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[Music]
you're
on well good morning everyone uh welcome
to the special city council meeting
today is Monday January 13th 2025 it's a
approximately 9:00 a.m. I am Mary hriz
we will start with a moment of silence
for the brave men and women of the
United States armed forces as they
protect the interests around the globe
our courageous men and women of the Las
Cruses police and Las Cruses fire
department we also want to keep those in
mind in in Southern California who are
going through a crisis right now all the
responders families and everyone there
please join us in the
pledge pledge allegiance to the flag of
the United States of America and to the
repic for it stands one nation under God
indivisible jusice
for at this time is there any conflict
of interests by any member of
Council none Grant none none none
none now we'll move on to resolutions
for discussions 3.1 resolution number
25081 a resolution for the discussion
and decision as to whether to limit the
selection for the position of city
manager to internal candidates
only move to approve second Graham
and Brad dudas will
start thank you mayor uh so good morning
everyone uh thank you for being here
today the resolutions on the agenda will
all deal with uh really One Singular
topic although there will be subtopics
there in that we'll have to discuss
individually uh as all of you probably
know um last year uh onor about April
1st uh this body approved in an open
meeting an employment contract with E
con tomoo to serve as its next city
manager uh prior to that uh there were
executive sessions or closed meetings as
we sometimes call them with regard to
the hiring process for the city manager
position uh taking place honor about
March 18th and March 20th uh
respectively uh during those closed
meetings uh what occurred was this body
decided to limit the scope of uh its
search for a city manager to internal
candidates only and that will be the
first topic uh that we address here
today this is all being addressed
because of uh an opinion authored by the
New Mexico Department of Justice which
I'll probably just refer to uh again and
again as the AG's office uh there was an
opinion authored that stated that uh the
city of Las Cruses violated the open
meetings act which uh and summation just
states that public business absent some
sort of enumerated exception shall occur
in an open meeting uh the exception that
we had proceeded under it's my
understanding was uh The Limited
exception for discussing hiring firing
promotion uh demotion Etc uh of a public
employee and the reason we find
ourselves here is it's the AG's opinion
that that exception only applies to One
Singular employee and not uh and not a
candidate search like we had here uh so
with that said I'll move on uh I've
prepared a timeline of events that I'll
just go over briefly on or about
February 28th the city announced that it
would be accepting internal applications
for the vacancy of the position of city
manager as I stated earlier on our about
March 18th uh this body met an enclosed
session to discuss and decide whether
the position of city manager would be
recruited through outside means or
whether to proceed solely with internal
applications uh and that at that same
meeting this body decided to proceed
solely with an internal hiring process
instead of doing a nationwide search or
some other search
um also during that same session Council
decided to narrow the candidate field to
three internal candidates I might refer
to them as finalists their names are aan
tomoo uh who's a former assistant city
manager at the time Sonia Delgado uh
assistant city manager as well and David
sadio who is the director of Public
Works here for the city of Las
Cruses hon our about March 20th this
body interviewed the three finalist for
the vacant position of city manager uh
and on that same date uh selected a
Connie tomoo to serve as its next city
manager in closed session uh pursuant to
agreeing to terms in an employment
agreement and then as you all know on
April 1st during an open meeting city
council approved the employment
agreement for Mr tomoo to serve as his
next city
manager um and then we have ultimately
on December 20th uh pursuant to an OM
complaint the AG's office made findings
that city of Las crus has violated the
open meetings Act
the AG's office made what I consider to
be three major findings and then one
additional
finding um the first finding uh was that
the city of Las crus has failed to
decide the scope of its search in an
open meeting and that it appears to have
engaged in a rolling
Quorum uh the next finding was that the
March 18th 2024 closed session to narrow
the candidate field violated om and that
it's the AG's opinion that that should
have also occurred in an open meeting uh
and then lastly that the city council's
closed session to select a city manager
um in this case the finalist would have
been or the selected finalist would have
been Mr tomoo that that also violated om
the additional finding I I'll talk about
real briefly but I won't go into too
much detail um the AG's office found
that city of Los cruus did not timely
make its required statements for closed
meetings pursuant to section 1051 J but
found that Council had taken remedial
action to correct the issue uh that one
is is simply the the closed meeting
statement that we make
subsequently uh to our closed meetings
at an open meeting what uh we had been
doing was making that closed meeting
statement at the next regular meeting uh
it is the AG's opinion and finding that
we should be doing that the very next
time there's a quorum and so we have
internally uh adjusted our
procedures so I think it's important for
everyone to know that my office has been
coordinating and communicating with the
New Mexico Department of
Justice uh my office has drafted the
current
resolutions uh to bring forward for a
vote as to whether this body will cure
and ratify prior decisions made just so
everyone
knows um there were two possible
remedies identified by the AG's office
the first remedy was to do exactly what
we're doing right now of course the
second remedy was to start the process
over from the
beginning Oma violations can be cured by
holding an Oma compliant public meeting
summarizing all the discussions outside
of a public meeting and ratifying the
actions by a public and open vote of a
majority a simple majority of the city
council pursuant to New Mexico law uh
this comes from one of our state court
presidents New Mexico State investment
Council versus Weinstein uh that is
citing kleinberg versus Board of
Education that is the case uh and I
might be going too far in the weeds but
the Weinstein case is the case that
basically stated that uh settlement
agreements can be approved and decided
in closed meetings uh but the court went
a step further and and let governing
bodies know what to do basically if
there was a violation of oma which is
what we're doing here
today and so moving on to our first
resolution here uh resolution number 25
081 the discussion of the hiring process
for the city manager position this
should include discussions had honor
about February 28th 2024
if any and March 18th 2024 regarding the
decision to pursue an internal hiring
process versus an external hiring
process and whether this body still
chooses to limit its search to internal
candidates
only this next paragraph uh is a result
of my collaboration with the Attorney
General's office and so the words
thoughtful discussion will come up time
and time again throughout this this
presentation so Council should now have
a thoughtful discussion regarding their
decision to limit the candidacy for the
vacancy of city manager to internal
candidates only uh including pros and
cons of this approach so uh I'll be
asking for help from the mayor with
regard to this portion uh potentially
what the AG's office would like to see
is for every member of of the governing
body if you can uh to rely upon your
memory I know that it's been
10 months ago now uh but to summarize
discussions had at uh the March 18th and
the March 20th closed meetings uh
doesn't have to be a
perfect uh you know
verbatim discussion of what you had at
the time uh and
frankly the most appropriate statements
might begin with with the words at that
time I thought or I said or this was uh
my process my analysis with regard to
the internal versus external hiring
process
so this discussion slide will be
peppered throughout my presentation
today uh this is where I'll turn it back
over to all of you uh but city council
should now partake in discussion
regarding this resolution summarizing
all discussions and comments made
outside of a public meeting honor about
March 18th
with regard to the decision to limit the
candidacy for the vacancy of city
manager to internal
candidates okay thank you Brad um look
towards Council uh councelor McClair
would you like to go
first at that time I had no discussions
about whether or not this is going to be
an internal external search the reason I
heard about it was a press release and I
had the same questions afterwards I
asked mayor I said Hey how do we do this
I said hey why why are we going internal
versus external because ultimately I
think external might have been a good
idea I think our candidates could have
been internally strong enough to compete
even if we had just put it as a
um job search on our website not a
nationwide search costing us money so
at that point what do I remember from
then I emailed the attorney at the time
Linda samples and I said hey who makes
this decision city council does okay
good to know I also heard reports on the
uh from different
um news outlets that there was a
consensus and I not sure where they got
that from so thank you
councilor
M I have a question before I make my
deliberation if you could answer it um
is this a process have we followed the
same process in the
past uh mayor internal or external have
we followed the process in the past as
we did this
time mayor councelor matis I don't know
honestly uh I've only been at the city
uh for One hiring process for the
position of city manager frankly I I
just don't know uh I did reach out to uh
human resources to inquire as to uh what
that process might be uh if
any
uh and maybe I maybe I'm saying too much
but I think that's the point of this
meeting um it's come to my attention
that there is no policy simply with
regard to the hiring of a city manager
so that might be something that uh you
your colleagues might want to pursue as
you know uh uh the city manager is this
governing body's one and only employee I
do tend to think that deference should
generally be given with regard to how
you all uh want to select that person uh
and I think that is the general thought
around the
state um but I think the most important
thing that occurs in the future is to
have uh any discussion regarding that
position should it become vacant again
in an open meeting uh consistent with
the AG's
opinion okay uh with that uh my
statement of course is uh I've only
attended two closed
meetings I'm not a fan of closed
meetings I did not attend the 18th but I
did attend the uh the March 20th so I
was not a part I just want go on record
I was not part of any
consensus uh of whether internal
external
or particular person for city
manager con gr thank
you at that
time great uh great way to start the
phrase I'll probably repeat this for
each of the
discussions um the
legal team that we had at that time
which is not the legal team we have now
so
Brad I know you're you know flying a
little blind here I
was never under the impression that the
legal advice uh regarding om closed
session Open session was in any way
misguided um we had continuous
conversations and I just wanted to state
that um if the impression that I as a
council member member was not in
communication with staff or legal that
was not the case in regard to my
thoughts on internal versus external at
that time and I think the slide spoke to
it well there are pros and cons to each
of those
situations I felt I felt strong about
internal because of the depth of
candidates that we had here
in the city I felt that we had what
seemed like a great problem um which was
multiple qualified candidates right here
in the culture of the city who had
extensive
experience um with everything that had
been going on and it was a very
tumultuous time for the city as well um
you know
as thinking back on the time was a very
uh rough time in the city and the
stability and consistency of having
people who were on board with that and
again the cost savings and the time
commitment of going through a national
search
um that was why I felt good about
staying
internal thank
you Council k
thank you um similarly at that time I
think I was coming to this in the
context of understanding a long history
of of various approaches to how people
were hired and um I even though I wasn't
on council at the time I I witnessed the
city go through um a number of of
processes that were failed that resulted
in candidates who were pretty structive
to the city so all of those things were
in my mind as
I uh sort of historically but as
I continued in as a as a city councelor
I think part of my job was to and I
continue to think that part of my job is
to encourage the city
to give Avenues of for advancement for
for folks inside the city and I think
that that context is is part of the
internal versus external search and and
that was definitely part of my constant
conversations with with um city manager
peely who who had searched had been
involved in several searches prior to
this so
um I consider that part of my my
conversations with him was about
building a bench and so in that context
that was my that
was not related to this specific
decision but part of my conversations
along the way for about a year um we had
known that city manager P may be seeking
other opportunities in different places
so that conversation had been happening
um and I did go into the
meeting with with all of that knowledge
and the expectation of of relying on
staff in particular our city attorneys
to to sort of guide us how how this
should go and their
presence honestly at these meetings
helped me feel like okay
um we are you know and it it followed a
process that I believe mirrors many
processes that I've seen happen um with
in terms of the the functional
components of it people applying
reviewing Etc um
but to go back to the idea of internal
versus external as as a question I've
managed many people I have been part of
many many executive searches and less
executive searches in my career and I
have come to see the value of I I have
come to see little value often um in an
organization that isn't
um in crisis or needing to go in a
completely different direction ction of
of searches that that bring in folks
from the outside I I don't want to
suggest that I'm a protectionist but I
have seen a number of external searches
go horribly arai
um more than five I would say of people
who who were expected to be leaders and
and didn't come through after an
external search and I think um those
hopes or disappointments also considered
into my decision
um in in in terms of understanding where
we were and what we were deciding on in
this context so
um I I think that's the main question
that's that's being asked and that's my
admittedly it's all because
of historical trauma worries about the
stability of the city and and my
experiences in those contexts so um I
brought all of that to this conversation
and and
that's where we landed where I landed in
this in this
discussion thank you Karan councelor
flotes thank you mayor um I was um on
the city council when we hired EOP peely
and uh and so was uh my colleague mayor
protm uh benom and we did a national
search during covid
and so
we sorry and
um and it was
extensive it was um horrible in many
ways because we really couldn't see that
person and um and I say horrible because
uh these national uh searches and I
don't know who are the city hired to uh
find these were utterly um unqualified
to be uh manager city manager uh when I
started we had uh city manager Stuart
Eid who proved to be
um uh for lack of a better word I don't
want to slander anybody but it's true uh
he just didn't uh he just didn't measure
up so we fired him um and then his um
his uh assistant City manager uh was
even worse and um so and this is you
know like this is my eighth year on city
council um I'm an attorney licensed in
California and uh we went
through a lot of turbulence with with
Stuart Eed and and his uh assistant city
manager who took the uh Helm and um and
and I have to uh I I I don't I I read
the uh AG's uh report and I still don't
understand uh what we did wrong um and I
I'm sorry I I was out of town I was
actually in Europe uh for Christmas
where my with my son and
grandchildren and um but fortunately I
was able to read about the uh I I did
read the AG and I did not have an
opportunity to speak with our attorney
uh Brad Douglas
to see where we
aired
um we I did not ask why we were having a
uh closed session on this I didn't ask
what
the I I just didn't ask and
because um we knew who the candidates
were I don't know how they were
selected um
I I I don't know that part but I will
tell you this part every person who
interviewed was overly qualified for the
position and it was probably the most
difficult decision that I
made uh because all of our candidates
are were remain a stellar uh people and
um and frankly
well not frankly but it it was a relief
for me after going through that National
search of over 200 or 300 candidates
that some of them were just uh
pitiful and um you know one one guy out
of California said that he decided to uh
retire in Las guses from city manager in
wherever he was in Southern California
and um that he and his wife were looking
at brochures and that Las crusa seemed
like a nice place so that's why he
applied to be our city manager and it
was like come on oh my God and that's
one of the examples of how horrible that
search uh how difficult it was uh When
We Came Upon EOP peely it was like what
is he for real and yes he was for real
and then um he hired uh the assistant
city managers and um and you know he hit
a a home run a grand slam um on the
hiring of
EOP
uh I felt I I I don't understand how we
came to that close session I I did I was
not a party to that decision and I do
know that our legal team and our uh
Human Resources people are uh topnotch
and I say this because I've been around
the block I know I look a lot younger
than than I than I am but um you know
I'm a child of the 60s and um you know
and and I think it was our generation My
Generation my age group that really
started to question a lot of things and
uh so I've been that way and being an
attorney NE necessarily I'm that that uh
inquisitive and all that sort of stuff I
saw it as a relief it was a and I didn't
see it I felt a relief to know that our
candidates I mean it was was it was just
the the worst part was making a decision
because all of our candidates were
topnotch
topnotch and uh and it was difficult uh
to uh to say oh this one you know or
knock that one out you know totally
unqualified I just want to let you know
that um it may have looked like we
conspired somehow as City councilors and
I do uh and I don't want to in any way
um um how should I say um avoid the the
uh uh avoid the the responsibility we
have on the other hand for this to
appear to be something that
was you know I mean I read I read that
AG's report and I haven't had time to
call to find out exactly exactly how we
VI violated the open meetings
act um and our our city clerk is very
good about making announcements about or
excuse me notice giving notice about uh
these things and um I think that whoever
felt uh that it was inappropriate to
hold this meeting should have raised it
before it was held and to then further
pursue the questions that that uh
were addressed by the
AG and I just I just want to go well
this is on the record but I just want to
say that um I'm
I'm I mean it's terrible it's terrible
what we're going through and I and I
don't think it's
uh I I all I have to say is that um I
personally I can't speak for my
colleagues because I don't
uh I'm very careful about uh socializing
with my colleagues uh once in a blue
moon something comes up and um you know
we happen to be at the same place and I
make it a point not to even stand next
to one of my colleagues outside of city
council outside of our our meetings so
um and I and I'm and I just uh I'm
honestly appalled that uh the AG had to
intervene on something like this
and I just want to express uh my
gratitude to our city clerk and to our
City attorney our um our Personnel
Department uh and but I don't know who
made the decision I I really don't know
and I had no concern whatsoever to even
question it um and it was a relief to
know that the people that we work with
that I've worked with for you know seven
eight years now uh were qu were had
applied because they are so
qualified and believe me after going
through that search you know several
years ago uh never well I won't be here
anyway but um it was horrible so I just
want to express this openly to everybody
uh the Press uh Justin Garcia does an
excellent job of reporting everything um
calls it as it is and for those of you
who are attending the meeting this
morning um who care about uh local
government and who
are indeed uh a part of you know we're
in this together so I want to thank our
City attorney our city uh clerk uh
Christine Rea and U Brad Douglas and um
and
I I hope to correct this in a manner
that is not too disruptive um I you know
I I I I think that even though I had
nothing to do with the decision that we
would have in-house uh candidates or how
that was made the the the
um the you know going through steuart
Eed and then his uh assistant city
manager who was you know whatever and
then going through the search and going
through all of that uh that was so
disruptive it was so disruptive we
couldn't do our work so anyway I've gone
on and on I just want to emphasize that
I can't speak for my colleagues but I
can't speak for myself that I had uh I I
didn't feel it was a
conspiracy uh it uh I I was in my in my
experience it was not a roll in Quorum
or anything like that so um anyway I'm
sorry we're going through this and uh
totally in my humble opinion uh
unnecessary and um and I want to thank
again uh city clerk Christine Riva and
our attorney uh Brad Douglas and um
everyone else who has been working on
the resolution of this issue thank you
very
much thank you mayor thank you Brad our
City attorney our city clerk
uh the Department of Justice
for their due diligence and getting us
here today and thank you to my
colleagues for engaging in thoughtful
discussion today as we try to cure the
issues
presented um I was also not part of some
consensus to arrive at this issue though
I think as I reflect on the time period
I may have inadvertently been part of
one when I gave gave a public interview
to the bulletin shortly after EO peely
had announced he would be leaving I was
asked um by the bulletin how just how I
felt about it um obviously was
heartbreaking to me as I was part of uh
the team that hired him in
2020 and I was asked you know what
happens now and um I I pretty sure I
said I think Council has to
uh come to a close meeting to to decide
what we do and I and I know I said that
because it's always been my
understanding that um the open meeting
meetings as me the open meetings act has
very specific exemptions for a governing
body which include Personnel matters
include Uh current or pending
litigation and real estate matters um I
don't like closed meetings either but I
attend them because they're part of my
job um they're the most difficult part
of my job I would argue and so no I am
also not a fan of them um so I and so
that was that's always been my
understanding I think it's important to
note that throughout the process in
February March and even April 1st uh our
our then City attorney was present at
every single meeting every single
meeting um but at the time I think
uh when I look back on it I think one of
the biggest mistakes I made was arriving
at my ultimate decision from a very
emotional place um February and March
were pretty tumultuous time in the city
um there was a lot of tragedy a lot of
heartbreak things happened around that
time that
ultimately changed my relationship to
this job and epop deciding to leave was
just one of those very heartbreaking
pieces I do want to correct matter
though that I don't think EPO was
seeking other opportunities EO was being
sought after um by a lot of cities and
um when that started to happen I started
having a conversation with with Mr peely
about building a bench that was always
one of his tasks when we hired him
around uh in 2020 we actually got a lot
of push back for going external for
hiring an external city manager and one
of the tasks that we had given him was
to build a bench and a bench he built
and um so when he notified us that he
would be uh going back to Utah um and I
reverted back to 20120 when we last
hired the city manager and actually we
did two external searches two national
searches because the first search did
not yield the candidates we had hoped
and it was it was honestly devastating
so we went out to a second search and
the second search is how we landed on
EOP peely I will address some of the
things I remember from that search in
items 3.2 and 3.3 as well um because
some things are just not necessarily
clicking and I feel like we're sort of
picking and choosing here
um however at the time I remember um
having a strong desire me personally to
um
to stay internal to to hire internal
because of the chaos that I felt like
was happening at the time and the the
desire that I felt to um have some sort
of stability as I knew it was going to
be a very difficult year given the
tragedies that had happened so um that
was my ultimate how I arrived internally
in my own self at what I was hoping that
this Council would move forward in doing
and we did and and councelor Flores was
right um getting to the ultimate
decision was one of the most difficult
decisions because our staff is
incredibly talented um and Beyond
competent and
uh uh ready for the job so that's that I
think I've covered uh item 3.1
thoroughly at least I hope I have and
that's at least how I arrived at at um
that decision for myself to remain um
internal thank
you thank you all and uh what I recall
at that time on March 18th and and prior
to getting to that point as the mayor as
a chair of City Council meetings and
closed session meetings I work with HR I
work with the legal department and the
city clerk's office and the city clerk
usually comes to me to uh look for dates
that we can find for close session
meetings when we have something that's
coming up as mayor protm said whether
it's litigation whether it's Personnel
or whether it's real estate and we
looked at the dates and see what would
be a consensus to move forward with that
at the same time I can tell you that I
was interested in internal candidates
because I've been through this process
before as uh assistant city manager as a
fire chief and dealing with interims and
positions and the city becomes stagnant
and there there's no decisions made and
it's hard to move forward and I know
that an external process could have been
lengthy but the key was to have a closed
session meeting to get a decision and a
consensus by Council and on March 18th
we did that asked in a Clos session do
we want to go
internal and then options to go external
if we don't fill a candidate and the
consensus was at the time we would go
internal then we had the interviews and
we made our decision and the whole time
legal was present HR was present uh
throughout the process so that's what I
recall at the time thank you
Brett
good
okay did you have anything else you
wanted to add
before okay at this time we'll open it
up for public comments you'll have two
minutes to speak on this issue
I'm Lyn
moer trying to redo in public the
decisions made behind closed doors was
an option by the AG however I think that
a wiser choice is to start the process
from the beginning it makes a lot more
sense and it it has a much better
opportunity for the public to be able to
observe and be a part of that process in
terms of understanding you will hear
quite a few questions placed to you this
morning that you should be able to
answer I respectfully suggest that you
all take note of each question then
answer each during your discussion time
this will help dispel the impression
that no genuine deliberation is likely
to occur today I appreci that you all
appreciate that you all are providing
what you consider to be your
Recollections and your thought process
at the time but we the public are also
interested in actual deliberation about
the decisions
made uh this will help dispel the
impression that no General deliberation
is likely to occur today it will also
dispel the impression that you're
perfectly happy to keep the public shut
out of your decision-making process the
New Mexico open meetings act States
upfront that a representative government
is dependent upon an informed electorate
and it is public policy of the state
that all persons are entitled to the
greatest possible information regarding
the Affairs of government where are the
materials the counselors reviewed that
caused them to conclude that there are
qualified candidates for the position in
house as the resolution states to comply
fully with the act the public must have
the opportunity to read and study all
non-confidential documents that the
council uses to make its decision
decisions today's agenda packet includes
nothing but the four resolutions and
brief explanations at a minimum the
candidates resumés should have been made
available to the public to read and to
study I'm also very concerned about the
Criterion of preventing institutional
disruption um let me just I'll have two
more sentences thank you mayor this is
very troubling uh unless you found a
clone every change in Staffing in a
healthy organization will tend to lead
to some disruption this is a this is
comes with a territory you want to have
healthy organizations that find new
Personnel that help improve things and
you don't want to have coverups whether
it's
malfeasance um financial difficulties or
any sort of
non-compliance uh at any at any rate I
recommend that you all start restart
from the beginning which was the other
option that the AG gave you thank
you good morning I'm Peggy
Strahan it's h I had a lot to say but I
just have two minutes so I'm going to
cut it short it's clear from the
resolutions that everything is designed
to lead to the hiring of Mr
Tamo as the new city manager and payment
of a disgraced High salary with an
extremely generous benefits package the
council should be starting over from the
beginning in choosing a new city
manager this was a clear option provided
by the Attorney General to cure the
council's violations why isn't the
council starting over the council could
do that it would be a much more
effective way to conduct decision making
in an open manner while allowing an
informed public to observe and
participate this is the only staff
position the city council appoints and
it is a position with great deal of
responsibility why not carry out the
selection process correctly from start
to finish in a manner fully compliant
with the open meetings
act um
I just ask that you vote no for this
resolution thank you very
much good morning my name is Patty
Hartman um I didn't have anything
planned because this 9:00 meeting kind
of surprised me I don't know why it's
called a special meeting or why it was
moved since it was going to be on
today's city council meeting um the
biggest thing that I'm disappointed in
is that and especially councelor Flores
that you don't
see how you did anything wrong um I look
at you all as serving our city and the
people in it and I don't feel that's
reflected in the things that you do you
seem to think you're an independent
governing body
that doesn't have to consider the people
who live here and I would strongly
suggest starting over from the
beginning um I don't think there's
anything to justify a
$216,000 salary which the highest paid
city manager in the state of New Mexico
is
$111,000 so I just would ask you to
consider the public process is important
in a democracy and and I feel like
you've kind of slapped us all in the
face by not only the way you did it last
year which I was upset but by the way
you're redoing it now which is just
to Boulder through and do what you were
going to do anyways thank you for
letting me be heard
good morning my name is Liz Rodriguez
Johnson and I just want to preface what
I'm going to say that um I truly truly
appreciate good intentions and I have no
reason to believe that there was nothing
but good intentions but good intentions
cannot replace transparency which was
what was missing in in the
process there is one auditory feature of
the council's agenda packet for today's
special meeting the council does admit
wrongdoing for many but not all of its
violations of the op meetings
act carried out over weeks related to
its decision making to put Mr uh Topo
into the city manager's position and
with without any information to the
contrary like I said there was a lack of
transparency here it really looks like
the selection was a foregone
conclusion with that in mind the city
needs to start over from the beginning
in choosing a new city
manager this is the AG's option two the
public needs to be fully included from
the very beginning of the decisionmaking
process every discussion and meeting
needs to be impel public every meeting
needs to have public notice and an
agenda that fully explains what actions
will be considered you know especially
when it comes to a
selection of a position as important as
the city
manager you know you you cannot be
making you cannot be making that
decision behind closed doors also um we
need to know who were the other folks I
mean we know their names we know they
were inhouse which is fine but the
public needs to know enough about them
to arrive at an assessment regarding the
council's judgment and validity of his
decision to eliminate consideration of
anyone not on the staff the rumes at a
minimum should have been a part of the
the agenda packet the council's failure
to provide the resumés appears to be
another violation of the open meetings
Act
mayor protm council thank you for this
time to speak I'm on the bicycle
pedestrian advisory committee and we
were presented uh by a attorney came to
us and presented the importance of us
following the open meetings could you
state your name again I'm sorry Jim
Wilcox and we were uh we were an
attorney presented on the importance of
following the open meetings act so this
is kind of personal to me as far as
membership on that committee and
actually I pushed back because we are an
Advisory Group I contacted the
organization in the state that for open
government they said no you do not have
to be subject to the open meetings act
you just advise and it's the people who
are elected that you advise that must be
following the open meetings act but I
thought well I'm going to have to give
up some freedom of speech I can't talk
to somebody about any subject that might
come up in our meeting so I'll have to
keep my mouth shut and lose some of my
freedom of speech but I'll follow that
particular
advisement the thing that kind of
concerns me a little bit here is that
some people are saying well we wanted to
expedite this we had a bad experience
the open meetings Act is not part of
that we don't say well I really wanted
you know we don't really have to talk
about the stuff in front of people
because we had a bad time before it's
because the public is what comes first
the public knowledge so when they go to
vote they say oh I know why those people
voted I'm voting for that person so
let's look at it positively because I
like their answer that's why we have the
open meetings act so that the public can
make decisions when they vote so I would
suggest that those kinds of things be
considered primary rather than having a
bad breakup in the past thank you
good morning my name is Kathleen
Sullivan and I'm a little disappointed
this morning that I haven't heard
anybody take responsibility ma'am could
you speak directly into the microphone I
haven't heard anybody take
responsibility for making this
decision however I I do think that at
this point there should be some kind of
transparency about the compensation that
you may be offering this candidate for
city
manager
$216,000 per year
$18,000 a month four weeks
vacation uh 96 hours sick
leave 16 hours personal leave car
allowance
and a very generous benefits related to
person uh professional
development by contrast Albuquerque with
five times the population of Los
crues they pay their city manager about
$106,000 a year so that's that's quite a
difference so I think the the citizens
of Los cruus should be asking the
council what
what kind of
person is going to be
uh equivalent to this salary it's going
to be about
$250,000 when it's all said and done his
compensation
package we need to know why you think
that this person is deserving of this
thank
you is there anyone else wishing to come
up okay
right thank you mayor so with that
said Council options with regard to this
resolution uh would be vote Yes this
would improve the selection of internal
candidates only um vote no this will not
approve the selection of internal
candidates uh vote to amend this would
obviously require further discussion
from the Das and typically we have a
vote to table um and as I stated earlier
I've been in coordination with the AG's
office on this this is not an option
based on NM doj guidelines they would
prefer to see this handle this quickly
as
possible and I'll obviously here for any
questions all right thank you Brad any
questions I have counc FL thank you
mayor um attorney Douglas what
um there's all these options on how to
vote
um but then one of the options is not an
option based on the the department of
justice so why would we even be
contemplating that and
to and then well yeah okay I just don't
understand that part thanks um mayor
counselor Flores and good point maybe
maybe I shouldn't have put that on there
but the reason I did put that on there
is because I knew that if there were
just three options we're typically used
to four um someone might wonder why
isn't the option to table available and
that's pursuant to my conversations with
the Attorney General's
office okay thank you br
Christine this is on the motion to
approve resolution 25
081 councelor McClair no councelor
mat no councelor Graham yes councelor
cran yes councelor
flutes yes councelor bomo yes and mayor
yes motion
passes next item is 3.2 resolution
number 25- 082 a resolution for the
discussion and decisions as to whether
to narrow the internal candidate field
to three internal candidates originally
taking place during a closed meeting on
or about March
18th move to approve Graham
second if I may mayor thank you um so
the next
resolution uh that I've brought before
you today is with regard to the decision
to narrow the candidate field to three
internal candidates I'm going to call
them
finalists uh namely eon tomoo Sonia
Delgado and David sadio it was a finding
by the nmd OJ that the decision uh to
consider these three internal finalist
was in and of itself uh violation of the
open meetings act and
so same as our uh our last resolution
that we
discussed uh the Department of Justice
wishes for this governing body to now
have a thoughtful discussion regarding
their past decision to narrow the
candidate field to the three finalists
that I just
identified and topics of discussion may
include qualifications of the candidates
experience education or or any other
relevant factor that may have led uh any
of you
to uh the consensus that Mr tomoo Mr
Delgado and Mr sadio would be your
selected three
finalists uh
again uh I'd ask that the governing body
now hold a discussion regarding this
resolution summarizing as best you can
all discussions and comments made
outside of a public meeting on or about
March 18th 2024 with regard to narrowing
the candidate field to three internal
finalists uh those three people that I
had just mentioned
previously all right thank you Brad uh
councilman cler
have a question before we move ahead
with our comments
um I think a discussion would be helpful
that HR gave us a original list of nine
right uh mayor councelor McClure
um if that is your recollection
absolutely that would be an appropriate
now would be an appropriate time to
discuss that so I know that that was the
original I'm not entirely sure how they
made those decisions in internally
because I'm not not part of the HR
process on that right so at the time I
recollect that we had those three come
about due to a sort of Hefty discussion
partially because more on the Das than I
had any experience with working with
them so it was a lot of how do we pair
it down so that we don't spend 10 hours
doing interviews right um I was fine
with selecting three at that point so I
trusted in The Limited experience I had
and the experience of my
colleagues uh I agree with my colleagues
that the three finalists uh in attending
that closed meeting uh were very well
qualified I'm just in again the mystery
to me is if this is the same process
that we always followed and
I didn't get that answer because you you
can't answer it but maybe HR can and and
that's what I'm concerned with in the
past I understand we had some ugly
situations under covid but uh was this a
different process or was it the same
process that we always followed either
for external or internal and that's my
question that I'm not getting
answered can I jump in actually just
real quick counselor Graham my apologies
mayor mayor go ahead thank you um just
to that point I think I so in
20120 the last time uh Council hired a
city manager I came in when
the Consultants the decision had already
been made by the previous Council to do
a national external search um that
Council I remember had to decided to
wait till the new year started given
that there had just been a recent
election and they wanted the two new
councilors then to be part of that final
decision given that this is our only
employee um and so I don't I I guess
this is an assumption of course that I'm
making but I assume that every Council
when faced with a decision to hire their
only employee gets to decide how they
want to go about it obvious viously the
mistake we made and I feel like this
whole thing is taking responsibility for
whoever said we weren't taking
responsibility this whole thing is
taking responsibility that we made a
mistake um and so
I I think every Council when faced with
a decision to hire a new city manager
has to decide that for themselves how
they want to go about it and um I also
want to know that I I want in the name
of transparency which everyone is here
for to make sure that we are very clear
about
misinformation and there I pulled it up
uh there is one news source on March
19th that names all of the candidates
the top three candidates that were
selected and the others that were in
that pool
and um there were certain guidelines
given by HR to um City Council about
who had moved on through the process and
who was like who met certain
qualifications and from that we all got
the resumés and we all reviewed them and
we all came to that closed meeting with
uh our sort of top candidates that we
then decided to move forward with I will
say that the bit of an issue I have with
item 3.2 and
3.3 um is that in 2020 and please
forgive me that's a long time ago and so
I don't remember clearly someone may
have to look at the record to correct me
if I'm wrong but I also don't
remember making um the decision of
narrowing down the candidate pool
or um for either the first or the second
process in a public meeting so I think
um again I'm under in last year I was
operating under the guise of these are
the limited matters that Oma is G gives
exemption for and so um that was my
mistake that I was operating under from
the one time the one other time I had
gone through this process
myself so my apologies Council gram I
didn't want to interrupt it just the the
the process of how everyone I don't
think there's like one set process
because I think every Council decides
how to do that um when faced with that
decision Council yeah I just want to
thank you for the current
uh explanation of how it's done I guess
I'm going back to the past and uh when I
was on Council previously and as mayor
we had the candidates actually in an
open Forum in city council and they
would meet the public and so that's the
part of the transparency that that I'm
concerned with and so maybe my past is
influencing what I think is happening in
the present so uh I I just like that
older process thank
you councelor
grant thank you um like councelor
McClure and then confirmed by mayor
proem I also recall receiving
information from about nine nine
candidates nine or 10 maybe who had
cleared the initial HR process and had
been deemed
um meeting meeting requirements
qualified on paper I'm not sure how to
uh how to term that I also reviewed all
of the resumés in advance and uh came in
with some
opinions um I think if we're speaking
specifically
to how m Mr tamap Miss Delgado and Mr
Sido uh became our three
finalists I feel that you know at the
time both Mr Tomo and Miss Delgado had
relevant current assistant city manager
experience um serving the council uh Mr
sadio um as a
counselor um I don't know how many would
agree with me up here but I think Public
Works is
probably who I talk to the most
frequently um in terms of reaching out
with constituent issues so I
had confidence in Mr
sido's um knowledge both of the city
infrastructure literally and
figuratively that I felt
absolutely put him in
the running along with folks who had
current experience in the city manager's
office um and
that that is how I reached my decision
at the time um you know in agreeing in
the narrowing of the candidate field to
the three
finalists and I hope think that'll
suffice thank
you Council
K thank you um I would parallel sort of
the events that happened we were
provided the HR um sort of summary what
folks input into the city HR System um
which included I think their initial
screening which in my mind is parallel
to if you have an external search that's
what the search firm does and then
presents the candidates as they as they
are um in narrowing the field to three
internal finalists the the again we had
a pool of qualified folks uh in terms of
Education in terms of experience the
things that I was looking for
particularly when I and I used a rubric
of maybe half a dozen to
10 um different variables that I ranked
all of the candidates on after receiving
their
materials um experience in a breadth of
of spaces which included as assistant
city managers or as city managers um
education both formal education and also
training related to being a city manager
and um my experience of the folks and
their and their connection to uh
relating to the public which is uh being
responsive to the public and that was
that's a big component as councelor gr
mentioned um and what I had seen in that
in that space as as those candidates
came to
be um
so those are I it was um based on those
categories for me it was there were it
was
um I I used my Excel spreadsheet so I I
Ed the numbers related to it which is
pretty nerdy but that's how I would
evaluate any um pool of applicants so
for me that's when when we had this
discussion that's what informed the
narrowing of the of the pool and
again we had a what I consider to be the
best type of problem people who were
very well qualified had a long history
with of service within the city a
commitment to what we have consistently
been adhering to in terms of our values
as a as an institution and so
um going back to the prior
resolution it would have been really
difficult for any external candidate and
I think councelor McClure was alluding
to this it would have been really
difficult for any external candidate to
match the those expectations and see
what those um sort of values are of our
institution um and and make that case in
terms of their experience but uh these
candidates came in that way from my
measure
so Council
fles um so for clarification this is a a
comment coming from each uh counselor
regarding our
a summary of all discussions I don't
remember what I had for breakfast am I
supposed to remember what happened I
mean what March 18th that's one of my
niece's birthdays I remember that uh
narrowing the candidate field to three
internal
finalists
um what do you want me to say what do
you want to
hear okay no I it's rhetorical um it was
tough it was one of the toughest
decisions besides deciding to have a
second child took me eight years between
having my babies uh it was tough it was
a very very very difficult decision um
discussions and comments made outside of
a public
meeting
um the comments I made then would be I I
don't have a problem with public meeting
on this I mean yeah you know let's go to
town on it let's be without a city
manager and have more chaos that's fine
um I don't mean to be factious but okay
if this is what it's going to take to um
to be open about everything we'll do it
and also um on a personal note if
there's anybody out there in district 6
please take my place I'd be very happy
to relinquish it I'm way past my
retirement time and uh in many respects
um I does that answer the question
attorney Douglas if not let me go on and
blab a little bit more so mayor
councelor Flores um I was concerned that
that this might be an issue uh
because it took uh New Mexico Department
of Justice about nine months give or
take to conduct their investigation and
generate an opinion
and so in in
speaking uh with the AG's office I did
ask that question uh you know
paraphrasing but I said this has been
almost a year ago what if certain
counselors cannot recall what uh what
what they discussed or or their thoughts
at the time and the direction that I
received
was that each counselor should summarize
to the best of their ability their
thoughts uh and convers ations at the
time and so it sounds like you're doing
that uh to the best of your ability and
that's all we can hope for okay so thank
you um thank you attorney Douglas I um
all I remember is that in terms of the
conversations how we uh Came Upon the
decision again I think I've already said
this it was very very difficult to uh to
narrow it down
to these three uh candidates and um and
it was yeah I I wish we would have had
that luxury when we hired EPO because we
had to go several months and several um
again we had two uh National
searches um so um what I remember is
that I was um a totally happy that we
wouldn't have a city manager who's
trying to you know has to look at uh
ways or whatever that you know app is to
find out where City Hall is it was
wonderful to know that um I mean the
finalists were um I mean topnotch it uh
Ian Sonia and David there's just it it's
and and the other candidates too so um I
do I all I remember was that it was such
a relief to know that we knew what we
were were going to get we weren't going
to get some guy out in California who's
retiring and wants to retire as a city
manager in Las Cruz is that's a slap in
the face uh and we have the talent the
internal Talent is is to die for and um
I can't speak highly enough about these
three candidates um I I truly regret
that there was a FAA in so far as the
doj um is concerned
um but um in my humble opinion or my
experience W there were no Shenanigans I
think that you know all of you have the
right the the uh to question everything
we do that's that's how it should be but
um it doesn't feel I don't know how how
my colleagues feel um but it it doesn't
feel good to be out here and have uh you
know Tomatoes thrown at us thank
you mayor
Pro thanks
mayor um oh my gosh okay so again at
that time I know that I remember feeling
like
um I hadn't expected to see as many
names in that list as I did though I was
very pleased though it is also what a
great problem to have that all these
folks are qualified confident and want
to step up to the challenge that is a
city manager in a city manager form of
government I might add right so Los
Cruses is a city manager Council form of
government we do not have a strong
uh city managers in other cities are
hired by the mayor perhaps and appointed
by the entire governing body here the
city manager Works
24/7 every day every hour except for his
mandatory mandatory time off because the
job is so demanding so challenging and
it is literally
247 I just want to clarify that um I
went into this and so there's this like
misconception that um the the person who
was ultimately picked it was sort of his
all along that is at least for me
couldn't be further from the truth I
went into reviewing these resumés with
an absolute open mind about who
would uh be right for this job having
supervised one city manager one
full-time City Manager for almost four
years and a couple of interim city
managers for a little bit of a
tumultuous time there in 2020 um and I
went
in um ultimately with that eye on
um having the experience of supervised
one one city manager for several years
and I was definite I remember being
definitely surprised that there was um a
lot of agreement amongst the council and
perhaps yeah perhaps the the uh more
experienced City councilors at the time
had uh more of a weight on these folks
because we also had personal
professional experience individual
professional experience with all of
these folks um I know that I was very
confident and felt very good about the
top three candidates that were selected
uh in moving forward in both their their
experience um with City management their
experience at the city their experience
with the public their experience with
the council and um
uh yeah I think that's it I will say one
thing that I thought was interesting in
the applications asked some I'm going to
butcher the question but one of the
questions in the application asked about
like your willing like what's your
willingness to work like 8 to five 8 to
n and one of the candidates did answer
that they were not willing to work after
a certain period of time to me
disqualifying them given that that this
job from what I know having been here 5
years is a
247 job and so um I I think it's um I
also again I want to reiterate that in
2020 I do not remember having this
conversation publicly um about the
qualifications of the finalist in either
of the two processes but I'm sure
someone will correct me if I if I am
wrong thank you Brad
thank you at that time on March 18th I
know that uh
HR uh the HR Director at the time came
up with the minimum requirements for all
the candidates that were listed uh that
list was provided to Mayor and Council
where a discussion took place uh to
narrow it down and we narrowed it to the
three finalists that you see on the
screen Eon tamop pel Sonia dado and
David sidu very pleased with the process
and the understanding and I too I'm
trying to recall in the past um having
um any kind of process publicly with the
selection of any city manager while I
was working here at the city as fire
chief or assistant city manager I knew
at one time we did have uh internal
candidates that that applied and were
not selected and then they moved on to a
national search but there was never any
kind of public meeting that took place
that is at the discretion and I believe
Brett under the state
statute we as a mayor and councel we
have the authority and the right to
select our city manager is there some
law
there uh mayor council uh you are
correct uh this is a this is a home rule
municipality we have a city Charter uh
which as as you all know
um we receive a great deal of difference
it's it's my position that um pursuant
to our
Charter uh you all obviously are the
ultimate Arbiters of uh who your city
manager who is your only employee your
only direct report employee uh how you
want that process to work and who you
want those candidates to be um I think
that the the
only uh I don't want to say the only
because then it sounds like I'm
minimizing but uh the Crux of the AG's
opinion is that nothing about those
actions was wrong inherently they just
should have taken place in an open
meeting mayor just before we discussion
on this I do I wanted to just note once
again that through every process of
getting to the final three our then City
attorney was present the entire
time mayor can I make an addition real
quick yes Council so what bewildered me
sort of as a novice was the fact that we
didn't actually have for such an
important position that person and all
three of them present in public because
it is a unique position and councilor
Flores said you know we we know what
we're going to get but the public didn't
and a lot of times I really grappled I
came home after watching the Pres and
thought to
myself whoa I'm I going to make that
decision for the rest of the city a lot
of times I take in account what other
people tell me if I get emails if I have
discussions that's how I build those
decisions kind of felt a little
rudderless to be real about that and
thought to myself you know what we've
done in the past that's one of my least
favorite phrase what we've done in the
past but going forward having that
transparency for something that is such
an important position left a kind of bad
feeling in my mouth because I do think
that the the public should have had the
ability to hear those presentations to
give us feedback and I think that's what
was stripped out of this a lot of times
was feedback that I find crucial in my
position so something to consider for
the future that's all I wanted to
say mayor um JC Christine our city clerk
do you remember in 2020 if I
I vaguely remember was there some sort
of
Citizen
committee does anybody remember in 2020
what I know it was Co and so everything
we did was via Zoom but if was there any
sort of like public I don't think there
were public presentations and so again I
think it's not so much
um I hope I hope to not be a part of
another city manager H while I am here
um and so I have 3 years left I
certainly hope that doesn't happen again
and so I hope that um for those of you
who are here in the future that um that
is something that gets implemented from
now on I just I I think because it is
our only city like it is our only
employee um City council's employee uh
to me that is a decision that um and
that responsibility that I will carry
myself right as as the person who has to
supervise um the success of that person
and so I don't I again I don't remember
what happened in 2020 um I think for me
what was the most different about this
last time was that it was a lot shorter
and that's what we're discussing here
right that some of these decisions
needed to have made publicly not
necessarily that um they were the it was
the wrong
path uh Barbara BR come you have your
light on yes thank you mayor and councel
just to your question uh mayor protim
regarding the process in 2020 in
addition to the interviews conducted
with the mayor and Council there was a
community panel and also a staff panel
that participated in interviewing the
candidates thank you do you remember how
big the community panel
was and were those meetings public or
were those meetings via Zoom
um the meetings I don't remember the
exact number I I do remember that the
mayor and Council had the opportunity to
nominate the community members who were
to participate on the panel um and I do
recall that the meetings were
facilitated via Zoom um and uh as
interviews they were allowed to not be
public uh meeting because that is one of
the exceptions thank you thanks Barbara
for having a better memory than me
uh Barbara just another question um how
many processes were during that time
frame was there more more than one
process um so mayor and Council in the
2020 search there were two rounds of
interviews one that did not yield um a
selection and then the second that
yielded a selection and as I recall that
was the same case for the
2016 process as well uh that there were
two
rounds okay thank
you any members of the public would like
to speak you have two
minutes Lynn moer I like your idea Mr
matis very much of having the public be
able to observe uh interviews with
candidates many other public bodies that
I'm familiar with use that process and
it really does help a lot to achieve
transparency the big hole you still have
here today in all your Recollections is
you haven't provided any resumés at
least two counselors have mentioned that
you reviewed resumés for these
candidates why has this not been
provided to the public that easily could
been a part of your agenda packet who
are the other candidates who were not
who were eliminated from the narrowed
down three you said there were nine we'd
like to know who those folks were it's
important for us as the public to be
able to review res uh resumés and get a
sense of um what we think of your
judgment and your decision-making Acuity
in deciding who you think the best three
are all right that's you haven't come
close to achieving transparency today I
understand your great desire to follow
the specific directions from the
attorney general which I totally respect
but you're follow falling far short with
respect to actually being transparent
and giving the public an idea of your um
your field the choices that you had
available to you it's still very much
looks like the skids were totally
greased and continue to be totally
greased today for your final candidate
Mr
tomoow I mean I don't none of us get the
impression that any of you are inclined
to change your mind or revisit any of
these issues rather everything you're
doing here today is in seems
totally directed toward exactly the same
decision in the end and leaving the
public out we haven't seen a single
resume that would have been so
easy it would have been very easy to
include those resumés in this agenda
packet that is a violation of the open
meetings act by by the way another one
thank
you um my name is Patty Hartman and you
brought up something that I happen to
think about I moved here in
2016 and I went through I think it was
the first neighborhood Leadership
Academy and um I ended up being on a
citizen committee that was
chosen uh to help select I don't believe
it was the city manager but it was a
department manager and I was kind of
quickly perusing the the City Municipal
Code I guess it's called and we do have
a process for that um for
having citizen engagement in that way um
when miss Ben benom mentioned um that
there was a community panel I never
trust that because it's always chosen
from within and just like this process I
know it's going to sound really crude
but it's a little bit like inbreeding
when you keep the same people and the
same processes and I feel like nobody
did anything intentionally wrong I don't
feel like you were out to hide anything
from us but when you keep everything
within you don't have any knowledge of
anything beyond that and I know that
when I look at anything that I'm not
familiar with the first thing I want to
do is learn and I a lot of times I will
compare well what are other cities in
the country doing and I can tell you
there's an immediate difference when you
look at cities that are transparent I
was looking at the Farmington City
website and their city manager
farmington's a completely different city
but I would suggest that for everyone
here have some frame of reference where
you compare it to something else because
when you're only hiring within you're
doing the same thing and and you might
do your best but but is pretty limited
so thank you for hearing
me my name is Fred
huff and it was pretty clear walking in
here this morning and looking at all the
printed out
resolutions that you're going to stick
by the same decision
that you had made uh last year and that
was pretty much a given what I had hoped
was would you would use this as an
opportunity to look at the last one
year's performance by the city manager
and ask yourself is Los cruus really
better off after this
year what I as a citizen have
seen and I'm just just normal citizen
living over on the edge of burn
Lake um I see the city spending money
like drunken
Sailors I watch these budgets and they
are absolutely crazy I watched the
rating of the tailore fund that's
unprecedented I see an excessive salary
as somebody mentioned over
twice of what the highest other City
this is a highest paid person basically
in the state of New Mexico unless a new
County uh County Manager exceeds it I
don't
know
but and then as councelor Beno keeps
mentioning about conditions in
2020 um 2024 was a totally different
situation so you should have handled it
differently but my big question is is
this really a distraction to keep you
all from working on the issues that you
need to be working on
and you know you're going to make the
same decision you did and we'll go down
the road but we need to be working on
the issues that are uh plaguing our city
and get the crime and lawlessness and
and homelessness taken care of thank
you okay anything else
Brett thank you mayor if there's no more
public comment uh I'll move on to your
Council voting options same as last time
um mostly uh Council may vote Yes this
would approve the narrowing of the
candidate field to the three internal
finalists that we discussed uh Council
can vote no this will not approve the
narrowing of the candidate Feld
uh Council can vote to amend obviously
would require further
discussion um
Council uh could usually vote to table
but as I stated earlier based on my
discussions with the AG's office uh this
is not an option at this time because
they would like to see this matter acted
on as soon as
possible Christine
this is on the motion to approve
resolution 25
082 councilor McClair yes councelor
matis no councelor Graham yes councelor
cran yes councelor
flutes it's you can amend no because we
we can have further discussion we have
all the time in the world we do nothing
else okay um abstain you can abstain you
can't do that man and I resign okay
um yes good councelor Beno yes and mayor
yes motion
passes next item is 3.3 resolution
number 25- 083 of resolution for the
review and discussion for candidate Ian
tamop Paya for the vacancy of the office
of city manager
move to approve second
Graham all right so with regard
to
um another violation that that the
Attorney General's office
identified uh was the actual selection
of
a of a finalist or a selected candidate
maybe I should say uh aan
tomoo uh so the nmd OJ found that
um the selection of Mr tomoo as
council's preferred candidate violated
the open open meetings act uh they found
that uh this was different from holding
a vote in an open meeting on April 1st
approving Mr Tomo's employment agreement
to serve as the the city's next city
manager uh and so the Attorney General's
office wishes again for this body uh to
have a thoughtful discussion regarding
their decision to select aan tomoo as
its next city manager uh topics of
discussion should probably include all
relevant factors or should maybe should
say facts discussed at the closed
meeting honor about March 20th
2024 um
and I'll stand for any
questions thank you Brad discussion
open who would ever like to go first
mayor's not here I'm going to do my own
thing sure go ahead councelor
McClair I'll keep mine short um if we're
looking at internal candidates um I did
not select Aon as the highest rank we
did a rubric filing um and uh he based
specifically on his past history of
leading cities that were of a l much
less density population wise than here I
also think that the other two candidates
were stronger so that's
it councilor ma thank you mayor
uh again the U the voting was difficult
all three candidates were
very very
qualified and in the ranking it came
very close to another candidate very
close to the
count U my decision was continuity he
knew
exactly what was happening in the city
of Las cruus was dealing with the city
manager that uh unfortunately I didn't
serve under I just had come aboard I
think I was on the job couple of months
and uh eo's um Retreat and what I could
hear from many of the directors of the
different departments I think all the
directors were very pleased with uh eo's
performance and he had uh decided to uh
take another position and
resign and due to continuity and and
following through on on some of
the retreat the visions and planning um
I thought it would be the the best
choice un unknowing that uh uh I was
participating in a violation so uh again
I'm sorry sorry for my uh lack of
knowledge on on that part
coun Grant thank
you um Brad to clarify this refers to
the kind of dayong closed session where
we conducted the interviews I just want
to make
sure mayor counselor Graham uh that's
correct um this would summarize
encapsulate the March
20th uh closed
meeting uh and if and if you could all
to the best of your ability like I
stated earlier summarize your thoughts
at the time any actions that you may
have taken uh that resulted in Mr TL
payo uh being council's selected
candidate thank you um so in preparation
for that session we were briefed by
human
resources um I remember this
specifically because it was re
reiterated several times that each
candidate had to be asked the same set
of questions
without without deviation so the
questions
perhaps I think there were six or seven
questions I think it was maybe seven
because it was one for each of us read
each council member read one question um
the interview process um
was frankly emotional at times um
again we I regardless of whether the
context when the hire was made should be
relevant or not um the city was hurting
and I think that we were all you know we
were all feeling that um I felt that
each of the
interviews went incredibly well um
you're going to hear over and over again
I'm sure that we had a very difficult
decision to make
because each of the candidates was
exceptional um we went through the three
interviews I believe there was a brief
we had time for discussion after each
and in deciding to choose uh Mr tomap
was my top ranked candidate as councelor
matis mentioned it was
close I felt again that the
preponderance of
experience that he brought um not just
as an assistant city manager but as a
former city
manager um just gave him that little bit
of an edge that made
me that made me confident that he would
be the Top Choice thank you
thank you Council k um I Echo a lot
about the processes the process that my
colleagues have have mentioned we um
went through a series of conversations
with the candidates they did
presentations um we deliberated we at
the end ultimately voted in in our
rankings and and tallied that up all
accompanied by HR all Guided by our City
attorney as well in that context very
similar to many searches that I've I've
been a part of
um so I
think I I think at this moment folks
really want to just say we hired the
wrong person and and you want us to do
something different and what I am saying
is first of all
I don't believe that our deliberations I
believe our deliberations were
considerably more um
thoughtful and and asking critical
questions
than uh than may have happened in any
other setting I I think we were all
struggling with this decision um as has
been mentioned many times but I also
think
um
the I think it's telling the sort of
context of of
saying you should have hired someone
else is always that's always what people
say after a search often they they have
their own perceptions of who the best
person is and I acknowledge that that's
there's there are often many people who
can fill positions um sometimes there
aren't any um which I would argue is a
is a much worse situation um but I would
also say that in in these
conversations the I would I would not
uh I think that it's harmful to an
institution
to
um air out every discussion point and so
I would I would argue that those
discussion that discussion was within
our purview to having a closed meeting
and for me this this particular um sort
of airing of of qualifications and
deliberations is not something that
um
is should be subject to public comment
because I believe that people bring we
we all had a discussion where HR told us
these are the these this is how you
check your biases this is how you
consider things this is how you um can
measure your support for folks and and
we use that guidance in that context and
and um I believe that often public
comment especially when considering
individual people is is
is not informed by that by that
foundation and so I I believe that this
process that we engaged in in this
discussion
um
was again completely above board in
terms of of our understanding and
Frameworks that we used and it wasn't
there wasn't a consensus
um among us but we did vote um using
sort of a closed ballot process and
folks had a chance to make the case for
their for their candidates and so
um I I also just want to sort and and I
get folks say we want someone else
that's not what's going to happen here
today and as you can tell we're
discussing this resolution but I also
want to point out that folks um this
discussion first of all again this was
March and I haven't
heard um
at the time I didn't hear this feedback
but I also just want to point out to the
salary question um a few other salaries
in our state that might be relevant the
Albuquerque Chief uh sort of
administrative officer makes
$216,000 the El Paso city manager makes
$350,000 the doniana county manager
makes
$220,000 and if you wonder um you know
the city of Las crusa has I don't know
1600 17700 employees including police
and fire whose jobs are um life or death
uh and then a number of folks whose
whose Impressions on people's lives are
pretty pretty big so the city manager
job is one deserving of the best
candidates and the best pay and I will
always make that argument in this
context NMSU football coach $600,000 so
if you if you want to indict us on how
public money is being spent I urge you
to please make sure have the context for
what you're what you're critiquing us
for because I will always advocate for
us to have the best candidates and and
that also includes paying people better
all of our staff um and so um I I just
want to speak to this is about the
hiring of of eon and and folks have
really suggested
um this particular topic as as something
that we should consider and and uh I
just want to push back on that narrative
because this is an extraordinarily uh
difficult job as was mentioned 24 hours
a day uh heavy lifts
supervising a team of really great
people who who are responsible for a lot
of things in our city and and the
suggestion that we would pay
someone
um that much less is
is uh I just want to push back against
that topic as well so again it's a
ponderous decision it's a ponderous job
and
we did our diligence in in these
conversations about narrowing down the
field and and um I would again argue
that that is not something that
that is helpful for
any um sort of public airing because I
think it it is harmful
to it is harmful to the institutions
that
are engaging in in a type of Monday
morning morning quarterbacking um in
particular with the public in particular
with folks who who definitely want to
have input but don't have um have as
much context as we do so so I think I
just want to say that uh our
deliberations weren't as light there was
no wheel greasing or skid greasing um we
took it very seriously so um I'm just
going to push back on on a couple of
those points
councelor
flus I'd like to thank um councilors
Graham and uh Ken for being
um very well spoken and I don't think I
can add much more than what they have
said um I I take I mean I will share
with you that um there's the undertone
that there was some Shenanigans going on
and meeting in dark and all that sort of
no um
um in fact I don't socialize with any of
my colleagues
uh for that reason I don't ever want to
be accused of violating the open
meetings act as an attorney I honor that
and um I want to thank all of you though
for keeping us on our toes and um and
again I invite each and every one of you
to consider running for city council and
uh and making this a better place
because obviously you're not very happy
with it right now and um I don't mean to
be factious but I am I am very upset by
this process and offended quite frankly
thank you mayor protim thanks mayor
thanks everyone
um of
all first I'd like to say that I hate
hate hate that I was part of a a
violation um that feels it feels pretty
terrible um I'm grateful for the folks
who brought it forward and for the doj
who brought it back to us and said you
need to fix it and I'm glad that we're
fixing it thank you Brad I will say that
this particular item is the one that I
have the most concerns
about the interviews that we partook in
with the three final candidates to me
were
sacred they were
emotional they were deep they were
serious
for there to be a demand that we discuss
those
publicly violates so
many really it violates the Privacy that
those three folks are entitled to at the
end of the day I get that this is a
public job but can you imagine can you
imagine applying for a job where you
where you thought that your
qualifications or lack thereof would be
discussed and scrutinized publicly no
one would
reply I do not believe that the doj uh
which by the way I will be speaking
about in my comments at the end I will
be asking for a meeting with him to
discuss some of these
concerns the Oma guide there's an OM
guide by the doj that talks specifically
about the exemption on limited Personnel
matters and one of the paragraphs here
says this exemption permits a public
body to close meetings for the purpose
of discussing certain matters concerning
individual employees of the public body
specifically a public body May close a
meeting to discuss the hiring promotion
demotion dismissal assignment or
resignation of an indivi of an
individual Public Employee or the
investigation or consideration of
complaints or charges against an
individual Public Employee a public body
may also close a meeting for matters
that are closely related to those
specifically listed in the exemption
such as performance appraisals and
interviews with job C
candidates
I get the suspicion that so much of the
criticism that we've been receiving on
this is perhaps this desire for there to
be something
juicier than there was and the reality
is
that this body has a responsibility of
hiring one employee that is the city
manager that is very important which is
why I respect this which is why
ultimately why I respect and honor this
process and I'm here to engage in
thoughtful discussion around the very
real violation I also want us to
consider some of the impacts that this
would have especially on these very real
three people and I think um thank you
councelor Graham for recalling some of
the process that took place because I
think if anything you should know about
is that is that there was these question
there was a list of a very long list of
questions that HR provided to us that
the council then chose um narrowed down
because we wanted you know to
have a
timely yet deep uh interview and not a
you know dayong interview for each
person um I recall there being very
important questions about the job
there're being questions that um helped
us to get to know those folks better and
for that I'm I will for always be
grateful um ultimately I felt so proud
at the end of that day that these three
people work for the city of Las Cruses
and I continue to be proud and I
continue to be proud of the final choice
we made and of many of the choices that
person has consequently made in building
his team and leading leading this city
so thank you
thank you and at that time on March 20th
I remember that we had three finalist
that we held interviews with and they
were all asked several questions where
we rotated as councelor Graham had
mentioned but they were also given a uh
10 minutes to do a presentation orally
and perform uh so we could get to know
them on a on a on a better note and that
created a lot of discussion because it
was like we've all said three
very good qualified candidates at work
for the city of Los cresus for me my
selection was Ian
tamop um he just had more time and
experience and Service as a city manager
in the city manager's office and I felt
that it always that he's a good fit for
the city of Los cruus and the
organization uh that was my selection at
that time and nine months later I'm
still happy with that
selection so so that if there's anyone
uh public comments you can come
forward for 2
minutes Lynn
moer what is missing from all of this
just to reiterate is that you haven't
provided any materials for the public to
see to review and to get a sense of no
resumés no letters of reference or any
other materials whatsoever it's like
it's the immaculate
selection in my experience with public
bodies except for this one they
invariably go to considerable lengths to
provide the public a good Quantum of
background information on candidates for
key government positions and this has
been brought to your attention and you
still haven't provided anything it it
makes no sense no other public body that
I have experience with has ever handled
it like this like it's all quiet and
you're not provide providing a bit of
information like for example I'd like to
know what Mr Tomo's qualifications are
I'd like to know what his education is
and what his experience has been and
what his skills are this has not been
provided to the public at all and we've
brought this to your attention now
repeatedly it's both arrogant and
unlawful for any elected official to act
upon their view that notwithstanding
what the law requires all that really
matters is that the officials are able
to review and study relevant documents
as much as they care to and it does not
matter whether the public has adequate
opportunity you don't have that option
New Mexico public records act and open
meetings act require that you provide
these things it's
basic members of the public may not be
shoved over to the side like they're a
hindrance public officials are elected
to serve the interests of the public in
an open manner when citizens see
nonchalant as we're seeing all across
except for the exception of one here
today I think from elected officials
about citizens are able to observe and
participate fully in the Democratic
process from an informed perspective
citizens work even harder to penetrate
that dangerous undemocratic attitude and
make sure that official leaves office as
soon soon as possible this is something
you can do something about Miss Mo your
time is up I can see that thank you
mayor thank you for this opportunity to
speak thank you again mayor and Council
my name is Patty
Hartman and um while I'm not satisfied
with this as any kind of
a
doover um I will say the more that I
hear counselors
speak the clearer I understand how
little the public is
respected um you know while I was
sitting here I'm going to jump to
something really quick I just found an
article which I can send to you that was
local from February 28th 20 24 and the
last line of that article from
cbs4 local I think
says the very last line leaders said the
next city manager will be an internal
hire coming from the existing City Pool
City employee
pool I that's not what I was looking for
but that definitely caught my attention
so as of February 28th it was very clear
what the council plan to do um I think
they played right into the hands of our
previous city manager who was friends
with our current city manager and when
you talk about
experience um our current city manager
was a city manager in a city in
California for one year that's there's
something to look at there um I don't
like being characterized as oh we think
there's some shenan nanigans or it's
really insulting to say perhaps the
public is looking for something
juicier that that is extremely
denigrating to us who come here as the
public um no what we're looking for we
don't want to be in on the personal
interviews I would like to know some of
the questions that you were given from
HR to ask I would like to know the
format I would like to know everything
Lyn Mo brought up the process thank
you I'm sorry is today's form only for
uh city manager nothing for City other
City issues that's correct it's only
public comments on the specific issue
Peggy
Strahan um I sat here and listened I
don't mean for anybody to think we're
throwing Tomatoes we're
not we just want answers that's it and
really there are a few answers that
haven't been addressed I would like to
know what
specific characteristic or or
um what the word I'm looking for U
experience that you liked about this
candidate that made you think oh yes not
because it was an easier process you
didn't want to go through a long process
of getting another candidate I just want
to know what stood out to you what tell
me as a public because these things
matter I want to know about these things
and that's all I I just want to know why
you think he is the best candidate not
because he has been that way be served
as assistant not because
he has just been established here I want
to know wow you know he did this and he
has this idea and this really sparked my
interest and this is good for the
citizens of Las Cruses that's all I'm
looking for I I have no bias and I have
no opinion but I would like to just have
a little bit more knowledge and so thank
you very
much oh I I would like cancel cor go
ahead if if the public is done in for
this question but I would wait till the
end
if seeing none go ahead okay um again I
don't I I don't know that this is
something that the public is necessarily
entitled to but I will
um yeah actually I won't
thanks m'am you had your two minutes to
speak from the podium you have your
public comments we don't need you
shouting from the from the seats
okay again your your opinion and you
have had your opportunity to speak with
your two
minutes
Christine hold on Christine do you need
to bring up Brad the
options thank you mayor um so with this
particular item council's voting options
are you can vote Yes this will approve
the review discussion and decision to
select a count tomoo for the then vacant
position of city manager you can vote no
this will not approve the review
discussion I should say and decision to
select a county tomoo for the vacant
position of city manager uh as always
you can vote to amend but this would
require further discussion and again
voting to table is not an option based
on uh doj
guidance Christin
this is on the motion to approve
resolution 25
083 councelor McClair yes councelor
matis yes councelor Graham yes councelor
cran yes councelor flutes yes councelor
bomo yes mayor
yes next item at 3.4 resolution number
25-0 84 a resolution to cure ratify the
Los crusa City council's prior invalid
decision and decision to seek candidates
for the vacancy of position of city
manager from an internal pool of
candidates and to appoint Ian tamop
payel to the office of city manager
thereby
approving and ratifying both his
selection and employment
agreement move to approve second Graham
Mr Mayor if I
may
um so this is the last item uh that I've
brought for your consideration today uh
the purpose of this last item uh just
for full transparency sake um because
some people may not know this uh
initially this is very similar to what I
had prepared we were going to vote I say
we you all were going to vote on this on
January 6th
uh that resolution was sent to the
Attorney General's office who made edits
and recommendations I collaborated with
them at the time uh the reason it was
not voted on on January 6 is that on the
preceding
Friday uh the AG's office contacted the
city and let us know that even after
making edits and recommendations to that
action that it was not acceptable which
is fine um
we have since then as as you've all seen
taken portions that are very similar to
the items identified or the actions
identified in this item and split them
into separate resolutions which is
ultimately what the nmd OJ preferred uh
I will I do want to state
for everyone's knowledge and information
that um every item that has been brought
before this governing body today
has been reviewed by the Attorney
General's office including attachments
to those items and were deemed to be
sufficient by the New Mexico Department
of
Justice so with that said uh in
summation the nmd doj excuse me made
findings that the city council failed to
decide the scope of its city manager
search and appears to have engaged in a
presumed rolling Quorum and before
anyone asks yes all this language was
Ved by the AG's office uh that the
closed session to narrow the candidate
field violated the open meetings act and
that the city council's closed session
to select a city manager violated
om uh you all have taken votes on those
items already here
today uh what I would ask you all to do
now is have a final discussion as to
whether you wish to cure and ratify all
prior invalid actions as identified by
the department Department of Justice
pursue to a public and open vote by a
majority of city
council um what I would ask you to do
again finally or lastly here today uh is
to have a discussion as to whether you
wish to cure and ratify all of the
issues identified by the AG's office
which
include items that you've already taken
votes on which which are limiting the
scope of city manager to internal
candidates only narrowing the candidate
field to internal finalists namely Ean
tomoo Sonia Delgado and David steo
selection of a count tomoo as the city
manager for the city of Las Cruses and
the terms of Mr TL's Employment contract
that was previously approved in an open
meeting onor about April 1st
2024 all right thank you Brad uh
councilor
MCL do you just wish that we say that
what what are we what are we going for
here so what makes this mayor councelor
McClure what makes this item somewhat
interesting uh is that everything
included therein are items that you all
have voted on today correct this was the
AG's preference the whole point of this
final action would be to cure and ratify
uh every uh invalid decision or action
as identified by the Attorney General's
office this was their preference uh but
in taking uh this final vote uh this
Council either will cure and ratify uh
all of those concerns that the AG
identified as of today January 13
2025 uh or it will
not like I said I I recognize that this
final action or this final item uh may
be a bit
redundant uh
arguably uh but this is the format that
the AG's office preferred and in the
spirit of
collaboration uh cooperation and
accountability uh I've brought this item
to you I guess in a nutshell maybe the
simplest way to think about this item is
that this will be the final curing and
ratification of anything and everything
identified by the AG
so hey is the head I guess but uh what
do we what do we say we literally just
say I as a city counselor wish to cure
and ratify the following 1 two 3
4 no B basically like he's looking for
uh any kind of discussion how you feel
about the whole thing and how you want
to move in that direction and then we'll
vote after the fact if you have no
comment then there's no comment excuse
me based on what we've already voted on
or you can comment to to any of the
whole
process Al so these are essentially our
final comments is what we're aing here
okay we do get Council
comments oh my gosh
okay okay all right um let me just go
ahead and say I'd like to cure and
ratify and I apologize to the public I
partially too it was what was I six
weeks into this when I when this all
started kicking off um
I think a learning experience is a hard
thing to say but that is what it was for
me and it's been full Barrel the whole
time so um but I do very much value
transparency I do think that we should
have had this in a a more open way I I
do think that there are other entities
here even in Las cruus that do when they
have large positions will ask the public
to have that input have people who work
with that person intimately um I didn't
know that we had a community panel last
time so I you know as much as I've said
in the past I really wish there was like
a binder of info that I would have given
I am collecting that as I go so I hope
to do better and um still appreciate
your guys' faith thank
you Council
matiz uh thank you and on that last
statement uh I hope to do better as well
um my previous
vote
um I feel that I've had nine months and
I just want to share with a public
comment uh what's so what's the
character what what was the overall
reason why I I chose and and my my
ranking one with the Connie uh well it's
actually come to reality that in the
eight and nine months that I've been
dealing with this city manager
uh just as the other candidates because
I also have dealings with with both of
them his response has been fantastic in
other words a city
councelor uh has a lot of problems going
on in their district from pack of dogs
uh sink holes you name it things happen
and when a resident who who voted or
didn't vote for me you I'm not I'm not
loved by everyone but but if if they
contact me it is my job to respond and
to take care of that that issue but
without the help of a city
manager uh the city clerk and and and
other staff members I can't get that
done and I've been able to do I I
believe a good job in in in in the
months that I have served because of his
attitude toward helping his
notifications uh when things happen in
the city of Las
Cruses and during the interview he also
hit on a cord that I really the reason I
ran again for city council I mean I was
having a nice relaxed life I I didn't
really need to do this but I am upset
with with the crime and the issues and
the problems that we have in the city of
Las Cruses and this is one of his his
key uh policies he would also like to
make the city a county would also like
to make the city a safer City and that
means as a city manager he supports the
the police department the fire
department and the public safety
departments and and for that
reason um I felt my vote was being part
of my policies that I like to see happen
in theity city of Las crues we all want
a safer City and that has to be a
priority and a county I believe
hopefully through transparency
transparency is very important we we
don't need any more secrets about what's
what's happening in the city of Las
cruus that will determine our actions
and I really commend Chief story for for
bringing this out for bringing out the
crime STS and what's happening so that
that
combination of having a city manager
that that appreciates and supports
Public
Safety uh infrastructure works way well
with David and David I I just have to
give you a
Kudos thank you very much for being very
responsive in in the public works and
and then miss Delgado uh I know you've
help helped me recently and some things
that are happening with the things in
the in the city and particularly my
district so we have three great internal
candidates and it it was a tough
decision but uh I believe I voted for
the correct person thank
you councilor
Graham thank you
um since we do have the opportunity for
Council comment after this specific item
I'm going to kind of stick with the past
here and I'll save my uh
um save my comments on how I feel since
my vote for um bringing Mr tomap on his
City Manager for comments I also
appreciate the opportunity to have cured
ratified strange legal terms um to have
dealt with this using one of the options
I'm presuming that if this wasn't a
viable option the AG's office would not
have supplied it and I know that there
has been a lot of talk of just starting
the process over but I trust in the AG's
office that this is a way of properly
curing and ratifying the issues moving
forward I agree completely with
councelor McClure um this job is a
constant onou feet learning process I
have learned from this process and while
I like mayor protm bomo pray that I will
not be involved in another city manager
hiring decision in my time left on the
Das um it has
certainly driven home to me the
importance not just of transparency but
of public perception of transparency
thank
you coun curan thank you I appreciate
the opportunity for us to have this
discussion thank you uh uh attorney
Douglas for following up with the AG and
understanding really what this means um
I would say
I I know we could have done it better
that's what we're saying here today uh
you will see that we do future things
better this week um at the ascmv meeting
we will start a very public process to
to look at an executive director um so I
I can say
that we systemat Al have changed a
number of things that we do the types of
conversations we have and we are making
notes for
future actions as a body
um and also that I I still maintain that
we that we relied heavily on our on HR
and our attorneys to guide us through
this process in the ways that we
understood it to to happen acknowledging
that we could have done better now and
understanding the context for that
and committing that we will see these
changes you already have seen a number
of these changes um in terms of our
announcements of public meetings and and
closed meetings um and uh search as How
We Do searches going forward will be
will look different consistently as we
can make it so so um I appreciate the
opportunity to cure this I appreciate
the AG and the folks who advocated to
the AG for for bringing this up um I do
regret that this is nine months after
all of these things happened uh I think
we could have made more Dynamic changes
along the way um at a different
time um but I also do want to just
reaffirm my commitment and I'll talk
about that in counselor comments of um
why we hired Eon which I think again um
is one of the the agenda here today but
I think the the big picture is we could
have done better we will do better and
that's what we're committing to that's
what I'm committing
to councelor
fotus thank you mayor um first of all
I'd like to thank all of you for being
here and keeping um your elected
officials on their toes um it doesn't
feel good to I know you said no tomatoes
I said Rotten Tomatoes to
boot but um no it's really um wonderful
I expected uh the entire population of
Las Cruses to be here um and and it's
good that you're questioning all of the
uh decisions um that we made and um and
that should continue in so far as all uh
voted officials or elected officials
including um the one who sits soon will
be sitting in the white house um so I I
I do want to thank you for that and um
and I'll continue to um represent and
work as an as a um elected official in
the most ethical manner possible uh not
possible period thank
you thank you
mayor um again thank you Brad and the
City Clark for uh getting us to this
moment today to cure these important
issues I I learned really early on
actually that even the appearance of a
conflict or the appearance of anything
is enough to deteriorate the trust of
the public and um I I hold that very
dearly and um I do want to apologize to
the public for acting in a way that uh
was outside of that and so um I I
actually I don't know how to show up any
other way but really authentic and it
has gotten me in a lot of trouble in the
last six years that I have been here um
I will continue to do that again I truly
hope that in the last three years of my
term I don't have to go through another
city manager hiring process um and that
um in the very no I'm not even going to
say it because it's not going to happen
it's just not going to happen um but I
think what this has this has really
taught me a lot of things as well about
om and um always appreciate an
opportunity to learn more about a pretty
complex um issue that I think for a long
time I felt was pretty clear it was
pretty clearcut to me and that's
obviously not the case and so um I do
want to say that I also want to
apologize specifically to Eon David and
Sonia for have having made decisions
that put you in this situation nine
months later and I honestly couldn't be
more grateful for the three of you for
all of you for JC for all of you up here
and everyone in the city who are the
truly I've said this before we come and
go there are dedicated public servants
who work in this building and outside of
this building every single day um and to
them I want to just express my sincerest
gratitude and an apology to those
employees as well for having caused
several weeks of confusion about um the
the functions of government and so I
will leave it at that I will have
additional comments to make as well um
in in my public comment section but I'll
leave those for then thanks
mayor thank you yeah I just want to
mention that I do want to uh cure and
ratify this process I'm in favor of that
can we learn from it absolutely can we
do better from it absolutely but I just
want to sincerely thank you Brad and
your team for working with the AG to
ratify this to cure this I know it was
two rounds I know it was two separate
attorneys that you had to deal with in
order for that to come through and I
appreciate all your hard work on
it guys is there any members from the
public two
minutes Lynn moer there's a long list of
questions you have not yet provided an
answer to I hope you're all planning to
jump in and do that here in your last
comments why haven't resumés been
provided all you're talking about
turning over a new Leaf it's all a
little too too little too late with
respect to this process today what was
the extent of the council's research in
coming up with the salary and benefits
package of offered to Mr Tom P which
other municipalities did the council
examine as a comparison what are the
various options of terms the council
considered for the employment agreement
with Mr tomap what was the salary range
the council considered
$216,000 is the same salary paid to the
previous city manager EOP who according
to news reports stated that his salary
in Los cruus must match what he had been
paid by Eagle Mountain Utah for
activities that included various
responsibilities additional to the city
manager responsibilities in light of
this how can this same amount
$216,000 be justified for the new
candidate we look forward to hearing
your answers today to these questions as
well as to all the other questions posed
to you in today's meeting each qu each
question is directly relevant to
responsible decisionmaking in selecting
and hiring a person to fill the top
administrative position in the city of
Las kusus moreover the Monumental salary
and benefits package the council is
considering awarding Mr tomama Pia
requires full vetting explanation and
justification I ask that you provide
answers to all of these questions if you
don't our concern will be substantiated
that the city council isn't actually
carrying out full deliberation careful
deliberation deserving of this
particular job I urge the council to
vote no on this resolution then restart
the selection process from the beginning
that will be far healthier for the
public good that will be far healthier
for the public good that will be far
healthier for the public good thank you
thank you for your time any other
members of the
public thank you for giving me every
opportunity possible to speak to this my
name is Patty Hartman and um when I
listen when I look at things that are
going on you know I look with a bigger
picture in mind but I also listen
between the words and tone is rather
important I appreciate my city councelor
who was the first to speak Cassie
McClure who um
sincerely apologized to the
public um actually everything she has
ever said to me first of all she
responds to me when I email her that's
something I don't get from anyone else
here but um her sincerity speaks volumes
um her intelligence speaks volumes about
needing to do more than just follow the
rules blindly
um what I hear from several is the
defensiveness of your
positions and and so while I appreciate
your actual apology councelor Ben Como I
I just I'm wondering what's going to be
different I'm hearing oh you're going to
see differences right away I agree with
Ms Moore that um we're not this was not
really a process this was just a kind of
a defense of what you did and why you
did it and why is the public here
annoying you with trying to change your
minds or get something juicier no we're
here in the name of public process and
and I think we need to have some serious
considerations about what public process
means thank
you Diane Starbuck for the
record um it's been clear to me that
listening to this whole thing that
apparently there is no standard process
to hire a city manager and that you rely
on what's done in the past and since
many of you weren't here in the past
that you have to rely on people's
memories may I suggest writing somebody
writing and sorry if this Falls to you
Mr Douglas but writing a standard
operating procedure on how to hire a
city
manager I also want to say um I app
appreciate every single person that's up
there today um I know your job is not
easy I know you take a lot of grief um
but I still appreciate you representing
the citizens thank
you okay Mr Doug
thank you mayor and so here are
council's voting options you may vote
Yes this will ratify the city council's
prior decision you may vote no this will
not
ratify uh Andor cure the city council's
prior decision you may vote to amend
which will require direction to City
staff me uh and again uh based upon
conversations with the AG's office a
vote to table would not be appropriate
for this
item
Christine this is on the motion to
approve resolution 25
084 councelor McClair yes councelor
mati yes councelor Graham yes councelor
cran yes councelor flus yes councelor
Beno yes mayor
yes oh thank you again Brett and next we
have city council comments uh Council
MC thank you mayor this is where I'm
going to slide in my thank yous I want
to thank Brad and Christine for letting
me be the pain that I kind of have been
but I appreciate working with everyone
at in the city I I haven't run across a
bad egg um maybe in three years I still
will who knows but I I get a sense that
everybody's genuinely doing a good job
and um cares about the city that they
work for um I also want to say too for
the record
that as much as I object to the process
uh I haven't had problems with Ian in
the time that I've been here either he's
been very forthcoming in in working with
me and helping the constituents in my
district and to me that's what I care
about is how do we work together how do
we move forward how do we actually help
residents in the city so I want to say
that and um I want to thank my
colleagues because this is an
uncomfortable process I knew going in
this was going to be unfun today but um
I think it's part of it and that's I
think I've spoken to each of you I don't
know if that's rolling but how fun this
all is it's so fun so lastly I want to
actually thank the journalists in the
room because without this this would not
exist and that there is something very
potent about the ability for journalism
to hold elected officials accountable
and I'm glad for it so thank
you councilor
ma thank you mayor and again uh I'd like
to appreciate and thank uh the attorney
and and
I just want to uh comply with the
Department of Justice and and actually
ratify and get these
violations in the background and move
forward I think some good comments were
made today by the by the public and I
think we do need a standard operating
procedure in selecting a city manager I
think that needs to be a priority I also
think um in hearing from barara Ben
Como I think it's important that we do
have transparency and have panels that
will uh review in that standard
operation procedure there needs to be a
public involvement and selecting a city
manager so if we could actually get that
done I think that would uh show the
public that we we do want to change and
we uh definitely want to avoid any
future violations in the future and
again I I believe Connie has done a an
excellent job and I hope he continues
thank
you councelor
grant thank you um I will get to my
official thank yous but just to riff a
little bit and think a little bit um I
follow the Pew charitable trusts um
research on government government RIT
large
um pretty closely and Trust in public
institutions is at an historic low and I
don't think that I understood that so
deeply until I took office um if you
show up here on a first or third Monday
of the month when we have general public
comment you'll hear a lot of mistrust in
institutions um Federal government
people who are upset with the governor
of the state with congress with their
state legislators and
representatives and I think the beauty
of being on city council is the
accessibility I run into constituents at
Albertson's and that's amazing on the
other hand um a public body this
accessible this local this close to you
is going to catch
a lot of anger valid anger and
mistrust at all levels
and I am committed
to trying to push against that from my
space as a local elected um I'll also
point out and this isn't to I'm not
trying to Curry sympathy or anything but
we were joking about throwing Tomatoes
or Rotten Tomatoes when the story broke
on social media it was shared uh shared
around pretty roundly and I came across
a comment suggesting that they bring out
the Gallows for us and after a quick
Google search to make sure I knew the
difference between a Gallow and a
guillotine which I did I was I was good
on that that means that we should be
hanged that we should be that we should
be hanged for this breach of the public
confidence and I reported that comment
to the social media platform form and
was assured that it was perfectly fine
with Community standards and who knows
maybe maybe that's a joke maybe that's
just somebody else who's angry um I'm
sure that person would probably not have
the guts to come and say that to my face
if you're out there I'm ready um but
that is that is the reality of being a
small part of a much larger Suite of
government
institutions and again I take that
seriously and if I can do
anything to help rebuild trust in
institutions that's one of the most
important things I can do in the time
that I have left here in terms of
speaking specifically um regarding akan
tamop and how I feel about the decision
I
made one of of the most amazing things
that I have experienced it's not just
being able to meet with him or be on the
Das with him it's just how often I run
into him at community events all times
of day all levels of
formality um I'm just like oh my God
there's a Connie and you can't miss him
because he's super tall and I'm like I
this this guy is
everywhere and he's not I don't feel
like this is performative this isn't a
guy trying to get the job this is a guy
who already has the job and who I think
puts not just amazing expertise and
efficacy into it but a ton of heart a
ton of kinho as we like to say up here
um so in terms of how I feel about the
decision that I've made um rock
solid um finally for the thanks thanks
uh you know of course
to all of City staff who were constantly
doing the heavy lifting behind us um in
this case specifically Brad for very
tireless communication back and forth
with the AG um working on a situation
that you were really not a part of um
and then especially especially uh to
Christine Rivera our amazing city clerk
who again because she's accessible
because she'll answer her phone because
she'll respond to emails I think gets a
lot of often unfair blame um you know
what it's easy to blame the person who
is who you can actually see and your
commitment and expertise um and your
willingness to keep putting yourself out
there is truly inspirational and I just
want to acknowledge how rough this has
been um so I go thank
you Council current thank you um I
second councelor Graham's last points
but also her her prior points thank you
for for all that you've done and and
Brad thank you for navigating this as as
you have um we we rely on our our
attorneys to advise us and and um I
appreciate you doing so in this
situation um I think a lot of what's
been said has already been said I I
think um I'm going to talk about the
things in part because mistrust uh of
course assumes a lack of diligence on
the part
of everyone um and and I want to get to
that to that those questions um things
like how did we decide on the
contract
I we took the prior contract as a
variable we took City salaries provided
by HR as a varable variable we also
looked at neighboring municipalities
people within them um
Albuquerque um El
Paso Santa Fe uh Tucson were among the
places that we that we examined both
whether they were strong or weak mayor
um cities which is a which is an
important variable and what salary the
city manager has paid because in some
cases the mayor is the person who's
who's making those decisions is is not
the case here um and managing the city
so so we looked at a number of variables
um I understand that public mistrust
means that you assume that we didn't
um so those conversations did happen as
well as uh an understanding of what the
national standards were for city
managers and and there's a lot of data
and research related to to what kinds of
things city managers um have within
their contracts especially given that
they're in police itical positions that
can be uh hired and fired at the whims
of a body like
ours um so to that question about our
diligence and those conversations those
were part of our our conversations and
that didn't come up in in our discussion
earlier so um those things did happen in
the
in in the last of our meetings um and
prior I had been researching all of
these things prior pror to
um that conversation
so and then to the other question about
why we and I think that this this to me
is why I feel
particularly
um strong about the time lapse and the
the space where folks are coming to us
um critiquing city
employees uh I will always I I believe
that we're the public office we should
get the critique folks channeling their
anger at us into critiquing city
employees and or our higher is really
problematic and so I'm here to to both
um defend that decision as my colleagues
have talked about I think in the in the
nine months since we've made this
decision we've experienced things but
but even in the interview I will say
this is the reason that I um the the
thing that I believe Eon has lived but
that came out in the interview he talked
about this very specific story and I'm
sharing it it's probably inappropriate
to share but here we are we're trying to
be open and and tell you why these
things are happening he talked about in
his prior city manager job driving past
a couch on someone's curb every single
day on his way to City Hall and I think
about this when I see you know I know
that uh there there was a loose dog
around city hall for a long time um and
thankfully our Animal Control Officers
knew the whole story and and told us
when when I called to complain about
that dog that loose dog um right down
the street here so I Connie told the
story and I'm telling you this because I
think um if you're wondering what our
thinking was and again mistrust means
perhaps not understanding what's in our
minds and I understand that that comes
from from that place E con talked about
this couch sitting on the curb right
outside of their City Hall um at the
place where was previously city
manager uh and driving by every day and
going to work um and thinking man I hope
I hope solid waste does something about
that I hope um I hope someone's paying
attention is that going to be recycled
you know one day two days the next day
and then after several days I don't
remember exactly how many days he
realized that he was the person that
should should do something about it um
and that highlighted his management
approach which was if you do something
going above and beyond your job
expectations um I will always have your
back and I think sometimes in city
government we can be stayed and not NE
and always think about something being
someone else's job
um and I myself have been guilty of that
as I said when I called Animal Control
about the loose dog
um that was an extraordinarily powerful
and anecdote in addition to all the
other HR related things the
qualifications our experiences with with
staff many and and all of the
interviewees told us stories that that
made us understand who they were and how
they would be city managers and so those
conversations were very powerful again
it was an extraordinarily difficult
decision but we
did
um use the resources that we had from
from human resources from our City
attorney our meetings our conversations
and tried to make the best decision that
we possibly could in that context using
an a range of inputs um from a from a
whole bunch of different
folks that said I understand that we
didn't do the best that we could in in
public meetings and as I said you will
you can judge us by our actions as we
move forward um in this context
beginning with this week um so as we
begin a search
for whatever kind of search we're going
to have for for a new executive director
in the
asmv um which is a parallel but
separate um position as a
jpa I say all of this to make
transparent my thinking and usually when
we talk about our own thinking and our
own feeling from here it's something
that we get hundreds of email EMS
excoriating us about afterwards so I
embrace those excoriations as they come
um but I think it's also part of what
you all are asking for and so I
understand that that ask and and that
context um all of that said I appreciate
very much as has already been said the
folks who have worked to to rectify this
and the the folks who brought it brought
it forward and and contined to demand
that we rethink think the way that we
did this and the way that we would do
things in the future and it's been it's
been absorbed we we feel it and we have
experienced it and we are committed to
working um forward as that goes
so councilor
flus I I um again want to thank all of
you for keeping uh local government on
its uh feet and um I hope you do the
rest with the state and the federal
government I think you're all very uh
well informed and care about democracy
care about uh what the government has to
do for you but you've done a lot for us
to uh bring this to our
attention um and uh Happy New
Year mayor protm thanks mayor I wanted
to speak publicly about a couple of the
um issues that I saw with this process
and I waited till the end because
I um I wanted to honor the process that
was laid out in front of us by the doj
ultimately knowing that uh coming into
this I knew that whatever I said was
going to be filtered through a lens that
would paint me as defensive that would
paint me as dismissive whatever because
I'm used to it I think um I
I up here I get emails pretty
consistently about the way that I like
physically show up what I wear that I
joke with the mayor that I don't say hi
to you a Pilates you know those kind
like those things come up quite often
the sort of criticism outside of like
the scope of my job um so I'm pretty
used to that and I knew coming into this
that would be similar which is why I
carefully thought about what I wanted to
say but wait until the end because I do
want to honor the process um and and
cure a mistake that was made um I think
the concern that I have that I hope to
write to the doj about is um ultimately
the process that took nine months um
that allowed
for this to become a referendum on the
current city manager a person who had
nothing to do with the decision that was
made at that time um and that's what
that became and I think that that's
pretty um disruptive to the functions of
government and I would hope that another
government entity would have seen that
um and perhaps rethought the second
recommendation that they made because I
think H them having turned around as
quickly as they did for berilio County
by the way who had a very similar
complaint at around the same time and
their their determination that
turnaround was pretty quick um perhaps
that second one could have been an like
a recommendation that that was very
valid I think none mon nine months later
feels um like it placed the burden of
guilt on the current city manager when
the guilt and the responsibility is to
this governing body only and so I have
some pretty serious issues with that
that I'd like to understand a little bit
better I think the other thing that to
me felt um at odds was the LA lack of
legal discernment between a malicious
intent uh to keep them public out and a
failure of our internal checks and
balances which is ultimately I think
what happened which is why I agree that
we should have that there should be some
sort of layout for future city councils
on on the best practices for hiring a
new city manager something I actually
brought up to the oversight committee
last week as well and so um I think
there's a lot of ways to grow here and I
think there's um I think
if yeah I mean I think that there that
lack of legal discernment within their
investigation to me felt really
concerning um and then the last thing I
will say is that there was um some
unresponsiveness that I hoped would have
been different I the doj is a big
department and I know that they have a
lot of things going on um but I think in
the process of of trying to do the best
we can at at at
um at curing this and getting to the to
the very to the mission of what this um
determination was about I would have I
would have hoped that there was a little
bit more responsiveness and less confli
conflicting guidance from the Department
of Justice um I also lastly want to
thank the bulletin for uh their
diligence in this and bringing this
forth and for the folks who are
committed to public transparency I think
that's very important thank you I my
only other ask to those journalists
would be that you do not let
misinformation go rampant and that that
is also a responsibility that we have in
this moment um to make sure that the
public understands what has happened and
what happened here
today um that is it I I do want to thank
the city manager uman tamy for his work
247 um he has sacrif aced time with his
family he moved his family he built a
team he it it's pretty blood send tears
type of job and and I couldn't be more
grateful for the kind of leader that I
get to work with every day um and not
just him but all of you my colleagues as
well for um for engaging engaging in
this conversation thoughtfully and I
thank
you well thank you all again for being
here
um as elected officials we're elected to
do a job and we did our job and we do
what's best for the city it's not in any
way to be deceitful or malicious we want
it what's best for the city for the
organization so that we continue to grow
and move forward um adversity
difficulties challenges scrutiny is
going to come our way and we understand
that and I thank Council for sticking
together being professional as councelor
Karan said rowing together for the for
the betterment and becoming a team and
that's what we've worked on in the past
year and econ has been a big part of
that creating that team so that we can
move forward with all those challenges
and difficulties can we learn from it
absolutely can we get better yes we can
and we will prove that with our actions
because we're here to do a job for the
city of Los cruus and make it a better
place for all so thank you all for being
here
today move to a
journ
second this is on the motion to adjourn
the meeting councelor McClure yes
councelor matis yes councelor Graham yes
councelor cran yes councelor flutes yes
councelor Beno yes mayor
yes
e e