Rookie wants to volunteer to help the City

By Norm "Opa" Segel

I am new to City politics. I have never served on a committee and I know very little about most of the current issues facing the City. For this reason I have not participated in the debates that some of you have attended. I am not sure that serving on a committee or committees is the litmus test for serving on the City Council. One thing is for sure: There will always be new issues.

Getting the background on a particular issue should not take long. The right people can get up to speed rather quickly if they put in the time. Also most of the issues are probably more about common sense than anything else.

Do we want to fix the roads? Of course.

Do we want to take care of the Pension cost? Of course.

Do we want to keep attracting new business to the City? Of course.

Etc. etc. etc. etc.

It really should be quite simple. There is a defined amount of money to go around. We need to allocate this to all of the projects with merrit. This may mean doing a little at a time and have some projects take multiple years to complete.

This may also mean running a leaner city government. A City of about 150,000 with a government of almost 1,700 employees? I wonder how well we could run with say 1400-1500 employees. Or maybe fewer. I propose to have an independent study performed to determine required staffing levels. This would apply to all levels of our city government. Managers and middle managers would not be exempt.

How then would some of this work be accomplished? How about Torrance businesses? That way, you complete a project without the long-term costs associated with employees. You also have the work performed by companies with a motive probably not ingrained in city government. Efficiency!

I come from the private sector. I am a career accountant with extensive management experience. My training is all about performing functions for the least cost. My customers demanded it and were not afraid to go to the competition if our prices were too high.

I think that we have a choice of new ideas and methods versus the way we are currently managing. It may be time to take a good look at what we are doing and how we do it. The fact that we are going to have a new City Manager may be a blessing in disguise.

If you elect me, I will volunteer my time and skills. I will simply work hard and try to be fair to all of our residents, businesses and all who deal with the City.

Thank you folks.

Norm "Opa" Segel