The "Gold" Standard of Culver City Employees

Neil Rubenstein

Through a Public Records Act request that I filed, Culver City gave me several documents concerning City employees which are being utilized for this article.  The first employee I am writing about is Mary (Marlee) Chang.

There is a lot of debate throughout the country and in our community about public pensions.  While there are many questions raised by these documents regarding pensions for our city employees, the most concerning name appearing on the list of City employees’ pensions is Marlee Chang.  While some might argue that public safety benefits are too generous, at least we know those retirees on the list were qualified and earned their dues.  Not so with Chang who made her meteoric rise due to her association with former Chief Administrative Officer/City Manager Jerry Fulwood.

Chang neither had a four-year college degree nor understood the elementary difference between a cash and an accrual accounting system.  Yet she ended up holding the positions of City Controller and exited the City (with the early retirement incentive “golden handshake”) as one of the two, yes two, Assistant City Managers.

Marlee Chang first started working for Culver City in 1990 in the position of Administrative Assistant for which a bachelors degree was not required.  In 2004, Chang was appointed by Fulwood to become City Controller (which required a BA/BS degree in Finance, Accounting, Business or Public Administration) over other candidates who had advanced college degrees and much greater experience.  Chang submitted a resume which said she had a “major” in International Trade from Ming-Chuan College, Taiwan.  The outside recruitment firm of Avery & Associates in its applicant profile package clearly said Chang was “non-degreed”.  The College did not even offer accredited four-year bachelors degrees until 1990, many years after Chang moved to the United States, per her resume.  Jim Lavery was selected as the City Controller, however when Lavery left after less than a year on the job, Fulwood quickly slid Chang into the position.  So how did she come to be interviewed anyway and why didn’t the City’s Human Resources department, that was monitoring the process, pull her application out of the pile?   Wasn’t it a violation of the rules to appoint her, when the job application approved by the Civil Service Commission specified a college degree as a minimum requirement? 

If that wasn’t bad enough, it happened a second time.  After the changes to the City Charter form of government took effect and the City hired a Chief Financial Officer in place of the City Controller, Fulwood had to find a position for Chang.  So he created a second Assistant City Manager (which also has a minimum requirement of a bachelors degree)  and increased the minimum number of years of professional experience.  With no recruitment process whatsoever, Fulwood slid Chang into that position, with nary a blink of the eye from the City Council.  Again, Chang did not possess the minimum requirements to perform this job.

This might pass the smell test if Chang was one of those extraordinary individuals who is considered a leader in her field and recognized by fellow professionals as such, without the need of a diploma.  Chang is no Bill Gates or Steve Jobs.  While the last City Treasurer was busy representing the City’s financial interests with professional groups, including making presentations, writing papers, and serving on statewide committees, very few public finance professionals even knew who Chang was and what role she played.

Oh, and Chang never did have any responsibility for the accounting function, which is normally what a controller handles.  Fulwood also declined to clarify that situation in renaming the position she held to Budget Director.  Who did have the responsibility for accounting, financial reporting, revenue collection, tax administration, investments and just about every finance function except for budgeting?  Oh, that was the elected City Treasurer.  Good thing, too, because Chang tried to incorrectly influence the presentation of a $6 million transaction in the financial statements one year until the City Treasurer finally had to have the outside auditors explain to Chang that she was in error.

After the changes to the City Charter were implemented and the economy declined rapidly in 2008, Fulwood submitted Chang’s position as one of the few being offered a “golden handshake” early retirement incentive.  Chang happily took this prize going out the door, too, since it gave her additional service credit, which will boost her retirement pension by tens of thousands of dollars. 

It's bad enough to pay these outrageous pensions for city employees who are both qualified and hard-working.  But how can our city council explain to the tax payers of Culver City that the money spent every year on Ms. Chang's retirement is a good use of public resources?

Neil Rubenstein is a Former Culver City Disability Advisory Committee Member and a Former Culver City Representative to the LAX Advisory Committee.