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HomeMy WebLinkAboutCC Minutes - 12/03/07 Work Session M I N U T E S Eugene City Council Work Session McNutt Room—Eugene City Hall December 3, 2007 5:30 p.m. COUNCILORS PRESENT: Andrea Ortiz, Chris Pryor, Betty Taylor, Bonny Bettman, Jennifer Solomon, George Poling, Mike Clark, Alan Zelenka. Her Honor Mayor Kitty Piercy called the meeting of the Eugene City Council to order. A. EXECUTIVE SESSION: Pursuant to ORS 192.660(2)(e) and ORS 192.660(2)(h) Mayor Piercy convened an executive session of the City Council to deliberate with staff designated to negotiate real property transactions and to consult with council regarding current litigation or litigation likely to be filed. Mayor Piercy adjourned the executive session at 5:35 p.m. and convened the work session. B. WORK SESSION: Recruitment for City Manager Position Acting Assistant City Manager Scott Luell directed the council’s attention to the subcommittee’s recom- mendations for the new city manager selection process. He reviewed the recommendations and asked for comments and suggestions from the council. Mr. Poling asked for clarification of the recommendation that the mayor would preside over the meeting and facilitate the interview process. Regarding a question about whether the mayor was considered a part of the council and had a role in hiring the city manager, City Attorney Glenn Klein said under the charter the mayor was not part of the City Council, but would preside at all meetings and vote in case of a tie. He said that would include council meetings with the recruiter or city manager candidates. Alana Holmes, Recruitment and Selection Manager, continued to review the recommendations. She explained that there could be about ten to fifteen minutes at the end of each interview for a quick debriefing and to allow councilors to make any notes on the candidate, followed by a more thorough debriefing with the recruiter at the end of the interview process. Lauren Chouinard, Human Resources and Risk Services Director, said sufficient flexibility was built into the schedule to allow for follow-up questions if necessary. Mr. Zelenka asked if it was necessary to ask the same follow-up questions of all candidates. Mr. Chouinard said it was not necessary; the follow-up questions would be expanding on or clarifying issues that were raised during the interview, based on questions germane to all candidate interviews. He said a new topic could not be raised in follow-up questions. MINUTES—Eugene City Council December 3, 2007 Page 1 Work Session Ms. Holmes said the subcommittee recommended ten final questions to be asked of each candidate; each councilor would develop one question and two additional questions would be added for a total of ten. She said each councilor could develop his or her own questions or select from a master list of questions and the full council would approve a final list of ten questions to be asked in each interview. In response to a question from Mayor Piercy, Ms. Holmes said the mayor could offer questions for consideration by the council. Ms. Bettman asserted the subcommittee had agreed that each councilor could contribute a question and that question would be asked of each candidate; the entire council would choose two additional questions. She said if the council voted on the questions, then it was possible that one or more councilors would not have a question on the list. Mr. Chouinard said the intent was to avoid having three councilors ask substantially the same question. He said the council could review the full list to assure there were not repetitive questions, but each councilor would still have one question; there was no veto. Mr. Pryor said the subcommittee was clear that the questions had to be within an appropriate framework. Mr. Poling suggested that each councilor submit two questions and in the event there were duplications, a councilor's second question could be chosen to assure everyone had a question on the list. Mr. Clark supported the suggestion that each councilor submit two questions. He asked if the subcommittee had recommended the two additional questions be selected by consensus or majority vote. Ms. Bettman moved that each councilor contribute their own question and that the entire council select two questions by a majority vote. Mayor Piercy said she could not see how that would avoid duplication of questions. The motion died for lack of a second. Mr. Clark thought it would be wise to consider something beyond a simple majority for selecting the two additional questions because those questions represented an opportunity for the council to show consensus on what was important to it. Ms. Taylor said a majority was acceptable to her. She liked the idea of councilors submitting two questions each and the two additional questions being selected from that pool. Mr. Zelenka suggested that councilors each submit several questions to assure a range of questions that would elicit information from candidates in a systematic way. Mr. Pryor suggested the councilors could put forward ideas for topics or issues that should be addressed in the interviews and staff could assist in drafting questions on those for the council's consideration. Ms. Bettman, seconded by Ms. Taylor, moved that each councilor submit one ques- tion and two additional questions would be selected by the full council. Mr. Clark offered a friendly amendment to require an affirmative vote from at least six councilors on the two additional questions. MINUTES—Eugene City Council December 3, 2007 Page 2 Work Session Ms. Ortiz hoped that the ten questions would be balanced and would address a range of issues of importance to the community. She was neutral on the need for at least six affirmative votes for the additional questions. Mr. Zelenka said the basic questions that were standard human resource questions could be asked and answered in a written supplemental that the council could review in advance and the interview process reserved for councilors' specific questions. Mr. Zelenka offered a friendly amendment allowing each councilor to submit several questions, one of which would be included in the list of ten questions, and the remaining questions would be a pool from which the council would select supplemental questions. Ms. Bettman and Ms. Taylor accepted the friendly amend- ment. The motion passed unanimously, 8:0. Mr. Chouinard asked councilors to submit all of their questions to Ms. Holmes by December 12, 2007. Ms. Holmes continued with the review of the subcommittee's recommendations. Ms. Bettman asked that the forced ranking between candidates be identified as "advisory only." Ms. Holmes asked councilors to reserve January 12 and 13, 2008, for interviews. Ms. Holmes summarized a discussion of the interview process. She said if the council narrowed the list to two candidates and after interviewing those finalists on Sunday found them both still compelling candidates, the recruiter could be asked to obtain additional information on those candidates. She said that the recruiter, Bob Neher, could help the council further refine the process for selecting candidates for interviews and narrowing that field to two finalists if necessary. Ms. Holmes reviewed the composition of the internal interview panel. All councilors asked to have the city manager pro tem included on the internal interview panel. Mr. Clark asked if the council would vote on the list of community members to include on the external interview panel. He expressed some dissatisfaction with the approach used during hiring of the police auditor as he felt the panel was not as representative of the community as he had hoped. Ms. Holmes said a list of community members developed from the enhanced list of those invited to the community forum would be proposed to the council by staff. She said it would be up to the council how it made a decision on that list. In response to questions from Ms. Bettman, Mr. Chouinard said that 90 minutes had been scheduled for external stakeholder interviews, to include candidate responses to the interview questions and follow-up questions from panel members. Ms. Holmes added that the council would be provided advisory feedback forms from external interview panel members following the interviews. Ms. Bettman suggested specifying that each candidate interview would last 90 minutes, with responses from the candidates limited to four minutes. Mr. Chouinard cautioned against being too specific and retaining flexibility in the process, depending on the number of candidates to be interviewed. MINUTES—Eugene City Council December 3, 2007 Page 3 Work Session Ms. Ortiz was not in favor of selecting external stakeholders primarily from the same pool used for the police auditor process. She felt the external panel should be as large as possible and the council should not vote on panel membership. She noted that many people could not take a full day away from work. She encouraged opening the process to anyone in the community who wanted to participate. Mr. Chouinard cautioned against a process that was too casual; if someone wanted to participate they needed to commit to the entire day so that each candidate met with the same group. He said participants would not be compensated, but the City would provide lunch. Mr. Zelenka asked how the external interview panel questions would be selected. Mr. Chouinard said panel members should submit their questions in advance and staff would select from among those for a list of questions to be asked each candidate. Ms. Solomon suggested that invitations to the social event on January 11 should come from the mayor and the council, not just the mayor. There were no objections. Ms. Holmes reviewed the steps for future consideration, including reviewing current market data on compensation for the city manager position, finalizing the city manager job description, planning the final background check process, determining how the contract negotiation process would be managed and the mayor and council's approval of the employment agreement obtained. Ms. Bettman noted that the document still referenced the mayor and council when it had been determined that the council would be conducting background checks and approving the employment agreement. Ms. Holmes provided councilors with copies of the applications for city manager. She said they were divided in to three categories: first tier applicants, second tier applicants and third tier applicants who did not meet the minimum qualifications. She asked that councilors review the applications and be prepared to identify those the recruiter would be asked to conduct a more extensive information search on. Ms. Solomon said it would be helpful to have a matrix similar to the one used during the last recruitment process to organize the review of applications. Ms. Holmes said she could provide an updated matrix. Mr. Chouinard said the recruiter would also be asked to describe how he sorted applications into the three categories. Mr. Luell reminded the council that the applications were confidential. He determined there was no interest in scheduling another subcommittee meeting. The meeting adjourned at 7:40 p.m. Respectfully submitted, Angel Jones City Manager pro tem (Recorded by Lynn Taylor) MINUTES—Eugene City Council December 3, 2007 Page 4 Work Session