The Concord City Council approved City Manager Tom Aspell’s contract Monday night after a short discussion about whether the council should change how it negotiates contracts going forward.
The agenda for Monday’s meeting made note of the vote taking place after a nonpublic session, but didn’t include any details about what the contract councilors would be voting on. The only change in the contract was a 3% cost-of-living adjustment to Aspell’s salary, bringing it to $186,698. The full contract is available online; it goes into effect July 1.
The vote was unanimous, although one councilor – Ward 2’s Allan Herschlag – brought up concerns he had about the transparency around the approval process.
“There is nothing preventing us from agreeing to a contract with the city manager, providing the public with an opportunity to review the contract and then allowing public comment,” Herschlag said, reading from a prepared statement.
Herschlag went on to say that while he was pleased with the city manager’s performance, it was “difficult” for him to approve the contract. He said if the council doesn’t change its policies, he will not support city manager contracts.
The city manager is the only position in the city that is not governed by a salary scale or job grading, according to city documents. Instead, it is a charter-governed role, which stipulates under Section 21 that the council evaluate the manger’s performance in April and “determine, in public session, whether the city manager’s overall performance in office has been satisfactory or unsatisfactory.”
Other than that, the council is given little guidance, said Mayor Jim Bouley. But Bouley said the conversation was worth having, and he said he looked forward to working with Aspell on the matter going forward.
“I think we need to hone in a little bit better,” Bouley said. “Even though we don’t get a lot of guidelines, as a policy group I think we need to look at the policy, reflect and move forward.”
Bouley also encouraged any of the councilors who feel a policy change needs to happen to bring it forward prior to a vote on the subject.
Councilors who spoke thanked Aspell for his work and focused on his development of next year’s $66.5 million operating budget, which will include a 1.92% spending increase.
The mayor made a motion in April asking the Fiscal Policy Advisory Committee to look at whether the city should change how it deals with its public contracts going forward.
A Monitor report in March found that most cities in New Hampshire make the details of contracts for police, fire and other employees public prior to a vote once both parties have ratified a contract.
Many include the information on an agenda, while some simply read the details into the record prior to a vote. In most instances, residents have the ability to comment on the contracts prior to a vote.
Only three cities – Concord, Keene and Claremont – choose to provide no information to the public prior to a vote on a labor contract.
FPAC has not had any meetings since that meeting. A meeting scheduled for last Monday was canceled due to the rescheduling of the budget adoption and the need for a nonpublic meeting to discuss the city manager’s evaluation prior to that meeting.
(Caitlin Andrews can be reached at 369-3309, candrews@cmonitor.com or on Twitter at @ActualCAndrews.)