Chriss Street, leader of movement to leave California, could get Shasta's top government job

Will the Shasta County Board of Supervisors finally make it official and appoint Chriss Street as executive officer Tuesday?

Supervisors are scheduled to meet in closed session at 8 a.m. before Tuesday’s regular meeting to discuss public employee appointment, title: county executive officer.

On March 14, the county announced that Street had been offered the job pending a background check. The announcement came after supervisors returned from closed session and it confirmed rumors that had been circulating in the community for weeks that Street was the preferred candidate.

Street, the former Orange County treasurer-tax collector who is vice president of the New California movement, was one of seven candidates who interviewed for the position last month. A panel that included the five county supervisors, department heads and residents interviewed the finalists on Feb. 25-26.

New California is a rival group of State of Jefferson. Both groups want to split California but in different ways.

New California would leave the more liberal populated coastal areas and form its own state comprised largely of the inland regions, including Shasta County, where more conservatives reside.

Street was supposed to sit down with a Record Searchlight reporter earlier this week for an in-depth interview about his interest in becoming Shasta County’s next executive officer.

Read more:After axing Dominion, Shasta eyes election policy, commission to hand count some races

But Street pulled out of the interview Sunday evening, the day before the Monday interview was scheduled to take place, telling the reporter in a text message that he learned the reporter co-authored the article announcing that a majority of the Board of Supervisors had offered him the CEO job. The article’s headline was “Shasta supervisors offer CEO job to leader of ‘New California’ secessionist group.”

“As a result of your disappointing action(s), I cannot meet with you until you and the Redding Searchlight retract such false and defamatory statement(s),” Street concluded in the text message.

The article published March 15, four days before Street sent the reporter the text.

The newspaper does not unpublish or alter editorial content unless there is an overriding reason, such as an error of fact that needs to be corrected, said Jenny Espino, Record Searchlight editor.

"In this case, we believe the word secessionist, which we used in the headline, is an appropriate term to describe New California. Street's organization proposes a process of formal withdrawal from California's state government, so the word fits and there is no reason to change it," she said.

Street agreed to sit down with the reporter at District 1 Supervisor Kevin Crye’s March 16 town hall, which he attended. He spoke to the Record Searchlight reporter after the town hall ended.

As Orange County treasurer-tax collector, Street decided not to run for reelection in 2010, the same year he was ordered to pay more than $7 million in damages for allegedly mismanaging a trust, according to the Los Angeles Times.

Street appealed the ruling but was unsuccessful.

But in 2017, the Times reported that Street was awarded nearly $10 million in a malpractice suit against the attorney who represented him in the 2010 civil case.

Street is the host of the syndicated radio show Agenda 21, an activist movement that wants to stop what it calls the totalitarian take over of the United States.

And he has written articles for far-right-leaning Breitbart.

This article originally appeared on Redding Record Searchlight: Chriss Street, New California leader, could get Shasta County top job