Unethical behavior at RMWD

The Village News letter by Bill Bopf (3/24) left out important information that was not beneficial to him. Ms. Tomlinson was president of the Rainbow Water District Board of Directors when General Manager Ensminger was hired. Shortly after Ensminger was hired he (Ensminger) fired Assistant Manager De Bie, reduced the job education and qualification requirements and hired Ms. Tomlinson in De Bie’s place. Ms. Tomlinson could not perform major requirements of the assistant manager position (according to members of the recall committee), namely, preparation of the Rainbow Water Board budget. Therefore, another person was hired to prepare the budget at the same salary Tomlinson was receiving. To me, this action by Ensminger and Tomlinson was/is totally unethical and could be considered by some to be public corruption. Mr. Bopf, in my opinion, is just as guilty of unethical behavior in this matter because he strongly supports Ensminger. Mr. Glick, of the Rainbow Water Board, is an extremely close personal friend of Ensminger who would support Ensminger at all costs. It has been suggested that Glick was appointed (not elected) to the Rainbow Water Board, with the help of Bopf, to save Ensminger’s job. De Bie won $600,000 in a lawsuit because of the above described indefensible, unethical employment behavior and Rainbow Water’s insurance coverage was cancelled shortly thereafter.

A similar case occurred in the Bay area’s West Bay Sanitary District, where a member of the District Board was given the job of district manager, and this personnel action resulted in a lawsuit. A superior court judge and an appellate court agreed that this Bay area case was a violation of Government Code section 1090, which holds that district officials “shall not be financially interested in any contract made by them in their official capacity, or any body or board while they are members.” The Rainbow Water case may not be identical to the Bay area case but it is just as unethical.