County officially dedicates building to honor former chief administrator
Speakers highlight Clint Quilter’s character, contributions
Friends and family packed the conference room of Inyo County’s Clint G. Quilter Consolidated Office Building Wednesday for an unveiling of a plaque officially dedicating the building to the former county chief administrator.
Quilter was first hired by Inyo County as its Public Works director in 2013 and became CAO in November of 2018.
During his tenure with the county, Quilter is credited with laying the groundwork that would eventually bring commercial air service to the Bishop Airport as well as seeing the completion of the consolidated office building shortly before his death in July 2021 due to cancer, among other accomplishments.
The Inyo County Board of Supervisors unanimously voted to dedicate the building, located at 1360 N. Main St., Bishop, in Quilter’s honor in November 2021.
Wednesday’s unveiling ceremony included comments from current county CAO Nate Greenberg, Juanita Joseph, Quilter’s daughter, Second District Supervisor Jeff Griffiths and Fifth District Supervisor Matt Kingsley.
Remembering Quilter
Greenberg, who became the county’s CAO in September of last year, said he had a chance to work with Quilter on a regional dispatch project. He said he found Quilter to be humble in his leadership role and ultimately supportive of initiatives that were not only improving Inyo County as a whole but the region as well.
Greenberg said Quilter’s absence has been felt though his vision for the consolidated office building has had a “tremendous” impact on county staff for the better.
Griffiths said while he could have talked about what Quilter meant to the
community, how he came to Inyo County and hit the ground running, what a dedicated family man Quilter was, Griffiths said he wanted to talk about was what made Quilter a “really great county administrator.”
Griffiths, who has served on the board of supervisors since 2013 and was a Bishop City Council member before that, said he has seen a number of executives and administrators with strengths and weaknesses but “Clint really had it all.”
“Clint was able to put out the work product, finish projects, he had a great strategic vision, but what I think made him the most effective and just the greatest county administrator was how he was able to develop the team and how he was able to work with employees,” Griffiths said. “Clint had this amazing ability to be tough when you needed to be tough, to be soft when you needed to be soft, but most of all, he cared so much about this county and this community and the people who work here and he loved the people here. And the people here loved him.”
Griffiths said naming the building after Quilter honors the man’s legacy.
During his talk, Pucci noted how the concept of the consolidated office building had been in the works for years and had a lot of setbacks and hurdles to go through with sometimes plans being shelved and then revived.
Pucci said Quilter carried the project over the goal line, which has resulted in one of the most costly and costeffective buildings in Inyo County in the last 50 years, the other being the county jail. However, due to financial structuring, there was no public debt incurred with the consolidated office building.
“The building will be cost neutral and will actually begin saving public dollars in less than 10 years from now,” Pucci said.
Pucci said the building has received some complaints for being “ugly” but Quilter knew during the planning and design phase that suggestions for statues and fountains would have increased the cost to the public.
“We’re here to use this building to serve the public, that’s what it’s for, and Clint knew that,” Pucci said.
Kingsley noted how impressed he was at how many people showed up for Wednesday’s ceremony from throughout Inyo County and Mono County as well.
Kingsley, tagging on Pucci’s talk of the building, said in a way the building resembled Quilter.
“It’s not very flashy,”
Kingsley said. “It’s a working person’s building. It’s utilitarian. And that’s what Clint was – just hard working, not flashy.”
Kingsley joked that while Quilter was a great administrator, “he was worse at golf than I was and I’m pretty bad.”
Kingsely said while Quilter had his ups and downs, even in Inyo County, he was humble about those.
“Clint was great at motivating people,” Kingsley said, adding that this included his daughter and his daughter’s basketball team. “I feel like we were lucky to have Clint.”
A daughter’s words
Joseph start off by saying thank you on behalf of the Quilter family for the opportunity to memorialize her father’s dedication to public service in Inyo County.
She said the consolidated office building was a milestone project for Quilter put there to help deliver services to Inyo County residents in one location. She said the building offers a place for county employees “to come together and unite as a team and as a whole.”
“Like, Clint, this building isn’t fancy,” Joseph said. “But it has a solid foundation, and we hope the services it provides to Inyo County residents continues for many generations to come … So when you come to the Clint Quilter Building, take a moment to say hi to someone you might not usually converse with, because it’s the little things that count.”