Is Lakewood training a new City Manager?

The 2022 City Manager Employment Agreement includes a new clause in Section 9: Benefits:

“The Employee shall receive 20-days of Executive Leave Time which may be used in any manner desired with the intent of advancing leadership succession & organization development planning for the City by the Employee.”

What does this mean?

One interpretation is that City Manager leadership succession planning is currently underway.

The only member of Council to directly comment on the new clause was Council Member Shahrezaei, who seemed to think the leave was for personal growth in leadership, rather than succession planning. When asked about it in an interview, she responded that the clause could mean both things. She’s right.

Find Out

While the new clause may not mean that a City-Manager-in-Training is in place, for a move of this magnitude, it may be important for City Council to find out, and decide how they would like to deal with succession management, rather than have the decision made for them.

In fact, if there is a succession plan in place, approving this employment agreement may be tacit agreement to the plan.

Two Council Members brought up the fact that it may be time to start looking for a new City Manager, based on length of service rather than any performance reason. Two other Council Members pushed back that they were not looking for a new manager and that no one asked them to look for a new manager.

During this time, cautions about disparaging remarks were repeated. No alternative time to discuss a new City Manager was offered, although if succession planning is taking place, that is a matter for the public. Succession is already introduced in the agreement amendments. However, it seems no one on Lakewood City Council understands the topic is already on the table, if indeed, that is the case.

As a reminder, Lakewood’s current City Manager, has worked for the City of Lakewood since she was 17 years old, and was trained by the previous City Manager.