City seeks manager
The City Council and mayor have hired a consultant and are beginning their search for a new city manager. They have increased the salary from $137,425 to around $148,000 and hope to have the position filled in early November.
Published Aug. 26, 2005
The Columbia City Council will try to attract a new city manager by increasing the posistion's salary from $137,425 to about $148,000, sixth wardcouncilman Brian Ash said.
City Manager Ray Beck announced in July he plans to retire at the beginning of the new year.
A replacement is expected to be hired in November.
By hiring someone in November to replace Beck, the new city manager will have time to move to Columbia and get comfortable before starting his or her job, Ash said.
The starting salary of $148,000 will be adjusted based on the experience and education of the person hired.
"The thing that's challenging when you've had a city manager for 20 years is that his salary doesn't keep up with the going rate," Ash said. "We need to increase the salary so we can hire someone with the same qualifications in 2005 as (Beck) had when we hired him in 1985."
The City Council hired Karl Nollenberger as a consultant to help with the search for a replacement, Ash said.
Nollenberger listened to what qualities and requirements the City Council and mayor wanted in a city manager.
Nollenberger also had the council review an advertisement he plans to place in the International City/County Management Association newsletter and send out through a mailing list.
"I want someone with a lot of experience because Columbia is a very unusual city in that we are a full-service city, which means we have our own police department, fire department, railroad, airport and all our own utilities," Ash said. "It'll be challenging to find someone from a similar situation because generally it would take a larger city to have the same services, and a similar-size city will usually have less services."