stop visual

00:32:40.020 - 00:32:55.180

shop, so to speak. They could look at all of those offices in one location. Technology will do that, you know. You know, it's it's limitless. In some ways, the big barrier were running into, and this is one that most counties in most states are going to

00:32:55.180 - 00:33:15.790

be encountering over time. Even Mawr is that because technology makes it possible to do all those things, the bad things that happen are also now much more possible. They used to be. So there is increasing concern by members of the public, for instance, that because so

00:33:15.790 - 00:33:32.480

many counties or agencies have put information out available to them technologically now, suddenly somebody in Timbuktu can go in and look at their personal information, and they look at their property record. Maybe they could get access to some of the old documents to their Social Security

00:33:32.480 - 00:33:50.630

number. Identity theft becomes an issue. Fraud becomes an issue. Uh, so there's a balance that that the legislative bodies air trying to some sort of firewalls. Well, it's more than its for a while. If it's out there, if it's accessible and out there, how do you

00:33:50.630 - 00:34:06.730

prevent somebody from Friday fraudulently using the information? That's the issue that they're running into. So we're getting is alleges, a legislative tension. That's really interesting. We have bills being passed at the same time by the same bodies on one hand, that saying Put more and more

00:34:06.730 - 00:34:17.580

and more out onto the Internet make it accessible to the public so they don't have to come in so they can get online and get whatever their public information is, which is great. I mean, that would be fabulous. With 24 hours a day, you could look

00:34:17.580 - 00:34:27.640

up anything you want to. You don't have to come in. You have to call. You don't have to make the drive down here at the same time as those bills are going through. There are bills going through Sango, By the way, you can't post anything on

00:34:27.640 - 00:34:44.120

the Internet that has anything to do with an elected official's residence address. Ah, you can't put down any information if the person is a safety officer, for instance, so you've got both of those kinds one. Expanding the use of technology, making more available. One restricting what's

00:34:44.120 - 00:35:04.270

on it going through the same time that will be one of the challenges of the technological age. Information is so available. How do you balance the availability in the access with the issues of privacy with the issues of potential fraudulent use with identity theft? All of

00:35:04.270 - 00:35:24.550

those other things that technology makes very easy. If I might ask you specifically on the issue of identity theft, having observed change in legislation of some years ago in regards to accessibility of vital records, us apparently specifically drafted with subverting identity theft. Is it your observation

00:35:24.550 - 00:35:41.860

that that was successful legislation or not? Personally, I it's only a partial solution, so I don't think it was tremendously successful in the reason I say that is because the information that was closed down at the government level was already available in the private levels. So

00:35:41.860 - 00:35:57.840

what Unless, unless the legislative bodies take one more step, which is to close it down the private level. And I don't know if that ever going to be able to do that in today's society, particularly with the freedom of the press. And you know that and

00:35:57.840 - 00:36:12.600

the Internet issues, um, it doesn't matter if you tell government you can't put this out because guess what? It's already out there anyway. All of the information when you go online and you look at some of the some of the information that you can get to

00:36:12.600 - 00:36:27.350

like, I think's Abbas, one that I'm thinking of a number of with the rest of the titlist. You can key in some of these search engines and put in an address and a name, and you can get an incredible amount of personal information about someone. At

00:36:27.350 - 00:36:41.780

one point, they probably got that information from some government agencies somewhere and compiled it, or they bought it from someone and somebody else sold it to someone else who sold it to someone else. And it doesn't even if you can't get that same information from the

00:36:41.780 - 00:36:56.150

government website and you can't get it from the government agency unless you show them that you have a right to a copy of that information. Guess what somebody else still can, because it's out there and that's and that's that's where the where the where the big

00:36:56.150 - 00:37:11.140

hole is. So it's not. It can't be successful to deal with that issue. And I don't know how legislative bodies can. Yeah, you bet it is. But it's some other type of privacy insurance that I d number that we haven't yet. Well, you know, one of

00:37:11.140 - 00:37:27.770

them, from my perspective at least, is one of the ways Teoh to at least mitigated is that when governmental agencies require information from people what we do through vitals you had a whole set of things that we used to have to get from the person who

00:37:27.770 - 00:37:43.530

was applying for a marriage license or wanted a code or the information that was gathered on the birth certificate of the information was gathered on the death certificate. One of the increased responsibilities I think it puts on governmental agencies is not to ask for anything more

00:37:43.530 - 00:37:59.880

than what you really need. The minimum, the minimum. Yeah, really? Look at what data you're asking for and be selective over what you ask for, Um, that will at least prevent some of those private and pieces of information from being available. Folks who legally can get

00:37:59.880 - 00:38:18.620

copies of public records in some of the other states. For instance, Um, that's that's another area that that we're working on. In fact, I know in the In the Marriage License Arena we've just now gotten passed legislation that has pretty much re drafted a lot of

00:38:18.620 - 00:38:34.670

the family law. Could the family could dealing with marriage licenses, including the forms and some of the some of the data elements we've been collecting. So areas that people have felt were intrusive that were collected for statistical purposes are not on there any more or won't

00:38:34.680 - 00:38:49.670

be after 2008 is the Legislature, which is the enactment date of the law. So things like, what's the highest grade you completed? What's your profession? That kind of stuff is not going to collected after 2008 as in the story, and I'd have to see sadly, I'm

00:38:49.670 - 00:39:06.160

sorry. I'm sorry. There will be fewer records for us to read, but But it does address the issue of what do we is government really need ask for if we have this information that public that we've forced you to give us in order for you to

00:39:06.160 - 00:39:23.210

be able to get some service that you need and yet the same time there's elements of it that people are fearful of. Being out there in the general public is being in an undue invasion of personal privacy. It's another attention. Oh, yeah, fascinating agents. Everything's going

00:39:23.420 - 00:39:43.900

fascinating timeframe. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Even if you were to describe some elements or aspect of your many angles of were work that were of greater importance than many people would realize Well, you know, one of the things that is is has been always one of my

00:39:44.010 - 00:40:01.800

personal beliefs is that the functions that I'm responsible for the county clerk, the registrar of voters, to recorder the assessor, form the foundation of why government exists to start with in my pants. Maybe other people will think the same thing, but all the way back to

00:40:01.810 - 00:40:19.860

the beginning of the creation of the county. Those core functions were an expected part of government. They were Kenny Clarke was one of the first offices created recorder. In the end, the on the the elections. People were the first people created because they knew they needed

00:40:19.860 - 00:40:35.750

that in government. No matter what else they did or didn't have, they knew they needed those where the importance of that is sometimes or maybe the the the provision of those services or sometimes taken absolutely for granted. And people don't think of them in the same

00:40:35.750 - 00:40:51.460

sense they might think of a sexy court trial, for instance, where there's a murder case or whatever it happens to be there not as highly visible in the last few years, probably elections for different reasons. But they are the foundation of why we have a local

00:40:51.460 - 00:41:04.430

government. Um, and I don't in some ways up. I guess it's a compliment that they're taken for granted because it basically says people not only expect those to be there, they know they're going to be there. They don't have to second gas. Whether they're there, they

00:41:04.430 - 00:41:16.220

have. Don't be concerned about whether they're there, because they're always gonna be there. They're gonna walk in, they're gonna get their marriage license, they're going toe registered to vote. They're going to get their ballot that good. The balance gonna be counted they're going to submit their

00:41:16.230 - 00:41:30.570

record, the document for recording and assuming all the document information is there, it'll get recorded. It will be permanently retrievable. Somebody will be able get it when they need it. Very, very basic things that we in this country take for granted right there, all in the

00:41:30.570 - 00:41:43.530

offices that I manage, right, right? Yeah, And I think that's probably one of the key issues, a testament to your success that people are made. Take it for granted the tunes they dio and I think, and I think that's the important element for me, that it

00:41:43.530 - 00:42:00.770

was always been there. It's why I feel still strongly then, um, that our obligation as public officials and certainly in my office is is that we we have an incredible trust that's been handed to us by the voters and by by the by the people who

00:42:00.770 - 00:42:15.070

select the people who work in our offices. And being a public servant in an office like mine, in my opinion, is the highest calling you can count. It's an incredibly important role, even though it's under the radar screen. It's an incredibly important I agree with you,

00:42:15.080 - 00:42:34.380

yeah, and marvelously well done. I think e v in in the year long tenure of these positions with Sonoma County government, if you were to highlight certain chief crises or challenges are emergencies or whatever you choose. We had a few of them. Some of them go

00:42:34.380 - 00:42:54.970

back. I mean, one of the one part of it's a reflection of the changing evolution in this county. Um, one I can remember is I first got involved in in the elections arena in 1976. I became the assistant county clerk at that in the middle of

00:42:54.970 - 00:43:12.840

1976 and 1976 was one of those incredible bellwether years we had in the course of that one year. 10. We have five seats on the Board of Supervisors, and in that year we had 10 different people who either sat on a were elected to serve on

00:43:12.840 - 00:43:34.880

those five states because of of a tremendous amount of of public tension that was going on, particularly in the taxing arena, taxing and budgeting arenas. We had two supervisors who were re called. We had another one who resigned rather than be recalled. We had one who

00:43:34.890 - 00:43:55.190

lost his reelection bid unexpectedly we had another one who had been a replacement in the recall election who lost his election for the seat four months later. So, you know, over that period, we had 10 different supervisors at the same time. It was the same year

00:43:55.200 - 00:44:16.360

in which we had a clerk of the We had a Superior Court judge. Are presiding judge who lost Hiss reelection bid into a deputy d A. You don't see that kind of turmoil and and and, um, and turn over in a in a local county government

00:44:17.060 - 00:44:28.290

very often. And I know one of the things that I wanted at the time is this. Oh my God, is this a typical year? Because it was my first year dealing directly with elections, and I was also quirk of the board, and I was clerk of

00:44:28.290 - 00:44:44.880

the court. So is dealing with all three of those things in one particular year is a very new assistant county clerk. That was, that was that was a crisis here in a lot of ways, because there was. There was there was so much we'll talk about

00:44:44.880 - 00:45:03.820

high profile that that year was a high profile year, the basis the driving issues tended to revolve around finances. Obviously, there were some budgetary decisions that had been made by the board that, um concerned some of the taxpayers groups and because of the impact it would

00:45:03.820 - 00:45:21.140

have in the on the the property tax system, among other things, and some increases in planning, for instance, that also had some concerns by that. But by some of those same groups, it was a very, very major, major change over. It was kind of like a

00:45:21.140 - 00:45:37.430

cage. You've got the environmental groups here and you've got the got the business and tax pain groups here and you could definitely see that there was a tremendous amount of jockeying going on in the county. Two years later, we had our next big one, and it

00:45:37.430 - 00:45:53.200

was part of it was a result of this was just the the indication that there was definitely something out there which was obviously the Prop 13 year, which was 1978 Um and that one was from an internal perspective for the county. It was it was certainly

00:45:53.200 - 00:46:11.110

huge world, the particular people who managed the county 78 waas in 78. We do budgets typically early in the year. So I was Theus, assistant county clerk. And at that time I was also acting kind of because my boss had just died. So I was assistant

00:46:11.110 - 00:46:23.690

county clerk and responsible for the budgets for all the offices. And I was also acting county clerk running the offices in the year first, which I ran for my first office. That was 78 when I had to run all year Is that this was the first

00:46:23.690 - 00:46:41.420

time I've had to file for office. It was it was an exciting air, but, um, we had a, um we prepared budgets in early January without prop 13 in mind. Then we were asked to re prepare them with Prop 13 as if properly, you know, anticipating

00:46:41.420 - 00:46:58.720

profit 13 passage with major cuts identifying cuts all over the place. Then we were asked to prepare them again. Ah, anticipating some state bailout. And then we were asked to prepare them again on a final version, knowing what the state bailout levels were going to be.

00:46:59.090 - 00:47:18.250

So it was with the uncertainty was on reimagine internally. Nobody knew who was gonna be here, who wasn't what services would go or which one wouldn't, whether the state would or wouldn't backfill whether or not Prop. 13 would pass Major major, major local government bellwether year.

00:47:18.260 - 00:47:35.580

Also, um, we saw things going on then that we didn't that that would seem before, but never to the levels on in the elections feel. For instance, we saw I can't even remember how many people voted on one issue. I want to show only the ballot

00:47:35.580 - 00:47:51.700

was full. It was a primary, so it was a lot of stuff on it. We had unbelievable numbers of people who only voted on the Prop. 13 issue and nothing else, really. And it was. It was so in front of folks. Focus, focus, and it didn't

00:47:51.700 - 00:48:10.050

one of the things that did, and it's a A so one of the reasons it's also a bellwether year for counties is that it shifted the um, financial dependence of counties from local property taxes and local resource is to stay. We became a creature of the

00:48:10.050 - 00:48:25.940

state so much more than we ever had before because we were so reliant on money from the state, rather than being able to establish your own property tax based locally so it was. It was a big change here, Right here. Did the county adjust well, quickly

00:48:26.070 - 00:48:42.780

to this, You know, considering the what they had to do and how quickly they did it. They did. They adjusted. They adjusted pretty well. There were. There was additional fallout. I mean, three years later, we, um because of all of that uncertainty about financing, how much

00:48:42.780 - 00:48:56.940

we're going to get what was gonna look look like the following year and the rest of that our labor negotiations that I think that was this that was the three year without the three year contract of the two year country Bottom line is because there was

00:48:56.940 - 00:49:12.530

so much uncertainty. The labor contract that was entered into that year at the end of that year, early the next year was not one that our our internal label organizations were very happy with. They thought that they had to give up a great deal and take

00:49:12.530 - 00:49:31.310

1981 2 years. Two and three years later, we had our the one and only major strike since I've been here. We had a three week leap actual strike in July 81 that was fallout from Sony eight followed from 78. All the internal, the financial implications and

00:49:31.320 - 00:49:49.600

impacts of 78. But I think overall, when you consider the just the sheer magnitude of the hip. And it was a big one, um, and the competing the competing needs for the resources that were available and the uncertainty about which ones would or would not be

00:49:49.660 - 00:50:03.670

because we continue to be dependent on state of the state funding and you never know what was going to like from year to year. Um, I think the county's done remarkably well. And that is one of the challenges that continues is because we still are dependent

00:50:03.670 - 00:50:22.280

to some degree on state financing in some forms or other, or certainly in state mandates, unpaid mandates. In some cases, um, the, um, the annual evaluation of Okay, what money do we have available? Will they raid us and take some of our funding? And what does

00:50:22.280 - 00:50:37.470

it do to us? What's available for us for long term planning is really a difficult issue because a big corps of general overall budgeting, the budget that the county has to rely on is some state money in some form or other, and we've had lots of

00:50:37.480 - 00:50:55.860

them. We've had Arraf. We've had the VLF issues. We've had a multiple of different issues your F two and then erect three. And the triple flip and all that stuff is state financing related. And yet it has a direct and traumatic impact. Local governments financing. So

00:50:55.860 - 00:51:10.950

you never know what the plant for well, so if I'm understanding you properly with the greater role of the state in county government functions, there are many more imponderables that, to that extent makes the job of county government officials much, much more death. Definitely no question

00:51:10.950 - 00:51:24.770

whatsoever. Would you say that the healthy tendency or not from actual provision of the best services in a Well, in my opinion, it's not very healthy, But it's It's the The fact of life is the fact of life trying to get a stable source of funding

00:51:25.230 - 00:51:42.830

that is a reliable source of funding that's a knowable source of funding for local government. Since Prop 13 I'm sure, has been one of the big dreams of boards and CEOs in the state ever since. If you were to guess if the state hadn't taken on

00:51:42.830 - 00:51:59.520

this larger role would would say Sonoma County be well equipped to continuous They had done No, no, because you're funding source would be unbelievably there wasn't there. Your ability to be able to raise funds to meet service needs were limited one of the big impacts of

00:51:59.530 - 00:52:13.650

Prop. 13. And it's both good and bad. I mean, there's there's certainly there were some very valid reasons for people to be concerned about what was happening with your property taxes. You did peer anecdotal information about people losing their homes. Now they own their homes, but

00:52:13.650 - 00:52:29.780

they couldn't pay the tax because it was it was not set at a limited basis, but one of the one of the impacts did did do is obviously it limited the Middleby ability to be able to increase assessments. It rolled back assessments, first of all, and

00:52:29.780 - 00:52:42.290

it basically said that you could only in crude. You could only increase those assessments by a maximum of 2% per year, depending on what the C p. A looked like. CP, I looked like and you and the maximum tax rate was going to be 1% on

00:52:42.290 - 00:52:58.640

that and the only time that there would be a change in that is, if you if you, um, sold the property, there was a change of ownership where it was new construction. So significant cap on your ability to be able to respond to needs because she

00:52:58.640 - 00:53:13.460

didn't have the base that you that you had any control over, and to some degree, that's, you know, that's that's still there. We mean, we go through huge cycles like we have for a while where we've had major increases in value in the county and a

00:53:13.460 - 00:53:30.240

lot of change of ownership, which is triggered a higher assessment and therefore a higher property tax. But next year, what we're hearing with the market is going down. We may be looking at profits where we're having to temporary reduce assessments because the assessment is higher than

00:53:30.240 - 00:53:48.730

the market value of the house or the property at that particular point in time. So there's there's definitely a continuing in the very interesting, very interesting TV. What features, if any, of your tenure of your positions with the government here seem to you to be uniquely

00:53:48.730 - 00:54:09.350

Sonoma County, things that would not way mentioned one, I think, and that was that was the what I believe is the uniquely among the uniquely competency levels. Andi collegiate ality levels of your electives. You have some very, very long term and very knowledgeable, competent and capable

00:54:09.350 - 00:54:24.620

people working in elected offices throughout the county. And they tend Teoh that to do not only know what they're doing and be very good at their jobs, but they also tend to work together well. And that's unusual on you. Yeah, certainly within our boards, for instance,

00:54:24.620 - 00:54:44.770

we've been we've been Our Board of Supervisors, for instance, has been very stable for a very long time as well. And you again here a lot of anecdotal information from other counties, where squabbling the public squabbling, particularly between board members of different viewpoints, has a detrimental

00:54:44.770 - 00:55:03.050

impact on how county government works. We don't have that, and we have not had that. I mean, it's been a long time since my Gwoza said 17 76 was one of those bellwether years since we've had that kind of internal animosity event finals squabbling the so

00:55:03.050 - 00:55:19.610

they worked together. Our elected, they're appointed and our board and our CEO's office is work together is an organization much more collegiately they certainly have. I mean, whether that changes over time, who knows? But at this point and for a very long time, they have, um

00:55:19.620 - 00:55:32.140

and I think that means that a lot of the territorial stuff that comes into play in some of the other counties doesn't to the same degree. Here, you're more were willing to work with some other agencies. And so well, you know, this is the year when

00:55:32.140 - 00:55:46.810

they really need this funding. So I'll pull back mine. Yes, I won't. I won't go on and have a slam bang in front of the Board of Supervisors trying to get my program. And to heck with everybody else's. There's there's a district, there's a big picture.

00:55:46.810 - 00:56:02.280

Orientation is the result of that. Part of that for a long time is because of the nature of our culture. Sanoma County governments. Culture for a very, very long time has been based. It's a very Orel cultural in a lot of ways. It's, you know, it's

00:56:02.280 - 00:56:17.750

not. Everything is not in black and white have written down, and all these various, very hard and fast, immovable, inflexible policies. There's there some because because you need some we probably could use more than what we've had, but but a lot of it is you pick

00:56:17.750 - 00:56:28.380

up the phone and call. Someone said, This is what I need to do. I need some help. Tell me how the heck we could do it and you work with the agency and accomplish whatever the goal is that you need. So it's a very oral culture.

00:56:28.380 - 00:56:44.790

It's based a lot of it's been based on relationships, trust, trust and relationships, and that part of it is because the county government is an organization has been stable for very, very, very long time. You will see some changes because the personalities are changing. We are

00:56:44.790 - 00:57:05.160

going through major retirements all over the place. Um, we've had well over 50 60% or more of the department heads, for instance, have or will have turned over in a period of about four years. That's huge, and then the people under them as well your middle

00:57:05.160 - 00:57:27.570

management, a lot of your key support staff. Baby boomer generation is hitting us and hitting us hard, and we've seen major major change in those particular positions. So we're getting great people coming in, but there they've not been involved in that particular culture. They haven't established

00:57:27.570 - 00:57:41.780

those relationships, so the trust takes a what a little bit longer to build. So that has to be rebuilt in whatever methods are going to be used by by some of the incoming people coming in to do that. But I think that was uniquely Cinema County,

00:57:42.630 - 00:57:59.990

even even though I know most of the other counties in the state have also been hit with retirements because of the baby boomer impacts. Um, but I think the the stability of our are working relationships, the collegiate ality of our working relationships on and therefore the

00:58:00.000 - 00:58:18.130

big picture orientation of the county, the county departments has been unique to us. I think that's really quite marvelous. And one can only hope that that Orel tradition of management in a sense is somehow communicated. It's very interesting when you point out that it isn't written

00:58:18.140 - 00:58:39.610

in stone thing. It's like the British Constitution, some of its in for just from activities. Um, let's see as sort of the overview of Sonoma County as a population center as, ah, agricultural endeavor. How have you seen a change in your good long time? huge major

00:58:39.620 - 00:59:00.380

changes. I mean, and I'm talking big changes. I started with the county in 1971 and it's now 2000 and six, so that's quite a range. But I know when I first came to cinema counting, our population was just around 200,000. We were, Ah, very rural agrarian

00:59:00.380 - 00:59:23.070

type of county, So your issues were rural in nature. I'm agricultural in nature, a lot of farmers, a lot of ag folks, a lot of local business people, very homogeneous and a lot of ways, as far as its ethnic composition is concerned, predominantly, probably white. Middle

00:59:23.070 - 00:59:42.950

class, I guess, is what you would predominantly non Hispanic white. It was probably the predominant, at least the predominant. Visibly certainly within government. Um, we have, and it was indicated it was when I first walked into in the government, it was very much a mechanical types

00:59:42.950 - 01:00:01.860

of devices. You didn't use computer systems, you picked up the phone and call. There wasn't a tremendous amount of automation within this structure. Um, the fact was, very little organization within the structure people knew each other. Um, you'd have, um, you'd have the key people within

01:00:01.860 - 01:00:16.850

the community were known. They were known who they were and their influence. Waas uh, you know, when somebody was running for office, for instance, one of the first things the papers would do is they take a look and see who signed that person's nomination papers. Because

01:00:16.860 - 01:00:33.920

those people, whoever those people were, had an influence themselves on support and opposition as well as who was who you'd vote for, wouldn't or what paper would endorse for. Wouldn't that kind of that kind of is definitely a rural small county feel to it? It's not

01:00:33.920 - 01:00:57.930

that way at all. At this point in time, you've now got an incredibly diverse population, first of all, and the in the population is diverse both ethnically. But it's also diverse politically, socially, philosophically, economically. It's all over the board. One of the things that I've seen

01:00:57.930 - 01:01:12.060

in the last few years, for instance, and that's become more and more and more obvious, is we have constituencies that will pop up literally out of the woodwork or at least appears out of the woodwork on almost any issue you bring to the board, you will

01:01:12.060 - 01:01:27.850

have. And that wasn't the case for a lot of years, you would have, um, if you proposed to put this here, you've got a group that opposes it, a group that supports it there. And they're very vocal, incredibly vocal. They know the system. Quite a few

01:01:27.850 - 01:01:41.830

of them have fairly well educated, and quite a few them have time and money. There's a there's a retirement community that's built up in Cinema County. There are fairly well to do people who now live who have second homes in a lot of cases, within, throughout

01:01:41.830 - 01:02:00.680

the Hill systems. Here, Um, there's a boutique element in a lot of cinema county. There's a lot of, um, the tourism industry has skyrocketed, the sophistication level has skyrocketed, but the same time you have it. The other end. You have people who are who are ethnically

01:02:00.720 - 01:02:17.650

just coming into the end of the United States into this county. Who has don't history speak English? Who have, um a who also have not a lot of sophistication relation toe how the bureaucracy works. In a lot of cases, they distrust it. A lot of cases

01:02:17.650 - 01:02:32.290

they're not going to rely on. For instance, your A, T. M's and all the rest of that stuff. Which party? Population absolutely lives by the other population, doesn't probably doesn't have a checkbook, ran into it with Tom Ford was telling me about this latest round of

01:02:32.300 - 01:02:46.020

paying taxes. You know, the last day of paying taxes, property taxes, he had a line out the door and he had tons of people coming in who were paying their taxes in cash. Because this is a This is a part of our society that has grown

01:02:46.020 - 01:03:01.490

up that way. They don't have checkbooks, they don't have credit cards. It's entirely a cash driven group of our society. And the other hand, we have people who never carry a diamond their pocket, cause it's everything everything is by credit card or a team or debit

01:03:01.490 - 01:03:16.850

cards, and you've got both him in the same county at the same time, both with very major impacts on how we do business. Would you say it's a sort of bifurcated society? Some of it is increasingly that that presents really Rachel problems, big, big issues the

01:03:16.850 - 01:03:31.640

county is doing right now, a big evaluation on developing strategic plan over the long haul because they want to see okay, what's going on right now, what are the big issues that are gonna be hitting us in the next five years? Where do we want to

01:03:31.640 - 01:03:47.120

put some focus on money? Um, and they've done the data gathering stage of it, and they're now looking at the evaluation planning stage of it to see where they want to go on. But I think there's the needs are skyrocketing in certain areas. The nature of

01:03:47.120 - 01:04:09.620

the needs are different. The culture clashes that you see and there are some. There are There's it's It's an incredibly diverse county and that paid needs major, major challenges does to county government big ones. Little be exciting. Oh, yeah? Well, yeah, And lastly, TV, would you

01:04:09.630 - 01:04:23.880

kindly I know you're you don't wanna pat yourself on the back. But if you were to say what milestones and accomplished once you achieved during your tenure in these positions, what do some of the things that I would that would? Well, you know, part of part

01:04:23.880 - 01:04:40.750

of what I've always been very proud of is building an organization with that will be perfectly that that will work very well once I've left. It's not dependent on an individual. It's not gonna fall apart. It's not. Service levels are not gonna go away. Um, I've

01:04:40.810 - 01:05:00.620

I've always felt strongly that, given particularly the nature of the diversity of my own responsibilities, that one of the keys to making it operate well and operate into the future has been to find good people who can run those divisions who become expert and very comfortable,

01:05:00.620 - 01:05:13.160

incapable in their own fields, who are perfectly capable of continuing to provide the kinds of services that I feel a very crucial at the levels that I think they need to be. They need to be provided, and that is one of the one of the things

01:05:13.160 - 01:05:28.750

I feel really good about in relation to my career. I've been fortunate enough to do that in all of my organizations. So Sanoma County is one of those those counties that is called by somebody wants. If somebody in this state needs some help on issues related

01:05:28.750 - 01:05:43.970

to county clerk functions, they'll call Vicki Peterson, my chief deputy county clerk, if they need help about elections. Janice Atkinson, my my assistant registrar voters, said. My replacement is known statewide is being the guru you call her If you want to know because she's gonna know

01:05:43.970 - 01:06:00.800

the answer. She's gonna be able to help you through it. If you want to know anything about recording issues, you call Steve, Steve Lehman and my my, uh, my recorder's office. That kind of statewide reputation among colleagues is really makes me feel good, because I know

01:06:00.810 - 01:06:11.260

I've had I've had some of my neighbors say he be What the heck did they have in the water in Sonoma County? All your people are the ones we always go to said Well, you know, it's just good people and finding them and putting them in

01:06:11.270 - 01:06:26.170

this place is and and giving them some responsibility. But some authority to be able to to exercise their very good judgment, and they're very great skills and being able to carry it forward. That's probably one of my biggest. I also have always felt very, very good

01:06:26.170 - 01:06:44.030

about being able Teoh to take on and and and handle whatever it is the county would like me to do. Um, for instance, is that I've been bad. Mom was the queen of consolidation and de consolidation, and I've been able to do that in somehow. Who

01:06:44.030 - 01:06:57.420

knows what, How, in a way where the consolidations have been and the D consolidations, whatever they have been, have been done in a way that I think provides better service for the public in the long haul makes best use of the resource is in the long

01:06:57.420 - 01:07:21.880

haul and make sense makes logical sense, but also, in a way where I've been able to avoid tremendous upheaval, labor unrest, dissatisfaction, animosities have been in and the people have been put together or sometimes separated out. And they've maintained working relationship. They functioned well, They function

01:07:21.880 - 01:07:38.510

well, they function without high level strife and all the rest of that, um, I don't know how that happens or why that happens. But I've been very been very proud of being able to do that. So and I think the other is I've I've I've always

01:07:38.510 - 01:07:53.770

loved to doing what I do. I think I've been a very good public servant, and I see see my role very much more later. Thank you. Most definitely. I think I've lived up to Teoh to the trust that that that the voters have have given me

01:07:53.770 - 01:08:04.800

and and I feel really good about that. I feel good about returning when I have with what I left behind. I think it's a good life and exemplary. And the county has been so fortunate to have you among us for all this time. And I know

01:08:04.800 - 01:08:18.520

the Khalidi ality that you just spoke of is something that you uniquely, I think, provides so well. And that's the best insurance for continued good service in county government. I think it is. Yeah, I think it's important. And I hope it does continue, I'm sure. Well,

01:08:18.530 - 01:08:20.310

thank you. Re v. Lewis. You're welcome.