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City officials have announced the first two applicants to interview for the vacant city administrators position.
Based on recommendations by executive staffing firm Austin Peters Group consultant Marla Flentje, city council members received applications from five selected candidates at the end of December.
Last week, the city council (less Matt Christenson, who has been on vacation), Mayor Bob Dixson and Flentje selected applicants to invite for interviews.
The city will interview Gary Emry, the current city administrator of Girard and Eddy Truelove, the current chief of police in Sterling.
Emry and Truelove will interview with the mayor, council and key city employees, visit city facilities and tour the community on January 11.
Emry is entering his fifth year as the city manager of Girard, a bedroom community northwest of Pittsburg.
“After reading the [profile description] I feel like I have a good skill set for what is needed,” Emry said on Friday morning. “That is what first caught my attention.”
The 20-year Air Force veteran previously served as the executive director of the Augusta Chamber of Commerce and then as the president of the Fort Scott Chamber of Commerce before taking his current position in Girard.
“He was a hard-working individual and we were sorry to see him go,” said Mark McCoy, owner of a pair of McDonald’s restaurants in Fort Scott who served as chairman of the local Chamber of Commerce during Emry’s tenure. “He worked intimately with the city manager and economic development team trying to attract and retain businesses in town.”
While in Girard, he has been linked to a number of high profile, highly publicized city projects including the new Girard Sports Complex, municipal golf course renovations and utility improvements.
In April, the city of Girard established a capital improvement fund, at the recommendation of Emry, to finance city improvements. He then asked municipal departments to compile a wish list of potential projects and created a long-term improvement plan. Proposed projects included street and town square improvements, storm siren upgrades, a new senior citizens center, an administration building at the Girard cemetery and others.
The Pittsburg Morning Sun, a sister newspaper of The Signal that covers Girard municipal news, reported that the Girard City Council recently approved a number of the recommended projects that are scheduled to be completed through 2013.
In May, Emry oversaw the termination of Girard’s contract with the Kansas Power Pool and last month implemented it’s newly drafted power purchase agreement with Kansas Municipal Energy Association. In an interview with the Morning Sun in May 2007, Emry expressed concerns over the energy cost increases stipulated in the city’s contract with KPP. The city was unable or unaware of the rate increases and lost an estimated $599,000 before discovering the loss. Emry commented that he had “raised the flag on that issue within two months of my employment here.”
City officials have announced the first two applicants to interview for the vacant city administrators position.
Based on recommendations by executive staffing firm Austin Peters Group consultant Marla Flentje, city council members received applications from five selected candidates at the end of December.
Last week, the city council (less Matt Christenson, who has been on vacation), Mayor Bob Dixson and Flentje selected applicants to invite for interviews.
The city will interview Gary Emry, the current city administrator of Girard and Eddy Truelove, the current chief of police in Sterling.
Emry and Truelove will interview with the mayor, council and key city employees, visit city facilities and tour the community on January 11.
Emry is entering his fifth year as the city manager of Girard, a bedroom community northwest of Pittsburg.
“After reading the [profile description] I feel like I have a good skill set for what is needed,” Emry said on Friday morning. “That is what first caught my attention.”
The 20-year Air Force veteran previously served as the executive director of the Augusta Chamber of Commerce and then as the president of the Fort Scott Chamber of Commerce before taking his current position in Girard.
“He was a hard-working individual and we were sorry to see him go,” said Mark McCoy, owner of a pair of McDonald’s restaurants in Fort Scott who served as chairman of the local Chamber of Commerce during Emry’s tenure. “He worked intimately with the city manager and economic development team trying to attract and retain businesses in town.”
While in Girard, he has been linked to a number of high profile, highly publicized city projects including the new Girard Sports Complex, municipal golf course renovations and utility improvements.
In April, the city of Girard established a capital improvement fund, at the recommendation of Emry, to finance city improvements. He then asked municipal departments to compile a wish list of potential projects and created a long-term improvement plan. Proposed projects included street and town square improvements, storm siren upgrades, a new senior citizens center, an administration building at the Girard cemetery and others.
The Pittsburg Morning Sun, a sister newspaper of The Signal that covers Girard municipal news, reported that the Girard City Council recently approved a number of the recommended projects that are scheduled to be completed through 2013.
In May, Emry oversaw the termination of Girard’s contract with the Kansas Power Pool and last month implemented it’s newly drafted power purchase agreement with Kansas Municipal Energy Association. In an interview with the Morning Sun in May 2007, Emry expressed concerns over the energy cost increases stipulated in the city’s contract with KPP. The city was unable or unaware of the rate increases and lost an estimated $599,000 before discovering the loss. Emry commented that he had “raised the flag on that issue within two months of my employment here.”
Last October Greensburg signed a twenty-year renewal with KPP to be the city’s energy supplier.
Emry has been criticized by some for maintaining his residence in Fort Scott, 30 miles north, for the entirety of his time in Gerard. In the same May 2007 interview, Emry said that his decision to stay in Fort Scott was due to a slumping housing market and that the city council had advised him to stay in Fort Scott until the market improved.
“I can assure the public that they get an honest day’s work from me,” he added. “I spend 10 hours a day on average here, often times more, and represent this community within the region and state.”
In September 2010 the Girard city council enacted a policy requiring the city administrator, fire chief and police chief to live within the city limits.
Emry has also received criticism for recent increases in water rates, although council minutes indicate that the increase is intended to offset the cost of long existing water tower and water pressure problems.
“Four years ago when I came to Girard my charge was to take the community forward through roadblocks that had been in place from previous administrations,” continued Emry. “So, how do we get out of the mindset of ‘we can’t spend’ to a mindset where we can do those things if we do them prudently and if we manage growth proactively and not reactively. Let’s do it in a responsible way.”
Emry came to Greensburg this past November to tour the city and research its unique set of challenges.
“I talked to some of the residents, met with some people and inquired about the stage of recovery and what kind of issues are still out there,” he said. “I wanted to get a feel for the community’s ability to move forward, knowing that they had been through the recovery process for the last five years. That is a long time, what sort of enthusiasm, support and spirit is there to take the city through the next phase?”
While in Greensburg, Emry spent approximately 25 minutes with Kiowa County Economic Development Director Dee Chandler.
“I thought it was good that he came to see the town and talk with people about our challenges,” Chandler recalled. “He mentioned that he had some experience with the chamber [of commerce] but he was not there to discuss himself. He was very polite and mild mannered. He seemed cautiously optimistic about the job.”
Emry referenced his rural Kansas roots when asked if his work in a city the size of Girard, with a 2010 US census population of 2,789, could transfer to a town the size of Greensburg who has grown slowly from it’s 2010 US census listed population of 777.
“I come from a farming background,” he noted. “I understand rural Kansas and I understand agriculture. Rural Kansas is something I’m familiar with. I understand the issues and the challenges. Going from a population of 2800 to 700, or 800, I don’t see it lessening my scope of responsibility. I see Greensburg as a challenge. I am all about facing challenges.”
Emry acknowledged that a challenge facing Greensburg is the clash between innovation and tradition and feels community feedback and input will be a key component to the rebuilding process.
“First and foremost, I work from the ground up,” Emry explained. “I’m not a ‘top down’ driven guy. In the last two communities I’ve lived in and worked in, I’ve been involved in the Community Square process. I am a community involvement sort of person. I’m not going to put something out there until it’s been communicated with the town and I’ve had a chance to hear their say. Consensus can be different from what you and I agree with, but at least we had a part in it. And we’re able to speak our peace. When it is done properly you have all of the stakeholders at the table. When it comes to the council for discussion or approval, you have taken out most of the negative. If it’s been done the right way, you have something that’s easy to work with. More often than not, it’s proven successful for me.”
The city’s press release also states that Emry has a Bachelor’s degree in business management from the University of Phoenix.
The city has also invited Eddy Truelove, the current Chief of Police of Sterling to interview for the position. Truelove is also a 20-year military veteran, and a former Wichita police officer. He has been in Sterling for the past four and a half years, and currently manages a police force staffed with four fulltime officers and two reserve officers.
“The difficulties and struggles that community has gone through in order to get to where they are today [is what attracted me to the position],” said Truelove in a Saturday morning phone interview. “Every Kansan knows about Greensburg. It’s such an incredible story what’s happened there. I think it is a pivotal community for the state of Kansas and possibly the United States depending on what happens in that community in the future. I think it’s exciting to have a chance to be part of that.”
Sterling is a college town with a 2010 census reported population of 2,328 people. The largest employer is Sterling College and was the original home of Jonathan S. Dillon’s general store before he opened his “food market” in Hutchinson in 1913.
Truelove says that one of his biggest accomplishments was bringing the small Quaker community, which was originally called “Peace”, into the 21st century.
“When I left the city of Wichita as a police officer, I’d like to think I brought some big city practices to a small town,” he continued. “I’ve completely rewritten the procedures and manuals. I’ve more or less updated their procedures and brought them into more mainstream law enforcement. I have a background in computer science as well, and so the system is now completely automated. I think I’m a meticulous person. One of the things that we have created towards the future is implementing the electronic communications here.”
According to city-data.com, Sterling has seen increases in some reported crimes during Truelove’s tenure (see Fig. 1). Although according to Reuters, a 2009 study conducted by the Police Executive Research Forum, a law enforcement research agency, found that the recent economic downturn had increased theft related crime in most cities.
Assaults;
2003(0), 2004(0), 2005(2), 2006(2), 2007(7), 2008(3), 2009(3), 2010(2).
Burglaries;
2003(4), 2004(11), 2005(4), 2006(9), 2007(13), 2008(12), 2009(10), 2010(12).
Thefts;
2003(15), 2004(18), 2005(22), 2006(25), 2007(15), 2008(33), 2009(35), 2010(31).
Auto Thefts;
2003(2), 2004(0), 2005(1), 2006(3), 2007(4), 2008(2), 2009(3), 2010(0).
Arson;
2003(0), 2004(0), 2005(3), 2006(2), 2007(0), 2008(1), 2009(0), 2010(0).
It should also be noted that in 2009 the Sterling Police Department reduced its police force from five fulltime officers, to four.
“Eddy’s done a really good job since he’s been here,” said Sterling Café owner Ron Groth, who also preceded Truelove as the Sterling police chief for 23 years. “I think he went in and redid a bunch of [electronic] records in the department, which I had not been doing, because I was old school.”
Goth, who left the police force on a medical retirement, says that people in Sterling have been happy with the job Truelove has been doing. “The only thing I really ever hear that’s negative is that he doesn’t get out a meet people as much as they want him to.”
Truelove completed his master’s degree in public administration at Wichita State after retiring from the Marines and says he has been looking for an opportunity to work as a city manager.
“I think I did quite well in the master’s program at Wichita State. I have a certificate in public finance as well. It has been my goal, even before beginning that course of instruction, to at some point begin a career in city management. It was, I guess you could call it, a well-thought out plan to gain additional public management experience by becoming a chief of police after I received my degree. I think I’ve gained a lot of experience working with the budget office and the city of Sterling.”
Although he acknowledges his lack of city administrator experience, Truelove feels his experience as a career marine, is an asset to his possible future position in Greensburg.
“My time in the marine corps, especially as I started to reach some of the higher ranks, I learned about managing people as we attempt to begin projects, initiate them, get them underway and see them to completion. Whoever takes over in Greensburg, it’s going to be a challenge, whether it’s me or someone else. Any city administrator that is going to be there, it is critical that they are able to work in a team setting. And I think my time in the marine corp. prepared me to do that very well.
“To use an infantry metaphor, no one man is going to take the hill,” continued Truelove. “It takes a team. If we’re going to assault the position, it takes a platoon, it takes a squad. With all of the activity that is going on in Greensburg, I think if someone were to sit down at the city administrator’s desk in Greensburg [and attempted to handle everything by themselves], it would be a very difficult thing for any one person to do. It’s going to take a team effort. I think my time in the marine corp prepared me for that. As a member of a team.”
When asked on Friday if the city would invite additional candidates to interview, mayor Bob Dixson did not comment either way, saying only that the city has a “good pool” of candidates and that, currently, he felt the process was “very fluid right now.”
A press release estimates the city will have a new administrator in February.
The City of Greensburg has been without a permanent administrator since the abrupt firing of Sheila Magee on July 18, 2011. Interim city administrator Jay P. Newton has filled in for the past few months while the city searches for a permanent replacement.
editor@kiowacountysignal.com
Nikki Patrick of the Pittsburg Morning Sun contributed to this article.
