Haines City Can Start Search for New Manager
By GREG PARLIER / LEDGER MEDIA GROUP
Posted Sep 16, 2013 at 12:36 AM
HAINES CITY — Former City Manager Ken Sauer is officially off the books, and the city may finally move forward with a search for a new manager.
Sauer retired Sept. 7 after being on paid administrative leave since May 16. He will be paid the remainder of his settlement package, which totaled $94,503, at the end of the Sept. 20 pay period.
Sauer could file for unemployment, according to his employment transition agreement, but the city hasn’t received word on whether that has happened.
The City Commission approved an executive search for a new manager July 18, and staff will ask commissioners to approve a timeline at the Thursday meeting.
If the commission follows the timeline, which was put together by human resources consultant Lurene VanNess, it will take six to nine months to complete.
Some commissioners have expressed concern that there might be an unspoken understanding between commissioners that acting City Manager Jonathan Evans would automatically get promoted to the manager position after Sauer was officially off the staff.
Mayor Don Mason said Evans was doing an “excellent” job, but that this is a decision that needs to be made by the commission as a whole.
Evans said he would go along with whatever the commission wants to do.
“I’m in support of the organization no matter what they decide.“
Commissioner Kenneth Kipp, who called for Sauer’s firing in May and voted against the executive search in July, said he thinks they already have the man they need.
“I am absolutely 100 percent for naming (Evans) city manager,” he said.
Commissioner Ronnie Cotton also voted against the executive search in July but could not be reached for comment Friday.
Commissioner Roy Tyler expressed issue with Evans’ performance as acting manager in a June commission meeting.
“If we are going to trade a manager with 15 years of experience for a neo-phyte with no experience, there’s some question there,” Tyler, who voted to keep Sauer, said at that meeting.
Tyler and Commissioner Horace West couldn’t be reached for comment Friday.
With the budget season winding down — the budget is scheduled for final reading Thursday — Mason hopes the city can find a leader who will stay long term.
City managers stay with cities for four years on average, but “we want someone to stay longer than that,” Mason said.
Evans indicated that he would be willing to do that, and Mason said he was pleased with Evans’ dealing with the budget.
“I think Jonathan has done a great job with the budget process, bringing the city together and bringing staff together.“
Evans said he sculpted the budget as if it were for his administration with the long-term interests of the city in mind, and he hopes that whoever the next administrator is will consider the information he included in the budget when leading the city.
The Sept. 19 commission meeting begins at 7 p.m. at City Hall, following a 6:30 p.m. workshop.
Commissioner’s Change of Heart Elevates Evans Into ‘Dream’ Haines City Job
By GREG PARLIER / LEDGER MEDIA GROUP
Posted Sep 21, 2013 at 10:59 PM
HAINES CITY | The city manager search ended before it began in Haines City — and it was ended by the city commissioner who had expressed doubt about the man who was hired for the job.
The City Commission voted unanimously to take the “acting” out of the title of acting City Manager Jonathan Evans on Thursday night before discussion could begin of how to proceed with an executive search for a new city manager.
“This has been my dream for a long time. Haines City will always and forever have a special place in my heart,” the 33-year-old city manager said Thursday after the appointment.
Commissioner Roy Tyler, who in June had repeatedly expressed doubts about hiring Evans, made the motion to elevate him to the job Thursday.
Commissioner Horace West quickly seconded the motion, and it passed unanimously without any discussion.
Tyler’s motion caught Evans, along with some of the other four commissioners, off-guard.
Staff was prepared to present options for a city manager search that was expected to take six to nine months and cost $15,000 to $20,000, but Tyler interjected before Human Resources Director Mary Makovec could begin.
“It was very flattering hearing that Commissioner Tyler was the one to make the motion,” Evans said.
Evans became assistant city manager in Haines City in 2012 and was appointed acting city manager after the commission voted not to extend then-City Manager Ken Sauer’s contract in June.
Evans had had a rocky relationship with Tyler since June, when the commissioner publicly questioned Evans’ future with the city.
“I am not willing to gamble my city’s future while you learn on the job,” Tyler said at the time.
Three months later, Tyler has warmed up to Evans, but he still has concerns about the manager’s youth and inexperience.
“He has enormous potential. I think he can do the job. A little bit of experience only comes one way,” Tyler said.
Tyler, Commissioner Horace West and Mayor Don Mason voted to begin a search for a city manager at a July 18 meeting, but they changed their minds Thursday once Tyler was on board to elevate Evans.
”(Tyler) was one of the key people against placing Jonathan (as city manager). ... I was surprised,” said Commissioner Ronnie Cotton, who voted against the search in July, citing concerns about the cost of a national search.
Commissioner Kenneth Kipp has been open about his support of Evans since July, saying he thought the city already had the man for the job on staff.
Tyler said he thinks that early endorsement was a mistake and would have hurt the city’s ability to find a good outside candidate.
“When you make the statement ‘I’ve made my mind up,’ a number of candidates that would’ve certainly brought more experience might be reluctant to even apply if there’s division amongst the commission. We should’ve not let that statement emanate from the commission,” he said.
Kipp said Evans has proved himself to be a man of integrity and strong ethics, and he believes Evans wants to lead the city to be the best community in Florida.
He said Evans’ work with the budget, which was passed Thursday, was “extraordinary.“
Mason said he also was impressed with Evans’ handling of the budget and thinks Evans would’ve been the best candidate even if the city had done an executive search.
“Through the budget, he’s convinced me that he’s our guy. If we went out for a search, we would get the same cast of characters that went out in Lake Wales and in Winter Haven. We don’t want that,” he said.
West said he never was against Evans, but just didn’t want people to think he got the job only because certain people didn’t like the former city manager, Sauer. He said he wanted Evans to be able to prove himself in a manager search.
But, West said, Evans has shown his commitment and dedication over the past few months. West thinks Evans’ youth is a plus because it could lead to a long tenure with the city.
Evans said Friday that this is a “remarkable opportunity” and that he hopes to make Haines City “the envy of Polk County and Central Florida.”
“Until our mission is complete, I will be here,” he said.
Evan was paid $78,000 per year as assistant city manager and $98,000 as acting city manager. The city manager is slated to make between $95,486.30 and $143,229.99 a year, according to the 2013-14 budget.
Evans and the commission still have to negotiate a contract setting his pay and other terms.
Before coming to Haines City, Evans was assistant to the city manager in Largo for six years and served as recreation manager for two years in Celebration.
Haines City City Commission Considers Station Renovation
By GREG PARLIER / LEDGER MEDIA GROUP
Posted Oct 2, 2013 at 11:57 PM
HAINES CITY | The city will start moving forward with renovating the downtown fire station if the City Commission authorizes an architect search at tonight’s meeting.
Meanwhile, the planned Patterson Road fire station could wind up costing the city money, even though construction has been on hold since April.
The renovation of downtown’s Fire Station Number One has been delayed for years because of a shortage of funding and while the city considered building Fire Station Number Two on Patterson Road.
The commission voted in April to postpone construction of that station in order to focus resources on renovating the existing one.
“I think we have a professional and moral obligation to renovate that facility. That is (the firefighters’) home. It’s long overdue,” said City Manager Jonathan Evans.
The downtown station was built in 1958, said fire Capt. Kim Miller. There is one room for the six firefighters on duty to use for sleeping, training on computers, relaxing and cooking meals when not on fire calls.
The bunk room resembles a cavern, with six simple twin beds and two dim lights overhead. The one female firefighter has a privacy curtain and headboard.
The exercise room floods during heavy rains through a crack at the bottom of the door, Interim Fire Chief Rick Sloan said.
The station was renovated in the 1970s, Sloan said, when the city re-did some of the interior and added windows.
Possibly the most pressing issue are leaks through the aluminum siding that is around much of the station. That causes mildew in a number of the offices along the building’s exterior.
Evans has estimated that the city would need to use $700,00 to $800,00 of the $1.6 million federal loan originally set aside for the construction of Fire Station Two for the renovation, pending City Commission and County Commission approval. The county is involved because the loan for Fire Station Number 2 came through the county.
There is $1.4 million budgeted for renovation this fiscal year.
As for Fire Station Two, the construction management company hired by the commission, Welbro Building Corp. of Maitland, sent an invoice to the city May 3 for more than $22,700 for preconstruction services.
Evans said there is no contract on record authorizing Welbro to proceed with work.
In a letter Welbro’s Vice President of Operations Jeff Rand sent to Evans on June 21, he wrote that then-City Manager Ken Sauer asked Welbro to work with an architectural firm to design a station that would fit within the city’s budget.
Rand wrote that the company was finalizing the contract with Sauer when commissioners placed the construction of Fire Station Number Two on hold in May 2013.
Haines City Moves Forward With Fire Station Renovations
By GREG PARLIER / LEDGER MEDIA GROUP
Posted Oct 3, 2013 at 10:06 PM
HAINES CITY | City commissioners in Haines City on Thursday moved forward with renovations to the city’s primary fire station as the company tapped to design a now- postponed second station says the city owes them money.
Commissioners unanimously approved a request to allow staff to seek an architect for the renovation of its 55-year-old downtown station.
Those renovations have long been on hold because of tight city budgets and the possibility that the city would build a second station on Patterson Road and Orchid Drive.
The city last renovated the 11th Street station, Fire Station No. 1, in the 1970s.
Commissioners agreed to postpone construction of Patterson Road’s Fire Station No. 2 in April, instead opting to focus resources on the existing station, which city officials said was long overdue.
“I think we have a professional and moral obligation to renovate that facility. That is their home. It’s long overdue,” said City Manager Jonathan Evans earlier this week.
Interim Fire Chief Rick Sloan said problems with leaks and mildew, along with space constraints, have made things difficult at the downtown station, making it a priority.
Commissioners have said, however, that as Haines City grows, one central location will not suffice to serve the department’s entire service area.
Commissioner Roy Tyler said Thursday that firefighters need additional stations because, unlike police officers, they respond to emergencies from a station rather than patrolling. That was part of the reasoning behind the city’s building a second station on Patterson Road.
That project got as far as picking a construction management company to negotiate a contract with Maitland-based Welbro Building Corp. in July 2012.
But Evans said that contract never was drafted.
On May 3, Welbro sent the city an invoice for about $22,700 for preconstruction services.
On May 16, Former City Manager Ken Sauer was placed on administrative leave, and Evans stepped in as acting city manager.
In a letter sent June 21 to Evans, Welbro Vice President of Operations Jeff Rand wrote that he had a verbal agreement with Sauer and previous City Manager Ann Toney-Deal that Welbro would be reimbursed by the city for any preconstruction services if a project was put on hold.
He wrote that they were working on a contract with Sauer when the project was postponed.
Welbro proposed in August that it settle with the city for about $11,364, according to city documents.
Thursday, the commission granted Welbro’s request that the subject be tabled until the Oct. 17 commission meeting.
City Attorney Fred Reilly said allowing Welbro to tell its side of the story would be the best option, especially because of the long-term relationship the city has with the company.