QuickTake:

The City Council is entering the final stages of its hiring process for the next city manager. The finalists are expected to be made public later this month, followed interviews with community leaders, city staff and councilors.

Eugene will soon learn who could next hold the city government’s top job.

When City Manager Sarah Medary retires on Friday after six years in the role, Assistant City Manager Matt Rodrigues will fill her shoes on an interim basis. Meanwhile, the Eugene City Council and recruiters are working to select a permanent replacement. 

About 50 people, including one internal candidate, applied for the job in November as part of a national search led by a recruitment firm hired by the City Council.

The role is important: The city manager runs the day-to-day operations of Eugene’s government, managing more than 1,500 employees and a $1.9 billion two-year budget under policy direction from the council.

Since the job listing closed, councilors and recruiters have met twice in executive session to continue the recruitment, on Nov. 24 and Dec. 5. Though those discussions can’t be publicized or reported on under state law, city leaders briefly outlined the next steps for hiring the city manager last week:

Later in December

The names of two to three finalists will be made public. The City Council goes on break from Dec. 11 to Jan. 11.

Sunday, Jan. 11

The finalists for the position are invited to arrive in Eugene for a private meet-and-greet with city councilors.

Monday, Jan. 12

A panel of city executive team members will interview each of the candidates, followed by a community tour with city staff.

“This will give them an opportunity to learn more about special projects, upcoming initiatives, city facilities and interact with a wide variety of staff throughout the organization,” Central Services Executive Director Mia Cariaga said.

Later that day, a panel of eight community stakeholders will interview each of the finalists. Members of the panel, which were proposed by city staff based on conversations with city councilors, are: 

  • Bethany Cartledge, executive director of St. Vincent de Paul Society of Lane County Board of Directors
  • Greg Erwin, CEO of Sapient Private Wealth Management
  • Dana Fleming, executive director of Eugene Public Library Foundation
  • Demond Hawkins, president of the Eugene-Springfield NAACP
  • Graham Trainor, president of Oregon AFL-CIO
  • Brittany Quick-Warner, president and CEO of the Eugene Area Chamber of Commerce
  • Guadalupe Quinn, a social justice and immigrant rights activist and community organizer 
  • Katie Wilgus, downtown solutions strategist for the Eugene Area Chamber of Commerce

Councilor Alan Zelenka asked if Dan Bryant, the director of public advocacy for SquareOne Villages, could be added to the list. 

Tuesday, Jan. 13

A panel of eight agency partners will interview each candidate. Those partners include: 

  • Jameson Auten, CEO of Lane Transit District
  • Stephanie Bulger, president of Lane Community College
  • Frank Lawson, general manager of Eugene Water & Electric Board
  • Miriam Mickelson, superintendent of Eugene School District 4J
  • Steve Mokrohisky, Lane County administrator
  • Nancy Newton, Springfield city manager
  • Karl Scholz, president of the University of Oregon
  • Kraig Sproles, superintendent of Bethel School District

At midday, a panel of all eight city councilors will interview the candidates in the council chambers. This is the only part of the interview process that the public is allowed to observe.

The candidates will then have their final interview, this time conducted by a panel of chair and vice chairs of the city’s eight standing committees. 

Members of the city’s boards and commissions, as well as elected representatives of neighborhood associations, will be invited to observe this interview and can provide feedback on the candidates using a form at the end, Cariaga said.

Wednesday, Jan. 14

The City Council will meet at 1:45 p.m., after its regularly scheduled work session, for deliberations, which are scheduled to last about two hours.

“My intent is to send you all of the feedback and everything that we’ve heard from panels on Tuesday evening, so that you have that to work with,” Cariaga told councilors.

The city will issue a notice of a public meeting for later that day in the event the council is ready to announce its decision.

What council is saying

Councilors largely approved of the schedule, though there was some debate over whether the process included sufficient opportunities for the public’s participation.

After Councilor Mike Clark confirmed with Cariaga that there won’t be a time for members of the public to speak with the candidates directly, he said: “I just want to lodge the opinion that I believe there’s value in that,” adding that “soft skills are going to be some of the most important evaluation pieces for these folks.” 

Zelenka disagreed, saying, “Those kinds of forums end up being very limited in the interactions with maybe two people, three people and somebody could tie up someone for the whole time.”

Beyond the events scheduled in January, the city has conducted a staff survey, held stakeholder meetings and a public listening session, which was attended by six people. 

The city also held a Zoom drop-in to hear feedback from the public and members of boards, commissions and neighborhoods, though an initial press release from the city advertised the wrong time for the event, which reportedly caused some people to miss it.

Grace Chinowsky graduated from The George Washington University with a degree in journalism. She served as metro editor, senior news editor and editor in chief of the university’s independent student newspaper, The GW Hatchet, and interned at CNN and MSNBC. Grace covers Eugene’s city government and the University of Oregon.