November 10, 2005

By Robert Mihalek

Village Council followed a recommendation from the Village Manager Search Committee and agreed on Monday to invite three applicants to Yellow Springs for interviews.

Council members agreed that the interviews will take place sometime between Thanksgiving and Christmas. A motion unanimously approved by Council said that Council will conduct interviews with the three candidates. The motion also said there will be an opportunity for the community to meet the candidates.

Council member Bruce Rickenbach, who is also a member of the search committee, said the committee will recommend to Council a process for interviewing the candidates and for the public event with the applicants. Al Schlueter, the chairman of the search committee, said the committee will begin to finalize the process during its regular meeting on Wednesday.

The three candidates who will be invited to Yellow Springs for interviews are:

• Teddy C. Ryan Jr., who has served as the borough manager of Columbia, Penn., since 2003. He has held the title of manager or administrator in eight other communities, including Sebring, Ohio, 2000-03; Riverside, Ohio, 1998–2000; New Lebanon, 1994–98; Stoneham, Mass., 1989–92; Ocoee, Fla., 1986–88; Green Cove Springs, Fla., 1984–86; Clovis, N.M., 1982–83; Trinidad, Colo., 1979–81. He has a master’s of public administration from the University of Kansas and a BS in business administration from Old Dominion University.

• James C. Smith, who has served as the city manager of Newport, R.I., since 2002. Smith has also been the city manager in six other communities, including Draper, Utah, 1998–2002; Hudson, Ohio, 1994–98; New Rochelle, N.Y., 1992–93; Concord, N.H., 1979–92; Berlin, N.H., 1973–78; and New Carlisle, Ohio, 1971–73. As a captain in the Air Force, he was stationed at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base. He has a bachelor’s degree in business administration/economics from Miami University and a master’s in governmental administration from the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton Graduate School.

• Eric C. Swansen of Jackson Hole, Wyo., who worked as the city manager of Farmersville, Calif., from 2003 to 2004. He has also been a senior management analyst with the city of Shoreline, Wash., from 1998 to 2003; a senior management analyst with the community development department of Deschutes County, Ore., from 1994 to 1998; and a management analyst in the public works department of Lacy, Wash. He has a master’s of public administration from the University of Washington and a BA in political science from Pacific Lutheran University in Tacoma, Wash.

Council agreed to invite these three candidates to Yellow Springs after meeting in executive session at the end of its meeting on Nov. 7. While the search committee has led the process thus far to find a new manager to replace Rob Hillard, who resigned in September, Council has the responsibility of hiring the manager.

Council’s decision to bring the three applicants to town is in line with a recommendation from the search committee.

Schlueter told Council that the three applicants received the highest scores in the committee’s ratings system. He described the finalists as “ranked considerably higher” than the other candidates being considered.

Last month, the search committee agreed not to conduct telephone interviews with more candidates before making a recommendation to Council about which applicants should be brought to Yellow Springs for in-person interviews.

“There was unanimous agreement that little would be served by conducting the telephone interviews,” Schlueter said in a statement he read to Council.

Schlueter also told Council that while the three candidates “seem well qualified by past experiences, the committee had some concern that these experiences were in communities that lacked the diversity of Yellow Springs.”

The committee also presented Council with the resumes of two other candidates, who were ranked fourth and fifth on its scoring system. Those candidates are Thomas Carroll, the assistant city manager of Loveland and Eric A. Strahl, a former town manager of Hopkinton, R.I. These applicants were not invited for interviews.

When asked why they were not offered the chance to interview, Rickenbach said, “They remain in the potential pool” of applicants.

The Village received 120 applications for the manager’s job. The search committee cut that list to 19 people, who were sent information about Yellow Springs and the Village government, a statement on the challenges facing the community and a description of the ideal Village manager. Each of the 19 candidates was asked to tell the committee how his or her personality and experiences meet the challenge statement and manager profile.

Thirteen candidates responded to this request. The committee ranked each candidate based on his or her response to the challenge statement and manager profile as well as his or her qualifications, including experience and education, Schlueter has said.

Committee members ranked the candidates by using 12 categories, based on a scale of five (“excellent”) to one (“unsatisfactory”). The 12 categories range from judging a candidate’s “compatibility with the village’s values” to his or her personal qualities. The list is based on qualities identified in the ideal manager description and from feedback from the community, Schlueter has said.

After the meeting, Schlueter said the three finalists received average scores that were close to four from the search committee, while the next best rated candidate received a score closer to three.

In his statement, Schlueter said he does not think the search committee is moving too quickly with the search process, which, he pointed out, has been ongoing since July. He said that the committee had recommended that the interviews with the three candidates take place after Thanksgiving, giving “time for this Council and the one elected [on Nov. 8] to have adequate time for input.”

He also said the committee has an obligation to the candidates “who have been engaged in this process for quite some time.”

In addition to Schlueter and Rickenbach, the Village Manager Search Committee consists of Council member Mary J. Alexander, Public Works foreman Kelly Fox, Police Chief John Grote, police dispatcher Randall Newsome, Village Finance Director Sharon Potter and villagers Tom Haugsby and Len Kramer.

Contact: rmihalek@ysnews.com