Torrance City Treasurer Dana Cortez Comes Under Fire
Torrance City Treasurer, Dana Cortez
In a stunning move, the City has proposed slashing the compensation afforded to the City Treasurer by over 50%. Per Transparent California City Treasurer Dana Cortez made $134,976 in regular pay in 2016 and received $196,604 in total pay and benefits. The proposal would reduce her salary to $65,088 a year.
Cortez ran unopposed for the City Treasurer’s office in the recent election and received 100% of the vote. Cortez has worked in the City Treasurer’s office since 2000 and has served as the City Treasurer since 2010 when then Treasurer Linda Barnett retired.
The City staff report indicated the reduction in pay was based on a realignment of duties that occurred in early 2017. Cortez stated at the meeting that she expressed concern to the City Attorney’s office at the time the realignment occurred over whether the City Manager had the authority to effectuate the modifications. She was informed at the time by the City Attorney that it was within the City Manager’s purview to effectuate the change even though her duties are outlined in the City Charter.
City Attorney, Patrick Sullivan, affirmed during the meeting that there was nothing improper about the realignment and that such modifications were not in violation of the City Charter.
Cortez asserted that the proposed resolution was brought forward shortly after she refused to sign a confidentiality agreement that the City Attorney had requested that she sign. Cortez also said she did not sign the confidentiality agreement because her job was to be transparent and accountable.
The realignment of duties caused key tasks such as central cashiering, utility payments, coordination and reconciliation of bank deposits, wire transfers of city funds, and processing of parking citations to be assumed by the Finance Department.
When pressed by Mayor Furey about why the realignment occurred, Assistant City Manager Aram Chaparyan referred to errors and omissions in various staff reports and a high turnover rate in the City Treasurer’s office.
Former City Treasurer Linda Barnett spoke at the meeting and expressed concern that the realignment of duties removed important checks and balances pertaining to city finances. Barnett also expressed frustration that the matter had previously been discussed behind closed doors in a closed session of the Council.
On that point she stated:
“To me if there is anything that is going on that is inappropriate, the residents of Torrance have a right to know. This should have been handled a lot differently than it was … it’s not an employee situation … I really do believe this should have been handled in an open forum where issues could have been brought out and Dana would have a chance to speak.”
Cortez herself echoed that concern at one point adamantly stating,”The voters deserved to know before the election so that they could cast their votes informed.”
Councilwoman Ashcraft explained the reasoning for holding the closed door session by saying, “The reason the matter was discussed in closed session was to protect your integrity … it was not to not be transparent. It was to protect.”
The City Council did not act on the proposal instead opting to have the matter brought forward again at its next meeting where presumably all issues pertaining to the matter can be discussed in an open session since the Council also waived its privilege to have the matter heard in closed session.
Not enough information to make an informed opinion, but on the surface this smells bad.
That is the correct answer. Not enough info to make an informed opinion. What if we find out her office has been incompetent and that’s why the duties were moved and the pay is being reduced.
Always thought it was interesting that the Treasurer and City Clerk make 6-figures while the Mayor and Council make $100 a meeting…
Time for citizens of Torrance to realize that city manager is running this city. If Miss Cortez was not meeting her required tasks why none of this came out before the election. How about this idea: the finance department is trying its best to hide their illicit financial activities. Removing checks and balances from our elected treasurer will give them carte blanche.
Checks and balances keep people HONEST by not giving someone the temptation to cheat…. transparency is crucial in govt….
This all seems peculiar. Why wasn’t this all done before the election? Reducing an elected officials pay by over 50%? It doesn’t matter if they’re taking away 20%, 30% or even 50% of her duties, this should have been done in public view BEFORE the election. Leroy Jackson makes over $345,000/yr. plus benefits. Why? He seems to be the one that’s responsible for all the financial conjuring that goes on in Torrance and his office wants to take away duties of the treasurer and move them under his office? Hell No! #Leroymustgo
Yes
I have every expectation that this will blow up on Torrance. The office of the treasurer is supposed to represent the people of Torrance. My guess itis that it has to do with the recent increase of fees or the insanely high revenue generated by street sweeping parking tickets. This council has always seemed dirty, and Heidi Ashcraft’s claim that the behind closed doors discussion was to protect her , makes me wonder why. The public always has the right to know, and quite franly we cannot trust our City.
Since she ran unopposed what difference would it have made if this was brought out before the election? You would really need a lot of write-in votes for one candidate for an unopposed candidate to lose. It should have been released before the filing period opened when someone would have had a chance to jump into the race. We need to have a separation of duties and giving so many of the treasurer’s duties to Leroy Jackson violates that principle. Four years ago then Furey wanted to get rid of Gerber Ambulance we heard similar charges leveled of not being competent etc. This is just another attempt for the city mis-manager to accumulate more power. Keep the checks and balances in place and don’t give more power to one person because we all know power corrupts. Pretty soon we need to ask why do we need a mayor and city council if Leroy is running the whole show. I hope our 2 new city councilmen will not be a rubber stamp for the city manager like this current council and its predecessors have been.
Time for an internal control review. An independent audit.
Something is not right here and the residents are starting to smell something emanating from the corner of Maple and Torrance Blvd. This is too close to being right after the election. I suspect the sitting mayor has put a delay in this, (something wrong in Denmark) after an anticipated close election. Remember the city manager works for the mayor.
Has Dana Cortez responded to this …I don’t not find anything from https://transparentcalifornia.com/, pertaining to her salary…
Dennis, Dana spoke rather passionately about this at the Council meeting. Her compensation is included at Transparent California at the following link https://transparentcalifornia.com/salaries/search/?q=dana+cortez.
Thanks Clint for the link..
Former City Treasurer Linda Barnett spoke at the meeting and expressed concern that the realignment of duties removed important checks and balances pertaining to city finances.
Thank God for Linda Barnett. I remember her well from my days with the City. A voice of sanity within a City of smokes and mirrors.
Lots of assumptions and conjecture on here already? Attacking the council and mayor without much information. Why dont we wait until next meeting and find out all the facts before we start attacking people’s character? Oh… right. Its TorranceCityCouncil.com… where the loons go to anonymously blast on people.
Jr again trolling.
Anonymous conjecture and assumption
Anonymous…. By being so….. it makes YOUR comments QUESTIONABLE….. what are you afraid of??
It’s about time Karma comes to get her.
It says a lot to me about refusing non-disclosure, it would seem there’s much to hide, and transparency is the enemy of corruption (if indeed that’s why they needed to hide stuff). Now more Treasurer news (April ’19).
City of Torrance has never been transparent, working solely on favoritism and self preservation. I know. I worked there. I feel very sorry for Dana who got the brunt end of a very predictable stick. So glad I’m out of there. My pension is more than worth it and gives me the satisfaction I never felt under such unethical circumstances.
let me guess who wants to be next City Treas….you guess it …
We need some fiscally conservative PPL in Torrance leadership. We need them NOW.