Welcome Tom Bonfield

I have to say, I can't wait for next year's budget process.

Having a City Manager, with a decade and a half experience in other towns at the beginning of his 5 year contract managing the budget process is going to be a whole lot different than the dog and pony show we just witnessed. And, next year is an election year for the Mayor and three members of Council.

Should be fun.

Continue reading Welcome Tom Bonfield

Budget

I posted this to the Inter-Neighborhood Council list, but i thought i'd share it here. There's been some discussion about the priorities in the budget this year, with arts and other non-profits, which have traditionally been funded by the city, getting a much smaller piece of the pie in the proposed budget. And that's even before the cuts that Mayor Bell has asked City Manager Patrick Baker to make, to reduce the proposed increase in the property tax rate to 3 cents, from 5 and a half cents.

Mike Shiflett made the point that:

With ever increasing demands on providing basic services (police & fire protection, minimum housing code enforcement, roads, sewer and water, trash pickup/yard waste, other services) residents need to understand that there is not an unlimited amount of money to go around.

. . .

The Non-City Agency funding changes being implemented by the City Council are attempting to address this.

emphasis mine.

There's the rub. Read the news articles and you'd get the impression that staff came up with this idea all by themselves. But this is, as far as i am aware, a policy decision made by Council some time ago.

Why wasn't this communicated to the non-profits before the funding cycle began? For that matter, why wasn't the 54 cent property tax limit communicated to staff before the budget cycle began? If Council had a tax increase limit in mind, wouldn't it have made sense to let the manager and budget director know before they put the budget together? Or does someone actually think that by rejecting the proposed budget, our elected leaders look as though they are standing up for the taxpayers?

Really, the whole budget process this year has been disgraceful.

UPDATE: Several people have written to me explaining that the city staff did in fact communicate with the NCAs about the changes they could expect in funding levels and priorities in this and subsequent budget cycles. The suggestion is that NCA staff may not have communicated the seriousness of the city in implementing these changes to their Boards, with the result being the highly public clamor among these groups for more funds from the city.

Could be.

My thinking is that the city could have perhaps been a bit more proactive in letting the public and the people who use the services provided by the NCAs know about these changes as well. I don't necessarily oppose limiting the time frame in which local non-profits can expect to be funded by the city, or the levels of support they can expect to receive. But somewhere in the process this year, something broke. And the result is that everyone looks bad.

Continue reading Budget

More comments

Over at Kevin's place, commenter Will wonders why posts about new City Manager Tom Bonfield are not attracting a lot of discussion.

That's because nobody is asking our new manager the one question on every Durham blog reader's mind: Starbucks, Dunkin' Donuts, or Krispy Kreme?

That should get the ball rolling.

Continue reading More comments

It's official

Durham, N.C. – Mayor William V. “Bill” Bell and City Council members today will announce Thomas J. Bonfield as their selection for Durham’s next city manager at a 4 p.m. press conference in the Council Chambers at Durham’s City Hall.

Bonfield will be present for the announcement.

Currently the city manager of Pensacola, Fla. where he has served for 10 years, Bonfield has 30 years of government experience with local governments of increasing size and complexity.

Prior to his current position, he served as the city manager of Temple Terrace, Fla. for 13 years.

Bonfield has provided leadership to state and national professional associations, and is an award-winning community leader who has extensive experience in a variety of urban settings.

Continue reading It's official

Irony

From the comments at Rick's Blog, a Pensacola blogger, to his post on the announcement that Tom Bonfield will be leaving Pensacola to take the city manager's job in Durham:

#
Anonymous // Jun 2, 2008 at 12:14 pm

my problem with nc is too much 55 mph speed limits, strictly enforced.

Continue reading Irony

More from Pensacola

Commenters at Rick's Blog:

#
escambiamom // Jun 2, 2008 at 11:04 am

The article states: “Fogg also praised Bonfield for his work on economic development projects downtown, including a maritime museum complex that featured a baseball stadium, conference center, museum and amphiteater at a public cost of $40 million.”

Did anyone tell Durham it is still just weeds? Is it just me or does it make it look like a completed project?



#
Joe // Jun 2, 2008 at 11:31 am


I guess Tom knows a sinking ship when he sees one. Hey, good for him.


#
Jerry // Jun 2, 2008 at 11:58 am

Congratulations Tom!

No matter how good the city manager, this city with this council can never progress as long as the policy for progress includes a check -in with the good ol boy brotherhood first.


#
publius // Jun 2, 2008 at 11:59 am


golly. north carolina has higher taxes than florida. why would someone leave a low tax paradise like florida for a high tax hell like north carolina? better schools? better roads? better universities? better health care? none of that matters compared to the taxes people dont pay here in florida. those suckers there up dont know how bad they’ve got it.

Love that last one. Out of the frying pan into the fire for Mr. Bonfield, perhaps?

From Progressive Pensacola:

Some folks don’t care for Tom Bonfield, but I never had too much of a problem with him. I think he’s an able administrator. He’s not visionary, he’s not even really very future-minded, but he is an able administrator, and a professional, and I can’t blame him for putting on a life vest and jumping off our sinking ship. While the opportunity to bring in new management and shake up city staff is appealing, the city manager is selected by the City Council, which is not appealing, especially in light of recent events.

In any case, I wish him luck in his new endeavours.

PP is a relatively new blog. This appears to be the first time they've written about Mr. Bonfield in the 3 months they've been publishing.

UPDATE: One thing i have not been able to discover about Mr. Bonfield in all of my research, is whether he's a Starbucks man, or if he prefers Dunkin' Donuts or Krispy Kreme. I assure you, i will keep digging.

Continue reading More from Pensacola

First impressions

Regarding new city manager Tom Bonfield.

I like him already.

Further afield, there was some grumbling that none of the three candidates presented last month hailed from cities as diverse as Durham. That seems to still be the case. Let's see if the grumbling resumes.

UPDATE: Looks like Mr. Bonfield doesn't arouse much ire in the Pensacola blogosphere. Only two mentions in the past three years in what appears to be a very highly opinionated local blog. (Remind you of anyone?)

One's a touch troubling, though.

Pensacola city manager Tom Bonfield must be smiling these days. After a nationwide search ended two months ago, it looked like he might have to hire as the next city fire chief his own professional Selection Committee's first choice: an Orlando firefighting woman with outstanding credentials.

But Bonfield held tough. She 'wasn't a good fit.' Now he's whittled the Just-Gotta-Readvertise list down to six new candidates. And whaddaya know? Every single one of the finalists is a local boy! (Emphasis on the boy. Now, that's a fit!)

That was two years ago. Pensacola News Journal has an article available for purchase in their archives about the "controversy,", so maybe one of our professional journalists will fork out the cash for the info. Here's the tease:

The more we think about it, the harder it becomes to not be puzzled about Pensacola City Manager Tom Bonfield's decision to ignore the recommendations of a highly qualified panel when it comes to naming a new fire chief. Bonfield said the top-ranked candidate, Kim Berryman-Dages, was not "the right fit" for the job. He said the same for the four male applicant finalists ranked immediately behind her. It's hard not to wonder if . . .

Again, it doesn't appear that, after the final selection was made, there was much in the way of ongoing controversy.

Continue reading First impressions

City manager hired?

Matt is reporting that Pensacola, FL manager Tom Bonfield has been hired to fill the manager's position being vacated by Patrick Baker, who is moving over to the city attorney's office.

We'll spend some time today learning what the blogosphere knows about Mr. Bonfield.

Meantime, here's a request for our city leaders. Let's just drop the whole kabuki theater aspect of introducing the candidates to the community and the press, shall we? It doesn't serve any purpose whatsoever. Do your jobs, find the best candidate for the position, and negotiate the contract. It's what we hire you to do.

And let's get a discount coupon from the Mercer Group for our next managerial level search.

Continue reading City manager hired?

More stupid

The unfolding disaster that is Durham's search for a new city manager is taking yet another wrong turn, according to the N&O. It's not bad enough that the kabuki theater presentation of the "three finalists" last month has not led to an offer, and that the mayor is continuously dropping hints that Council might have someone else in mind. (To be honest, i don't think that presenting the candidates to the public or the press during the hiring process is necessary, or even such a great idea. Although in Durham, it might serve the dual purpose of the citizenry meeting their potential managers, and the managers getting a taste of what their new life might actually be like. Perhaps that's what happened here. Maybe all three finalists decided that Durham wasn't where they wanted to be after all.)

No, dropping hints that none of the finalists may have been good enough, and dragging the process out far longer than is necessary may be minor concerns compared to Matt's news:

City Council members have not been taking minutes of their closed meetings to discuss who will be the next city manager, possibly a violation of state law.

And it might not be the only instance of the council running afoul of the open-meetings law, which says that "every public body shall keep full and accurate minutes of all official meetings, including any closed session."

Council member Diane Catotti said the city clerk usually leaves the room for closed sessions and said she doesn't know "if anyone's taking notes or not."

The City Council has entered closed session more than a half-dozen times in the past month to discuss the new manager.

"I'll be honest with you: We haven't taken any minutes," Mayor Bill Bell said. "It's because it's just been confidential personnel. We've kept it strictly among the council."

He said he didn't know the law required documenting closed sessions. "If I was aware of it, I would have been doing," that he said.

I don't know. I thought being aware of it was part of the job description, Mr. Mayor.

To be fair, Matt quotes the interim City Attorney as saying that a report that Council entered closed session to discuss personnel matters and "discussed the qualifications of the candidate" would be adequate to meet the letter of the law.

I wouldn't want to take that bet.

Continue reading More stupid

Scooped! City manager hunt takes an unexpected twist

Matt's got a great scoop on the latest in the Durham city manager hunt. Seems that one of our three candidates (Patrick Salerno, most recently from Sunrise, FL) is a finalist for another city manager job. No big deal there, right? Qualified city managers are a relatively small pool, and city manager openings are equally small.

Here's where it gets good.

Pat Salerno, former city manager of Sunrise, Fla., is in the hunt for the Wichita top job, according to that city's Web site.

Wichita's search is aided by Jim Mercer of The Mercer Group, the same Atlanta firm helping the city of Durham.

In another parallel, Durham finalist George Kolb recently left the city manager job in Wichita. Salerno declined comment when reached Tuesday afternoon.

Hey, maybe Durham and Wichita should have gone halfsies on the Mercer Group's headhunter fee? Certainly no less ethical than billing two different clients for the same work, no?

Continue reading Scooped! City manager hunt takes an unexpected twist