Placentia City Administrator Damien Arrula is under investigation for whether he overbilled his city credit card and violated city policy by spending tax dollars to install an electric car charger in his parking spot at city hall.
Now, city council members are looking at ways to tighten their policies on city-issued credit card spending and travel allowances while debating whether or not to fire him.
Nicolette Drulius, the city’s spokesperson, declined to comment whether or not Arrula has been placed on leave and Arrula did not return multiple requests for comment.
Arrula became city manager in 2016, when trust in city hall was at a record low after the city’s former financial services manager was charged and later convicted for embezzling over $5 million from the city and sentenced to over 20 years in prison.
Since then, Arrula has become one of the highest paid city managers in the county, helping lead the city out of the OC Fire Authority and establish an independent fire department.
[Read: Placentia First OC City to Leave Fire Authority and Form its Own Fire Department]
But now, he’s facing questions around his own spending with officials meeting behind closed doors twice this week to discuss possibly removing a city employee.
Officials did not report any action taken behind closed doors out of either meeting, and would not confirm or deny if Arrula was the employee in question.
They also would not confirm who would be sitting in the city manager’s office come Monday.
The questions first surfaced in March, when resident Julie Suchard publicly brought up concerns about Arrula regularly sending staff out with his personal car to a car wash who contracted with the city for free car washes, despite his $800 monthly vehicle stipend.
“I would argue that time spent using city resources and the funds expended on the maintenance of Mr. Arrula’s personal vehicle should be considered compensation,” Suchard said at the city council’s March 5 meeting. “Where does the council draw the line on forcing taxpayers to fund Mr.Arrula’s employment perks?”
Since then, Suchard has repeatedly shown up at public meetings raising her concerns about Arrula’s spending and on Tuesday called on officials to release the investigation report about her concerns to the public and taxpayers that are paying for it.
“Since it was my concerns being investigated, I am a party to the investigation,” Suchard said. “I believe this report should be revealed to everyone in Placentia.”
At the council’s Tuesday meeting public comment period, Suchard said she’d been interviewed by investigators regarding her public comments about Arrula, and told the Voice of OC Thursday that she turned over the city records she’d received to them.
“The city council took my concerns about Mr. Arrula wasting taxpayer money so seriously that they hired a private investigator,” Suchard said at Tuesday’s meeting. “I was interviewed by the investigator at length in June 2024 and was asked not to mention the investigation at city council meetings until his report was given to council.”
City Councilman Chad Wanke declined to comment on the issue on Thursday morning, saying he couldn’t speak to an ongoing investigation.
“(Arrula) has been fiscally irresponsible with taxpayer funds enriching himself personally at taxpayer expense,” Suchard said at Tuesday’s meeting. “Placentia taxpayers should not be expected to fund Mr. Arrula’s Nordstrom lifestyle on our Walmart budget.”
Proposed Changes to Travel Allowances & City Credit Card Usage
Earlier this week, officials held a study session to discuss ways to update travel allowances and city-issued credit card use policies including submitting all travel expense receipts even when taking per diem allowances.
Staff is also proposing to ban officials from using city credit to buy meals when traveling as well as raising one time spending limits for department heads, general employees, and mid-level managers
Beyond that, the proposal would ban staff and officials from using their credit cards to buy and pay for ammunition and weapons, legal fees, insurance, excessive baggage fees, movies, shoeshines, haircuts, magazines, dry-cleaning, traffic tickets and more.
The changes to travel policy are expected to be approved by the council at a future meeting, while changes to the credit card use policy will be made administratively by the city manager.
At the meeting, Arrula said the mayor approves his travel and all his travel expenses, adding that he implemented a system that requires the finance director to review council member travel and expenses prior to his own review.
“I just want to make sure I’m being clear about that. We do have that process in place. In addition, it is for checks and balances and internal controls,” he said.
Noah Biesiada is a Voice of OC reporter and corps member with Report for America, a GroundTruth initiative. Contact him at nbiesiada@voiceofoc.org or on Twitter @NBiesiada.
Hosam Elattar is a Voice of OC reporter and corps member with Report for America, a GroundTruth initiative. Contact him at helattar@voiceofoc.org or on Twitter @ElattarHosam.
•••
Can you support Voice of OC with a donation?
You obviously care about local news and value good journalism here in Orange County. With your support, we can bring you more stories like these.
