Dominic Lazzaretto -Photo by Terry Miller
By Susan Motander
Dominic Lazzaretto will take over as Arcadia’s new city manager on March 26, having been appointed to the position by the City Council last month. He replaces Don Penman who retired last November after 14 years with Arcadia, the last four as its City Manager.
Lazzaretto comes to his new post from La Palma, a city he describes as “not unlike Arcadia, just smaller.” There he was City Manger for over five and a half years of the nine he worked for that city. He started as an interim planner there in 2002 and worked up to being its Community Development Director and then City Manager.
LA Palma is a community of approximately 15,500 people in Northern Orange County. Lazzaretto said the like Arcadia, “It is a bedroom community.”
Arcadia has long called itself a “Community of Homes.” La Palma is just such a community with just over 75% of it dedicated to residential property. His understanding of this type of community will doubtless be useful in Lazzaretto’s new role.
“Residential areas do not pay for themselves,” Lazzaretto explained. “Businesses are needed to support the city. My job is to find the right balance for Arcadia.”
He explained that finding this balance would include determining what the city needs and balancing that with what its residents want.
Asked what plans he had for the Arcadia, Lazzaretto said that was not his understanding of his role. “As City Manager, it is my job to understand what the City Council wants and to help them implement that.”
He is aware ot the issues facing the community and the council” the coming of the Gold Line and what it will mean to Arcadia, the use of excess area at the race track, the possible expansion of Rusnack motors, the potential and/or need of developing a stronger downtown. Asked his position on these issues, he reiterated that that was not his role. “That is not the City Manager’s job,” he said.
Lazzaretto knows well what being a city manager means. Not only did he hold that position in La Palma and restaurant management. He majored in that field at Penn State University, but a degree was not all he found in Happy Valley. Appropriately it was there he met his future wife, Christine. She now works locally as an advocate for historic preservation.
“I finally joined the family business in 1994,” said of his change of career, meaning that he began working in his father’s consulting firm, A. C. Lazzaretto & Associates. The firm specializes in assisting cities in administration and management, especially community development. From there it was a small step to his position at La Palma.
Lazzaretto has not left behind all that originally interested him in the restaurant field: of his hobbies he mentioned cooking first. He says he and his wife also enjoy traveling and skiing. His other athletic interests include cycling and running. Arcadia is not unfamiliar to Lazzaretto; for the last several years he has participated in an “over 30” soccer league which plays part of the year at Arcadia High School.
When Lazzaretto takes over as Arcadia’s City Manager, perhaps his early training at Penn State will be an asset. In essence, Lazzaretto will be become the concierge for over fifty thousand people, the residents of Arcadia.
