Regarding the possibility of the city establishing a public information officer position I posted an item on 5/1/13. (You can scroll down to read the whole post)
Part of that post contained the statement:
The city staff has a city manager, a deputy city manager (recently promoted from assistant city manager) and an assistant to the city manager. Heck, which one of them has been putting the publicity stuff up on the city's web site? And what about the emails that go out to the listserv addresses? And the facebook and twitter stuff already? And can't one of them handle verbal and or written communications with the local media?
Well, what was the mistake? The city no longer has an assistant to the city manager. That person is now an Assistant City Manager. Promotion time. This came out last night when part of the budget was being reviewed.
Also last night, Councilmember Sawyer questioned the projected remuneration for that position. Apparently the document he was looking at showed $70,000. The city manager said that it could be less depending on the person who was hired. Mr. Sawyer wanted to know if that $70K was salary or if it included salary plus approximately an additional 25% in benefits. If that figure sticks, then the position would pay approximately $55K in salary and approximately $15K in benefits.
So, now we know that a City Manager, a Deputy City Manager and an Assistant City Manager are not equipped to answer questions from the media/public and/or issue press releases concerning the city. If they were equipped and capable, then the city manager would not be asking for the additional position.
