Four people who were part of the brand new leadership team at Manteca Town Hall are no longer in town.
They were released after a thorough cleansing of all previous key personnel in September.
The youngest departure manager is technical manager Leigh Ann Sutton. It was discontinued by the city in July 2020.
In the course of the subsequent reorganization, which began nine months after the election of Ben Cantu in 2018 with the decision to take the then City Manager Tim Ogden on paid administrative leave, the in-house engineering department was created. The city and Ogden agreed on a separation at the end of December 2019.
The idea behind creating an engineering department was to reduce the need for consultants, speed up the processing of road projects such as the proposed North Main Street congestion reduction plan, and other community projects that require engineering.
Existing qualified personnel were transferred from the public works to the engineering department to do the work. During council meetings last year, when the council was frustrated with the slow progress of various city projects, Sutton said several times that the city was having difficulty recruiting qualified candidates.
Ken Jorgenson, who has been with the city for a number of years and has worked on numerous public works, is currently the acting city engineer.
The others who leave, who have been part of a new team and a new approach that is more agile, innovative and responsive to the needs of the community are:
* John Tresidder, who worked as a town clerk for four months from mid-May to early October 2020
* Lisa Blackmon, who served as Assistant City Manager for 11 months before serving as Assistant City Manager for three months.
* Miranda Lutzow, who after the leave of absence from Ogden in mid-September 2019 worked for 17½ months as a provisional, interim or “permanent” city manager.
Lutzow was in the city administrator’s office when former police chief Jodie Estarziau, former finance director Jeri Tejeda, former fire chief Kyle Shipherd and former public works director Mark Houghton were either put on paid administrative leave and then left town like Ogden or otherwise were abruptly removed. Others who were either retired or left on their own to work in nearby towns quickly hired them.
Lutzow abruptly resigned in late February to return to Canada. Blackmon left three months later for a position as Assistant City Manager in El Paso, Texas.
Tressider replaced Lutzow in February 2016 as deputy town clerk at Merced.
Lutzow had been hired by Ogden as the city’s HR director and was appointed by the city council as deputy city manager and then as interim city manager in 2018. After initially removing three department heads directly from the door or via paid administrative leave, she was rewarded with the appointment of permanent city manager.
Lutzow then raised Blackmon from the post of town clerk to deputy town director.
As of Monday, Manteca does not have a permanent fire chief, finance director, city manager, deputy city manager, community service manager or city engineer. That’s about half of senior executives.
To contact Dennis Wyatt, email [email protected]
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