Palm Springs appoints new city attorney

The Palm Springs City Council appointed a new city attorney during Wednesday’s city council meeting.

Councilmembers voted 5-0 to officially appoint Jeffrey S. Ballinger as the new city attorney. The vote was also to approve an agreement for “basic legal services” with the firm of Best, Best and Krieger, LLP.

BBK attorney already provide Palm Springs with legal services in the areas of planning, zoning, land-use, Public Records Act requests, cannabis-related matters, and litigation at “outside counsel” rates.

Ballinger is a partner at BBK and also currently serves as the city attorney for San Juan Capistrano and Fontana and is the assistant city attorney for Indian Wells. BBK attorney also serve as the city attorney for Coachella, Indian Wells, and Palm Desert.

Ballinger will be at city hall two days a week, Wednesday and Thursday, to provide general city attorney legal services in-house.

According to city documents, the city will save 223,000 annually, or about $21,000 a month, with the move. In the 2017/2018 fiscal year, expenditures for the city attorney position were $588,133. The retainer fee for BBK is equivalent to about $334,800. Other specialty legal services performed by BBK will come to additional costs.

Ballinger replaces interim city attorney Peter N. City King, who took over for Edward Kotkin in March after Kotkin resigned. King will remain with the city as the assistant city attorney until at least the end of May.