Council divided over city manager selection

A Springfield City Council that appears divided over the vote on the appointment of David Cameron as city manager presided over a public hearing last night in which members of the business community voiced their support for his hire.

At last night’s council meeting, Councilmember Brandon Jenson said he plans to vote against Cameron for the city manager role. Other council members, including Monica Horton, Craig Hosmer and Bruce Adib-Yazdi, also expressed reservations about either Cameron or the process for approving him, although they stopped short of saying they would not vote for him.

Approval of the city manager requires a simple majority, which is a 5-4 vote, including the mayor. Council is veering from its standard procedure of holding a first reading and public hearing for an ordinance in a regular meeting and then voting on it at the next meeting, usually two weeks later. An aberration in council’s meeting calendar – approved before the year began – puts the next regular meeting on June 9, three weeks away.

The city’s announcement of Cameron’s selection for the city manager role contained an error. It said the vote would be held May 27, a Tuesday and not a regular council meeting day. Mayor Jeff Schrag decided at a special meeting on May 15 to keep the vote on May 27. The vote is scheduled for a special open portion of a meeting to be followed by a closed session to talk about pending litigation.

Cameron, who is currently the city administrator of Republic, is scheduled to start in the Springfield leadership role on July 7, according to the original city announcement.

Business support
Erin Danastasio, representing the charitable Hatch Foundation as its executive director and Leaders for Ozarks Regional Evolvement, or LORE, as its board chair, expressed her organizations’ full support for hiring Cameron.

“At the Hatch Foundation, we believe in the power of public-private partnerships to bring innovative, lasting change to our community,” she said. “We see David as a true advocate for these kinds of partnerships.”

Danastasio said the foundation believes Cameron is a true advocate for public-private partnerships, and from LORE’s perspective, he is a courageous and empowering leader who empowers individuals and embraces regionalism.

“We need leadership that is positive and forward thinking and rooted in the true belief in our community, and we believe that David Cameron represents that kind of leadership,” she said.

Jaimie Trussell, CEO of Crosslines Community Outreach, formerly known as Council of Churches of the Ozarks, offered her organization’s support of Cameron as well.

“I know firsthand that David’s leadership will bring a level of grit, integrity, determination and a new measure of vitality to the important work of city government,” she said.

She added that the city has been waiting for the announcement of a new city manager since last year, and the community is ready to embrace a new leader going forward.

Bob Helm, a partner with Elliott, Robinson & Co. LLP and chair of the board of the Springfield Area Chamber of Commerce, said he had spent time with the three finalists for the role – Cameron, city Aviation Director Brian Weiler and former Roanoke City Manager Bob Cowell – and he found them all to be passionate and qualified.

He said his firm has had a location in Republic since 2015.

“The citizens of Republic are better today, in my opinion, than where they were prior to his time there,” Helm said, adding that Cameron is a bold, confident problem-solver.

Allen Kunkel, associate vice president for economic development at Missouri State University, said he has been on the Republic Enterprise Zone board for two decades.

“Watching that community grow during David’s tenure is amazing, not just only in the growth of the community, but also how professional staff has become,” he said.

One person, Kevin Evans, who described himself as a Phelps Grove neighborhood resident and a professor of geology at MSU, spoke during the public hearing to oppose Cameron’s candidacy for city manager.

Evans said having two of the three finalists in the national search hail from Greene County is short-sighted. He said Cameron’s experience – in Republic and in Siloam Springs, Arkansas – are from cities that are not comparable in population to Springfield.

Additionally, Evans said, council should be unanimous in its decision, and the public does not know if that is the case.

“In my opinion, this should be a failed search, and you should start all over again,” he said.

Council weighs in
Council members were invited to make their comments about the upcoming vote at last night’s meeting, instead of before the vote. Horton said Schrag had written an email to members and instructed them to speak only during the May 19 meeting and not before their vote at the May 27 special meeting – an instruction that Horton said goes against city code.

Horton said she anticipates emails, phone calls and face-to-face comments in the days leading up to the vote. Although only one week stands between the public hearing and the vote, Horton referred to the two-week period during which comments are typically gathered.

“I won’t get ahead of myself tonight, or jump ahead of the two-week latent response of our constituents by stating prematurely how I will or will not vote on this contract without factoring in the two-week period of public feedback that we are surely to receive,” she said. “Therefore, I will reserve my final remarks, if I have any at all, on this contract for the second reading, pursuant to section 2.38, number 6, of the municipal code, which makes provision for council members to discuss any council bill prior to any final vote.”

Hosmer spoke up to ask about the basis for putting the issue to the vote on May 27.

Schrag said, “I personally believe this is a time-sensitive bill. I believe that getting within a 30-day window of hiring a new manager is just cutting it too close.”

Schrag said waiting until the June 9 meeting to execute a contract would put the city into a time crunch.

Hosmer replied that Cameron is not available to begin until July 7. He asked if Schrag perceived an emergency situation, but Schrag said a lot of dominos have to fall for the hire to happen.

“I just think when we do things differently than we normally do, we set up Mr. Cameron for people to think there’s some sort of conspiracy, some sort of reason to push this through faster than the normal bill has to go through,” Hosmer said.

He said he has been on council for 12 years and has not witnessed a bill put through this quickly in lieu of an emergency.

“Frankly, I think Mr. Cameron’s tenure is going to be marred by the fact that we put this in in a different way than normal protocol suggests – than we’ve historically always done,” he said.

He noted the issue should be debated, and the public should be able to witness that discussion.

Jenson said he planned to vote against Cameron as city manager, noting that when he agreed to a $350,000 salary for the next Springfield city manager, he had a different idea in mind than Cameron.

“A part of my goal was recognizing that our community, we’re sort of on this threshold of thinking of ourselves as a big town, but really, we’re a small city with city problems,” he said. “For me, it was critically important that we, through the recruitment process, ended up with somebody that has experience navigating those complex social and infrastructure problems that only exist within large metros.”

He said it was his understanding that if such a candidate did not emerge, council would be willing to go back to the drawing board.

Jenson said he has heard two chief concerns from members of the community.

“The first is a major concern the lack of neighborhood support for the candidate will deepen the already prevalent belief that the city only listens to one viewpoint,” he said.

The inability to pull the entire community together around the candidate emphasizes the division, he said.

Jenson’s second concern is about Cameron’s embrace of disruptive leadership. Cameron has a consulting business, called Disruptive Leadership LLC. Cameron told Springfield Business Journal this week he would keep the LLC in place but would not do consulting as city manager.

Jenson said disruptive leadership can create transformative, efficient and effective change, but he added it can also demoralize staff and result in worse outcomes.

Councilmember Derek Lee, an engineer, said he has worked with Cameron on projects in Republic, and having seen Cameron in action, he can attest to his integrity firsthand.

“I got to see real collaboration with public-private partnerships; I got to see it with state agencies, with federal agencies, and I think that that same collaborative effort that I witnessed firsthand over a number of years repeatedly will be the same collaborative effort that will work with our neighborhoods and with our nonprofits and other people,” Lee said.

He added that his biggest concern is the divided council. While he said he shares some concerns, he noted that having a different candidate doesn’t mean there will be a different solution six months from now.

“The differences of opinion that have been expressed here tonight are real,” he said. “We have people that want different leaders.”

He said he supports Cameron and looks forward to seeing what he and council can do together to implement council priorities.

Councilmember Callie Carroll talked about a recent speech by Cameron that showed his willingness to be vulnerable and raw and to talk about mental health and the people who helped him get to where he is.

She said Cameron is collaborative and solutions oriented, holding himself and others accountable, and that’s what she’s looking for in a leader.

Burce Adib-Yazdi, a new member of council, said the day after election day, the three candidates were announced.

“That was completely out of the blue for me,” he said.

He added that none of the previous work to narrow down the candidate pool or conversations about them were ever made public.

He added that with the amplified salary – $350,000 versus the last city manager’s exiting salary of $268,000 – he, like Jenson, was wanting someone with experience in a larger metropolitan area. He said that he was also in the camp that believed council should begin its search anew, but he added that if Cameron is selected, he pledges to support him.

Schrag capped off the discussion by acknowledging that he would have liked to have steered the selection process from its beginning, rather than carrying it forth from the previous council.

“There’s a part of me – you don’t come into this role without a giant ego, which I certainly have – that said, ‘Gosh, I’d like to carve this process out myself,’” he said, but he added that those weren’t the cards he was dealt.

“What I believe in the process that council put forward is the cream rose to the top,” he said. “I believe some excellent people were in that cream at the very top, and I am thrilled to work with David Cameron as our next city manager.”

Schrag said ultimately, he had to put his ego considerations aside.

“I just have to look at how much do I care about myself, my own ego, and how much do I look at what’s right for the community – and David Cameron's what’s right for this community,” he said.

Cameron’s last contract in Republic put his salary at $270,448 – higher than that of Jason Gage, who was Springfield’s most recent city manager, according to past reporting. Republic has a population of approximately 20,000, versus Springfield’s population of about 170,000.