Council committee open to a quick find for city manager; search firm down the list of priorities

CEDAR RAPIDS – The four members of the City Council Personnel Committee talked more Wednesday about not using a search firm to find a city manager rather than using one.

In fact, committee members didn't rule out being able to find the city's second city manager closer rather than farther from home and more quickly than a search firm could.

In the short run, the committee will begin to work on a profile of what they want in a city manager, while Monica Vernon, committee chairwoman, suggested that Conni Huber, the city's human resources director, take some quick steps in the next two or three weeks to see if someone close by who is qualified for the job might express a desire for it.

If such a “quick search” isn't successful, the committee then talked about designing its own arrangement where Huber and her staff would conduct the bulk of the candidate search. The idea would be to use an outsider to hold applications and resumes so the outsider would not be bound by the state's open-records law to make the names public. Huber said she would have to see if such an approach did or did not violate the state law.

Council member Kris Gulick has said the value of a private search firm is that it is not bound by the open-records law and so applicants can take comfort in applying for the Cedar Rapids job without their current employers knowing it. The names only become public when the search firm submits the finalist list to the city, he has pointed out.

Vernon and council members Don Karr, Justin Shields and Chuck Swore comprise the Personnel Committee, which was created by Mayor Ron Corbett in January.

Council member Tom Podzimek, who initially had been on the committee, dropped off, convinced that some on the council already had decided whom they wanted for a new city manager.

The committee, though, on Wednesday did not see eye to eye on everything.

Karr said someone who has run a business can manage a city: “A city is no different than a business,” he said.

Shields didn't buy that. “It's a lot different than running a business,” he said. He said a city manager needs to have experience in the political world that cities find themselves in.

Vernon said she pretty much agreed with Shields, but both said they wouldn't rule out someone who had never run a city before.

Swore said his perfect candidate would have sales experience and, perhaps, would have owned a business.

Vernon seemed to suggest she wanted someone unlike Jim Prosser, who left city employment last week after 44 months as part of a “separation agreement” with the council.” Vernon said a new city manager should have the “demonstrated ability” to go beyond the planning process “to get things built and make things happen.”

At one point, Swore asked Huber what approach she would take to hire a city manager if it were up to her, and she said her job was to listen to the council.

Huber said she didn't have “the network” of contacts a search firm has and so she said she wasn't sure she had the ability to find all the candidates a search firm could find who might be interested in the Cedar Rapids job. She also said she would not feel comfortable conducting background and reference checks on candidates, one of whom ultimately will become her boss, or negotiating the selection's salary.

The committee seemed to think it could find someone else, including council members, to do reference checks, and Shields suggested that the council would negotiate the salary.