Six members of the community took turns at the podium Tuesday night during the Turlock City Council meeting to comment on the potential hiring of John J. Murphy as the new city manager.
All six said they had concerns.
In the end, those concerns weren’t enough to sway a single member of the council, which voted 5-0 to approve giving Murphy a five-year contract (which pays $269,000 plus benefits annually) to become the 13th different person to serve as Turlock city manager – interim or full-time – in the past 17 years.
Questions about Murphy’s background arose last week just hours after the city issued a press release announcing he would be considered for the job at Tuesday’s meeting.
The 55-year-old Pennsylvania native was fired as city manager of Palmdale in 2022 and was part of lawsuits filed against the city by three high-ranking Palmdale officials. Murphy sued the city for wrongful termination and settled out of court for $2.23 million. The other cases were settled for $4.4 million and $845,000 – a total of $7.475 million paid out by the Los Angeles County enclave.
“I am deeply troubled by the proposed hiring of a city manager who comes with an abundance of red flags,” Turlock resident Scott Siegel, the former superintendent of the Ceres Unified School District, told the council. “The proposed candidate has held his current job in (Roxbury Township) New Jersey for less than one year and for less than six months when he applied for this position. Did you ignore this obvious red flag?”
After hearing public comments, councilmembers pushed back.
Councilmember Erika Phillips (District 4) read a list of Murphy’s accomplishments, which included financial turnarounds for the cities of Wilkes-Barre, Pa., and Hobbs, N.M.
Councilmember Rebecka Monez (District 2) called Murphy’s former colleagues and reported that she heard good things.
“We don’t do our background checks on Google,” said Monez, a private-practice attorney. “It’s difficult to put out (human resources) sensitive information that is protected by HR laws and rules. We can’t just put that out. So, I understand that if you do a Google search there is a lot of controversy around Palmdale.”
Councilmembers Kevin Bixel (District 1) and Cassandra Abram (District 3) admitted to having reservations about Murphy, with Bixel seeming to put the future city manager on notice.
“We are all keenly aware of the concerns regarding Mr. Murphy’s past employment information that is easy to find on a Google search,” said Bixel. “I’ve had city staff, as well various members of the public voice concerns over his public record. I believe Mr. Murphy has a lot of very good qualities and strong leadership capabilities that he can bring to our city. At the same time, I will have zero tolerance for any behavior exhibited that resembles a hostile work environment, no matter the circumstance.”
Murphy was most recently the manager for Roxbury Township, a post he's held since last November. He was also city manager in Hobbs from 2012 to 2018 before moving on to Palmdale in 2018; he was city administrator from 2004 to 2010 in Wilkes-Barre.
According to his LinkedIn biography, Murphy served as parttime CEO of Civico Innovation Group from May 2022 to November 2025. During that same time, he was the Pasco (Fla.) County assistant administrator for public safety, overseeing the county jail.
From March 2022 through February 2023, he served as CEO of Goals Consulting. And from 1996 until 2017, he served in the U.S. Air Force and USAF reserves.
Murphy has a bachelor’s degree in political science from Kings College in Wilkes-Barre, and a master’s in public administration with a concentration in criminal justice from Marywood University in Scranton, Pa. He recently received a doctorate from Liberty University in Lynchburg, Va.
Murphy’s brother is former Democratic congressman Patrick Murphy of Pennsylvania’s 8th District, who served two terms in the House and was briefly Secretary of the Army during President Barack Obama’s administration.
