by P.D. Lesko

The only reason former City Administrator Howard Lazarus is several hundred thousand dollars richer is thanks to an open-ended, 2016 contract negotiated by someone among the attorneys employed in the City Attorney’s office, and six members of the current City Council. The Administrator’s contract was crafted to include a gigantic golden parachute should he be let go without stated cause. It’s important to note that just because cause is not stated in a separation agreement, abundant cause may actually exist.

After the contract was crafted, the Mayor, Jane Lumm (I-Ward 2), Julie Grand (D-Ward 3), Zachary Ackerman (D-Ward 3), Jack Eaton (D-Ward 4) and Chip Smith (D-Ward 5) read (presumably) the contract with its golden parachute clause and open-ended term of employment, then went ahead and voted to approve the contract.

If any members of Council should bear the brunt of the public’s irritation at having to pay to get rid of an employee, it should be those six people. They were clearly irresponsible in approving an open-ended contract for a public sector employee that included a golden parachute.

Yet, shortly after the payout Council was forced to approve (thanks to the lop-sided terms of the contract) was announced on February 18, 2020, the Mayor, Grand, Ackerman and Smith released an outlandishly dishonest joint statement in which they assured the public that the payout associated with the golden parachute they’d voted to approve in 2016 did not align with their “values.” MLive.com (as usual) kindly printed a piece about the joint statements. However, the usual suspect who reports on local politics neglected to point out that Taylor, Grand, Ackerman and Smith had approved the golden parachute payout to which they were objecting.

It should come as no surprise that Taylor, Grand, Ackerman and Smith used the opportunity (and a non-disparagement agreement) to shamelessly politicize the situation, and didn’t take responsibility for their actions. Neither should it come as a surprise that MLive.com once again neglected to hold the quartet responsible for their own 2016 votes.

Contrary to what Lazarus and his attorney would like the public (and any future employer) to believe, it’s not a stretch to say that Howard Lazarus brought much of his current heartburn on himself through his own actions and management of our city.

• Our recycling is being collected, trucked to an out-of-town MRF, and landfilled.
• Lazarus put the new Police Chief on paid leave and waited weeks before telling the entire City Council and the public why.
• The city’s Human Resources department has gone 10 months without a full-time director after the last one resigned amid a texting scandal that revealed a hostile work atmosphere in the department.
• After three years of Lazarus’s leadership, a higher percentage of our roads are in worse shape, not better.
• Lazarus has spent over $1 million on lawyers (including the law firm that employs the Mayor), and still we’re no closer to EPA intervention and a Gelman Plume clean-up.
• Crosswalks installed on busy streets are still inadequately lit, signed and marked, resulting in injuries and even deaths.
• City staff allege that Lazarus bullied several of the women on Council. His off-the-wall comments about working with women during a 2018 job interview in Austin, Texas were so noteworthy the Austin Chronicle reported on them.
• In materials that became public which had been submitted for yet another job, Lazarus told a prospective employer in Florida he had difficulties working with members of City Council.

The question becomes not why seven people on City Council decided to part ways with Howard Lazarus, but what took so long. It’s important to note that whether Lazarus engaged in any misconduct remains to be determined. We can hope for the best and prepare for the worst, but that question needs to be answered, particularly since Mr. Lazarus chose to bring it up himself through his lawyer’s public letter.

Now, in between stacking and re-stacking his pile of cash from taxpayers, Howard Lazarus is feeling très disparaged, according to his attorney in a letter made public. Lazarus and his lawyer recently shared a laundry list of complaints. They include Ward 5 Council member Ali Ramlawi’s (D) comment about Lazarus’s latest evaluations being “the final nail in the coffin,” to Council member Elizabeth Nelson’s (D-Ward 4) blog, and Council member Jack Eaton’s comments made before the non-disparagement agreement was signed.

As anyone who has ever worked with a lawyer knows, the job of an attorney is to throw cooked pasta against a wall to see what sticks. In this case, the pieces of dried linguine bouncing off the wall from the former City Administrator’s attorney consist of Howard Lazarus’s attorney claiming “Lazarus had no performance deficiencies, nor did he engage in any misconduct that would give council cause to fire him.”

Not a single performance deficiency? Lazarus acknowledged multiple performance deficiencies in writing in last year’s eval. in which Council graded him 3.2 out of 5. Council member Ramlawi’s recent comment suggests that, in fact, Lazarus did get feedback from his bosses concerning performance deficiencies. Keep in mind that performance deficiencies are not disparagement; they are documented, sub-standard/unacceptable work product as outlined by an employee’s supervisor.

At this point, since Lazarus has asserted there were no deficiencies, it’s in the public’s best interest to know whether he’s telling the truth. While this might be inconvenient or embarrassing for Howard Lazarus, such transparency is one of the most important rights of the public with regard to an employee in the public sector.

This is why the evaluations, contracts and personnel files of public employees, with the exception of state-mandated open records exemptions, are public records. Thanks to his attorney’s letter, it could be argued that Howard Lazarus just made public the purported content of his latest employee performance evaluations. Council should release the evaluations in their entirety, including the individual comments penned by Council members.

This information would address many of the concerns members of the public may have about why seven members of Council chose to part ways with Lazarus. The information would also show clearly that the four people on Council who voted against the separation agreement, did so for purely political reasons. The City Administrator was praised by the Mayor for adhering to “chain of command.” Translated, former military man Lazarus looked to Chris Taylor for his marching orders and clashed with the majority of members of Council.

We can only hope the lot of our Council members have learned from the serious mistakes made in 2016. The next city administrator’s contract should be golden- parachute-free, include a much smaller starting salary, and be for a limited-term with the option for renewal, not open-ended.