When Orange County needed a steady hand at the top, it didn’t find one on the outside. It found one who had been there all along. KC Roestenberg’s rise from county IT to interim CEO is a quiet ode to the power of showing up for two decades.
When the Orange County Board of Supervisors voted unanimously in June 2026 to name Chief Information Officer KC Roestenberg the county’s interim Chief Executive Officer, the story wasn’t just a title change. It was a statement about what leadership actually looks like. After an external search that failed to surface a candidate the board found compelling, the supervisors turned to someone who had been serving the county for nearly two decades. Roestenberg stepped into the role on June 26, succeeding retiring CEO Michelle Aguirre, and took on the job of running one of the nation’s most populous counties, home to more than three million residents.
His path is the definition of institutional knowledge. Roestenberg has worked for Orange County since 2007, rising to Chief Information Officer in 2022, where his operating philosophy was refreshingly plain: be innovative, be cost-conscious. He built his career not on flash but on the unglamorous work of keeping a massive public enterprise running. When the county needed a proven operator who already understood its machinery, he was standing right there.
There is something fitting, too, about a technology leader stepping into the county’s top job. Modern government runs on systems, data, and the ability to do more with constrained budgets, and Roestenberg spent years at exactly that intersection. The skills that made him an effective CIO, disciplined spending, operational rigor, and a bias toward practical innovation, are precisely the skills a county executive needs when the work is essential and the resources are never unlimited.
The board didn’t hide its gratitude, or its relief. Supervisor Don Wagner put it plainly:
“You really took one for the team. You came in at an uncertain time when searches out there had not turned up the ideal candidate.”
Don Wagner, Orange County Supervisor
That is leadership in its most honest form: running toward the hard job when it needs doing, not away from it. Vice Chair Katrina Foley noted that Roestenberg “brings two decades of county experience and knowledge of county operations,” adding that he had been shadowing the outgoing CEO for weeks. Supervisor Doug Chaffee was even blunter about the failed search, saying the candidates they had interviewed simply weren’t measuring up to the leadership already in the building.
Perhaps the most telling endorsement came from former county CEO Frank Kim, who described Roestenberg as “a good person, a person anyone would want to work with,” and “fantastic at working with people.” In a role that is fundamentally about coordinating thousands of public servants to deliver for millions of residents, that is not a soft skill. It is the whole job. It is a reminder that the best leaders lead with heart, and that people follow the person who makes them feel seen.
There is a talent lesson here that reaches far beyond government. When an outside executive search comes up empty, the answer is often already inside the building, quietly doing the work. Roestenberg’s elevation is a case study in the value of character, trust, and institutional knowledge over the allure of an unknown star. Two decades of showing up is its own qualification.
It is also a distinctly Orange County story. This is the region we cover, and its public institutions are run by people who chose service over spotlight. Roestenberg steps in at an uncertain moment and steadies the ship, which is exactly what the county, and the more than three million people who call it home, need right now.
To KC Roestenberg: congratulations, and thank you. Public service is the hardest leadership there is, and you said yes when it mattered most.
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Sources & verification
Appointment & quotes: Voice of OC · MyNewsLA · New Santa Ana · Patch
Cathy Trinh is the founder of Recruiter Hustle and has worked in executive search since 1998, advising companies and leaders across finance, accounting, operations, manufacturing, logistics, real estate, technology and professional services. Through Recruiter Hustle, she combines executive search, talent intelligence and market media to help companies and people make better decisions about work and leadership. HEART. HUMAN. HUSTLE.