Council - Special Meeting

Now officially called to order, we're going to stand for the invocation with the prayer by Ms. King, followed by the Pledge of Allegiance. If everyone will please stand.

Please bow. Heavenly Father, thank you so much for allowing us to be here today for this opportunity to serve this city. Please be with us as we make important decisions in going forward after these interviews. We appreciate you. Thank you for all that you do for us. In your name we pray. Amen.

Amen. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Thank you. Mr. Lighty, if you'll call the roll, please.

Councilmember Hendricks. Here. Councilmember Dixon.

Here.

council member bowling here council member spence here council member king here council president simmons here madam president all six council members are in attendance and therefore a quorum is present thank you very much

Again, thank you all for being here. Thank you all for tuning in. And the purpose of the meeting this afternoon is to have discussions with potential candidates for the current opening position of a city clerk that we are in the process of trying to get someone appointed to. And so we are interviewing candidates. And we have two candidates on today that we will be interviewing each council member. will be asked to, they have the opportunity to ask the candidates two questions each, and then after that, the candidate will be able to have a closing statement. And that's how today is gonna flourish and go. So at this time, we have our first candidate. If you will come and take a seat. Thank you for being here. If you would, please state your name, and you may have an opportunity to give an opening statement. Is your microphone on?

Yes, ma'am. Okay. Yeah. My name's Chris Faust. I'm the city license inspector, and I've been with the city for 22 years. I've had the pleasure to serve under Bob for the last 13 years.

OK. Thank you very much. So we're going to go ahead and get started. I'm going to ask you two questions, each council member. And each council member, when it's your turn, if you will, just identify and ask yourself in what district that you serve. I'm Katrina Simmons, president of the Florence City Council, and I represent District 1. OK. The first question is, that I have for you, why do you want to serve as the City of Florence City Clerk?

Sure, like I said, a moment statement. I've been with the city for 22 years. I've enjoyed it. I've worked in... three different departments, four different jobs, different disciplines. I've really enjoyed my time in the city clerk's office, enjoyed working under Bob. And that was my goal from the time I got the license inspector job was to try to get to the city clerk. I mean, there's been a couple of times where some other jobs have come open that I found I might have an interest in, but at the end of the day, I always wanted to be the city clerk. I mean, it's, I love the revenue aspect of it. I like the political aspect of it. I mean, I like the elections. It's hectic, but I've always enjoyed it, and it was just kind of a goal I had from the moment I got in this office.

Okay, thank you. The next question, the Open Meetings Act. How do you ensure that the city council meetings and agendas strictly will comply with the state open meeting laws?

Sure, and obviously that's something, you know, I know you're probably going to interview people who have more experience with that than I do because I've never been a city clerk. I am familiar with Title 36, which is what it's in, but I can't sit here and give you the exact verbiage, but it's just like any law. I mean, that's my job now. I interpret many laws. I just have to look at it and comply with it.

Okay. Thank you very much. Next, Mr. Hendricks.

Hello, Mr. Faust. Thank you for being here. Jackie Hendricks, District 2. My first question is municipal clerks in Alabama service as chief municipal election official. Describe your experience with elections or how you would get up to speed in this area.

Sure. Well, obviously, again, working in the city clerk's office, I have participated in, I think it's three elections now. Of course, my role was primarily to go out and get counts if there was a dispute at the polls, to go out and kind of check on those things, to bring in the votes at the end of the day. But, you know, I've got a friend, he's a city clerk at another city. And I reached out to him during this process and I was like, look, I said, you know, just to be honest, some of these things I don't know. I said, so I don't know. He said, well, he said, look, he said, don't stress about it. He said, I didn't know it until I knew it. And he said, nobody's going to know it until they know it. He said, you've always got me, forever a source. He said, you're going to meet other clerks that you have sources with. He said, and the Alabama League of Municipalities provides you a clerk's manual for that very reason.

OK, thank you. So also, along with its other responsibility, the city clerk also manages personnel. What are your ideas on maintaining a positive and productive work environment for your office, especially during periods of high workloads, stress, change, or internal conflict?

Sure. I mean, I think we've got a pretty good staff in there now. We all seem to get along for the most part. But there are times when it is very stressful. And, you know, at that point, And you can see it in our office. People who normally don't engage in certain activities or certain job duties will be pulled to come in and help on those job duties. And it alleviates that stress of those people who are becoming overwhelmed. And I mean, that's kind of how we do it. I mean, in that office, I think we've always worked as a team. And that's the way I view it. I mean, sometimes, like I said, we all get a little frustrated sometimes with each other. I mean, that happens. But at the end of the day, we all just got to work together and help each other when the person's workload gets a little too high.

Thank you very much. Thank you. Ms. Dixon?

Turn on my mic so you can hear me. Thank you for being here. Appreciate that. And I appreciate your interest in the position. Okay. Thinking of someone you highly respect, don't have to mention who, but thinking of this person, what is something they would tell me that you could improve upon? And then what would they say sets you apart that would cause them to recommend you over everyone else?

So the first part is something that I could work on, they would say. I think sometimes, and I'm trying to think of a good friend of mine who's pretty blunt, is I can be a little stern. I'm not trying to be ugly to somebody when I come up and say, you know, I need this done or I expect this to be done. And sometimes I just probably need to deliver it in a little more cordial manner, but it's not like I'm trying to be mean or ugly to anybody. It's just, that's kind of how I grew up. It was like, do this, it needs to be done. So I definitely need to work on that a little bit sometimes. I don't think I'm that way with the public, you know, but sometimes, like I said, I read something a while back that said the reason you're like that with your friends and family and coworkers is because you don't have that social construct as much as you do when you're dealing with the public. So maybe that's why it comes off that way sometimes. And then the second part was, I'm sorry, what was that, Ms. Dixon?

Why would they recommend you over everyone else? Hmm.

Well, thinking of this particular person, I'm trying to use this example in my head. Because they can count on me. I've never let them down. They know if it's 2 o'clock in the morning, they call me and say, I need this particular person. I need you to go to my mom's house. I can't get there. Go check on her. Then I'll get up and go check on her. I think that's what they would say. I do believe that I have been someone that I've shown over my years in the city that I can be counted on to come through in situations.

Thank you. And then the next one is, when you come across a challenge that you've never encountered, walk me through the process of how you get to your possible solutions.

Well, obviously, it's going to depend on the particular challenge. I mean, it's a lot of gray area. A lot of people think everything's black and white. It's not, especially in our jobs. For me, it depends on the situation. You're going to look at, obviously, the law first, what we can do within the confines of the law. And then we're going to probably look at the way we might have handled similar situations. If we haven't had similar situations, then what I'm going to do is pick up that phone and call some of my buddies at other cities and say, have you dealt with this? How do you feel like you need to move forward? And sometimes even beyond that, call one of my contacts from another department and say, I need your input on this. This might be something that is just not for me. It might be for you, too. You might need to have a piece of this pie, too. So that's how we do it. You're welcome.

Thank you, Ms. Dixon. Mr. Boulding.

Mr. Faust, thank you for being here. My first question is, what do you believe is the most important responsibility of the city clerk?

Well, I mean, to me, the city clerk is any – well, really, I think most any city employee. It's more than anything we have a fiduciary responsibility, not just to you guys and the mayor and our employees, but to the citizens. We have to be good stewards of their money and make wise decisions. I know that's obviously what you guys do too. So that's kind of my – I think the city clerk has to have some input on that and some, you know – just try to do that not previously spend money and make poor decisions okay uh next question what would your first 90 days in this role look like Well, obviously, a lot of it would be me getting up to speed, going to probably conferences. In fact, when I took the job I have now, it had been a nine-month gap since someone had had it. So when I came in, there was stuff stacked up on my desk, and I didn't know how to do any of this stuff, right? So the first thing I did was went to a conference. And I went to a conference down in Tuscaloosa, first day, I went and I sat in the very front row. And the first thing I see is I see two older gentlemen walk in. I go up and introduce myself. Well, it turned out those guys were Bill Fettner and Cameron Grams from Huntsville, I'm sorry, Madison and Orange Beach, respectively. And that's what I made contacts with them, and went to all these classes, took notes, took the slides home. If I ever run into any issue, I called all those guys. And that's what I did for my first 90 days in that job. It was going through, getting up to speed, reading law, finding which title in Alabama law would be a part of my job, and tried to study it as much as possible. So I mean, I do think there are obviously other issues. But to me, that's the most important part, is just trying to get up to speed on the job. Thank you.

Thank you. Mr. Spance.

Hey, thank you for being here, Mr. Faust. Thomas Spence, District 5. What makes you the strongest candidate for the city clerk position, and how does your experience and skills align with the responsibilities of serving the public and supporting city operations?

Sure. Well, I think the big thing is, like I said, I know there's going to be people that have more understanding of the clerk duties than I do. The one thing they're not going to have is 22 years in this city. And knowing the inner workings of this city and who to contact in each department. We've got contacts all over the place. They're not going to know the processes that our office uses. I can sit here and tell you right now, I could probably do a SWOT analysis on every single person in my office, including me. Don't hold me to that because I don't want to, but you can. You can do the strengths and weaknesses of everybody that I work with. So you know other issues in the office that we're going to face. Somebody coming off the street is not going to know some of the things that might be out there that we're going to run into. For instance, with you know, maybe software issues, third-party contractors we work with, some of our procedures that may need to be modernized a little bit. So those are some things, like I said, that to me is the main thing that we're going to have to look at. I'm sorry, was there a second part to the question too, Mr. Smith? We're good. Okay.

I'm going to say this position requires collaboration with multiple departments, elected officials, and the public. Can you give an example of how you have successfully worked with others across an organization to accomplish a common goal? And what did you learn from that experience?

Sure. You guys may be familiar with a program we use now called eProval. It's what we use when people have events across the city. Well, basically, I'm not going to take credit for that because that was Bill Jordan and Nikki Black, but it all came from an idea I originally had. When I first took my job, there were a lot of things that were happening I had no idea about. So I first reached out to Ryan Ort from the fire department. And I said, we need to start working together on these events, cuz I'm finding things that you need to know about, and you're finding things that I need to know about. He said, okay, well, we go on there for a couple years, and Start realizing we might need to get the parks involved in this. So we reach out to Bill Jordan. So Bill meets with us. So then all three of us start working together. Then finally some had an event that happened in the city that the police should have been at. The police weren't even notified. So I reach out to Nikki Black and I was like, we need to get you involved. So all four of us started working together. And that was the genesis of what eventually became e-approval. And what I learned from it, more than anything, was it's a whole lot easier when we work together. And I don't know about some. I get it. There's some kind of rivalry sometimes between departments, maybe. It's so much easier. That e-approval has been a godsend. People go on there. They got an event. They plug it in. Every single one of us can view it. We let everybody know what we need. It's been amazing.

Thank you.

You're welcome.

Thank you. Ms. King?

I'm Chapel King District 6. What do you feel that you have as far as organizational skills to be able to do this job?

Sure. Well, I mean, my job now entails that I keep track of all the sidewalk leases, all the liquor tax, all the gas tax, all the, about every tax you can say coming in other than sales tax. But the thing about sales tax is too, I still can go and check on it. So if I find somebody, if somebody, if there's a business out there that may be acting a little shady or behind, you know, a little bit on something else, it triggers me to say, well, let's go look at their sales tax. So then we go look at that. So that's the big thing right there is I've got a list in my office of my duties, and I go down one after another. It might take me two days to finish one, and then I'll go back and do the next one and keep doing that over and over until we get everything satisfied. But like I said, and plus, I mean, Just my ability to learn new software. I think that's a big thing, too, is new software and stuff is going to help us a lot. I do have a pretty good aptitude with software and things like that. Like right now we're running, I'm not sure if any of you guys are aware of this, AS400. We're running green screen. And green screen, it's not, you know, if another department calls you and says, hey, I didn't get my report, can you reprint it for me? It's not point and click. You have to go in, type in commands, do all these different things like that. So I do all that right now. In fact, I've got more access to AS400 than, according to the former IT department head, anybody that's ever been in my position. Just simply do because of my aptitude with software.

Besides your years that you've been here, what makes you feel that you're the best fit for this job?

Well, I think the city clerk, as a figurehead to the city, needs to be someone that the citizens can relate to, someone that has a certain type of personality. I do believe that – yeah, I get a little nervous up here in these interviews. I'm not going to lie to you. But I think I'm someone that most people that have dealt with me, whether it's my coworkers or – Citizens will say that I'm a kind person to them. I try to help them, you know, get through things, especially with business owners. You know, I will have business owners come in all the time, and I'll sit there and I'll talk to them about stuff. And they might be from a different city. And they'll sit there and they'll go, wow, you know, my home city told me none of this. And I'm like, well, because at the end of the day, I don't want you out doing something to get in trouble and go, why hasn't nobody told me this? You know, and I think that's a good thing. I've been fortunate to have a lot of supervisors in my time at the city who have been that way, who have been very open to the public and cordial to the public. I just hate it when we see those examples, and I'm not seeing any in Florence, but when we see those examples of city employees and city clerks, people like that, who don't want to take time for the citizens, who don't listen to their complaints. My position has always been Everyone deserves to be heard. I don't care what your situation is. I have people call me sometimes that may have some issues, and I'll sit there and talk to them, let them get it out, because they just want somebody to listen to them.

Thank you very much, Mr. Fowles, for coming and sharing. At this time, you may give us a closing statement up to two minutes.

Sure. I would just like to reiterate what I said earlier. Look, yeah, I'm not going to sit here and tell you I'm the best in this kind of format. I mean, it's a tough format to sit here and look at six people and try to answer these questions. But what I do know is I have a very good work history. I mean, you can go and look, I think, if you talk to my office, Co-workers over the years, they'll vouch for that. There were many times when I found out Mr. Lighty was retiring, I couldn't make up my mind if I wanted to apply or not. That's just the truth. From that moment on, I've had people from the building department, fire department, police department, IT call me, text me, put in. You've got to put in, man. You've got to do this. And it was a tough decision to make, but I did it because They know what I'm capable of. I mean, I don't know what all you've seen, but I've got letters of recommendation from two different departments. I could have got a lot more. I've got one from another agency I've worked with. I've got one from the guy that used to be over at the HVAC board. He said, if you need anything from me, let me know. These are different agencies. In my position now, I have different cities reach out to me all the time because I'm respected in what I do now. In the last about four or five months, I've had calls from Killen, Coleman, Decatur, Bolton, Hackleberg, Jasper, asking me, hey, we need to know how would you handle this? What's your approach to this? And at the end of the day, I want the job. I think I deserve it. But at the end of the day, if I don't get it, I've got a good family. I've got good friends. I like my job now. It's not the end of the world. But I do wish, I'm not going to lie, I really do want the job. But at the end of the day, it is what it is. And I do appreciate y'all giving me the opportunity to come interview for it.

I would like for you to forward. I'd like to see those letters of recommendation. Absolutely, will do.

Thank you very much. We appreciate your time. Thank you.

All right. Good afternoon.

Good afternoon. Good afternoon. If you would, I'm Katrina Simmons, President of City Council. Each council member is going to have an opportunity to ask you two questions. Okay. And then at the end, you will have an opportunity to provide a closing statement. But at this time, we're going to go ahead and get started. Okay. If you would state your name and then an opening statement, and then at that point, after you've done that, we're going to start with Ms. King, and she'll ask you two questions, and then we'll move on forward. Okay.

OK. I'm Shawna Talbot, and I'm currently a town clerk with the town of Killin. And I've been there for five years. It will be five years in September. okay miss king hi i'm chapel king i'm the district six representative what makes you feel that you are the best fit for this job just my my experience as a town clerk um with my with my city now i've recently got my cmc certifications um yeah with the iimc so um so i'm very prepared to come in at a bigger scale and to work.

Tell me about your experience in this type of work, and if you've had any experience with elections.

I have had experience with elections. I had one, so this past August, I had that election. Now, agendas, minutes, the preparation of the agendas and the minutes, records, I say just about everything, just about everything. You know, just agendas, minutes, prepare, make sure the council knows what they're, you know, the right things to do and everything. We got a whole new council this year, just about, except for one. So.

Okay. Thank you. Mr. Spence.

Thank you for coming, Ms. Talbot. Thomas Spence with District 5. Tell us about a time you demonstrated leadership in a challenging workplace situation. What was the issue, how did you handle it, and what was the outcome?

um well the biggest challenge that i had was the elections because i'd never been through an election um i that was that's probably the most challenging thing that i have done since i've been there um just followed the calendar of the books and relied on my city attorney and relied on the league and fellow clerks and of course our election ran pretty smoothly

Conflict can arise between employees, departments, elected officials, or members of the public. Describe how you would handle both internal workplace conflict and external conflict with citizens while maintaining professionalism and fairness?

Well, I try to make sure that I am fair and that I am professional and biased. And I also, with the public, I'm the first person that they talk to or see just about. And I try to go treat everybody with respect because not everybody knows they're calling you or coming to you for a reason and they want to be heard.

Thank you.

Yes. Thank you. Mr. Bowling.

Hey, Ms. Talbot. Glad you're here today. My name is Josh Bowling, and I am District 4. My first question is, what do you believe is the most important responsibility of the city clerk?

Oh gosh, that's a good one. Mine is to be there for my council and guide them in the way that they need to be guided. We're a small town, like I mentioned with the new administration, and I'm just always making sure that they are in the know and know everything that's coming up that they probably don't know.

Next question, what would your first 90 days in this role look like?

It would look like learning all of the policies and procedures, also making relationships with everyone here. Learn, learn, learn. Learn the things that I probably, you know, the differences between a small town and a large city.

Thank you.

Ms. Dixon?

I'm Alisa Dixon, representative of District 3. Thank you for being here and for your interest in the position. My first question is, and it's kind of a two-part question, thinking of someone you highly respect, what is something they would tell me you could improve upon, and then what would they say sets you apart that would cause them to recommend you over everyone else?

Repeat that first question.

Thinking of someone you highly respect, and you don't need to say who unless you want to, what is something they would tell me you could improve upon? That's the first part.

that's the first part probably just me I'm a little bit of a perfectionist it's probably not a bad trait but maybe just to kind of maybe chill just a little bit maybe and then I guess the second part of the question what was the second part again sorry why would they recommend you over anyone else well I am reliable organized and dependable.

Thank you. And then the next one is, when you come across a challenge you've never encountered, walk me through the process of how you get to your possible solutions.

Well, first I would research, then I would reach out to my fellow clerks and my city attorney, town attorney, and just make sure I gather all my information and make sure that everything is correct. And that everything's done correctly too, which is a big thing.

Thank you. Thank you. Mr. Hendrix.

Ms. Talbert, Jackie Hendrix, District 2. So my first question, describe your understanding of the statutory role and core duties of a municipal clerk, including responsibilities related to council meetings, ordinances, record keeping, and elections.

As far as my role in all of those, well, I'm the elections manager for my town. I do not do a lot with the court. What was the other ones? I'm sorry.

Well, council meetings, ordinances, record keeping.

Yeah. Well, I draft all of the ordinances and resolutions. I do that, of course, and then they're adopted. So I do that. Okay. record-keeping I just make sure that everything is you know saved and in the process right now of trying to digitalize everything of course because it's not at the moment so that's my goal for the town of killing is to try to get all of our records permanently safe okay so digitizing kind of leads into my second place

so what software platforms and technologies have you used for agenda packet preparation records management finance licensing functions and how comfortable are you to adapting to new systems used by the city of florence right now as far as budgets go you know software is i use excel a lot and of course word

That's how I prepare my agendas and then use a spreadsheet for budget. Right now, business license is administered through Avenue Insights, which you may or may not be familiar with that. So I could do a lot of learning with the business licenses.

Mm-hmm. Thank you. Okay, now it's me. I'm Katrina Simmons, City Council for District 1. My first question is, tell me, it's going to be about the Open Meetings Act, so tell me how do you ensure that the council meetings and agendas strictly comply with the state open meeting laws?

Well, I just look, I make sure that everything is properly done as far as agendas go and how the meetings are, you know, and I make sure that my council members know as well too. Okay.

Next question is, how would you build trust with the city council, the staff, and also with the community?

I'm very personable. I'm very easy to work with. I've probably never worked with anybody that I haven't liked or that hasn't liked me. So I'm very big on relationships.

Okay.

And strong relationships and work.

Okay. Okay. Alrighty, we appreciate that. Now at this time, you have an opportunity to provide us a closing statement in your own way, and you'll have up to two minutes. Okay.

It's going to be really brief. I'm just glad for this opportunity. I want to take my knowledge and bring it into a bigger scale. And so I just think I'm a good fit for it. I believe I can come in and delve right in and do the job.

Thank you very much. Counsel, do you have anything else? All right. Thank you for your time. Thank you for being here and have a wonderful weekend.

Thank you.

OK, at this time, it is now open for discussion. And that discussion will go all the way back to all five candidates. So it's open for the floor for each council member, whatever you want to say or don't want to say. It's up to you. We're not going to go in any particular order. Just dive in.

OK. I have my five in ranking order already. I'm just curious if any of y'all kind of have your dominant and your ranking and so forth to share.

I think I feel pretty confident right now with mine as well. If we want to share, I don't know if we want to do that or not.

I feel like having someone come in that matches our energy, that matches what we want to do for this community is huge. I think anybody could pretty much come in here with the people that we've interviewed and be able to learn this job. I think these candidates were Very wonderful in their interviews. And I'm very impressed by all of them. And I think this is definitely a very hard decision for sure. Okay. Anyone else want to speak?

would agree that these candidates were really really impressive going through their applications and I would like just a couple minutes to read over the letters of rec that I just realized were available and so I would like a second to do that I do have a couple that stand out and I I think that matching our energy as a council is important. Having some working knowledge already is really important. One thing that was important to me that I was listening for in these was their ability to interact with others even under stressful situations so I think a lot of our questions helped us come to that get those answers and so that's something that I'm I'm looking at very highly is you know I think it's really important that we have a good working relationship us with them and them with the other employees that they work with and creating that culture that will be positive and a place of growth people that another thing that was really important to me is is how willing they are to learn something new to come in and maybe do something that they aren't familiar with yet but willing to and not just willing but very eager and excited to learn something new and and to move into a different maybe aspect or a different scale of what they've been used to. Okay, thank you. Anyone else?

I was really impressed with their working knowledge, too, and their willingness to, all five of them, to step out and learn something new. and take it as a challenge. And I really feel that this needs to be somebody, I agree with the energy that we're doing as a council and how we're moving and what we're doing each and every day for our city. I question some leadership in some of them. I'm going to say that if they can actually lead a department because of the size of what they're coming to a larger city, that I have a concern for that.

Thank you. My thoughts are... Certainly we want someone who's very personable, not only to the council, to the mayor, and to the entire department of the city of Florence, but as well as for the city. I think this position is very important. It is extremely critical. I've been around a long time, so I see how hectic it becomes. We have so many different changes in operations, and also with elections, somebody's gonna have to be able to already know that, or can jump right in and catch up to speed. With that, it's so many different moving parts with that. I think knowledge is very critical. It's very important. with that especially with our size of a city considering in our area we are a large city with about 42 000 people so i think that's going to be very important for someone i appreciate every one of the candidates every one of them who stepped up step forward and wanted to be in this role. They took the time, they came and interviewed and I know it was not easy to sit here knowing that you're being videoed, to sit between, sit up here around six people and to answer these questions and we're just looking at you. I know, so I'm taking that all into consideration as well. I know that's very hard to do. It's hard for me to sit up here and speak And I might not have nothing but a camera. So I know that's difficult. So all of that is planned. So I don't take this appointment very lightly. I take it very seriously. And I take the position very seriously. So whomever, I know that they will do a good job, whoever the council decides. And if we will, I know Ms. Dixon and some others have asked to be able to review recommendation letters and they are attached to the application. So we are going to pause for a little second to give them an opportunity to read over those recommendations.

exposure questions well and I just like Billy to confirm it but I'm assuming what we're about to do is you'll open the floor for nominations which won't require second as a nomination on a motion we can have multiple nominations and then we'll vote on them individually and you can only vote for a person one time or you can only cast one vote correct my correct on that I mean that's one way to do it

As long as there's not a motion and a second to actually appoint somebody, the official appointment will be done at the next meeting with an actual resolution appointing someone. So however the council wants to do it tonight, just to discuss and figure out who, if you do come to a decision you want to appoint, is fine. But that's definitely a way to do it.

So the person with the majority vote would be the person that would advance to be on the resolution.

For the recommendation.

Ultimately, to appoint someone, the person will need to get four votes. So however the council wants to come to the... So four votes. So four votes is fine. But yeah, you can do it that way. Give everybody a chance to make nominations and then see if anybody gets four votes. Do it that way.

So just to make sure that everybody's understanding, because I know it's being videotaped, you can make nominations and can make multiple. And the one with the most votes, in which it will take four votes, will want someone to be recommended as the appointee for the city clerk.

We can make multiple. I'm sorry. This microphone is just a problem for me. So we can make multiple, like I could make multiple nominations for two different people? Or no? Just one. Just one. And also we can only vote once.

Is that right, Billy? Only vote once?

Correct. Per round.

Per round.

Per each candidate.

For each candidate, you can...

What I'm calling her round is that if we had two nominations, we would have a round of voting and you vote for one or the other. And if someone doesn't get four votes, then we go into a second round and you could change your vote. Is that correct, Bailey?

Everybody understand now? Okay. Then we're going to open it up for nominations at this time.

I'd like to nominate Shauna Talbot.

Okay, we have a nomination for Miss Talbot. Any any more nomination nominations?

I would like to nominate Ricky Williams.

So we got one for Miss Talbot and one for Mr. Williams. Any other before we close out the nominations?

I'll nominate Mr. Russ.

All right. So we have three nominations, Ms. Talbot, Mr. Russ, and Mr. Williams. Any others before we close it out? OK, the nominations are closed. We'll start off with all in favor of all who would like to support and in favor of Ms. Talbot, Ms. Shawna Talbot. What was it, three? Okay, next one, Mr. Russ. Mr. Williams? That's it, and we have one abstention. No, Mr. Spence, he did not vote. OK, that is it. So Ms. Talbot had three. Mr. Williams had two. So it looks like the recommendation will be for Ms. Shauna.

No, she didn't have four votes.

I'm sorry, she had three.

Yeah, she has to have four. Oh, yeah, that's right. So we start over.

So what do we do, Billy? Start over again?

Yeah, I mean, just. you can talk about it and figure it out however you want. We just gotta have, in order to appoint somebody, we just gotta have four people who agree on one individual.

Yeah, I think we need some discussion. I agree.

OK, so let's have a discussion on Ms. Talbot and Mr. Williams. Those were the two, the highest ones. Mr. Russ didn't get any. Ms. Michael didn't get nominated, nor did Mr. Fowles. So open for discussion.

It doesn't matter.

There's no particular order.

I was impressed with Ms. Talbot more than I even thought I would be. Her certification, she seemed very prepared. I like her energy. I think that she would do fantastic with the community. I think she can handle employees. I think even though she has done this in a small town, I do feel like she has the experience. I mean, to come in here and learn something new, um learning the software one thing I was looking for in everybody is for them to say that they would research before they did anything because that is how you get to a conclusion is you've got to research you know what you're doing and what the problem is or what you're looking for and she's the only one that said that that I heard and that that really impressed me and so I just feel like she's easygoing and I you know feel like she's knowledgeable thank you any others discussion

I also, obviously I agree. Those are many of the things that stuck out to me. And, you know, the question that I asked about thinking of somebody that they respect and what their... what they could improve upon. That was an important question to me, to see if they could, you know, not necessarily think about what they themselves think they need to improve upon, but what others maybe see in them. And, you know, she said that the thing she was was a perfectionist, and I think that's an important thing important part of this job is to be a perfectionist and even though she felt like somebody saw that as a downfall i think that's actually not a downfall for this position also um her her talking about research again we had several of them say that they would research and that's that's a big thing but also just how she said that she's very personable that people seem to really interact well with her that she interacts well with other people that stood out to me her first 90 days question learning the policies and procedures so she's really ready to jump in and learn what needs to be done recognizing that this is different than what she's been used to and then what else You asked how capable she was at adapting to new processes. And she felt like she could be very confident in that. So that was also important to me. And I think that's enough for me. Thank you.

Anyone else?

So I would like to speak on why I nominated Mr. Williams. First of all, I think we had several candidates that were impressive. The difference, though, with Mr. Williams was just he he kind of checked all the boxes for me he was extremely professional um his 42 years of experience uh in more than one city and he of everyone we interviewed he was the clerk of the largest city or town And so if we should appoint him, the learning curve is very flat for him. He will be able to hit the ground running. I think that's so important. As opposed to coming from a small town, and trying to adapt to a larger city. And then the big difference with me and with Mr. Williams and Ms. Talbert is the fact that she's only has experience with one election. And he has experience with multiple elections due to its 42 years. And I just think that for me, the experience factor and what they brought to the table, he just outdistanced them so much. Not that they're not capable of doing the job, but he just outdistanced everyone else by so far. I just felt like he was the natural pick. And there were a couple of others that were close, but they were a distant second for me.

Okay. Anyone else?

Yeah, I'd like to go ahead. I also really appreciate the years of experience that Mr. Williams has. I mean, that's a lot of years of experience, a lot of elections, just like you talked about, Jackie. I feel like every question we threw at him, he was able to answer and elaborate on every question. answer that he gave um he is extremely knowledgeable um within uh the city clerk's office also with the league of municipalities um you know one of the things is i wrote down is does a lot of homework uh that's research and and he does a lot of it um i just feel like uh My two questions, I really liked his answers. What's the most important thing? And he had a hard time answering it because everything is very, very important. But he said elections and then day to day. That's working with your staff, trying to make sure everything is taken care of for us, for the city, and then elections. He mentioned elections several times and I really appreciated that. And then, again, what's your first 90 days look like? And he said, homework, a lot of homework, a lot of research. So even though he does have the experience, you would think somebody with that many years of experience would walk in and say, you know, I don't need to do my homework. But he knows he needs to do his homework because he's been doing this job. And from what I gather, has done it very well.

Thank you. Anyone else?

I'd like to make one other comment that I should not have left out that set him apart for me is the fact that he's managed a staff. There's been a lot of change in that department. I don't know that there will be conflict because of it, but the potential is there. I've lived through that myself. And I just felt like the experience of managing staff and being equipped to deal with what potentially could happen, he's probably our best candidate in a management position.

Okay. Ms. King, was you about to say something? I was just going to say, I mean, even after all the years of experience, sometimes having somebody that has a little bit that can learn sometimes can be a better fit overall than somebody coming in that has done this for so long and knows most of it. I just feel like that people can be trained. Thank you.

Sorry. Well, I agree. You know, everybody can train to do a new job. But I feel like in the situation that we are in right now where, you know, Mr. Lighty's been with us for over 20 years. We have a new administrative assistant. Sorry. But she is new. And, you know, we need somebody with experience. to tackle what we need done currently. If this was a different situation, then maybe my vote would be a different way. But I just feel like after talking to Mr. Williams, he would be the right fit to come in day one and be able to take care of the entire department right away.

Thank you. Anyone else? Reviewing the discussion again, and I'm looking at Ms. Talbot's things that she answered. And going back over Mr. Williams' answer, he is definitely between those two, the stronger candidate that can hit the ball, hit the ground running, and I know can get us up to speed and to where we need to be. So he has a lot of strong qualities that we're going to need. So there you have it. Anybody else want to have anything else to say? OK. So do we go ahead and make the vote again? Yes, ma'am. All right. All in favor for Mr. Williams? Three. Ms. Talbot? 3-3. What do we do?

I mean, y'all can keep discussing it and trying to get four votes for somebody. I mean, like I said, there's no magic to it. At some point, we've got to have four votes for somebody.

I think clearly we're going to be at a standstill right now, for today at least. I mean, I just... I feel like we probably need to move it on to another meeting or something else.

Let me ask this. It's a 3-3. Is everybody solid on what they have just voted for? Okay. Okay.

I just feel like it. I don't think anybody.

We're not deadlocked, so it's not ready to move, obviously. So we'll take this up hopefully Tuesday.

Would it change if I nominated Bob Lighty? Could we? Yes. OK. OK.

So at this time, it is deadlock. I want to say thank you so much to the council. Thank you to everybody who had a part. Thank you to Mr. Musgrove. I know I've called you a lot. This is all new territory for everybody. that we have done it like this. And so I just appreciate you so much for answering all the calls. I thank you to the council for all of your questions. I appreciated those questions because that's how you learn by asking questions. And so what I couldn't answer right off, I did not hesitate ever to call our city attorney and he was always readily available to give me guidance to make this, to proceed with this process. So I just can't thank you all enough. for your support and your help and your patience while we all collectively work through this process. So thank you again so much. So at this time, we will stand and Mr. Bowling will dismiss us in prayer.

Let's pray. Father God, we just thank you so much for being our Lord and Savior. And Father, we just thank you for blessing us each and every day. Father, I just ask right now that you can pour your wisdom down on myself and my colleagues as we have this difficult decision in front of us. Just give us the wisdom and the peace in our decision. Father, we thank you for your son Jesus and the sacrifice on the cross. In the mighty name of Jesus, I pray. Amen.