Oxnard committee debates adding public‑records staff after residents allege delays and conflicts

The Oxnard Finance and Governance Committee on March 24 reviewed a City Manager’s Office report on California Public Records Act (CPRA) request activity and a resolution to reclassify one position and add an administrative specialist to the public‑records function.

Public commenters pressed the committee over what they described as chronic delays and poor transparency. Eric Andraste said he has filed “over a 100 public record requests,” flagged 51 of his requests as late and said “34 of those are more than 100 days late” with “the average delay … 154 days” and one request at 494 days; he urged the committee to “Vote no on moving this forward and direct an independent audit.” Alicia Purcell separately said the city often waits until the 10‑day statutory response period to publish records that were uploaded earlier, and that follow‑up requests are sometimes treated as new requests, resetting response clocks.

Staff and counsel defended the need for more capacity. Steven Novo, the city’s human resources director, said the reclassification would allow the public‑records lead to supervise a new administrative services specialist; he described the reclassification as a roughly 5% salary increase required for supervisory duties. Assistant City Attorney Jason Zaragoza explained CPRA timing: agencies must acknowledge requests within 10 days and may take a 14‑day extension in “unusual” or voluminous cases. Zaragoza also described the workflow: records requests go to a public‑records advocate who sends them to departmental liaisons; staff review records for responsiveness and possible exemptions before release.

Staff and members also discussed workload and cost. Zaragoza reported 321 requests submitted so far this year and said many are multipart; another staff member said there were 45 requests since the item was published seven days earlier. The staff report estimated the remainder‑of‑fiscal‑year cost of the reclassification and new position at about $20,000 and an annualized cost of about $88,000.

Committee member Star moved to postpone the item so the city manager and the city clerk could explore whether the city clerk’s office could absorb the work without adding staff. A competing motion to advance the item to council was made and seconded, and that motion failed in committee. Members agreed staff will meet internally and provide clarified information in the council report.

The committee did not take final action to adopt the position change; instead, the item will proceed to council with added clarification from staff after internal discussions.