City and General Manager search

LOUDON, Tenn. — Loudon City and Loudon Utility Board held a special combined meeting Monday night to discuss the next steps for the City/General Manager search, which turned into another discussion of Mayor Jeff Harris.

Last year, the two entities agreed to hire a third-party recruiting company to aid the search and hiring process. After spending tens of thousands of dollars, the name that kept coming up — and ultimately halting the process — was Harris.

During last month’s special meeting, Loudon City Council twice reached a two-two split vote among Council members — one vote for Harris and another for Thomas McCormick. LUB director Carlie McEachern talked like he was in favor of Harris, as did LUB Chair Don Campbell. However, after a lengthy discussion, LUB voted unanimously in favor of McCormick.

The discussion was deferred until each entity’s meetings on the last Monday of February, and LUB vice-chair Gene Farmer raised concerns of the process taking a negative turn. He brought up how everyone agreed to a specific hiring plan and process initially, but said they are no longer abiding by the original agreement.

A brief discussion in each meeting alluded to opening the search back up to allow internal candidates the opportunity to be considered.

With both entities not able to come to an agreement on the new hire, they called a joint meeting for Monday, March 11, to decide the next steps and no ability to make nominations.

All Loudon City Council Members and LUB Directors were in attendance for this week’s discussion, including Mayor Harris.

Yet again, the meeting began with similar anecdotes from Council members and directors not budging on their stances. The meeting took a turn when Loudon City Council Member Eric Newman addressed Harris and said he is the “roadblock” for this process moving forward.

“I would call on Mayor Harris to split this tie,” said Newman. “There’s two ways you can do it … you can come up and vote to appoint yourself or you can remove yourself. I guess it’s kind of a call to you.

“I know you were elected mayor. You were elected to lead us and through this process, through this decision and as it sits here, I believe you are the roadblock we have to overcome. And I think it’s time for you to step up and take your seat as mayor and lead us through this decision.”

Harris responded by reiterating points he spoke at the previous meeting about how being mayor has been one of the highlights of his adult life, and he hopes to continue serving the community on a larger scale in the manager position.

“The only way I can be more involved and try to lead our city is to apply for this job. That is the only avenue I have if I want to be more involved in leading the city in that direction,” said Harris.

Addressing concerns about elected officials applying for full-time employment within the city, Harris asked if that only applies to the mayor or if it applies to other elected officials such as Council members, referring to Newman applying for a city job.

Newman said that after applying and considering the motives, he called the hiring manager and rescinded his application for the unnamed position, because he felt it was wrong for him to use his position in that way, whether it would sway the decision or not.

Later in the meeting, Newman confronted Harris on the comment stating it seemed like the mayor was trying to question his integrity by bringing up the situation. However, Harris claimed to be seeking understanding of the expectations and he respected everyone’s personal opinions on if it is right or wrong for an elected official to apply for a position with the city.

The discussion shifted to actions both entities could take in an effort to move the process along. They talked about hiring two people to somewhat split the responsibilities, reopening the hiring pool to more candidates in hope of finding a hyper-local candidate and appointing Mayor Harris as the interim manager for a limited, contracted amount of time while deciding on next steps.

“It’s turning out to be a long process,” said McEachern. “The City Council is doing the taxpayers wrong and we’re doing the rate payers wrong without leadership.”

After a bit of deliberation, and continual disagreement, the general consensus was for Mayor Harris to be the deciding factor on the search. There will be an item on the agenda for the March 28 meeting for Council members to appoint and vote on a new City and General Manager.

The outcome of the vote will determine next steps between LUB and the Council, most likely resulting in another special meeting.