Columbia City Council to begin search for new city manager

UPDATE: According to city spokesman Steve Sapp, the 2010 and 2011 search for a city manager was done by Affion Public for a $20,000 fee. The city also agreed on an expense price that would not exceed $6,000.

Sapp said he’s working to find out how the city paid for it.

ORIGINAL STORY: Columbia City Manager Mike Matthes’ resignation is official at 5 p.m. Wednesday, and with that, the city council will be tasked with the job of finding a new person for the job.

On Monday, the council will meet to consider Matthes’ severance agreement, as well as consider Deputy City Manager John Glascock for the interim position. If the council appoints Glascock to the interim position, he’ll make an annual salary of $164,822.11: a 5 percent raise from his previous position.

Beyond that, it’s unclear at this point what the council could do in its search for the new city manager. Former councilwoman Laura Nauser was part of the search for two city managers: Bill Watkins and Mike Matthes. She remembered that they went with an outside group to find the right person for the position.

“It’s kind of a very limited pool of people across the country,” she said. “It’s not an overnight process.”

She couldn’t recall how much it cost but imagined the money came from discretionary funding within the budget. ABC 17 News is waiting to hear back from Human Resources to find out how much it cost and where the money came from last time.

Nauser said she thought it was critical to have a city manager who was a “jack of all trades” because Columbia is a large municipality with diverse needs and groups, some of which are extremely vocal.

“I feel that now with Mr. Matthes leaving that they will become even more vocal,” she said. “Whoever the city manager is that comes to our community is going to have to actually deal with that group.”

She said that whether you liked him or not, Matthes was conservative in his budgeting and “kept our city in good financial health.”

Hopefully when (the council) go(es) forward and look(s) for this city manager, they will take into consideration the budget and some of the budget constraints we have,” Nauser said.

ABC 17 reported Tuesday that Matthes’ severance is $179,659.61. This includes his annual base salary of $166,456 and his remaining vacation hours multiplies by his hourly rate of $80.027.

Dan Ross is the executive director of the Missouri Municipal League, which offers resources and advice to municipal officials to help them do their job effectively. He was not surprised or concerned with the amount of Matthes’ severance.

“It sounds like a lot of money, but it’s typical compensation for an executive,” he said. “The city manager’s CEO of a fairly large organization and if you look at the size of Columbia’s budget, it pales in comparison to that.”

ABC 17 News reached out to the city of Springfield to find out what a similar agreement with its city manager looks like. According to documentation sent to ABC 17, City Manager Jason Gage makes $220,000 a year and in the event of a termination, he’d continue to receive that base salary on the city’s pay schedule for six months. He’d also continue to receive city benefits until the six months is up.