Cleveland Councilman Banks Critical Of City Manager Casteel, But Several Council Members Come To Her Defense

  • Tuesday, May 26, 2015
  • Gail Perry
Janice Casteel
Janice Casteel

Cleveland City Councilman Richard Banks on Tuesday afternoon was critical of City Manager Janice Casteel, but several other council members came to her defense.

 

The council, at the end of the discussion, voted to establish an evaluation process for city employees.

 

Ben Moore, a retired pharmacist and life-long resident of Cleveland told the council that he fears that crime from Chattanooga is spilling over into Cleveland and he is afraid a major incident will occur and give the city a “black eye.” He said he had taken his concerns to City Manager Casteel and that she will not do anything about it.

“She can’t do the job. She’s not a manager,” he continued. He said it is up to the council to do something. “I want you to put someone in to run the city and put her back to keeping the books,” he ended.

 

"I am proud of the job Janice has done," said the next speaker. She and her staff take care of the city, he said, and "I am appreciative."

 

Commissioner Banks said, with the city council style of government, the council’s job is to make sure that taxpayers’ money is spent wisely, but that it has no say-so over the employees other than hiring a city manager. He said that what Mr. Moore said made everyone uncomfortable, but he too is concerned about the city and that it is hard to live down one black eye. He said that the city had hired an expensive consultant to solve problems in the police department, but that should be part of the city manager’s job.

 

"I agree with Mr. Moore," he said, speaking to Ms. Casteel. “You’re a good person with a strong ability to put together a budget,” but managing people is the hard part, he said. In the way of “constructive criticism” he also disagreed with the city manager’s advice last year concerning a new gym for Cleveland High School. "We would still be waiting on a new gym," he said, if the council had not voted to take the money for the building out of the city’s fund balance. As it is, the exterior brick is being put up now and the roof should be finished in early July.

 

Councilman Banks said he was tired of being blasted by the media and was embarrassed because of actions he said the city manager should have taken. He made a suggestion for the council to evaluate Ms. Casteel at the next council meeting. He continued by suggesting that her position be changed to a liaison for helping the council understand the budget. “In my opinion, it’s not working now,” said the councilman.

 

Most of the other council members agreed that an evaluation process would be a good thing for the city to have, but disagreed that Ms. Casteel is to blame for all the problems. Councilman Bill Estes said that the council sets policies and determines needs of the cit,y then the city manager puts them into the budget. “She is getting the money and doing things because of poor decisions made up here,” he said.

 

 “You don’t have any problems until you correct someone doing something wrong,” Commissioner Charlie McKenzie said to Ms. Casteel.

 

Commissioner George Poe said he believes that more issues should come before the council for decisions, but the city’s charter leaves decisions to the city manager.

 

Councilman Avery Johnson said in his past work history, he was evaluated every year. "It’s only fair to let you know where you stand," he said. But it is not fair to come up at a council meeting. He said, “We need a plan, but we bear a large part of the responsibility. It’s not all her fault.” Because the city is growing so fast, the right people have to be in place and the city needs to have a good policy to follow with everything in writing, he said. The councilman stated, "We need to get our act together." He added that he was involved with creating the city’s charter but that now it probably needs to be revised because the job has gotten bigger.

 

Councilman Estes suggested getting evaluation forms from the Municipal Technical Advisory Services (MTAS), provided by the University of Tennessee, to use as a starting point. A motion to establish an evaluation process will be voted on at the meeting June 22.

 

 

 

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