At the Sept. 12 Riverside County Board of Supervisors’ meeting, Registrar of Voters Rebecca Spencer was placed on paid administrative leave from her position. The supervisors met in closed session for a “Public Employee Performance Evaluation/Title: Registrar of Voters.”

“The County of Riverside accepted Rebecca Spencer’s resignation from her position as the Registrar of Voters on September 29, 2023, and have entered into a settlement agreement whereby the parties mutually agree that this action is done solely for the purposes of compromise, and to eliminate the burden and expense of any litigation,” wrote Riverside County Director of Communications Brooke Federico on Monday.

“This agreement is not an admission of liability or wrongdoing by either party. Ms. Spencer was employed by the ROV’s office since 2001 and appointed to the Registrar position in 2014. Art Tinoco, the Assistant Registrar of Voters, will be assuming the duties of the Interim Registrar, subject to confirmation by the Board of Supervisor. Mr. Tinoco has been with the ROV’s office since 2002. The County intends to conduct a recruitment for the permanent position of Registrar of Voters. The department continues to serve our residents and prepare for upcoming elections through the work of our dedicated staff at the Registrar of Voters.”

The county settled with her for $799,591, two years of salary, said Federico.

Rebecca Spencers attorney, Sanford A. Kassel, said “… Rebecca Spencer has been a tremendous asset to the County of Riverside throughout her employment as the ROV and in the Registrar of Voters Office for nearly 25 years and will be greatly missed.” He said his client, Rebecca Spencer, “agreed to resign from her position as the Registrar of Voters and the parties have agreed to a mutually very satisfactory Settlement Agreement.”

Last week, the Press-Enterprise released a letter from Jeff Ellington, chief executive officer of Runbeck Election Services in Phoenix, to board Chair Kevin Jeffries. In the letter, Ellington alleges that Spencer has regularly mismanaged her job which has caused substantial costs to the county and election delays. Furthermore, Ellington claims that Spencer has routinely blamed Runbeck for these problems.

Ellington is now surfacing these charges because Runbeck participated in an independent audit of Spencer’s performance, which was authorized or conducted by the county’s Chief Operating Officer Juan Perez. Runbeck submitted information that pointed to Spencer’s “mismanagement.”

Consequently, Ellington claims she is retaliating against his company. In June, the county issued a request for proposals for a new election material printing contract because Runbeck’s current contract with the county was expiring. The types of ballots to be printed include 1.4 million folded vote-by-mail ballots for countywide election, 100 test ballots per ballot type and counter ballots.

Runbeck has been serving the county since 2017.

The Oct. 3 supervisors’ meeting does have this new contract award on the agenda. Art Tinco, assistant registrar of voters, with Perez’s concurrence, is requesting that the board approve the personal services agreement for “Official Ballot Printing & Mailing Services” with Pro Document Solutions. The contract is $3 million annually for five years, through Dec. 31, 2028.

However, Ellington believes Spencer steered the award of this new election material publishing contract to Pro Document and intentionally rated Runbeck lower. Upon learning that Runbeck would not receive the new contract, Ellington appealed the decision to the Purchasing Department and subsequently wrote Jeffries.

In response to the Aug. 31 protest letter from Runbeck, the county reviewed the letter and accompanying documentation and denied the protest in a Sept. 21 letter.

The recommendation to the board states that Pro Document Solutions received the highest evaluation score from the six-person review team and also was the lowest bidder. However, the latter was not a necessary criterion for award.

Subsequently, on Sept. 28, Runbeck appealed the denial of its original protest.

“A review of the solicitation, initial protest response from the County, and the appeal submitted by Runbeck was conducted. The County issued a letter upholding the initial protest decision on September 29, 2023. It is proposed that it is within the best interest of the County to continue with the recommended award to ProVote due to the priority need of these services and the lead time required to meet obligations for the upcoming November 2023 elections,” Tinco and Perez said in the recommendation papers.

Two members of the county’s General Counsel Office also concurred with the recommendation to the board.

How Spencer mismanaged the office is not specified in Ellington’s letter. However, he does state, “In multiple instances in 2022, the Registrar attempted to use Runbeck as a shield to cover up certain mistakes that she had caused … the Registrar mispresented the facts of these situations to the County COO (her Supervisor) and blamed Runbeck for these errors …” Ellington added that he has emails to prove that Spencer was not telling the truth.

In recent years, questions have been raised about the county’s management of elections. In 2020, many voters received two vote-by-mail ballots. Spencer attributed this to voters who may have moved recently, but the ballot identification process would prevent counting two if both were submitted. In 2021, ballots for a special election in Eastvale and Cathedral City were mailed too late.

The independent audit of Spencer’s performance is not available. Neither Ellington nor Spencer’s attorney, Sanford Kassel, returned phone calls and emails from the Town Crier.

Whether Spencer will return to the county is not yet known. She joined the Registrar’s Office in 1999 as an intern. Since then, she has served on staff, as chief deputy registrar, assistant registrar, and twice as interim registrar until her appointment as registrar in 2014. Both her bachelor’s and master’s degrees are from the University of California, Riverside. She is a member of the California Association of Clerks and Election Officials and the Certified Election and Registration Association.