Williams: “I may not have followed what their intent was”

Yesterday, on the OC Register Total Buzz blog, reporter Jennifer Muir updated us on the John Williams mismanagement story (SOCCCD trustee Williams is also the OC Public Administrator/Guardian):

Memos may support allegations against public administrator

Grand Jury allegations that the county’s Public Administrator/Public Guardian has questionable promoting practices got a boost of credibility from inter-county memos obtained by the Register.

The offenses listed in the memos — all part of a draft county response to the grand jury report — are technical and obscure. But they lend credibility to grand jury allegations that PA/PG John Williams has tried to discredit.
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While the internal county memos don’t confirm some of the most egregious offenses in the grand jury report, such as pension spiking and mismanaging an estate, it does appear to back up some of the personnel questions the grand jury raised. The memos say Williams ignored human resource guidelines when promoting managers.

“PA/PG’s human resources administration practices are outside standard county practice and go against direction previously provided by (the Human Resources Department),” a memo from the county’s budget office says.
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The memos were written by county CEO Tom Mauk, Human Resources Director Carl Crown, and the county’s budget office and were sent to Supervisor Pat Bates. They also contain recommendations that supervisors consider splitting up the public administrator and public guardian office and delete three manager positions....

Williams said Thursday that the memos, dated June 4, contain old information. After they were circulated, he met with Mauk and Crown on June 24 and resolved their questions.

“Carl Crown confirmed we did not violate any policy or procedure,” he said. … “As it stands, I may not have followed what their intent was, and it may not have been what they wanted, but we did not violate policy,” he said.

He also responded formally to the memo.

A county spokesman confirmed that Williams met with Mauk and the other county officials. But he would not discuss what happened in that meeting. Instead, he said the county’s response to the first grand jury report will be presented publicly to supervisors July 28. Stay tuned.