Brad Mitzelfelt
At over 17,000 square miles, San Bernardino County First District Supervisor Brad Mitzelfelt holds the distinction of being the local elected official for an area larger than nine states. His First District is the largest county district in the lower 48 states. The fact that that there are only seven incorporated cities with relatively small spheres of influence within that expanse only increases the enormity of the job.
Mitzelfelt began his life in public service by joining the United States Marine Corps in 1986, where he served his country as part of Operations Desert Storm and Desert Shield in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia. He was a public affairs specialist. He reached the rank of Staff Sergeant and served a total of ten years between active duty and reserves.
In 1992, Mitzelfelt accepted his first political job working in communications for the California Republican Party. By 1993 he had become a field representative for Assemblywoman Kathleen Honeycutt. That same year he volunteered in Richard Riordan’s first campaign for mayor for the city of Los Angeles.
In 1994 Mitzelfelt added campaign consultant and manager to his résumé. He ran dozens of successful local campaigns over the next five years, including the 1994 campaign pitting Keith Olberg against Mike Rothschild for a high desert Assembly seat.
Mitzelfelt went on to work for the Building Industry Association, one of California’s most powerful lobbying organizations. He replaced Olberg as government affairs director, when Olberg left to assume his seat in the Assembly.
In 2000 Brad joined the Bill Postmus campaign as his senior advisor to help Postmus win the seat, becoming the youngest person to serve on the San Bernardino County Board of Supervisors. When Postmus took office, Mitzelfelt became his chief of staff.
Mitzelfelt served the residents of San Bernardino County for seven years in that position until Postmus left to become county Assessor. In a 3-1 vote, the remaining supervisors chose Mitzelfelt to finish the term ending in 2008. In the June 2008 primary, Supervisor Mitzelfelt beat out three opponents to win the seat outright. His current term ends in 2012.
First as a chief of staff and now as the elected representative, Supervisor Mitzelfelt has helped the high desert region finally obtain its fair share of tax revenues, services, and programs. Fire and police services have increased substantially while continually funding road improvements, libraries, public health and social services, and other infrastructure.
Both an adult detention facility and a juvenile detention facility/court have been built in recent years. Several new fire stations and a library are now serving the district’s residents. A centralized county government center is scheduled to open later this year in Hesperia.
Mitzelfelt has also been active in bringing much-needed training programs to the desert. With his assistance the nursing program at Victor Valley College has been expanded to help meet our state’s nursing shortage. And an aircraft mechanics curriculum has been established at the Southern California Logistics Airport.
Mitzelfelt has been an activist for alternative energy solutions to harness the desert’s natural resources without harming the environment. A new solar plant was recently approved as was a biosolids composting plant.
Supervisor Mitzelfelt’s experience and leadership skills may prove to bring about an interesting turn of events when it becomes time to elect a new chairman for the next two years. As we mentioned in another article, San Bernardino County has a provision for its chairman not found in the charter of any other county in California.
Article 1, Section 5 of the Charter of the County of San Bernardino states in pertinent part:
The Chairman of the Board of Supervisors shall be the general executive agent of the Board. It shall be his duty, subject to regulation and control by the Board, to exercise general supervision over the official conduct of all County officers and officers of all districts and other subdivisions of County charged with the assessment, collection, safekeeping, management, or disbursement of public revenue; also over all County institutions, buildings and property.
With less than four years under his belt as an elected representative, Mitzelfelt has not had the opportunity to serve in a leadership capacity on the Board of Supervisors. Under normal protocol, it is his turn to become vice chairman. However, the current vice chairman likely will not have the three votes necessary to elevate to chairman.
Supervisor Neil Derry has been on the board even less time than Mitzelfelt, and Janice Rutherford has a good chance of beating out incumbent Paul Biane. That would leave only Mitzelfelt to fill the chairman’s position without having ever served as vice chairman.
Mitzelfelt appears to have an even shot at assuming the chairmanship if he can show the other BOS members he has the leadership and communication/problem-solving skills necessary for the position. Besides for his years of government experience, he also serves as chairman of the Local Agency Formation Commission (LAFCo), the Victor Valley Economic Development Authority, and the High Desert Corridor Authority and he is president of San Bernardino Associated Governments (SANBAG), all four of which have helped him develop the skills that make him well qualified to become chairman.
In addition to his work as our elected official, this year Brad formed The Brad Mitzelfelt Foundation, a non-profit public benefit corporation “to improve the quality of life for residents of San Bernardino County by supporting and advancing charitable, public and private educational, cultural, professional and recreational activities, causes and facilities, and to support the efforts of those striving to improve these areas by providing material support such as grants and scholarships.”
Brad is also a talented writer. Many of his articles can be found at JoinBrad.
Brad received his Bachelor’s Degree from the University of Redlands. He lives in Wrightwood with his wife, Megan, and their son John.
