I have posted on YouTube clips from the Pensacola City Council’s special workshop that was held 9:30 a.m. Wednesday, July 20. These clips are the discussion of the proposed council executive, his salary of $90,000-$130,000 and his ever-expanding duties.
What we learned from the discussion prior to these clips, that the city council has hired a Dr. Riley from Atlanta to run all the candidates through an online personality test. Each council member was given an individual briefing on the previous day. There is a consensus from those briefings of two finalists.
All of this was done out of the public eye. Since the briefings were done one-on-one, no Sunshine laws were broken. However, none of the information about the proposed finalists was made available to the citizens before the workshop. In the 270+ page agenda workshop packet, the public wasn’t given information on any of the applicants or that Dr. Riley was screening them.
All the public could tell from the agenda is that there would be a verbal presentation and status report. The council had an obligation to be more forthcoming once it was apparent to any of them that they were down to two finalists.
For a city council that alleges that the mayor isn’t sharing information with them, they have been less than transparent themselves. At the very least, the public should have been given the resumes of the top prospects.
The resumes of the two finalists are only known because of the public record request made by the IN. Private briefings, no minutes and announcements of finalists without any disclosure of their qualifications set off red flags–not only for me but the public.
A proper process was not followed.
PART 1
PART 2
