Kern County needs an Alan Tandy.

Seriously.

Whatever you think of Bakersfield’s “beloved” city manager’s, er, aggressive tactics, his ego, or even his priorities, you can bet a B.A. Jinadu mess wouldn’t have happened under his watch.

Jinadu, the former County Public Health director, was outed by the state several years ago for bilking Medi-Cal via a string of clinics he owned in Southern California where, by the by, he was moonlighting while he was supposed to be working for us. Then it turned out he never paid the state his court-ordered settlement, something Kern County supes didn’t know until San Diego County rescinded a job offer to Jinadu after they did a background check. Jinadu has since retired from Kern County.

Now an audit of Public Health shows a department rife with “vision problems” where some employees apparently couldn’t distinguish between personal and public money.

Why am I not surprised?

The problem is the county’s structure.

The bulk of the county’s 26, non-elected department heads report directly to the supervisors. Each department operates independently, its own little fiefdom. If the department head is conscientious — as the vast majority no doubt are — no problem. But bad apples can get away with a lot before they’re caught, if ever.

They don’t have a boss, like Tandy, breathing down their necks, holding them accountable on a day-to-day basis.

Supervisors, technically their managers, have four-inch thick binders to go through every week on major policy issues affecting business, people’s well-being and the future of this county.

They do not have time to chase around after department heads to make sure they’re actually at work when they’re supposed to be, aren’t calling Nigeria on county cell phones, aren’t charging double mileage or aren’t having taxpayers foot the bill for their valet parking.

The county needs a Tandy. 

I wish I could say this was an original idea, but Supervisor Michael Rubio actually proposed it nearly three years ago. He’s continued to bring it up in the intervening years as other issues with department heads have emerged. But the board wouldn’t go for it, wanting to keep department heads reporting directly to them.

Supervisors Don Maben and Mike Maggard told me Tuesday their feelings haven’t changed. They don’t want to give up control to a strong manager or CEO (chief executive officer).

“I’ve had some experience with that,” said Maggard, who formerly served on the City Council.

OK, maybe a slightly modified Tandy.

Either way, the current county system is just not working.

In addition to the Jinadu debacle, supervisors discovered on Tuesday that the former head of KMC changed a contract without going through the board and it’s now become a nightmare that the current KMC director is struggling to fix.

How many of these rotten apples do we need before we figure out it’s the barrel that needs fixing?

At least supervisors are kind of looking in that direction. They asked staff on Tuesday to see if the CAO’s duties could be altered to include some checks and balances on other departments.

Not good enough.

The CAO (County Administrative Office) handles a heavy load already — the budget, managing employee health insurance, union negotiations, research and some financial monitoring of departments, among a host of other important tasks. I don’t want them saddled with more duties but no added staff or authority. That’s a recipe for failure.

This county has an annual $2 billion budget and thousands of employees. Government is bigger and much more complex now than ever before. Long gone are the days when supervisors knew every department head and their family members by name.

If we don’t adjust to that fact, we will continue to be “shocked” and “dismayed” at more and more Jinadus taking advantage of the system.

We need a strong CEO with the authority to investigate departments and take action when needed. Someone who can monitor audits, respond quickly when there are problems and provide clear communication to department heads. Hiring and firing at the department head level could still be done with board approval, but the ticky-tacky business of daily management should be left to a CEO.

Yes, creating a CEO would increase the county’s cost of doing business.

But how much does it cost now when department heads go bad? If not in dollars and cents, in public trust?

Lois Henry’s column appears Wednesdays and Sundays. E-mail her at lhenry@bakersfield.com or call her at 395-7373.