Mendocino's New CEO and County Counsel Land Pay Near the Top for a County Its Size

UKIAH, Calif. — On Tuesday, the Mendocino County Board of Supervisors approved compensation packages for a new chief executive officer and a new county counsel that, measured against what residents earn, rank near the top of California's 25 smallest counties.

The board voted 5-0 to make interim CEO Sara Pierce the permanent chief executive, at a salary of $275,000 and an estimated $481,000 in total annual compensation including benefits, on a contract running through October 2029. Minutes earlier, it voted 5-0 to hire Michael Rossi, a longtime Santa Clara County attorney, as county counsel at a $271,000 salary and an estimated $460,000 in total compensation. Rossi starts Dec. 6, and the board waived the county's residency requirement for him.

Both packages exceed what the county paid the people who held the jobs before. Darcie Antle, who retired as CEO in mid-July, earned a $219,616 base salary in 2024 and about $319,000 in total compensation; her approved salary had climbed to $250,000 by the time she left. Pierce's new salary is $25,000 above Antle's final rate and about $72,000 above the $202,717 annual salary she has drawn as interim CEO.

The jump is steeper for county counsel. Charlotte Scott, who left the post in 2025 to become a Superior Court judge, earned $189,082 in base pay in 2024, a figure that includes the first half of the year as assistant county counsel, and about $281,000 in total compensation. Her salary as county counsel was $200,000 starting in July 2024. Rossi's $271,000 salary is 36% higher than that rate — and nearly matches the new CEO's pay.

A MendoLocal.News review of 2024 state payroll records for the 25 smallest counties — Mendocino, at about 88,600 residents, is the 21st-smallest — found a median chief executive salary of roughly $227,000 and a median county counsel salary of about $187,000. Against those 2024 figures, Mendocino's new CEO salary would trail only Napa and Yuba, and its new county counsel salary would trail only Napa, the largest of the 25 counties.

Mendocino's median earnings for full-time, year-round workers are about $57,900, slightly below the middle of the 25 counties. Antle's 2024 salary equaled about 3.8 times that figure, in line with the 3.8 median for chief executives in the small counties. Pierce's new salary works out to about 4.7 times what a typical full-time worker in the county earns, and Rossi's to about 4.7 times.

Set against what the other small counties paid their officials in 2024, the most recent year with complete payroll data, Pierce’s ratio would rank fourth among chief executives in California’s smallest counties, behind Glenn, Yuba, and Napa counties, and Rossi’s would be the highest among county counsel, ahead of Siskiyou County’s. Pay in those counties may have risen since 2024, which could change these rankings.

One resident pushed back. John Risk, a board member of the Meadow Farm Community Land Trust, a registered 501(c)(3) nonprofit, urged the board to restrain the salaries, telling supervisors that the countywide median household income is $68,000 and per capita income is $38,700. "We do not pay our lawyers what the lawyers are being paid," he said. "We cannot afford these services."

Risk had spoken earlier in the meeting, during public comment on residential permitting and a possible amnesty program. He described a two-year effort to resolve 25 issues of noncompliance at Meadow Farm, which he said were triggered by a worker the farm evicted, and described his experience with the county's Planning and Building Services department as "exhausting, intimidating, overly complicated, frustrating, and expensive." He said the county has "good people working inside a broken system."

Board Chair Bernie Norvell (4th District) sponsored both items and administered the oath of office to Pierce and Rossi. Norvell said he had fielded questions, including at a community meeting he and Supervisor Madeline Cline (1st District) attended, suggesting the county hired Pierce because it had "run out of options." "That is not the case," he said. Several people applied, he said, most of whom did not meet the minimum requirements, and the board interviewed a few.

Norvell said he had thought Pierce "would have been a great candidate" from the outset, but that she first asked for time to consider the job herself, and the board gave it to her. At the board's previous meeting, he said, she asked for the chance to speak to the board in closed session and present herself as a candidate for CEO. "And then we're here today," Norvell said.

Cline spoke in support of Pierce's appointment. "I've had such a great experience working with you as interim," she told Pierce, "and all the other experiences you have definitely bring us the right experience we need for this job." Cline added that "every single staff member I have spoke to is beyond excited that you're up for this challenge."

Vice-Chair Ted Williams (5th District) said he found Pierce "to have exceptional character and ability." But "more than that," he said, "she's the least political person in the room, and I think that creates the right dynamic that we have five elected supervisors and a fantastic administrator." Williams added that "out of all the candidates we interviewed, she's by far the most qualified."

Pierce said her family has been in Mendocino County for more than a century. She said she was "eager to help address the challenges we face by utilizing knowledge gained from my county employment, as well as my experiences and relationships I've built in the health care and agricultural industries." "The county can only move forward if we work together," she said.

Pierce said she is "committed to an open communication and breaking down silos, which not only the public faces, but also the obstacles county staff face." "I want to see Mendocino succeed," she said. "It is a special place to me."