Springfield city manager ends 90-day listening, learning tour

Brandon Jenson would be happy to see his "no" vote proven wrong.

Jeff Schrag: A self-correcting organization like David Cameron envisions is a powerful one.

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In a fourth-floor office where Arkansas Razorbacks swag is interspersed with pictures of his two grandkids, David Cameron can sometimes be found on a break within a heavy schedule of meetings, tossing back a can of Diet Dr Pepper from a mini fridge that’s chock-full of them.

On Oct. 10, he sat down there with Springfield Business Journal to express how things are going after 90 days in his role. Cameron said he wanted to recap some of the details he shared with Springfield City Council in a 90-day review, given during a closed-door meeting on Oct. 7.

Cameron’s hire as the Queen City’s 14th city manager was approved May 27 by a deeply divided council. In a 5-4 vote, those in favor of the hire were Mayor Jeff Schrag and council members Callie Carroll, Heather Hardinger, Derek Lee and Abe McGull. Opposed were Bruce Adib-Yazdi, Monica Horton, Craig Hosmer and Brandon Jenson.

Reached for this article, three of the four council members who voted against Cameron’s selection for the position – essentially the city’s CEO post – said they liked what they were seeing from him, while the fourth said a proper assessment would require more time.

Others who work with Cameron, including Mayor Schrag, said they felt enthusiastic about his work so far.

In his first 90 days, Cameron said he had 320 meetings, or roughly five meetings per weekday.

“I call them engagements,” he said. “It’s been crazy.”

They have been long days, often starting with breakfast meetings and concluding after the dinner hour. The period culminated with a weeklong scheduled vacation that he started on Oct. 13.

Cameron said he has changed some personal habits during his time with the city. One example has been cutting out all caffeine – those cans of Diet Dr Pepper are his favored method of delivery – after noon.

“I’ve got to sleep better,” he said. “That calendar is not sustainable.”

Still, Cameron said, meeting the people he would be working with in the city was a priority.

“I’m gonna hit every single person and be available to everything that I possibly can because I want to learn,” he said.

Along with listening to city staff and stakeholders, Cameron said he’s eager to get the word out to the community on how things are going in city government.

“It’s so important to me that we tell the story that’s going good,” he said. “I’m sensing there is a transition that’s taking place. Let’s get Springfield moving.”

From Cameron’s perspective, things are going well. Outside of meetings with city personnel, he has been hard at work on efforts to launch and fund an estimated $175 million convention and events center in the downtown area – something that landed in the form of recommendation in a report by the Chicago-based Hunden Partners on the second day in his position.

Additionally, an effort to bring a new professional soccer arena downtown also vied for attention. He and Amanda Ohlensehlen, director of Workforce and Economic Vitality, traveled to Spokane, Washington, to meet with United Soccer League officials, and Cameron plans to travel to Tampa Bay for similar discussions soon.

“We went to a soccer game, saw the experience, got to go through the facilities, meet some of the players – actually, two were from Missouri State,” he said. “In addition to 320 meetings, I’ve had projects, and it’s crazy – it’s a lot – but I love it.”

Council ‘no’ voters
Council’s Oct. 7 meeting was closed under the broad heading of “personnel.” No indication was offered of a specific subject for discussion. However, the day before that meeting, Cameron told SBJ council would be conducting his 90-day review, and he offered a one-on-one interview to share his perspective.

Missouri’s Sunshine Law allows discussion and votes on certain personnel matters to take place in closed session. Cameron’s employment contract doesn’t specify the requirement of a 90-day review; rather, it calls for a performance review by council at least once during the fourth quarter of the city’s fiscal year, which ends June 30.

Cameron said it is a priority for him to be transparent with the media.

“Usually, the thinking is, well, if they ask for it, then we’ll give it – but I’d rather just give it and be done,” he said.

The council members who voted against Cameron were also forthcoming when reached for this story to offer their takes on his performance in his three months on the job.

Jenson said he appreciates much of what he is seeing from Cameron so far.

“I have been impressed by his ability to lay the foundations of bridge-building with many parts of our community and his approach to understanding the complex, yet rich-in-talent, organization that is the city of Springfield,” he said via text.

While the candidates were being considered, Jenson expressed some wariness about the disruptive leadership style that Cameron spoke about during the selection process.

“I have also begun to learn the value of disruptive leadership as an approach to challenges which is grounded in radical candor followed up by meaningful action,” Jenson said. 

Jenson indicated he is keeping an open mind about Cameron’s leadership.

“While I am still waiting to see how our city functions under his leadership over the next nine months, I am hopeful I will be able to say at his contract renewal that I was wrong in my vote,” Jenson said.

Hosmer also gave Cameron a positive assessment.

“Actually, I’ve been impressed,” he said. “It’s still early, but I think he’s done a good job. He’s responsive, and he listens to divergent opinions. That’s all you can really ask.”

Hosmer said even though he voted against Cameron, he believes the city manager has done everything the right way.

“It’s still early, and there haven’t been any big, controversial issues,” he said. “But he’s been good, and I hope it continues.”

Adib-Yazdi also said he sees Cameron performing well at the outset.

“In his first 90 days, Mr. Cameron has engaged with his staff and our community in the way I would have hoped and expected: with enthusiasm, an open mind and big ears,” he said via email.

Adib-Yazdi said council recently identified its top priorities – economic development, the development process, housing and public safety – and now it’s time for both council and the city manager to get to work on them.

“We hope to have meaningful conversations regarding those items in the coming weeks. His work really starts now that he’s had a chance to take it all in and assess his next steps,” he said.

Horton, reached by text, had a more guarded assessment, noting it’s too soon to tell how Cameron is performing.

Horton said she voted against Cameron’s appointment because she would have preferred to continue with a city manager search after staff ranked him last among all three candidates, and latent public input revealed favorable views toward starting over.

But Horton said she also had her own concerns with the council/city manager dynamic, as well as with Cameron’s qualifications and ability to address and improve longstanding issues in Zone 1, which she represents. These issues include infill and incremental development, chronic nuisance properties and brownfield development. She also questioned his understanding of issues related to homelessness, poverty and crime. All of these issues are vastly different in Springfield than they were in what she termed the suburban, greenfield community where Cameron the candidate was employed.

“David is in a honeymoon period, which is expected of any high-profile new hire,” Horton said. “Council has not tasked David with any substantive objectives other than building a rapport with the community, council and his staff. His work performance in Springfield has yet to be seen.”

Horton added that it may be three years or so before council can accurately assess Cameron’s performance in Springfield.

Positive reviews
Mayor Schrag, who voted for Cameron’s appointment, said he came into the mayoral role with a very positive opinion of Cameron.

“If anything, working with him as I have, my positive opinion of him has increased,” he said. “He’s incredibly hardworking, and he has really thrown himself into his role, which I sincerely appreciate.”

Schrag added that there are any number of leaders in the world who do not want to hear bad news.

“Dave is not one of those people,” he said. “He wants honesty – he respects honesty – and he wants to fix things.”

But then Schrag backed up.

“Actually, he wants to empower people to fix things – he wants to empower those who work with him to correct things themselves,” he said. “A self-correcting organization is very powerful to work with.”

One city department head, Martin Gugel, director of Building Development Services, said Cameron has been great to work with.

“He’s very aware of processes that can sometimes drag down our success,” Gugel said. “In the short time he’s been here, we have noticed improvements. He’s looked at how to shorten processes or make them better, and that’s a welcome message to staff.”

In an interview with SBJ, Becky Volz, chair of the city’s Neighborhood Advisory Council, said she has heard only positive feedback about Cameron from neighborhood leaders.

“They feel like he has an interest in neighborhoods,” she said. “That’s encouraging to those of us who struggled with that before.”

Matt Morrow, president and CEO of the Springfield Area Chamber of Commerce, said there have been no surprises where Cameron is concerned.

Morrow said a big part of Cameron’s model for success is empowering people to take risks and do what they feel is best while making sure they have the information they need to understand the decisions they’re called to make.

Empowering employees can improve efficiency, Morrow said, adding that it’s important to maintain high expectations while also making sure to have employees’ backs when they make decisions.

“He asks great questions, and he moves at the speed of business,” Morrow said. “He’s the same person we’ve known and partnered with over the years.”

New approach
People are at the center of Cameron’s organizational framework.

“One of my big points is decentralizing this office,” he said. “A lot of things come to me through the manager’s office for approval. It has to get decentralized so that other people can make decisions.”

City employees want to know what the new city manager expects of them, he said.

“I want you to find every process that’s a barrier to us doing business,” he said. “This is what I expect: We do process improvements, we build relationships and let’s work on trust.”

Those three words come up again and again in a conversation with Cameron, who says everything that affects us is either a process or a relationship – and ultimately, those two factors impact trust.

An important book to Cameron is “The Trust Edge” by David Horsager. It’s so important, in fact, that he plans to bring the author to Springfield, as he did in Republic, when he was city administrator there.

“It was the most out-of-the-box thing,” he said. “It was not cheap, but it was one of those game-changers. How do you build trust in an organization when people don’t trust you? Government is one of the least-trusted organizations – especially right now.”

A foundational idea in “The Trust Edge” is that people trust the clear and distrust the ambiguous or overly complex, Cameron said – and that’s why clarity is one of his highest values.

With a foundation of mutual trust and shared responsibility, city operations can move forward more swiftly and smoothly, he said. Cameron wants to pick up the pace, with improvements like moving people through the city’s hiring processes more quickly. He also wants to streamline business licenses, which he noted must now be paid for by check or over the phone. Cameron said he wants to establish an online system for accepting payments to simplify things on both the business and city side of the transaction.

“There is definitely an appetite for that from the mayor and City Council,” he said. “One of their four priorities is the development process, and what we’re outlining is operational excellence.”

Value add
Cameron also has an eye on cost. An example is the time spent by staff at meetings. He said there are too many meetings, and too many people in them who don’t need to be.

“I look around the room and ask how much is it costing the taxpayers for each individual to be in the room, and what is that person actually providing to the conversation?” he said.

In almost no cases does a meeting require Cameron, with an annual salary of $350,000, and his two deputy city managers, earning $270,000 and $260,000, he said.

“Those are expensive meetings, so you need to make sure there’s a value added,” he said. “You have to consider what the organization and the city is losing out on. What could that other manager be doing?”

Cameron said he has delegated assignments to his deputies, Maurice Jones and Collin Quigley, and that includes committee assignments that used to include both the city manager and a deputy. Moving forward, the deputy will attend, and Cameron will attend only if necessary.

“What I’ve told them both is I want you to do your job as though you are the city manager of the city of Springfield,” he said. “There is no other way. It’s not, ‘We’re here to support you.’ You’re here to provide recommendations and ideas and suggestions. You’re my teammates.”

Cameron said he is ultimately responsible, but he can work best by empowering the deputies, who are up to the challenge.

Cameron spent some time praising multiple city leaders, including Ohlensehlen, Gugel and Steve Childers, director of Planning and Development, as well as multiple others.

“There’s an energy that’s coming into the building that says, ‘Let’s get some stuff done,’” he said. “Let’s make Springfield a great place to work.”

Another person who will take a key role for Cameron is Taj Suleyman, who directs the city’s Belonging and Intercultural Development department. Cameron said he believes he can activate Suleyman to help deliver to the city’s 2,200 employees a message about culture and about operating around processes, relationships and trust.

“Taj is a change agent, and he’s been underutilized,” he said. “He’s jumped in on ‘The Trust Edge’ – he’s read the book, and he’s eager to be put to work. He’s an incredible resource, and again, it’s all about utilization that has to be decentralized out of my office.”

Ultimately, Cameron said he plans to hire a chief of staff, a position that will have to be approved by council. He doesn’t have a timeline or process set up, but he anticipates doing that after the beginning of 2026.