Council should follow procedure
To the Editor:
On Monday evening I attended only the second Marion City Council meeting since Cathy and I moved here in the summer of 1998. The first was because of a project the city and school district were working on.
My motive for attending this second meeting was to understand the apparent furor circulating about the town caused by the council's delay in re-appointing City Administrator David Mayfield.
I should say up front that while I am not a close personal friend of Mr. Mayfield, I have enjoyed several rounds of golf with Dave and valued the professional relationship we had while I served as superintendent of schools. My purpose for attending on Monday evening was to understand why Mayfield was suddenly not suitable to continue in his current position.
When given the opportunity, I asked the council to respond to a series of questions: Does the council have a formal system to assess the performance of the city administrator? When was the last assessment performed? What was the result of that assessment?
The council (minus Gene Winkler, who was called away on an ambulance run) was essentially unable to answer my questions, but I learned from City Attorney Dan Baldwin and Mayfield that the council conducts an informal performance review annually, with the last review in mid-January. The results of that informal review were that Mayfield was "doing a good job" and he was rewarded with a raise in salary. My last question was to ask what had changed in the two and one-half months since the review.
The council, or any public governing body, has a tough job. One of the toughest is in dealing with personnel matters, and I would argue that a public body, be it the city council or the board of education or the county commission must be able to remove people who are not doing the required job. But, such removal must be done fairly, thoughtfully, openly, and honestly. What I observed Monday evening satisfied not one of these concepts that should be valued by all citizens, especially of a community our size.
Monday evening's meeting began with a 45-minute executive session. After accepting comments from the audience, the first public action following the closed session was for Mayor Olson to move that Mayfield not be re-appointed as city administrator. The motion was seconded, and I believe was on the verge of being voted on had not several interested citizens been in attendance.
My primary reason for this belief was that in response to Councilman Stacey Collett's concern that such a controversial issue warranted the presence of all council members, Mayor Olson asked for an additional 30-minute executive session.
To the council's credit, the second executive session resulted in the Mayor's announcement that the council would meet with Mayfield prior to any action on his reappointment in order to discuss their concerns about his job performance. In my judgment, this meeting should have occurred long ago.
The meeting between the council and Mayfield is scheduled to occur at 5 p.m. Monday, just prior to the next regular meeting of the council at 5:30. The 5 p.m. o'clock meeting will be in executive session, as it should be. Any action taken by the council as a result of the closed meeting will be taken in a public session. That open session will be my third experience with the Marion City Council, and I would encourage all citizens who value the concepts mentioned above to attend.
Gerald W. "Gerry" Henderson
Marion
