It looks like our new city manager is keeping his powder dry.
Looking at the city web site I see that there are several management positions that have not been filled. The people doing the work have “interim” positions.
We don’t know if this is because the city manager wants to save us money or if he is delaying the hiring so that he can evaluate the staff that he has now. Either way it seems to make sense to me.
The city used to have three deputy city managers. When the former chief financial officer left we were told that she too was a deputy city manager, giving us four deputies. Looking at the web site we are down to two, with one on leave until she reaches her retirement date. We then get to pay her retirement for the rest of her life. That leaves us with one deputy city manager actually showing up to work. No interim appointments have been made.
We also have an interim city engineer. She has been in that position for several months now and has been the interim city engineer in the past when the city was without a designated city engineer. There is probably more to this story, but since it is a personnel matter we may never hear.
We have an interim comptroller, an interim director of general services, an interim computer head, an interim head of museums and cultural affairs, and an interim chief financial officer. It appears that the head of the office of management and budget has recently left.
If you study the interviews that our new city manager has given there is a consistent theme. The financial departments could not be relied upon for accurate information or forecasts. Evidently he thinks that accurate numbers are important.
The city web site does not show job postings for any of the permanent positions.
It would probably be unkind of me to suggest a list of other positions where we would benefit from an interim manager.
It’s too early to tell but we might actually be getting better here.
Brutus
elpasospeak 
Maybe he is trying to save us money on deputies that arent needed. He also knows that a vote to go back to strong mayor could happen so why hire now.
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Maybe it is because El Paso is iterim, too, awaiting its resurrection as Huntsburg?
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I wonder how much of a lifetime pension a person like Shang receives for just a few years of work and paid leave. Why does she still have a bio page on the city website if she is not working and there is no plan to ask her to earn her money for the remainder of her contract term?
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Funny you would bring this up….I talked to HR Director, and he said these David Almonte is doing Shang’s job and his. She is being paid administrative leave until January. Her couldn’t tell me the reasons of her firing. A private business or a successful one would never function this way.
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ln this town l guess l shouldn’t be surprised that Brut is asking one of the most important questions that a blogger has asked in the last decade and only four other people respond – and they don’t even answer the question! The question that you’re REALLY asking is, do we taxpayers come out ahead if we hire a CM that truly is fiscally prudent? l’ve spent years in the 915 blogasphere whining about how we don’t need a CM (especially the previous one) but now l find myself morphing into a flip-flopper. l mean back then we had a fox guarding the hen-house (although the hens seemed rather fox-ish themselves) but now it appears that the hen is neutralizing the foxes. Yes, he is doing a good job and we should keep him, on the condition that when he is no longer employed by the city, that his pension will not exceed past 5 years – no more of this lifetime crap. lf he can cut city employees and still have that department adequately function, that he should recieve half of the salary of the person that has been cut during his tenure as CM. Ok, that’s enough typing for one day.
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It doesn’t us any good to have a fiscally prudent city manager, if the mayor and council are irresponsible and overrule him. Case in point: When there was a $3.5 mil (I think that was the number) shortfall in the recent budget process, the new city manager said he wanted to look for cuts. Council and Roberta’s good boy disagreed and chose not to make cuts.
Think about this very carefully. They were unwilling to look for $3.5 million in cuts from a budget of more than $826 million. They thought cutting less than one half of one percent was too much work or too much of a sacrifice.
Instead, council voted 6-2 to impose a franchise fee on the water utility, which in typical fashion is probably part of the motive behind the newly proposed increase in storm water fees for all users. This was all political maneuvering so that the bozo politicians could act as though they were keeping taxes down and not cutting services.
These people really do think taxpayers are stupid. They are also financially irresponsible and patently dishonest.
The next question is how long will the new city manager stay? It’s his choice as to whether he fulfills the term of his contract.
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What we are now seeing is yet another “professional manager” who is feeding at the trough and a mayor and city council who are pleased to keep filling it with money. Our “professional” manager underestimated his moving expenses by nearly 60%, so he asked to have the terms of his contract renegotiated to pick up another $16,522 dollars. That amount is on top of the $239,000 base salary, $15,000 in deferred income, $6,000 car allowance, $10,000 moving allowance already approved, and $15,000 in temporary housing allowance.
Okay, so he cut a “bad deal” on one of the terms of his contract. So what?! This proves that he is unwilling to be accountable and accept responsibility for his own mistakes. Why didn’t the mayor and council ask him to trade one year of deferred income for the $16,000 in added moving expense.
This looks like a case of bait and switch; use a low number and then renegotiate it later. Neither he nor city staff bothered to get a moving estimate up front, yet he agreed to $10,000. Everyone should have to with it!
Despite his very nice comp package, he also still wanted a clause in his contract allowing him to do paid consulting and speaking engagements. He also thinks he has a book publishing deal in his future.
And Noe had the audacity to suggest that those consulting gigs benefit the city? Just the opposite. In the city manager’s effort to gain those income opportunities, he will market himself and leverage his position as the city manager of the second largest border city. He will use those speaking engagements to enhance his profile and position himself for other jobs, including possible national or state political office.
The additional $16,000 in moving expense for the city manager combined with the $7,000 to move Ann Lilly’s seat in the council changes, total $23,000. Those two decisions alone are equal to more than half of El Paso’s median household income.
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