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HomeMy WebLinkAbout1997-03-20 Council Minutes - Work SessionKENAI CITY COUNCIL WORD SESSION • CITY MMRGER SEARCH MARCH 20* 1997 7:00 B.M. KENAI CITY COUNCIL CBMWERS COUNCIL PRESENTt Williams, Moore, Smalley, Bookey, Swarner and Bannock. COUNCIL ABSENTS Measles STAFF PRESENT: Freas, Ross, Semmens, DeForest, Graves and Porter. Clerk Freas distributed a letter from Councilman Measles to the mayor and councilmembers. City Manager Ross distributed a copy of the legislative budget for council review prior to the budget work session. Freas requested the Volunteer Reception location be changed to the Senior Center because the Visitor Centers notified her the date, April 18, was no longer available at the Visitors Center. There were no objections to moving the location. COUNCIL MURGETS Mayor Williams discussed with council the reason he increased the amount for lobbying services in the legislative budget. He explained, the funds would be needed to either hire a lobbyist to help in obtaining funding for the Challenger project or to be used as start-up salary for a director of the project. He added, Kathy Scott has stated she did not want to continue with the Challenger project in her present capacity and someone else would need to carry on. Williams noted a request for funding would be made to the Governor and hopefully, intent language will be included in legislation to fund the Challenger project. If the state funding ($1.5 million) is received, help still may be needed to acquire the federal funds ($2.5 million). It is his understanding that money is included in the pool of appropriations for Alaska through Senator Stevens. If the money is not received, council will need to decide whether to move on by hiring a new director or pull back on the project and hire a lobbyist. He planned on the $25,000 for the project and added an additional $10,000 in case a lobbyist would be needed on a month -to -month basis. Ross added, he thought council may want to consider hiring a lobbyist on a need basis, i.e. find out who would be effective on a particular matter and hire that lobbyist on an hourly basis. KENAI CITY COUNCIL WORK SESSION . MARCH 201 1997 PAGE 2 He added, Ashley Reed has not been and will not be effective with the Juneau legislators representing the Kenai area. Williams explained, he understood the council was somewhat deadlocked on the city manager issue. There were three of the councilmembers who had made a choice of candidates to interview and three councilmembers who were not satisfied with the pool of applications and wanted to stop the process. There was one councilmember who could swing the decision either direction. Williams stated he wanted to move ahead and make a determination to bring candidates for interview. He did not think the city could continue with an interim city manager and get things done that needed to be done. He did not think it fair to Ross or the council. If the process was discontinued, he would not be willing to start over again until after the October election. Williams asked council to move ahead and bring in candidates for personal interviews. Councilman Smalley stated council could, at any stage, decide to stop the process. He wanted to go forward with interviews and added, if they interview candidates, it would not mean they would have to make a hire. Councilman Moore stated he was not willing to stop the process, but was not,dead set to hire at this time either. He felt council owed it to the candidates to interview and then make -a decision. Councilman Bookey stated he respected all the remarks made, but totally disagreed. He added, he didn't score the six candidates as he wouldn't hire any of them. Councilwoman Swarner stated she didn't feel comfortable with any one of the candidates and didn't think it fair to the candidates to go on. She added, she didn't think it would be fair to lead the candidates on through an interview if there is a question in council's minds. Smalley explained, he meant there were two or three of the candidates he would feel comfortable with and could hire one of them. He supported moving on. He added, he spent a lot of time reviewing the six applications and felt one of those applicants . could do a good job. • • RBNAI CITY COUNCIL WORK SESSION MARCH 20v 1997 PAGE 3 • is Councilman Bannock identified himself as being the swing vote. He explained, he scored the six candidates as accurately as he could. He discussed the matter with Mayor Williams and -read -the letter from Councilman Measles. After scoring the first time, he gave it more thought and re -scored the candidates and chose who he wanted out of the six. He added, out of the six, he did not see anyone with whom he wanted to replace Ross. Williams noted indications of a 4/3 decision to not continue the process and unless one of the members would be changing their feelings, the process should be discontinued. Williams adddd, he would not want to begin the process again until after the October election. He noted also that he made similar statement to Ross the day before and asked him if he (Ross) would be willing to continue as interim city manager. Ross stated he would be willing to stay and readvertise the position. He requested councils approval to make city legal resources available to him to deal with PERS and their concerns. He suggested a resolution could be considered by council which would define the intent of his employment. Council had no objections to the use of city legal resources for that purpose. Williams referred to Measles• letter in which it suggested extending Rossi contract for one-year with an option to stay for two. Williams added, he believed that would make Ross a full- time city manager and that needed broad discussion with the entire council and with Ross. Ross stated he thought council may want to discuss what they want in a city manager. They have seen how he operates. if there were things they wanted to see as a city manager and they hadnPt seen them, it was because they were not there. He offered to discuss those areas with council if they wished to discuss them, but had no problem continuing as city manager. Discussion followed in regard to conversations held during the interview when Ross was appointed interim city manager and concerns were stated that there may have been other people interested in the position, but didn't apply because of the minimum requirements. It was suggested council may have spoiled the process. Williams stated he wanted a city manager willing to stay for a long time. He added, he believed council was doing a disservice to the city by not taking charge of directives of the city. . KENAI CITY COUNCIL WORK SESSION MARCH 201 1997 PAGE 4 Bookey stated he agreed they needed to hire a city manager, but not with the candidates they had. He had no objection in waiting to September or October to readvertise. He added, he didn't want to rush or make a mistake. They did that before. Smalley stated he didn't think the process was spoiled. This was the second time they went through the applications. The screening had already taken place. He added, he believed anyone of the six candidates could do the job. Williams stated he would not vote for a candidate who does not live in Alaska. He believes there should be plenty of viable candidates who already live in the state. thSwarner stated she pushed to begin the process but now thoughte y probably should have first discussed goals and what council wanted in a city manager. She questioned whether the education requirements may be too strict, but a line had to be drawn somewhere. Ross stated he didn't think council erred. He was disappointed in the applications received didn't include more people who were currently working as city managers in Alaska. He added, he didnft think council was too restrictive. There just was not a big pool of applicants. Williams stated, having degrees does not always mean the person will be proficient. Being able to do the job has to do with the level of intelligence from which the person operates. Moore stated he had no hard feelings with council if the majority of them were not satisfied with the applications. He added, he was satisfied with Ross, performance and was willing to continue with Ross. Ross suggested after the budget and the goals and objectives are formulated, council may want to redefine what they want as a city manager before advertising in the fall. He added, council had a fractious summer. Perhaps it was not a good idea to start advertising for a city manager so soon. That may have had some affect on why there were not more applications from people working as city managers in Alaska. Williams stated he thought the media did a disservice to the city through articles appearing in the newspaper that stated McAlpine . was the front-runner when council had not made that determination. Also, that radio program announcers spoiled the . KENAI CITY COUNCIL WORK 3B3SION MARCH 20, 1997 PAGE 5 process by comments that were made. williams added, he would bring that to discussion during radio appearance were hiswill opinion. making. He added, he would state his comments The search process was officially closed. Administration was requested to write letters to the applicants and thank them all for being very patient; state the council continue late inthe readyuite to hire a new city manager; the process will fall; and, they would see the advertisement in the fall. The work session ended at approximately 7:50 p.m. Notes transcribed and prepared by: • • C44e.-6 arol L. Freas, 0