SCOTT STILES, formerly Garden Grove’s city manager , is now retiring from the same post in Palm Springs (Tribune photo).

By Jim Tortolano
Orange County Tribune

Scott Stiles, who served seven years as city manager of Garden Grove, will be retiring as city manager of Palm Springs after three years.

According to an announcement made by the City of Palm Springs, Stiles’ retirement will be effective on Nov. 1.

Stiles’ decision to step down comes around the same time as the retirement of his successor in Garden Grove – Lisa Kim – which will be effective on Nov. 2.

Succeeding Kim will be Matt West, currently the assistant city manager.

Stiles, who grew up in the Dakotas, originally had an ambition to be a sports writer. He ended up in public service and landed in Cincinnati, where he rose to assistant city manager and interim city manager.

When he moved his family west to take the position as city manager for Garden Grove he landed himself in the City of Youth and Ambition, something few city managers have done.

Admirers credit him while in Garden Grove with a one-cent sales tax increase that eliminated a “structural deficit” and expanded the police force, as well as the creation of the regional Navigation Center for the homeless and the Steelctaft urban eatery in the civic center-downtown area.

In Palm Springs, highlights of his tenure in that desert city included the opening of a navigation center there, as well as delivering balanced city budgets and progress on the planned expansion and modernization of the city’s convention center.