At the Thursday March 18th meeting of the Orange County Vector Control District’s Manager Gerard Goedhart was given notice by the District Board that they were exercising their right to terminate, without cause, in six months.

I’m not quite certain what Goedhardt did to annoy the Board President Joe Anderson of San Clemente, but he must have done something.

The OC Register’s Terry Sforza reported back on March 23rd that “Anderson said he plans to present a succession plan to the board at its April 15 meeting.”

On Monday, Terry posted this story regarding the latest conflict at the District over contracting out some pest control work as well as a threat from District Manager Goedhart over my post quoting from his resignation letter.

Goedhart wrote in his weekly memo to the board; “Trustees should be concerned that one of you released my March 15 confidential memo to Chris Prevatt (of The LiberalOC blog). Don’t blame me if this sensitive information surfaces in public.”

Those plans changed when Anderson called a Special Meeting for Monday April 5th at 3:30 p.m. to discuss this personnel matter in closed session.

LiberalOC’s Bill Spaulding was at the meeting to see what happened

The meeting began with a chance for public comment. I did not arrive until after that and the closed session had begun. When I arrived, I saw a binder with a label, “visitor log.” I asked if I was required to sign in before attending the meeting. My polite question was met with a universally unfriendly and condescending reply. Cool heads prevailed and I was begrudgingly permitted to wait in the reception area until the closed session ended. That occurred shortly after 4:00.

The board announced its decision. The board voted to “relieve Mr. Goedhart of his responsibilities immediately. They appointed Michael Hearst as interim director. The board secretary announced the roll call vote. Not a single vote against the motion. There were several cities absent from the meeting. A very few cities, including Santa Ana, were announced as vacant. Golly, one could have fun with that one…

After announcing the vote, the meeting was adjourned until the next regularly scheduled board meeting. The whole thing lasted less than an hour.

I asked Mr. Hearst if he had any comments and he declined.

Bill Spaulding contributed to this report.