By Ken Striplin
City Manager
“Innovation is seeing what everybody has seen and thinking what nobody has thought.”
— Dr. Albert Szent-Gyorgyi
The City of Santa Clarita prides itself on providing excellent service, innovative ideas and being fiscally responsible.
Despite the challenges that 2020 has delivered, the City of Santa Clarita continues to support the needs of residents, while also providing high-quality programs, services, projects and more.
In addition to welcomed feedback and recognition from residents of our community, under the direction of the City Council, Santa Clarita had another award-winning year.
I am proud to say that Santa Clarita has won 19 Helen Putnam Awards of Excellence from the League of California Cities. This is more than any other city in the state. In 2020, we took home not one, but two of these prestigious honors — one for the “I Found Sammy Clarita” campaign and one for our College Internship Program.
These most recent program honorees show our organization’s dedication to innovation, community engagement and staff development.
This year, the City’s purchasing division was awarded the 25th Annual Achievement of Excellence in Procurement by the National Procurement Institute.
This marks the tenth time the City has received this award in recognition of purchasing policies and practices. This award is given to cities that embrace innovation, professionalism, productivity, leadership and e-procurement.
The City’s finance division continued to excel as well this year, even when faced with the uncertainties of the coronavirus pandemic. First, the City of Santa Clarita was issued both ‘AA+’ bond and ‘AAA’ credit ratings from Standard and Poor’s Global Ratings for strength in management, budgetary flexibility, liquidity and institutional framework.
In addition to receiving high ratings, the City also earned a nationally acclaimed finance award. The City of Santa Clarita received the Certificate of Achievement for Excellence in Financial Reporting from for the City’s Fiscal Year 2018-19 Comprehensive Annual Financial Report.
The award is the highest form of recognition in governmental accounting and financial reporting, and a testament to the extraordinary work of the City of Santa Clarita.
Another City accolade from 2020 that I must acknowledge is the District Transparency Certificate of Excellence by the Special District Leadership Foundation.
The City of Santa Clarita was fortunate to receive this award for outstanding efforts to promote transparency and good governance.
Through all that has occurred in 2020, it is inspiring to see our organization’s efforts, services and programs continue to be recognized with these prestigious honors.
As always, I am proud to work beside our dedicated City Council and City staff, who strive to serve residents and enhance the quality of life in our community.
Ken Striplin can be reached at [email protected]. The views expressed in his column are those of the City and do not necessarily reflect those of The Signal.
