City manager turnover taking a toll in Sunnyside

SUNNYSIDE, Wash. -- When Mark Gervasi walks away from City Hall on April 6, he will leave unfinished projects, a stressed staff and another expensive search for a city manager.

While it's nothing the turnover-riddled city of Sunnyside hasn't lived through before, officials admit the latest installment of rapid comings-and-goings of senior administrators can't help but set back the city of 15,000.

"It kinds of puts the skids on it a little bit," said Mayor Mike Farmer.

Despite praise for his performance from council members, Gervasi announced his resignation last week, becoming the third manager here to last two years or fewer.

Gervasi spent 13 years as the manager in Tillamook, Ore., where he was largely credited for sparking a downtown renaissance.

City officials past and present blame discord between council members and administrators not only for Gervasi's departure after 18 months, but for prior turnover in the position.

Gervasi, who started in September 2010, has declined to discuss his reasons beyond saying he wants to retire at age 63. But he conceded that many ongoing projects will likely be delayed until the city hires yet another manager.

"There has to be a pusher," for many of those to be completed, he said.

Among the delays will be downtown revitalization plans, negotiating with two new employee unions and balancing a budget that ended 2011 $1.28 million in the red.

Gervasi aims to wrap up as many loose ends as he can, but other tasks will have to be taken over by an interim manager or his permanent replacement.

Average stay: Seven years

Change at the helm of a city is not necessarily bad, said Anne Pflug, an adjunct professor of public administration for Central Washington University and a former manager of several cities over 20 years.

New faces bring fresh ideas and sometimes personalities that mesh better with community values. However, a loss of continuity often hampers long-term projects or financial goals that look up to 10 years in the future, Pflug said.

The average tenure for city managers in the United States is seven years, according to the International City/County Management Association, a Washington D.C., organization that encourages two-year contracts in its code of ethics.

The job of city manager came about in the 1940s as cities turned to professionals to handle day-to-day decisions, while elected city councils set policy and controlled the purse strings.

Washington first recognized the council-manager form of government in 1943. Sunnyside became the first city in the state to adopt it in 1948.

In the 1990s, the national average city-manager tenure was about five years and has been rising "with the maturity of the profession," Pflug said.

Sunnyside has seen periods of stability.

Leo Fancey served as Sunnyside's city manager for 16 years before resigning in 1998. In Yakima, Don Cooper's predecessor, Dick Zais, was the manager for 32 years before retiring last year.

But Yakima has experienced some turnover recently, too. In December, Cooper resigned after only four months as city manager so he could attend to the serious illness of a family member in Florida.

Quality of candidates

City Council members must now decide how to replace Gervasi -- a process gets harder each time someone leaves.

"When you have a history of a lot of people walking out or leaving ... you always start to wonder about the quality of who will want to come," said City Councilman Nick Paulakis.

The council has scheduled a special meeting at 9 a.m. Feb. 25 to come up with a plan.

Finding new administrators is expensive. The search for Gervasi cost Sunnyside $28,000 including advertising, travel and a head-hunting firm's charges.

The costs go beyond the manager, too. After the City Council fired former city manager Eric Swansen in June 2009, finance director Jordan Arreola and city attorney Mark Kunkler both quit in response.

Searching for a new finance director, a position now filled by Deputy City Manager Byron Olson, cost $26,000, while hiring a seven-month fill-in before he arrived cost $87,000.

The changes also require staff to readjust, which can take a toll, said Jamey Ayling, planning supervisor. Each boss has a different communication style, he said. Some might ask for a lot of detail on a project's process, some may prefer a quick overview.

"Every person, because we're not robots, has their own personality," he said.

Though no one is publicly placing blame on city manager turnover, professional staff at the city began unionizing several years ago, worried about job security.

The fire hose effect

Turnover at the top could also impede economic development, said Dave McFadden, president of New Vision, the Yakima County Development Association.

Companies looking for places to expand usually pick sites based on climate, transportation, labor and taxes. But having a consistent city contact with the authority to make decisions can certainly help seal the deal, McFadden said.

For example, McFadden said when Wal-Mart narrowed its search for a distribution center to Grandview, then-city administrator Jim Sewell -- who served for 21 years -- helped find funding for water, sewer and road improvements.

Theresa Hancock, a city councilwoman, said the new city manager will have a learning curve, which will delay forward-looking projects such as the city's proposed $3.4 million renovation of the downtown streets and sidewalks.

Just meeting all the city's 100 or so employees and learning the budget is hard enough.

"That's like drinking from a fire hose, let alone trying to take (on) progress projects," Hancock said.

* Ross Courtney can be reached at 509-930-8798 or rcourtney@yakimaherald.com.

Recent city manager tenures in Sunnyside

* Leo Fancey: 1981-1998

* Don Hahnfeldt: Sept. 1998-June 1999

* Dave Fonfara: Jan. 2000-Jan. 2004

* Bob Stockwell: May 2004-Sept. 2007

* Eric Swansen: June 2008-June 2009

* Mark Gervasi: Sept. 2010-April 2012