Editorial: Questions linger upon exit of the City Manager

The City Council owes the public a better explanation of what just happened

The City Council owes citizens an explanation as to why they decided to part ways with the City Manager, Don Schwartz. There are simply too many questions. A short press release announcing the decision in the early morning last Wednesday is not enough. Without answers, we’re left to sort through rumors, innuendo and speculation. No one involved is speaking on the record.

We understand that personnel decisions are sensitive matters and that the details are normally withheld from the public. Yet, this decision is about the city’s top paid administrator, and the people who hired him for this position and were his boss. The unexpected timing of the decision itself reflects poorly on the City Council and indeed on the City as a whole. With the City struggling financially, we were told that its turnaround plan was developed by this city manager, and this is the person they just let go.

Call it what you want — “ending their professional relationship” was one version — the City Manager was fired. The decision was reached after his final performance review (the last of 10 over 15 months), which suggests that there were ongoing issues with his performance and they had become unresolvable. How could it be that “he was released from his position for no cause”? There had to be cause; both parties—the city and the city manager—simply agreed not to reveal the cause. This is a kind of behind-closed-doors-with-lawyers agreement that should be explained plainly, not hidden away. Releasing Schwartz from his contract for “no cause” doesn’t ring true.

Three members of the City Council (Zollman, McLewis and Carter) were in agreement that there was some cause to terminate Schwartz, but two (Hinton and Maurer) did not agree. Did three members of the Council think there were irreconcilable differences, while the other two thought the City and Schwartz should keep trying to work things out? Why was the vote not unanimous to release Schwartz from his contract? Will we ever know why each Council Member voted as they did?

From the outside, Schwartz was doing what he was asked to do when he was hired. Schwartz was competent. His expertise was valued. So what changed? Was it different on the inside? What did City staff think of him? Did they raise problems that the public could not see but the City Council was aware of? How did Schwartz respond to the negative performance reviews? Did he come to the realization that he could not work with City staff any longer or with the City Council that hired him? Or was his termination all so sudden and surprising to him? We may never know Schwartz’s side of the story because he doesn’t need to say anything in public.

The City Council agreed to a severance package, which could be worth $183,750. This also requires its own explanation. Was the City Council in agreement that he should go, but not in agreement on such terms that included a six-figure severance? Does that explain the 3-2 vote? Did the City Council and its lawyers do the best job negotiating the termination of Schwartz’s contract? It makes one wonder whether they had a good case to fire him or not? They had to be worried about a wrongful termination lawsuit. Were they unwilling to bet that firing him was justified by the evidence they had? Either way, it cost the City a lot of money to let go of their top administrator the way they did.

Even so, once they decided to be so generous with Schwartz, why did they have to be so polite by explaining that he was released for no cause? Did they not think people would want to know why and how they reached this decision?

Without more of an explanation, the main question about whether these elected officials acted responsibly cannot be answered. Even if we know no more than we do now, we have to admit that the situation is unfortunately a mess and comes at a bad time. It would certainly help for the citizens of Sebastopol to have a better understanding of what really happened behind closed doors before the same members of the City Council set out to hire a new City Manager.

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That’s my opinion. Tell us what you think in the comments.