Council majority did the right thing

It is getting increasingly difficult to listen to a small group of people that show up each week at the city council’s public comment section with a planned agenda and accuse Councilmembers Fox, Gillette and now, apparently, Irwin of misdeeds. You get on the wrong side of this little group and they will give you a mouthful of untruths and misstatements.

They really don’t care what they say as long as they think it will further their cause. I don’t have to name them. Just watch the council meetings for a few weeks and you’ll see them time and time again, as if they were in a parade that leads up to the council chamber’s lectern.

And now Fox, Gillette and Irwin are being targeted once again by this little group because of the exiting of City Manager Phil Gatch. This group supporting Gatch does not work well in his favor. I should first commend Gatch on his years and accomplishments with the city of Thousand Oaks. He holds a career record here that many would envy to have.

Second, a day does not go by where high-level executives are asked to leave or are summarily fired from their jobs.

Whatever the reason, it would seem that Gatch did not have the necessary skills to operate as city manager as his predecessors had. The city manager must be able to bring vastly different personalities and ideas into focus in order to give direction to the city. This evidently was not happening.

Situations like this are always tough for both parties, but I have no doubt that the leadership exhibited by Fox, Gillette and Irwin was the correct path to take, not only for the city but for Gatch as well.

According to my math, Gatch made out pretty well with his severance package, and I wish him only the best in his new endeavors. I’ll look forward to the selection of a new city manager and the direction and leadership that I know will come over the next few years from Councilmembers Fox, Gillette and Irwin.

Pete Turpel

Thousand Oaks