In general, relatively few community members attended Council's meeting this week. Monday night saw severe weather across the Ozarks, including thunderstorm warnings and a tornado watch while the meeting was in progress.
The city announced Cameron was Council's choice last week, but his employment contract is still up for a vote. The proposed contract Council is considering calls for him to start working as Springfield’s top employee on July 7, paid $350,000 per year.
The contract proposal also provides Cameron fringe benefits including a $7,800 automobile allowance, membership in a Missouri local government employees pension, and $15,600 per year paid into a tax-deferred 457 retirement plan. The previous city manager earned $220,000 per year when his contract began in 2018.
Cameron has been city administrator of the suburban community of Republic since 2016 and before that, city administrator at Siloam Springs, Arkansas for a decade.
Before the Springfield Council vote on Cameron’s employment contract bill — set for a lunchtime special meeting on May 27 — Springfield city charter requires the bill to get two readings at public council meetings. Monday night was the first reading. In other words, it was the general public’s chance to share unfettered opinions with City Council about their new hire — in a formal, on-record setting.
Four of the five area-resident commenters were enthusiastic about Cameron as a future city manager for the Queen City. Each one got five minutes’ talk time on the city clerk’s clock.
Cameron was seated in the audience of the council chamber and was not called to speak before Council.
What Cameron’s supporters said
Erin Danastasio, executive director of the Hatch Foundation and board member for a recently-formed private sector group, Leaders for Ozarks Region Evolvement (LORE), touted Cameron as good for Springfield business and quality of life.
“We need someone who understands that government and the private sector need to be rowing in the same direction,” Danastasio said.
Jaimie Trussell, CEO of Crosslines Community Outreach — formerly known as Council of Churches of the Ozarks — said she served as an employment reference for one of the other 75 applicants for the city manager role.
But, she said, she could have just as easily endorsed Cameron’s candidacy.
"When our city manager succeeds, our city succeeds,” Trussell told Council.
The other two supporters of Cameron included Bob Helm, chairman of the Springfield Area Chamber of Commerce, and Allen Kunkel, a Missouri State University economic development executive.
What concerns Cameron’s opponent who spoke at the meeting
One of Cameron’s supporters Monday night, Helm, praised Cameron’s “bold” “problem-solver” leadership style, but also noted, “David has probably stepped on a few toes along the way. It would be impossible, unrealistic to think that you’d be able to make everybody happy in the process of doing the job.”
Cameron also had an opponent.
Kevin Evans, a Missouri State University geology professor, voiced several objections: For starters, that the three city manager finalists were chosen by the previous City Council ahead of the municipal election held April 8 — which changed the makeup of Council as Mayor Jeff Schrag and Zone 4 Councilmember Bruce Adib-Yazdi replaced former Mayor Ken McClure and Zone 4 Councilmember Matt Simpson.
Then, the City revealed the city manager finalists on the day following the election.
Evans also worried about Cameron’s reputation for a “disruptive” management style; and that Cameron has a reputation for “fast-tracking” bills. City Council “is supposed to be a contemplative body,” Evans said.
Evans also criticized Council for choosing two out of three finalists from the Springfield area, with Cameron’s experience as a city administrator coming from Republic and Siloam Springs, saying: “Those are not comparable cities to Springfield.”
What Council members said about Cameron
City Council members’ comments Monday night suggested that hiring Cameron divided them.
Councilmember Monica Horton — an entrepreneur representing northwest Springfield’s Zone 1 — said she wanted to be the first on Council to comment on Cameron’s hire during the public hearing.
Horton wouldn’t say whether she’d vote for or against Cameron’s appointment, but she said it was likely Council would receive a torrent of public feedback between Monday night and the May 27 vote.
She also highlighted her take on internal Council discussion about the circumstances and the timing of the vote on Cameron’s hiring: “I would like just to say that I want to make sure that Council members are not caught off-guard during the second reading of this bill, scheduled for May 27, in light of the email councilmembers received Friday with anticipation that there would be no discussion during the second reading of this bill.”
Horton cited Article II, Section 2-38(6) of the city charter, which provides that City Council may discuss a bill during its second reading and final passage.
Councilmember Craig Hosmer, an attorney who serves as one of the council's four citywide “general” members, asked Mayor Jeff Schrag why Schrag set the vote on Cameron’s appointment for a special lunchtime meeting on May 27, instead of Council’s next regular Monday-night meeting set for June 9.
Schrag said the decision is “time-sensitive.”
Twice, Hosmer asked why.
“I believe that getting within a 30-day window is just cutting it too close,” Schrag replied, seeming to reference the July 7 start date in Cameron’s proposed contract. “Lots of dominoes will fall after we vote, and the next Council meeting is not until June 9. And I believe it is time to move forward with this process, and I don’t want to get into, I guess, a time crunch.”
Hosmer advocated for Council to keep to its normal schedule.
“I just think when we do things differently than we normally do, I think we set up Mr. Cameron for people to think there’s some sort of conspiracy,” he said. “Some sort of reason to push this through faster than the normal bill has to go through. We have historically — I’ve been on Council 12 years, and I’ve never seen a bill put through this way, unless there’s an emergency.”
By contrast, Callie Carroll, another of Council’s four “general” members who represent all citywide residents, said she was “lucky” to have gotten to know Cameron even before he applied for Springfield city manager. Comments Cameron made last week in front of a crowd of 250 people “grasped” her, Carroll said.
“And he was extremely vulnerable and raw and talked about mental health and talked about the people who helped him get to where he is,” she added. “Never once did I hear him say the word ‘I.’ It was about the team that surrounded him, and it was about how they empowered him and how he empowers others. I loved seeing that side of him.”
For Carroll, a former TV news anchor turned banking executive, Cameron “is exactly what we need in Springfield right now.”
Councilmember Brandon Jenson, a United Way director from southwest Springfield’s Zone 3, expressed concerns he said he’d heard from the community at large: That “the lack of neighborhood support” for Cameron means that if Council chooses him, some city residents would see Council and City Hall as picking sides between neighborhood and developer interests.
“I’m not sure that’s true,” Jenson said. “But perception and reality are very different things.”
Derek Lee, a general councilmember who works in civil engineering, said he “absolutely supports” Cameron and lauded Cameron for “integrity” and a tendency toward “real collaboration.”
“I don’t see issues with David or his leadership style,” Lee said. “My biggest concern is our divided Council.”
Recently elected Zone 4 (southeast Springfield) Councilmember Bruce Adib-Yazdi, an architect and developer, voiced concerns that the city revealed its three city manager finalists the day following an election that changed Council’s roster.
“That was completely out of the blue for me,” he said.
Adib-Yazdi also objected that “none” of the other 70-plus candidates, or deliberations about who would be chosen, “were even made public.”
He said he had advocated for starting over with the entire hiring process, but now changed his view: Council should “come together” to support their choice of city manager.
He quoted two lines from fortune cookies he ate at from recent Council lunch meeting buffet that said “be bold” and “always hope for the best.”
“I feel like that’s kind of where we are tonight,” Adib-Yazdi concluded.
Schrag, the mayor, ended Monday’s public hearing debate by saying in part, “What I believe in the process that Council put forward, is the cream rose to the top. And I believe some excellent people were in that cream, at the very top. And I am thrilled to work with David Cameron as our next city manager.”
Cameron’s proposed contract is up for a vote at a meeting currently scheduled for 11:30 a.m. May 27 in the Councilman Denny Whayne Conference Room on the 4th floor of the City of Springfield’s Busch Building.
