SEQUIM — Two new City Council members’ plan for recruiting a city manager didn’t go over well with longtime council members Monday night.
At what became the bitter end of Monday’s meeting, the council voted 4-3 for a novel way of finding a new boss for Sequim: Councilmen Erik Erichsen and Ken Hays, who took office this January, will work with former councilman John Beitzel to “develop and manage the selection and recruitment of candidates.”
The council’s four newcomers — Hays, Erichsen, Susan Lorenzen and Mayor Laura Dubois — voted to fire City Manager Bill Elliott on May 5, and appointed Sequim Police Chief Robert Spinks interim city manager.
Spinks later said he was looking at three executive search firms, aka headhunters, to start the quest for Elliott’s replacement.
But on Monday, Erichsen and Hays proposed their preferred approach: an ad hoc committee, consisting of themselves and Beitzel, with Spinks and City Attorney Craig Ritchie providing advice.
“This is a lawful process,” Ritchie said of the idea.