Council begins discussions on replacement of city attorney
Oct. 11—The Albert Lea City Council voiced support Monday for city staff to move ahead with two tracks to try to find a replacement for the city's legal services in light of City Attorney Kelly Martinez's recent resignation.
City Manager Ian Rigg said the city could advertise for both a new in-house city attorney as well as accept requests for proposals from firms that could provide legal services. He said while this may require additional work for staff up front, it will allow the council to see all of its options before they move forward to replace those services.
He noted the difficulty Freeborn County has had filling an open attorney position in its office, as well as another neighboring community. The city may not get a firm that would provide all the services or it may not get a candidate, but they needed to try both, he said.
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Mayor Vern Rasmussen Jr. said he thought the dual track was the way to go so the city could be aware of all of its options and that there was no sense limiting itself at this point.
Third Ward Councilor Jason Howland said he agreed and said though he would rather see someone in-house in the position than contracted out, he thought it was best to look at both routes at this time.
Martinez, who has worked for the city since 2017, will serve her last day in the position on Friday. The city presently has a contract with a firm for prosecutorial services through the end of the year.
Rigg said he researched costs for legal services in other communities between 10,000 and 30,000 population and had data from 32 comparable communities on their costs and setup.
The median cost between 2019-22 was about $10.22 per capita, while the mean cost was about $9.22. Those that had direct hire services were higher per capita than those who contracted out all services including prosecution.
The data showed two main groups of spending — one group that spent between $6.40 and $8.65 per capita and another that spent between $11.52 and $14.99 per capita.
Rigg said the city was projected to reach $368,800 in costs for all legal services for 2022, including the department budget as well as contracted services.
Using that estimate and averaging from 2019 to 2022, the city has spent an average of $312,820 annually or about $16.92 per capita.
"I still do not fully know what the numbers mean," Rigg said in an email. "They can mean a lot of things as not all communities are the same. What I do know is with a much higher than average per capita expenses, we have to evaluate more in-depth what we are doing and what we are giving the public as a result."
