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Council may seek interim city manager while searching for replacement

Mar 28, 2018 | 2:00 PM

The search is already on to find North Battleford’s next city manager, but Mayor Ryan Bater isn’t sure if a replacement can be found in time and said council needs to decide if there’s a need for a temporary replacement.

Yesterday it was announced that current city manager, Jim Puffalt, took the same position in Moose Jaw starting in May. With just under six weeks until Puffalt’s departure, Bater said the city already began the hiring process with help from a firm.

“We will be conducting a nationwide search with this firm beginning immediately,” Bater said. “Council has yet to make a decision on whether or not interim management is required. That’s something that will need to be discussed in the very near future, but in the short term, the recruitment effort is already underway.”  

As for a timeframe to when the position could be filled, Bater said it could take months to half a year. He was a councillor in 2014 when Puffalt was hired and said the process took roughly three months.

Bater said this is certainly not something council wants to make a rushed decision on though.

“We want to make a well informed decision, see what options are available to the city and hire the best possible city manager that we can,” he said.

Bater added council wants to be critical in this decision as the city manager position is the top civil servant position within the city government. He said it is the single employee who reports directly to council and the relationship the two sides have is very important.

“We believe we’ve had a very professional and productive relationship with Jim and we’re hoping to find a replacement that we can have a similar relationship with,” the mayor said.

Bater added he had high praise for Puffalt’s efforts during his time as North Battleford’s city manager and hopes his predecessor will be just as good.

“Since Jim took over the city has gone through a lot of new initiatives and I think that will become Jim’s legacy,” he said.

The Community Safety Strategy, the development and implementation of the Community Safety Officers and the work happening under the Community Economic Development initiative with the BATC were all initiatives that Puffalt was directly responsible for according to Bater.

 

greg.higgins@jpbg.ca

On Twitter @realgreghiggins