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2011.06.06_TC_Minutes_SpecialTOWN OF HIGHLAND BEACH MINUTES OF TOWN COMMISSION MEETING SPECIAL MEETING Monday, June 6, 2011 9:30 AM Mayor Bernard Featherman called the Workshop Meeting to order in Commission Chambers at 9:30 AM. CALL TO ORDER: Roll Call: Members present: Mayor Bernard Featherman; Vice Mayor Miriam S. Zwick; Commissioner Doris M. Trinley; Commissioner John J. Pagliaro; and Commissioner Dennis J. Sheridan. Also present: Town Attorney Tom Sliney; Interim Town Manager Kathleen D. Weiser; Town Clerk Beverly M. Brown; Public Works Director Jack Lee; Library Director Maria Suarez; Deputy Finance Director Cale Curtis; Assistant to the Town Manager Zoie Burgess; and members of the public. Pledge of Allegiance: The Pledge of Allegiance was given, followed by a minute of silence in honor of members of the military, both living and deceased. Civility Pledge: The Civility Pledge was recited by the Town Clerk. 1. ADDITIONS, DELETIONS OR ACCEPTANCE OF AGENDA Mayor Featherman asked for any additions or deletions. Receiving none, the agenda was accepted as presented. 2. PUBLIC COMMENTS AND REQUESTS All comments are the speakers opinion and are not necessarily fact. Joe Colby — Villa Costa From what I have seen and heard, Kathleen does a good job. The only experience I had with the past Manager gives rise to my comments about this contract that she has proposed. The contract with the last Manager was a mistake that should not be repeated. It was too rich and unnecessary. The last Manager cost the Town more than 213 thousand dollars per year in contractual expenses, plus huge costs of conferences, seminars, education, vacation, and the like which seemed to mostly benefit him and not the Town. We are a comparatively small Town of some 4,000 residents with a Mayor and a four member Commission. There are many qualified people seeking Town Manager jobs. Reading Town Commission Special Minutes June 6, 2011 Page 2 of 8 some of the terms proposed by the applicant, which seems to incorporate all of the most extravagant terms of the past Manager's contract, reads as though she is the only person available for the job so that we are required to give all that she asks for without negotiation. I know that this is not the case. I am sure she expected to negotiate every item. I would like to address the proposed contract. Section 1: The opening for Town Manager is as of July 1 after the expiration of the existing contract. The Town should not participate in a fraud against the State and the Town by using June 301h instead of July 1 St as the start date. On this I differ with the Town Attorney. 1 B: Termination by the Town should take a vote of a majority of the Board and not the current number of three. 1D: The employee should not engage in other business nor does she have "Off Duty" hours. She is on duty/call 24 hours so other employment is allowed by this Board, must always be secondary to needs of the Town and very limited. IE: Manager's work schedule should never be flexible as proposed. She should be at Town Hall every normal work day as with other employees. She must not set her own schedule. Her work should be done at Town Hall, not from home or some other place. Sec. 3: She currently warns the equivalent of $72 thousand a year. The proposed contract gives her a $50,000.00 immediate raise. Sec. 3: Provides for cost of living adjustment plus a merit raise not to exceed 5% after Town review, but an automatic increase of 5% if the Town fails to review. Town should have an obligation to review without this penalty. Sec. 4A: On termination of employment, the Town is to pay cash equal to one month's salary for every year of service and is required to pay health and medical premiums for one year. Do other employees get paid health insurance for one additional year when they leave? I am not referring to COBRA. Why a penalty of months' salary for each year? Sec. 5: Is $7,200 per year a reasonable amount to pay to the employee as additional salary for insurance and maintenance and rental of an automobile or should not the Town simply supply and service a vehicle, subject to personal use. Calling this additional salary increases the cost to Town of all benefits. Sec. 6: In addition to normal vacation time every employee accrues, why do we make a gift to this employee of over two weeks' vacation days? What is the basis? Employees accrue vacation as they work. These days have a monetary value, so this just gives two weeks additional pay. Sec. 8: Town is to provide health, hospital, disability, vision, dental and comprehensive medical insurance for Manager and her husband and a life insurance policy for 150 thousand dollars without contribution from employee. Do other employees get life insurance and the other benefits? Sec. 9: Provides the Town to pay Florida Retirement System not only the Town's contribution but also the contribution required of the employee. Also in 9B it provides that the Town pay to a second pension system the difference between 9 and 15% of the employee's salary and increases this sum by 1 % every year. This is ludicrous. Why is the Town paying the contributions to pension system that the employee is required to make? Why does the Town pay into two different pension systems? There should be one system only and the Town should pay only that which is required by law, as should the employee. Employee contributions to pension systems and the cost to municipalities is currently a national debate which this proposal wrongly ignores by requiring no employee contribution. Sec. 10: Town to pay employees dues and subscriptions in national, regional, state and local organizations desirable for her continued growth artd advance rnent. The last Manager earned his doctorate while employed by the Town, on our time, and for which the town contributed most if not all the expense. It did not benefit the Town, only the, individual. As with other employees, membership and continuing education should be a personal expense to be borne by them. Dues and other costs for benefit of employee, claimed to be for the benefit of the Town, should be discussed and voted on by the Board each and every time. If they do not benefit the Town, they should be denied. The contract obligates the Town to pay for travel and related expense for professional or official travel and meetings for the Manager and her spouse to continue Town Commission Special Minutes June 6, 2011 Page 3 of 8 the professional development of the employee. Each event should be on the agenda and voted on by the Board. No blanket approval for any other of these expenses, and only with complete justification, after public discussion. Attendance and the expenses for all of these should be by vote of the Town Board prior to the event. Unless there is direct benefit to the Town, as for example, Florida League of Cities, approval should not be given and not required by this contract, Sec. 12: Why are we paying $7,500 dollars or any amount for Manager's moving expense? Do we do this for other employees? How was this amount arrived? Except for termination for cause, the Board can make this contract for a fixed period of time. If the Manager is terminated within a fixed time, will the Town will be reimbursed for the moving expense. These are difficult times. The economy is bad. Home prices are down. We residents expect you to get us the best person at a reasonable cost. We do not want you to give away the store blindly, accept unfair terms without full discussion and review simply because you know and like the applicant for the last few months or because the employees like her. This is not a proper basis for a decision. Commissioner Pagliaro, Vice Mayor Zwick and even past Vice Mayor Asselta have asked you that you do your sworn duty to protect Town residents and learn from our past experience with the last Manager's contract. This is imperative, the contract must be fair and in keeping with what would be reasonable compensation, similar to what other towns pay their Managers with particular reference to benefits other than just salary alone. Let us not compare her proposed contract of more than $193,000.00 per year to the former one of more than $213,000.00. Both are exorbitant. Joe Asselta - Casaurina I have been away and recently skimmed through the proposed contract. Do not do the same contract that we had with the last manager. You now have a unique situation in that you now know the Town Manager. Previously we paid a high price company to come in with manager applicants, and brought us Sugerman. We found out too late about his past history. My comment is to fix the contract and keep the Interim Town Manager. Arlin Voress — 4403 Intracaostal I was previously Mayor of Highland Beach for eight years. It is important that the Town Manager attend seminars and conferences and that this be included in her contract. In terms of cost of the contract, our budget is between 12 and 14 million dollars a year. We are hiring someone who controls this budget. The previous manager had a very difficult relationship with our employees. While there are parts of this that might be modified, wasn't this put together in corroboration with the Town Attorney and Mayor? John Sorrelli — 3400 S Ocean Blvd. I did not attend the last meeting, but went in and reviewed the tape that is on file in the Town Clerk's office. I was shocked to see the Vice Mayor throw a bomb at the meeting. All I know is that the former Mayor and Town Attorney did a great job of interviewing potential candidates for the interim town manager position. Why are we going through this nuisance of going through the; contract again? Didn't the Mayor and Town Attorney meet with the Interim Town Manager to work out this contract? Rumor on the street is that two Commissioners are talking about Town -business. You can go to jail for that. Knock it off. It is a disgrace. Town Commission Special Minutes June 6, 2011 Paae 4 of 8 Carl Feldman — 3210 S. Ocean Blvd. If you read the contract, Mrs. Weiser is looking for a long term contract. I do not think the Vice Mayor threw a bomb. Believe we should have hired a labor attorney to negotiate the contract, not the Mayor and the Town Attorney. Some of the points brought up by Judge Colby should be discussed with a professional to be fair to both sides. 3. NEW BUSINESS A) Consideration of Proposed Employment Agreement between the Town and the Town Manager Mayor Featherman — There was not and had never been an agreement between the Town Attorney, Town Manager and myself. I did not review the contract. There are items that need to be addressed for the benefit of the Town. I have been in business for many years. The company made the contract not the individual. It is true she proposed the contract and I did not agree with it. Feel we should advertise outside. Comm. Sheridan — I would like to refer to the minutes from the May 3rd meeting, where I stated the following in reference to Manager Weiser: "She is a team player. As we all know, we will soon be hiring a full time manager and at the appropriate time I ask my fellow Commissioners to give serious consideration to hiring Mrs. Weiser. I feel there is no need to conduct another search for this position which would be costly and time consuming. We have found a real gem and a perfect fit for our Town and Community. I ask my fellow Commissioners to recognize her qualities and act accordingly." Commissioner John J. Pagliaro then stated: "I would concur with what Commissioner Sheridan has just stated. I have experienced very similar meetings with the Interim Town Manager. She has shown that she would like to make Highland Beach the best it can be. I agree with the comments about employee morale. Her door is always opened and she is acceptable to fresh ideas. I agree 100% with Commissioner Sheridan." Vice Mayor Zwick then stated: "I wish the best of health to Commissioner Trinley who we miss this afternoon. I always have a funny feel about Boards that rubber stamp. I remember a gentleman on the Board of our condo when I was president who would always vote last. If there were four votes in favor he would vote no. If there were four votes against, he would vote yes. I do not believe in that. If this is going to be a rubber stamp, it sounds like a very good one. I concur with my fellow Commissioners." Later in the meeting the Vice Mayor made the following motion: " Vice Mayor Zwick moved to set up a Committee consisting of the Mayor, Town Attorney and Interim Town Manager to discuss and formulate an agreement resulting in a proposed contract with the Interim Town Manager; proposal to be submitted at the May Workshop Meeting." Do not understand where the change in venue began. The Mayor' and Town Attorney met with the Manager and last week they submitted a contract. Why would we now start discussing the terms? MOTION: Comm. Sheriden — moved to approve the Town Manager's contrast ,as -submitted; seconded by Comm. Trinley. Town Commission Special Minutes June 6, 2011 Page 5 of 8 DISCUSSION: Comm. Pa lg iaro — Mayor your last comment concerns me. You were given an assignment to sit down with the Town Attorney and the Town Manager. Before the contract was submitted to the Commission, why were your concerns not addressed? Why are we just hearing them now? I heard Arlin Voress and John Sorrelli speak on the proposed contract. There were meetings held to discuss putting a contract together. Now all of a sudden, we have to re -negotiate the contract? Where did this sudden turn of events originate? The Town Manager did meet with all the Commissioners to go over the contract. As a matter of fact, I met with her for a total of 3 hours to discuss my concerns and comments. Look at the salaries for the Managers in the area. She is not out of line. We are doing very well with the salary. Benefits — there seems to be a lack of understanding. Conferences have workshops which are beneficial. It is ludicrous to dismiss them as going off to play. We are not talking about a major amount of money. This contract is a $38,000.00 savings from the prior managers. I think that this package is fair and reasonable. I would like the Town Manager to walk us through this contract so that we can put this to bed. It should never have gotten this far. Interim Town Manager Weiser - After the regular meeting on May 3, 2011 where the Commission discussed forgoing a search and negotiating a contract with me, the Mayor left town for several weeks. Attorney Sliney called and said "I have my marching orders, let's meet and talk about your contract" and we met on the 16th of May. We worked off of the International City Management's model agreement which is used across the country as a standard for municipalities and also since there was obvious consensus that the Commission and public wanted to stay away from the previous manager's contract format. On May 23rd the Mayor and Mr. Feldman met with me in my office. We proceeded to negotiate, item by item, the various elements of the agreement that I had previously discussed with the Attorney. To the credit of Mayor Featherman and Mr. Feldman, with the exception of the automobile allowance, all monetary items were negotiated downward from my initial proposal. The highlights are as follows with the justification for each: Open ended contract without a set term — this is the most beneficial, cleanest arrangement for the Town since the parameters of employment are "set in stone" and the Town would never be in the position where a termination would result in unclear or unreasonable expenses Start date of June 30th — A State law goes into effect July 1 which stipulates a severance allowance for public employees. A start date in this agreement of June 30th provides an advantage to the Town since it would allow a severance package more cost effective to the Town as well as more desirable to the Manager than those of the State laws that become effective July 1. Annual salary of $125,000 — I provided justification with a salary survey of Palm Beach County City Managers as well as a benefit comparison to the former manager's contract who had a salary of $144,000. This was also the amount I suggested was fair and equitable the first week the Mayor was in office when he, Mr. Feldman and Mr. Colby met with me and I was asked the salary I would expect if I remained with the Town. Termination terms — 12 months health insurance plus 1 month's salary for each year completed service to the Town up to a maximum of 6 months. Automobile Allowance - $600 a month and Manager to provide own insurance and maintenance. Retirement — Employer to enroll Employee in the Florida Retirement System and pay all contributions. As FRS contributions can vary year to year, any time the required contribution falls below 15%, the difference will be contributed to the Town's 457 plan. This contribution increases annually by 1 % up to a maximum of 20%. As a comparison to the 15% contribution, the former manager had a 27% contribution made by the Town to his retirement. Relocation Expense — Town agrees to reimburse Manager for moving expenses up to $7500 with stipulation that receipts must be Town Commission Special Minutes June 6, 2011 Page 6 of 8 provided. The Mayor & Mr. Feldman asked me to make the agreed changes to the agreement and place it on the agenda for the workshop meeting. I proceeded to contact each Commissioner before the Workshop last week regarding the agreement and to answer any questions. I believe the agreement before you was negotiated in good faith and I have provided justification to demonstrate that the terms are fair, reasonable and equitable. I believe I have done a good job for you over the past four months and have demonstrated my abilities as an experienced public administrator. Change is never easy, but I hope I have your support as together we continue to make the Town of Highland Beach the best it can be. Vice Mayor Zwick — No comments. Comm. Trinley — I also agree with the statements made by Commissioner Sheridan and Commissioner Pagliaro. Mayor Featherman — I still work with the Small Business Administration Advisory Board, and have served on City Boards where I previously lived for over ten years. Why should we start a new contract on June 30th, while we still have one running? Do not know if that will be a legal issue. I was away on business last month, but am available full time for this position. According to the Governor, all retirement funds will be 9% on July Is'. Deputy Finance Director Curtis — On July 1 St, the employer required contribution rate for senior managers will be reduced to 6.2% with a mandatory 3% contribution. On July 1, 2012, the contribution rate will change back to the current rate. Mayor Featherman — The contract also calls for a contribution to an ICMA pension if the retirement rate drops. I have never been involved in an organization that has two pension plans. I still believe the contract should begin July Is' not June 30th. I will say as your Mayor, what happened before I came was reprehensible. Item #10 — If not a benefit to the Town, we should not pay for it. We should only pay for travel expenses for professional meetings and eliminate seminars. We paid for the previous manager's doctorate that should not be. Moving — The Interim Town Manager's husband lives in Illinois and she has a house in Punta Gorda. Which house will we be paying to move? I really feel we should have had an employment contract lawyer to represent us. It is reprehensible that we should accept this contract. Things are not what you think they are. Comm. Pa lg iaro — You are entitled to your opinion. The one comment that you made saying that we paid for some ones education. In the public sector, we help employees go to another level in their education. Mayor Featherman — If they want to move ahead, they should pay for it themselves. Comm. Sheridan — We also pay for the education of the police department. Vice Mayor Zwick — Hate to interrupt you, but education is part of the police contract. Town Attorney — I have listened to everyone's point of view on this subject. I look at it through a business point of view. If this contract is adopted, I need to sign off that it is legally sufficient. We have followed the direction that the Commission gave to us at the May 3rd meting. I feel this contract is legally sufficient. But on the other hand, I do not have a vote. Town Commission Special Minutes June 6, 2011 Page 7 of 8 ROLL CALL: Commissioner Sheridan - Yes Commissioner Trinley - Yes Commissioner Pagliaro - Yes Vice Mayor Zwick - Yes Mayor Featherman - No Motion passed with a 4-1 vote. 4) MISCELLANEOUS — ITEMS LEFT OVER None 8. REPORTS — TOWN COMMISSION Commissioner Sheridan — No Report. Commissioner Pa liaro — No Report. Commissioner Trinley — No Report. Vice Mayor Zwick — No Report. Mayor Featherman — No Report. 9. REPORTS — TOWN ATTORNEY No Report. 10. REPORTS — TOWN MANAGER When everyone is exiting the building today, please notice the Royal Palm trees that were planted in front of the building over the weekend. 11. CONSENT AGENDA None. 12. PUBLIC COMMENTS AND REQUESTS RELATED TO ITEMS DISCUSSED AT MEETING Joe Colby — Villa Costa My understanding of the recently passed legislation regarding Florida Retirement System is that the percentage contributed was changed to 9%, with the employer paying 6% and the employee paying 3%. Do not understand why the Commission approved a contract that agrees to 15%. Town Commission Special Minutes June 6, 2011 Page 8 of 8 13. ADJOURNMENT There being no further business to come before the Commission, Mayor Featherman adjourned the Workshop Meeting at 10:25 AM upon a MOTION by Commissioner Sheridan; seconded by Commissioner Pa lg iaro. APPROVED: Bernard Featherman, Mayor ATTES Beverly M; rown, MMC 1�fa , 'G� at