Several candidates for the Hot Springs Board of Directors said they are opposed to a severance package like the one former City Manager David Frasher received in June.
Speaking to an audience at the Centre at Forest Lakes, candidates for the four seats up for election Nov. 6 said a severance like the one Frasher was granted following racially insensitive remarks he was alleged to have made to a black Hot Springs School District administrator in the gated community where they both live does not need to be included in the next city manager's contract.
The board unanimously requested Frasher's resignation June 12 after deliberating for almost three hours in executive session. The terms of his employment agreement allowed him to leave City Hall with $223,313, including one year of the $170,851 base salary the board approved in 2018, a $12,000 vehicle allowance, $20,370 for 248 hours of accrued paid time off and $20,090 in annual health insurance premiums.
District 5 Director Karen Garcia, who is being challenged by former District 5 Director Rick Ramick to represent south central Hot Springs, said a lucrative severance should not be part of the new manager's employment agreement, even if it's customary to do so.
The International City/County Management Association's model employment agreement recommends a minimum of one year's salary and benefits. Data ICMA shared with The Sentinel-Record in June showed six months of salary and benefits were the average severance for a municipal chief administrative officer.
"At the first of the year, when the city manager will be looked at on a permanent basis, I hope we do not have a contract like we've had in the past," said Garcia, who was appointed to the board after Ramick resigned last year. "They say city managers require those types of contracts, but how many in Arkansas have that type of contract? That's applicable in some areas, but from my research it's not applicable in Arkansas. I don't believe we have to do that in order to hire a good city manager."
District 2 candidates Billy Blackmon and LeDante Walker Sr. told the audience they, too, would be opposed to a similar type of severance for the new city manager.
Mayor Pat McCabe, who was appointed to the board last year, said he wanted to void the severance provision in the employment agreement after the allegations were made against Frasher.
The Oregon City Commission, which employed Frasher as city manager of the Portland, Ore., suburb from April 2010 to October 2015, did not honor the severance terms in its employment agreement with Frasher after firing him for racially insensitive remarks he was alleged to have made, leading Frasher to file a $433,000 federal wage claim.
The case was settled last October for $389,500.
"I worked with the city attorney on whether or not the provisions in there needed to be honored under the circumstances," said McCabe, who is being challenged by Brenda Brandenburg. "He indicated there was no option for us. My goal is that we make sure going forward we don't find ourselves in this situation again. I don't anticipate us getting into that."
Ramick told the audience he was the only board member to oppose hiring Frasher, explaining he wanted to install Interim City Manager Bill Burrough as the city's chief executive. Burrough, formerly the deputy city manager, served as the interim after David Watkins died from a fall at his home in August 2015 and stepped into the breach again after Frasher's departure in June.
He was a finalist for the job the board tapped Frasher for in January 2016.
The board hired Frasher despite the allegations he faced in Oregon, which were detailed in a memo former Oregon Supreme Court Justice W. Michael Gillette wrote after the Oregon City Commission asked him to investigate whether Frasher had made derogatory comments about African-Americans to two Oregon City police officers in July 2015.
"I was the lone holdout," Ramick said. "You can ask any director who was on the board at that time. I supported Bill Burrough from day one. My choice right now is Bill Burrough."
Ramick and District 2 Director Elaine Jones are the only candidates who were on the board when Frasher was hired.
Ramick said he did not think the $475,000 the city and Arkansas Municipal League paid in 2016 and 2017 to settle lawsuits filed against Burrough and other city employees should be a factor when the new board begins considering candidates next year.
Margaret Hillistad, a former employee of the city's solid waste department, filed a federal discrimination claim in September 2015 that alleged she was passed over for the position of solid waste director as a result of a sexual harassment claim she lodged against Burrough in the summer of 2014.
The city and Municipal League paid $300,000 to settle the claim in March 2017. The related lawsuit Bill Boyles filed was settled for $175,000 in late 2016. He claimed he was fired from the solid waste department in retaliation for corroborating Hillistad's allegations.
"It was a trumped-up charge I can tell you," Ramick, responding to an audience member, said. "I sat through the whole hearing. I don't want to spend $20,000 or $30,000 on a search when we have the right man in the position right now."
McCabe said the board has agreed to put off a search until the 2019-2020 term begins next year.
"We want the election to occur and let those individuals who are going to serve in 2019 and beyond be part of that decision making," he said. "Mr. Burrough has done this job a couple of times. This time he's been in there for what's going to be a considerable number of months. So we've been able to see him operate. That's a good thing for us."
Local on 10/21/2018