Meet the Roseville City Council Candidates: Phil Ozenick

Editor's Note — This is the fourth in a series of Roseville City Council candidate profiles. Seven people are running in the Nov. 6 election; three seats are available. Read more about candidates in our Election Guide here.

It’s been a year since political activist and former Roseville City Councilman Phil Ozenick and the Friends of Roseville’s (FORE) initiative to cap city management salaries failed to get enough signatures to appear on the ballot.

But that hasn’t stopped the fervent political activist from continuing his efforts to see it through. Nor has it kept him from seeking a bid for a City Council seat in three weeks. 

“We believe the residents of Roseville are not represented as far as taxes and other issues are concerned,” Ozenick said.

A 34-year resident of Roseville, Ozenick has long been a proponent of city financial accountability and transparency. He is the chairperson of FORE, a community watchdog group.

In October 2011, Ozenick and FORE drew up an initiative to limit pay scales for city management and City Council-appointed employees. They needed 9,600-plus signatures. But collected about 600 short of qualifying to be on the ballot, Ozenick said.

Still undeterred FORE has a new petition they plan to submit to the Placer County Office of Elections on Oct. 29. This time they need 9,229 signatures, Ozenick said. “I believe we have more than that come the 29^th,” he said.  

Looking further toward the future if elected, Ozenick’s top three priorities would be to limit government, follow the City’s money trail and to focus on economic development.

He questions how the city spends its discretionary funds.

“I would insist on a forensic audit where the money has come from and where the money is being spent,” he said.

"We cannot do it individually. We have to do it as a City."

On economic development, he would like to revisit a plan he said he has been proposing since the 1980s.

“I put together a plan in 1987 that I put before the City Council,” he said. The plan proposes establishing a committee or commission of 10 people that would pursue companies and businesses to locate in Roseville.

“(We would) want to be selective and actively seek industries and businesses which will be compatible to Roseville, and would provide a livable wage to those who want to work and live here,” he said. 

An additional priority he maintains is the need for fair City employee compensations, referencing back to the petition.  

“I would like to see as one of the planks, if you want to call it, reasonable compensation for all employees,” Ozenick said.

He explained the new initiative would limit management salaries. If approved, it calls for limiting them to two times the median income of a family in living in Roseville or from $86,000 to $175,000, whichever is greater. Currently the highest paid city position is that of the city manager, at $251,433.

Since 1995, FORE and Ozenick have taken issue with the City’s increase in utility taxes and has called into question the City’s boundaries laid out in its general plan and city council appointments. The group publishes a dogmatic newsletter it mails to all residents.

Ozenick said he supported updating the interior of the Roseville’s first library, Carnegie Museum, along with members of the Roseville Historical Society and an effort to get Amtrak to stop in Roseville.

Ozenick is no stranger to political positions. He was a Placer County Board of Supervisor from 1990-1994, and served on the Roseville City Council as mayor in 1987. He was also on the Roseville Planning Commission from 1983 to 1985.

He is in favor of encouraging a university to locate within Roseville and said he was involved in the initial idea working with then Sacramento State University President Donald Gerth in the 1980s.

“We are large enough right now to have our own university,” he said.

Ozenick has a master’s degree in business administration from the University of Michigan and doctorate of public administration from the University of Southern California.         

He is a retired United States Air Force colonel, and a member of the American Legion and Veterans of Foreign Wars.

When he finds the time, he said he enjoys gardening in his Diamond Oaks neighborhood yard. He lives with his wife of 62 years. The couple was married in 1949.

Unlike the other candidates, Ozenick didn't include his age on the sample ballot candidate statement. “I don’t’ want people to make an issue out of it,” he said.

Finally, when asked why he personally is driven to politics and a seat on the City Council, he said, “I feel the people of Roseville need a vocal voice — a voice that will support them.” 

For more local election coverage, see our Election Guide 2012 topic page here.
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