KPCC News In Brief

Women serve as chair, vice-chair of OC Board for first time

The Orange County Board of Supervisors made a little history today. KPCC’s Nick Roman says you might not have noticed it unless you’d been observing Orange County politics for many years.

Nick Roman: The chair of the Orange County Board of Supervisors is mostly a traffic cop. You hold the gavel. You run the meetings. Among five equals, you’re a little more equal. The vice-chair one year typically gets to be the chair the next - and that’s how it worked this time.

The outgoing chair - Supervisor John Moorlach - handed the gavel to vice-chair Patricia Bates. Moorlach then nominated Supervisor Bill Campbell to take over as vice-chair. But Campbell declined. He’s chaired the Board of Supervisors before - and he said each supervisor should get an opportunity to do it.

So as vice-chair, he nominated Janet Nguyen, the board’s youngest member - and the first Vietnamese-American county supervisor in the nation. The other board members agreed - and they chose Nguyen.

Women have served on the Orange County Board of Supervisors for only 30 years. This is the first time they’ve served together as the chair and the vice-chair.

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• January 13, 2009 4:52 PM
• Categories: Politics/Public Affairs