City Council - Special Meeting

I'm calling this meeting to order. If you would please rise for the Pledge of Allegiance. Please be seated. Chris, if you would take the roll, please.

Council Member Cavanaugh. Here. Council Member Reed. Here. Council Member Galloway. Here. Council Member Hoffman.

Here.

Council Member Dupre. Here. Mayor Foote. Here.

With that, I will entertain a motion to approve the agenda.

So moved.

Second. Chris, take the roll.

Council Member Cavanaugh.

Here. Yes.

Council Member Reed. Yes. Council Member Galloway. Yes. Council Member Hoffman.

Yes.

Council Member Dupre. Yes.

With this agenda, it's a little bit different than normal. So to start off, we would need to entertain a motion to remove the item off the table.

Motion to remove the item off the table.

Second.

Okay. Chris, take the roll, please.

Council Member Kavanagh? Yes. Council Member Reid? Yes. Council Member Galloway? Yes. Council Member Hoffman? Yes. Council Member Dupre? Yes. And then appointment of Director of Finance for the City of Ottumwa. Recommendation, confirm the appointment of Michael Lee as the Director of Finance for the City of Ottumwa effective on or before September 1st, 2026.

Do I have a motion to approve?

So moved.

Second. Okay. You need to take the roll again? No. So with discussion, I just wanted to, I kind of have a little bit of an order here. So we'll follow that. And I just wanted to first commend the council, all of you for being so careful in this process. I know it hasn't been easy and I know that each one of you wants to make sure that we're doing the right thing for the city of Ottumwa. And so I know you've heard a lot from the people of Ottumwa and you've asked various people questions and direction. And so I just wanted to commend all of you for the work that you've done to get to this point here today. I know as Representative Galloway mentioned that this would be number five out of five years as far as finance officers. So we wanna make sure that we're doing it right. And with that, yeah, I'm just glad that you guys are taking the time to make sure that we're doing it right. So that's where I wanted to start. And with that, I want to turn it over to the administrator for his opening comments.

All right. Thank you. So this kind of leads into that. Through my meetings with city council members over the past couple of days, it's been brought to my attention that there is some confusion regarding the hiring process for the role of finance director. As a result, I think it'd be helpful to distinguish between governance and administration. The council's role is to establish policy and provide direction on behalf of the public. The administrator's role is to carry out that direction professionally and efficiently. Maintaining that distinction helps ensure accountability and respects the responsibilities assigned to each role under Iowa law. A healthy municipal government depends on maintaining the distinction between governance and administration. The city council's role is to determine what the city should accomplish by establishing policy and priorities, while the city administrator's role is to determine how those policies are carried out through professional administration. While the administrator is expected to provide recommendations and expertise, policy decisions ultimately belong to the elected governing body. Likewise, council members generally avoid directing the day-to-day work of city staff, relying instead on the administrator to implement council direction efficiently and consistently. The council governs, the city administrator manages. Or another way to consider, the elected officials decide the destination, the city administrator plans the route and drives the bus there. The city of Ottumwa's form of government places distinct but complimentary responsibilities on the elected mayor and city council and the city administrator. The mayor and city council are entrusted by Iowa law and the city's charter with establishing policy, adopting ordinances and resolutions, approving the budget and setting the community's priorities. The city administrator by contrast is appointed by and serves at the direction of the city council as a city's chief administrative officer. The administrator's responsibility is to implement the policies adopted by the governing body, oversee the day-to-day operations of city government, supervise the administration of city departments, including the selection of viable candidates. and provide professional recommendations to assist the Council in its decision making. The administrator may recommend policy, but the authority to establish policy rests with the elected officials. For good governance, it's important that policy decisions remain with the elected governing body, while the administrative decisions remain with the city administrator. Clear rule definitions help avoid misunderstandings, promote transparency, and allow each position to fulfill its responsibilities effectively. The delineation of roles transfers into employment practices. Even with the recently modified ordinance, the city administrator serves as the hiring authority, subject to approval of the city council for department heads. The city council is the hiring authority for the city administrator, city clerk, city attorney, and via the solid waste commission, along with Wappalo County Board of Supervisors, the landfill supervisor. While hiring and approval of an appointment are related, they are distinct steps in the employment process. Hiring is a process of choosing and employing a person. Approval of an appointment is the official authorization that confirms the person may be placed into a specific position. In other words, hiring is the decision to employ someone, while appointment approval is the formal approval that makes the employment official. A quick example would be if we think of it like buying a house. An individual chooses the house they want, that's hiring, but they don't own the house until all the paperwork is signed and approved. That's the appointment. In this example, the hiring authority or city administrator selects the house and the city council represents the entity completing the paperwork. As mentioned last week, applications were received and candidates were interviewed for the position with the recommendation of Mr. Lee put before the City Council for approval. Lee has met the criteria for the role and is a qualified applicant, and I again respectfully request the City Council make the employment official by approving the appointment.

Thank you, Administrator. I know that we had received a couple letters from the public that wanted to be read tonight, and I guess at this time I'm going to ask Chris to read both of those letters.

Okay, the first one we received, and I believe she sent it to all council members as well, is from Brenda Case. She was not able to come tonight, but she wanted to make sure this gets read to everybody. It says, the Tomah City Council Members... I am disappointed to learn that you tabled the matter of appointing a finance director. Your complaints seem centered on the existing budget. While the budget situation is dire, failing to hire and retain a qualified financial professional is not a reasonable response. This is exactly the situation in which such a professional is desperately needed. The city cannot bluff or DIY its way through the situation or tack responsibility on our collective finances onto the full-time city administrator's job. Both are full-time, responsible, professional positions and should be treated as such. Tabling difficult decisions seems to be a trademark of this council. It is your responsibility, your sworn duty, in fact, to make difficult decisions. A qualified professional has been found. The agreed upon salary is in the budget. The path forward is clear. Hire the person, provide all the information they need to onboard. Then heed their recommendation. Your attention would best be spent finding out why we can't seem to keep financial professionals on staff. The last finance director attributed his departure to poor working relationships with elected officials. I suggest you investigate and address those without delay. Sincerely, Brenda Case." And then I also received a message from Carson Chestnut, who is the chair for our Human Rights Commission. He just wanted to make sure that this gets shared with all of you. It says, Council, I'm emailing to voice my support for hiring a new finance director. While I understand the concern due to the city's budget, I am concerned about how the city will operate without one. Additionally, I do not believe it is in the city's best interest to add additional responsibilities to current staff. I believe this would lead to lower staff morale, issues recruiting prospective employees, and a decline in public trust. Thank you, Carson Chestnut.

All right, thank you, Chris. Before we get to council, I do have two people who wanted to speak on this matter. So I'm going to call them up first. So Travis Decker, if you would come up and speak.

Again, Travis Decker, 719 Glenwood Avenue, Ottumwa, Iowa. And so I reached out to each of the city council members and asked a very important question. And that question was this, have you been able to talk to or interview Michael Lee, the man applying for CFO? And with questions, because they have questions, we have questions as citizens, do you know what ideas he brings to the table to help our city overcome the financial shortfall? Do you know if he will be looking out for our citizens or whether he is going to continue the 15 to $20,000 raises to the upper administration? One, I did not hear back from, maybe they didn't get the email, that's fine. Each of the others said they had not been able to have a meeting with Mr. Lee. At first, I thought this might be neglect on the part of the council members until I found out they requested to meet with him and were met with great resistance by city administration. Mr. Lee may be the greatest man for the job. He may have wonderful ideas to make this city financially sound. I spoke with Mr. Lee outside after the last meeting, pleasant guy, friendly guy. I had a good conversation with him, but it wasn't an interview type situation at all. How can the council vote to hire someone they have not had a chance to ask questions which are important to them and questions which are important to the citizens? And as far as the previous finance director and his resignation letter, it was clear that he did not feel accountability to the people of Ottumwa. He felt only accountability to the city administrator. And he expressed that in his letter as he exited the town. But ultimately, we're expecting everyone in the city to be looking out for the best interest of the citizens. When we look at price or wage raises like these, for instance, 2023, a $91,000 salary. In 2024, $103,000 salary. In 2025, $122,000 salary. Those are extreme raises in salaries. Another one, 155 in 2023, 163 in 2024, 177 in 2025. Again, these are examples of very, very extreme raises. And considering the finance officer, again, he may come in and $142,000, whatever, and he may save the city $280,000 by really looking into the budget. And that would be very great. But one thing to consider is if he comes in at 140 or 42 or whatever it is this year, is it going to be 155 next year, 170 the year after, 200 the year after? How are these raises going to continue? Just some things to consider and some thoughts concerning concerning hiring the man. Again, he may be the greatest guy for the job. And I'm all for that if he is. but we just need to know some things, I guess.

Thank you. Thank you. Brian Morgan.

Thank you. I'm Brian Morgan, born and raised here. Set up there for a time right where you guys are. And I went a lot of different directions of where I really kind of wanted to take this. And boy, I'd really like to answer some of those questions. And the one I will answer is all those raises mentioned was approved right up there. Ain't the finance director doing that? And the finance director ain't gonna dig in there and find too much stuff because they don't exist. You can look at your state level and the house file those past a few years ago to put the cities in the shape that it's in now, the counties it's in the shape that it's in now. I'll go away for that. As I said, I was born and raised here, and there was a long time, I can tell you. Agassiz School, I was about eight years old. Carl Radosevich came and planted a tree at Agassiz School. I was eight or nine years old. Not a big deal, but boy, that was the mayor. There was a dignitary. And for some stupid reason, growing up, I always admired people sitting in those seats. Got to know people like Bob Mercer when I was a kid. Later in life, getting to know the Frank Fishers, the Gerald Breezes, the Gordon Aistropes that I'm gonna tell you when I started running, I didn't like Gordon, but I didn't know Gordon, and I've become great friends with him. A very educated person, a person that thought things through, a person that didn't grandstand, a person that handled things professionally. And I think that's something that we've missed through this whole process. I do think there's a way that the city administrator can make the hire, but the council can be a part of that, and we've done it. When we hired certain positions, the council was in on those interviews. We broke it down, you'd have Phil and two people, you'd have the mayor and two people, you'd have Barb and two people, and everyone got asked those questions. So I do think there's a definite way that you can do that, that you can be accountable for that, and maybe that's something you should look at in the future. Now getting to the budget side of this position, and I know it was said that one concern was fiduciary responsibility in hiring this position. Your budget was ratified three months ago. There's no difference. No difference at all. That doesn't make you look financially responsible. It makes you look inept that you went through the hiring process. You posted this job. You went through the interviews and you hired the person. And I'm gonna pick on Ms. Dupre for just a second, your post on Facebook, should we hire Michael Lee as finance director? You shouldn't have used his name. Should we fill the financial director position? So be it. It is a slippery slope, folks, and the city gets sued every day. You've got to be careful. You're in those seats. This is not a Facebook poll position. You were elected. You were hired to make these decisions. It's on you to make those decisions. I personally don't think you can combine Phil's job with a finance director. I believe Keith may have been on council and Heffernan took over for city administrator for a short amount of time. I do think that's a possibility, but in closing, I do believe you need to hire your finance director, be that Michael Lee or anyone else. It's a top three position in the city that does need filled. Otherwise you're looking at a lot of red tape, possible fines, other things you don't want to get into at the state so thank you for your time thank you um katie howard

I did not think that I would have, I'm sorry, Katie Howard, 15477 Eddyville Road. I did not think I would have an opportunity to speak tonight because it says clearly public forum and there's no call to the public. So I don't have prepared remarks. However, as usual, my comments have to do with process. One is if you're going to allow the public to speak, you should say so on your agenda. That's an aside. The other thing is that When I worked for five different county governments, we had hiring processes that were very transparent. And in every single case, the board or council was involved in those hiring processes. Yes, the applicants were screened by upper level staff, if it was a director level position. But at that point, There were often, in fact, at Cochise County, where we had the most arduous hiring process I've ever seen in my life, there were often full board meetings with every board member in attendance. There were posted meetings. And the applicant came in one at a time. There were written portions. There were oral portions. There were problem-solving portions. At the end of this process, and those were all independent, but at the end of this process, when the board was involved, what would happen is they would bring in every single qualified applicant who had been vetted, to that room and they structured a debate among those applicants and the board evaluated their process and their and their their performance in that i went through that myself when they hired me let me tell you it is it's nerve-wracking but it is extremely revealing we began using it for uh not just upper tier uh positions i just You know, you need to hire a finance manager. I get that. But I just think you can tighten up your processes and have a better result and wind up with more than two applicants. Thank you for your time.

Thank you. Colleen, are you speaking on this matter? Okay. Yes. I'm Colleen Decker.

Colleen Decker, 719 Gladwin Avenue. I'm not here trying to scold anybody. I'm not scolding through a letter, and I'm not scolding up here. I have a misunderstanding, probably. We elected a city council, and we would like for them to be able to ask questions. If I was hiring someone for... mowing my lawn i would want to ask them questions i don't see why that is and if we don't want that then i guess i'm just wondering why why we don't want to know or we don't want the council to be able to ask them um that's my question i don't know if you can answer that but I would like to know, and we did elect a good city council, and we appreciate the time because they are not being paid for the time they put into this, but they care about our city. We care about our city. We know we need someone. We just want to know about them, and I don't know why that's a crime or why we're getting bashed for that. Anyway, thank you.

All right, thank you. With that, I don't have anything else from public, so I would turn it over to council for questions and comments.

May I respond to Mr. Morgan's comments? He pointed out to us that we were responsible for our budget, which was passed three months ago. But I would point out to him that budget was passed at the direction of our finance director, three quarters of a million deficit. That's a negative number. And so that's why we are appearing very concerned.

Thank you.

I have some comments and I wrote my comments down too, because I lose my brain sometimes, especially right now. So I just want to explain how I'm approaching this decision and address a few concerns that have been raised with me by, you know, just sitting up here, having conversations, the public and just so on. So first, I just want to say that I am not in favor of having Administrator Rath serve in both the city administrator position and the finance director roles. Again, as I said last time, I had concerns with that just as an option because we did see that for a short time. But also I'm going to go back to an email that was sent by Administrator Rath on May 12th, stating that he had been informed there was a possibility that his contract would not be renewed. I was not part of any conversations regarding the potential non-renewal of his contract. So when the email was circulated, I spoke directly with Mr. Rath to better understand this statement. If there is in fact an intention among this council not to renew his contract when it comes before us in February, then asking him to assume both positions does not make sense to me. We would find ourselves needing to hire both the finance director and city administrator at the same time. In my opinion, that would create unnecessary instability in two of the most important leadership positions within the city. So then even if we set aside that issue, the council has had repeated public discussions about the city's finances, the financial oversight audits, and the public's confidence in how the city funds are being managed. Combining these positions could create additional concerns and leave the city, like Mr. Morgan stated, more vulnerable rather than providing the stability and separation of responsibilities we needed. To Mr. Decker's point, I was asked if I personally interviewed the candidate, and while I did not, I did have in-depth conversations with Administrator Rath about the candidate. We discussed qualifications, why this one was selected over other candidates, what support may be needed for this candidate to be successful, and how administration plans to address any areas where additional training or development may be necessary, and then the ability to work together. Based on the information I've received and the concerns outlined above, I do believe the responsible path forward is to approve the appointment of the candidate, Mr. Lee, as the finance director. This provides the city with dedicated leadership in the finance department and avoids creating additional uncertainty around two critical positions. And then I also just want to thank everyone who reached out, shared their questions and concerns. I do truly appreciate the public coming forward and voicing their opinions.

Thank you. Thank you. Any other comments or questions from council?

I would like to comment again, Your Honor. Yeah. I am acquainted with the Lee family here in Ottumwa and have been for years, Charles Lee and his photography business. I have not been personally involved with Mike Lee. I'm aware of him, but I haven't had personal relationships with Mike Lee. although nothing that I would say would defame him in terms of his ability to be a CPA and possibly take over the finances of the city of Ottumwa. However, having said that, I can tell you that the city has to stay within a budget. And I believe that Mrs. Cujo and the administrator have set up what they believe to be a budget, what they call a step process. And I don't agree with it. In fact, I disagree with it. I think it fails the test of how much money we have and how much we can afford to pay out. And so it's nothing against Mr. Lee. I think he may be a qualified candidate. However, since none of the council had an opportunity to be in on the interviews or interview him individually, I think that lacks clearance. I don't think that the administrator without having some input from the council. And I, as a council member, object to his putting his foot on my face and making me squirm. So I think we just need to continue to look at what we're talking about. I probably will be in favor of tabling again tonight. But we do need a finance director. But we need someone that can fit our budget as well.

Anything else, Council? Mr. Mayor, if I could.

I feel thankful that we have a local family and local man that's available that has a good reputation. Seems to be, from anybody I've talked to, and I've talked to several, good reputation, well thought of family, well thought of folks. And I believe that we've determined that he's qualified And he's willing to serve, and he lives right here. And I think that's a blessing. I think there's a lot of towns around the state of Iowa that probably wish they had such a candidate ready to go. our process here today is really not it's not about the process really we may have had different ideas of how the process was going to go but it's really about finding a good man for the job and in what i can determine from I'll just say this reading the interview questions and the answers, um, they all look good to me. And it seems like he had good responses and, and, uh, you know, we don't know what person's heart necessarily, but he's excited about serving. He's excited about being a part of the good things that are going on here at Ottumwa. Um, he wants to help advance that. And, um, I feel like, um, we're, um,

we're blessed to have somebody right here that's ready to take the position and i'm i'm in favor of voting him into that position all right thank you anyone else i have a couple things mr morgan you're right i should not have used his name i did because it was in the in the packet but i do apologize to mr lee and his family for that um a couple of things When I was doing my research today, I want to thank Mr. Rath for explaining to us about the general fund. So I did look into that, and he's absolutely correct. It's not going to hit our bottom line. It comes out of an administrative fee. And just so the public understands as well as I found out today, is that the salaries for a lot of these executives are paid out of this general, the administrative fee, and it's an account 001-000-4595, which is where the revenue is. And the way that revenue is collected is through the enterprise zones or the different departments that have a revenue stream. for receiving money. So like your garbage, your sewer, the airport fuel, the library, the cemetery where they sell lots, landfill, those things, that's where the money's collected. So we, yes, did budget for the revenue to be 1,752,000. And it's estimated that those fees, if you add all of those together, they're gonna collect $1,746,834. And that explains to me why Cole was always saying that the admin fees were non-negotiable. That was to cover approximately 12 people's salaries that are at what we would consider an executive level. So I do apologize for getting that confused and not understanding that completely. Did I get that right?

Well, it's not only salaries. It's anything. So that's going to be attorney fees. That's going to be commodities. That's anything that's within the administrative functions, the support services that provide support to any of the other functions throughout the city.

Okay. Hopefully I got it right.

The concept, yes.

Thank you. All right. Secondly, it was probably very uncomfortable last meeting for Mr. Lee to be sitting in the audience and have us all sitting up here questioning and going back and forth. There was confusion on a lot of our parts as far as what it was our responsibility and where we were at. In looking at anything with Mr. Lee, I knew that he had checked all the boxes. He was local. He was qualified. He had experience. The only questions I had was questions I would have probably asked had I been in any kind of an interview process. Why did he want to come here? Why, you know, was it a passion? You don't just come working for city government because you like stress. There's a lot. And when I suggested combining the roles, it was only temporary. It was not permanent. I was only saying it was in the ordinance and that has gotten really blown up by a lot of people thinking that I meant full-time. I did not mean that full-time. I mean, right now you're doing both jobs. I'm sure there's a lot of stress. I just didn't want us to rush through just as Ms. Galloway said, in five years, we've had four. We've had the same people interviewing them and the same processes going on as far as I knew. I'm new to this. I didn't know what the whole process was. So if I've caused an upheaval, I apologize. I did want to hear from the public. We did hear from the public. And I appreciate everybody contacting us and letting us know where they stand. I do not question Mr. Lee's abilities. I think they're probably very strong. And I appreciate the fact that he has a CPA. I've worked with a lot of CPAs. They work hard to get there. It's a really tough test. And to maintain it, you have to stay on top of things. So I just wanted to clear a few things up there, and I appreciate your time.

All right. Thank you.

Mr. Hoffman.

I'll preface everything I'm saying. We're going to go up a little bit and then we're going to come down. Sitting up here responsible for taxpayer money. I will discuss money and table anything we need to to discuss it. That's just the way it is. I understand. I mean, just because we didn't want it to be a rushed process. As you can see, there was some processes that we need to put together. So just because we sit up here and want to table something and discuss a budget doesn't make us irresponsible, doesn't make us stupid. It means that we want to understand it. With that being said, I did look into things today and just because we tabled last week doesn't mean we weren't in favor of Mr. Lee, at least that's for my case. We have more understanding of the process now. So when I look back in the past, when I got elected council, there was a big problem we had to take care of. I would go to city hall and we had a finance director that was walking around and looked like he knows what was going on. Then we got one in, Very good, but didn't want to come to Ottumwa. Then we had Cole. I mean, okay, he was going to move someday. But now we have a chance to get somebody who was born and raised in Ottumwa, who's familiar with Ottumwa, who's engaged in Ottumwa, whose whole family is engaged in Ottumwa. And you know what? I wrote pages and pages. I stayed up late just writing pros and cons, and I'd wake up. And when I write down all the pros, the only con I wanted to think about was the salary. So I based research on salary. The average salary for a finance director for a town our size and even a little bit smaller is 125 to 203. he falls in the center of that because he has a CPA certification. If I'm correct, our last finance director did not have a CPA certification, right? So when you look up the roles and responsibilities of a CPA, this is what a CPA with no financial experience brings to the table, but this is all positive. Core accounting skills, strong internal controls, objective problem solving, a fresh perspective, familiarity with audits of all kinds and familiarity with government laws. Just because he hasn't done a municipality doesn't mean he's not familiar with government laws. He's had jobs where he's had to comply and know these things. Now, I do want a real quick address because it popped into my head because I did get a lot of questions is why couldn't the council talk to Mr. Lee? Well, that actually is, I went back and looked for everything. and I wanna be transparent about it, it's a little bit of our fault. We're the one that made the policy that the council had the last say, but we didn't put anything in it about. But I don't say that to put down city administrator Rask's abilities. I think he did pick the right person here, but I did want to explain that. So that was a policy problem. So when you look at it, the only real con was the salary, but I believe with what we are getting, We have somebody, like I said, new with a fresh perspective. And I did inquire because there was some concern about he's never done municipalities. Iowa League of Cities is a great resource. Phil and I have talked about some other resources that we could hook him up with. And not only that, he's a smart guy. He's a CPA. All the stuff he's ran, he can figure out the municipalities. Now, before anybody asks the next question, the average time it takes an accounting person and a CPA to gather city knowledge is six to 12 months. So there's a learning curve. But if we had somebody with city experience come here, there would still be a learning curve because it's our town, it's the right individual. So I'm going to stop with that, but my intention is I want to support Mr. Lee because we've always said, I've sat right here and people at that podium have sat and said, why don't the good jobs go to a Tumlins? Now it's going to an Tumlin. Now we have a good job going to an Tumlin, a good person, good family that's been in our community for years and extremely engaged. So I, you know, my intention, I'm supporting.

I just have one more comment, if that's all right. I just want to address Councilperson Cavanaugh's comments too. So yes, the council did approve our budget. We also did approve the step, the steps, the, I am struggling with my brain and names. What is it? Compensation. Compensation handbook. And so if we don't like that, that is on us. And I know that I think Mayor Foote is going to bring that up for in a session so we can have conversations then. But we also while we were up here discussing our budget, we did talk about. upcoming raises and cost of living adjustments too. And as a council, we didn't put that on the table for cuts for the next year too. So we as a council have that responsibility. And if we, we just need to look back. And again, we were up here, we approved the budget. We approved the compensation step. I feel like a few months ago too, wasn't it? Again, additions. Thank you. Yeah, so it's brought every year, too. So, again, that's on us, too. I appreciate Councilperson Hoffman's words, too. Also, I learned that Mr. Lee is very well-knowledged in the intricacies of GASB, which is government stuff, too. Phil can fill you more in on that, but I don't know what it is. So, that's... Stuff that he needs to know, too. I did ask Phil about that today because I was asked that. So maybe he's coming in a couple steps ahead with that government knowledge, too.

Go ahead.

Any other comments from comments? I do one more thing. I do want to thank, you know, no matter what side you are on, I do want to thank everybody that got to that podium, everybody that sent an email, everybody that made a phone call, because believe me, that truly makes a difference. It truly does. No matter what opinion have or what side of the aisle you're on. In fact, Hearing both sides, I actually felt good about hearing from people because we help quite a bit of people and that means people are watching us. That's what needs to happen. I appreciate everybody who reached out and everybody because they were good ideas. There was some different ideas shared that we may bring up later. I just wanted to appreciate everybody for that.

Your Honor, I have one further comment that seems to be overlooked most of the time. When we say there's a wage, let's say $142,000, which is the number that we're talking about tonight, we say that's the number. We fail to point out that that also gets additional benefits. So by the time you get done adding additional benefits to that salary, it's going to be $160,000, not $142,000. So everyone that gets a wage from the city gets a benefit package that elevates their income, and the city has to pay it. We have no choice. So every time we pick a salary, we also have to pick a benefit package that complements it. I'm done, thank you.

All right, thank you. Anything else from council? Before I call for the roll, I want to thank you all for your due diligence in asking questions, listening to comments, listening to the public, taking each one of them seriously. And yeah, as I said at the beginning, I commend you for the work that you've done through this process. And with that, Chris, please take the roll.

Hold on. Does the council have any choice? to change the wage that was negotiated with Mr. Lee or what the administrator negotiated with Mr. Lee has to be in place. We don't have any choice. Answer that question.

I will turn that over to Administrator Rath.

The discussion with Mr. Lee is that was the minimum that he would be able to accept to leave his current role. So I guess the room would be up if that was the desire. But if it's lower, I don't think you have him coming.

Well, that's an interesting concept. That means the council didn't have a chance to hear that. Only you knew that he would go to work for no less than that.

No, I did share that.

I didn't hear all that.

It was sent out in an email to the council.

Well, but that's not discussion.

Before presenting Mr. Lee, even last Tuesday, I had requested information from council to see if that seller was a non-starter, then I wouldn't have even brought him forward.

Okay, well, if I was asked that question a week ago, then I would have had to say, it's a non-starter. We don't have the money.

Okay.

I see Councilman Cavanaugh's concerns. I really do. But, and I'm talking about my research, it could possibly cost us more by not having somebody qualified in that role. I get the salary. I get it. But there's a big potential loss. I mean, you know, I have to weigh that in my mind too. And it's not that I disagree with Councilman Kavanagh. It's just I'm looking at, I'm weighing. And I don't know. I really... I really believe Mr. Lee is the person for the job. And I did have actually a discussion, I was aware of the, Phil brought, City Administrator Rath, sorry, brought to my attention about the 142, because we had talked about And there were, I just wanted to clear up a couple comments. There were six candidates, not two, there were six. And from what I understand, I didn't look at every one, just some, but there was good candidates. I mean, they were all, I would say, pretty good. I mean, they weren't, you know, just somebody who didn't know anything. And I hate to keep rambling on, I just wanna make sure I'm transparent to everybody why I make my decisions and so you can understand. But I think this is our chance to get somebody loyal to a TUMWA and that's important with knowledge.

Barb, when is he eligible for another step and how much additional funds would that amount to?

Based on the current compensation handbook, employees are eligible for a step based upon the step that they're on.

So what step was it that he was on? He was on seven.

With the CPA, it would be seven. Yeah, that's what I was going to say.

One step was a CPA certification. Since he would be at a step seven, it would be three years. He would then be eligible for his next step.

Which is how much?

Well, it would depend based on all of the COLAs and everything that we get at that point.

Our steps. Just give me a round number. Approximately.

Our steps are anywhere between two to two and a half percent, depending upon where they're at.

That's per year.

So that would be.

Between steps. Per step. Oh, per step.

Yes. Roughly 25,000 plus benefits.

So it doesn't change per year.

Okay. We got like three questions going on. So what will happen because he's on step seven in three years, he'd be eligible for the next step, which would be step eight. We don't know what that is because we will approve a COLA every year. For that or deny a COLA, whatever council does. So we do not know exactly what that amount is going to be. However, right now in between the different steps, it's anywhere between two to two and a half percent of an increase.

Okay. Well, based on that salary, that would be around $5,000. Rough estimate. Two and a half percent. 140 or 50,000 would be around $5,000 additional.

142, it would be 3,550. At 2.5%. Based on what numbers? 142,000 times 2.5%. Sorry, I can't hear you. 145,550 times.

Sorry, I used the wrong number.

2.5% would be $3,550. No, I did the math wrong.

My bad.

And that he would get that increase in three years according to our current compensation handbook.

Who made the decision to offer him step seven to start with?

That was a conversation that was had between the city administrator and I based on the rules that are in the current compensation handbook.

But he got a step because of the CPA certification, right? Because Cole didn't have that. Correct. I'm not running Cole down. I'm just saying.

Yes. So part of the compensation handbook does state that if an employee does have a certification that is of use to the city, they may qualify for additional steps. And so during the negotiation that Administrator Rath had with him, they agreed upon a step five with two additional steps for having that CPA. And as long as he maintains that CPA, he will continue to receive those two extra steps. There is paperwork that is filled out and it is filed and is put into his personnel file. So we have it documented as well. And that is what we have done with other employees because there are other employees. I selfishly as well, I received my SHRM certification, which is for HR. And because of that, and it's of use to the city, I also get that. Our city clerk has it as well. So it is something that is done for other employees.

I'm not arguing with other people. I'm arguing whether we have enough money to do that kind of process. We are three-quarters of a million dollars deficit as of the last filing, and we spend money like we got it.

And I think mayor, that's why you wanted to bring that forward.

Yeah. I think that one, just to have a better understanding of the step system and the comprehensive salary scale and how that works. I think that could be a huge benefit for council as we continue to look at next year's budget, the budget after that and how that interacts with that. That's one of the things I wanted to bring up in a, in a work session. So we could just discuss that openly. So, yep. If nothing else, Chris, please take the roll.

Council Member Cavanaugh.

What am I voting on?

The appointment of the Director of Finance for the City of Ottumwa, approving the confirmation.

Thank you.

Council Member Reid.

Yes.

Council Member Galloway. Yes. Council Member Hoffman.

Yes.

Council Member Dupre. Yes. Motion passes 4-1.

Thank you. With that, this is a public forum, and we had two people that wanted to speak on non-agenda items, so I'm gonna call those two up. First, we'll ask for Chief Canto.

Good evening, my name's Shawn Canto. I'm here tonight. I live at 401 Edwards Drive. I'm speaking as a citizen of the city of Tumwa in Waplow County. I'm speaking as a private citizen on a matter of significant public concern and safety. The First Amendment to the United States Constitution protects the right of every citizen to speak openly about public safety, government performance, the use of taxpayer resources. These comments are made in the capacity as a citizen and reflect my own views regarding the issues that directly affect the health and safety and welfare of this community. When someone calls 911 because a loved one is having a heart attack, a child cannot breathe, or someone has been seriously injured, they are not concerned with politics, personalities, or who provides the service. They simply want help to arrive quickly with the right personnel, the right equipment, and the ability to provide the highest level of care possible. That is what this conversation should be about. Over the past several months, there has been considerable discussion regarding the future of emergency medical services in the City of Ottumwa and Wapello County. Unfortunately, much of that discussion has focused on personalities instead of performance, opinions instead of evidence, and defending the status quo instead of asking difficult but necessary questions that every community should ask about a critical public service. It is also important to recognize that some of the data presented through this discussion does not provide the complete picture of emergency medical services in the city of Ottumwa and Wapello County. Individual statistics such as average response times or isolated performance measures can be useful, but they should be viewed as that in isolation. A comprehensive evaluation of an EMS system must consider the entire continuum of service, including response time distributions, 90th percentile performances, staffing levels, unit availability, concurrent calls, dispatching processes, geographic coverage, mutual aid utilization, clinical capabilities, financial sustainability, workforce challenges, and overall system reliability. When only one selected data point presented with broader operational context, they can complete or they can create an incomplete or misleading understanding of how the system is actually performing. The citizens of the City of Ottumwa and Wapello County deserve a complete, transparent, and objective assessment of the entire system, not conclusions based on isolated statistics or impartial information. So what we have to do is we have to answer these questions honestly. It has to be transparent. It requires looking at things objectively. And is the system that is currently in place able to meet future demands? I believe it does not. Every organization must evaluate itself honestly, and public safety should be held to no lower standard. So as I ask this evening, we should challenge ideas, we should challenge data, we should question recommendations, we should have respectful disagreements, but we should never attempt to silence or discredit individuals simply because they ask difficult questions or present information that is uncomfortable or some people do not want to hear. So thank you, and I appreciate you allowing me to speak this evening.

Thank you. With that, I'd ask Rick Beck.

Rick Bick, 1204 North Wapello. I'm just going to change the tone. I was looking at this when this year started with the new mayor and city council. I heard the same thing I've heard every year and every election for years here is it's the same old, same old. They never do anything. Well, I agree. I'm kind of excited to share, and I don't know, maybe some of these people or city administrators and people know what's going on, but there's a new wave in the community. I have outreaches in all sorts of areas and people are saying, hey, we're really glad about our mayor and our city council. We're glad that they're actually doing something. They're actually asking questions. They're actually making people accountable. They're excited about it. We see little things happening. Uh, some of the comments I'm hearing is, I mean, it's, it sounds kind of stupid, but your trash trucks are clean. When's the last time you had a, except when it came off the new lot, they're cleaning them every week. That's saying something that, you know, people are saying, Hey, you know what, we're going to make a tumble shine. There's things going on. I'm involved in certain means. And there's a couple of businesses knocking on the door, begging to come here. I'm kind of concerned about, uh, Old timers that are here, city people that are gonna block the way. This city has a history of entrepreneurship. If you do the history of this, the number of inventions and things that were done in this city is incredible. One person had like 196 patents. in Ottumwa, and that is beginning to move again. There's people coming up with ideas for businesses. We have a young man, 18 years old, starting an ice cream, I mean, did an ice cream shop over on Elvia Road. That's exciting. We got other people talking about things. That's exciting. So I just wanna say, some of the stuff that we just heard is garbage. Okay, the attacks on people, this new thing about a hostile work environment, there's been some things done and said around here that were purposely done right here for a hostile work environment, but that's changing. And so I just want to say is that I'm encouraged. I'm seeing encouragement in our city about people getting excited about the things are changing. The streets are changing. Like I said, the trash trucks, you know, you're seeing people mow their lawns. Across from my church, there's a house that hasn't mowed its lawn in years and they're mowing it every week now. Why? Nobody went over and told them to. There's something going on. There's a new thing going on in the city. There's a new thing being birthed in our city that's getting excited about it somewhat again. And so let's get on that wave instead of everything else. So anyway, thank you for your time.

All right, thank you. Again, this is a public forum. Is there anyone else that would like to come forward and speak? If not, I would entertain a motion to adjourn.

Second.

Chris, take the roll, please.

Council Member Kavanagh?

Yes.

Council Member Reid?

Yes.

Council Member Galloway? Yes. Council Member Hoffman? Yes. Council Member Dupre? Yes.