Interim hired as permanent Hopewell city manager despite calls from state for 'experience'

HOPEWELL – City Council took the “interim” label off interim City Manager Concetta Manker Tuesday night and in the process poked the Youngkin administration in the eye by rejecting its suggestion to hold off for six months and look for an administrator “with executive level experience" in turning around local government.

By identical 4-3 votes, council rejected a move by Ward 1 Councilor Rita Joyner to agree with the recommendations by the administration, then approved Ward 2 Councilor Michael Harris’ move to hire Manker full-time. Manker, previously the city’s information technology director, was named interim 11 months ago when March Altman left for the city manager’s job in Petersburg. Manker’s supporters on council claimed that Manker had accomplished more during her interim time than Altman had during his entire four-year tenure in Hopewell.

“She’s done a great job,” Ward 7 Councilor Dominic Holloway said in an interview after the meeting. He noted that Manker's two immediate predecessors, Altman and Mark Haley before him, also were not experienced city managers when they were hired. Altman was a deputy manager in Petersburg and Powhatan County, and Haley was executive director of Hopewell's utilities vendor Virginia-American Water Company.

The details of Manker’s new employment deal are still being worked out, but council’s vote essentially cleared the deck for her interim contract to be worked out. It also is the latest in a series of salvos fired back and forth between Hopewell and Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s administration over efforts to get the city’s fiscal house in order after roughly eight years of not submitting state-required annual audits on time and establishing protocols for keeping its books balanced.

More: State urges Hopewell to get financial house in order: 'This cannot continue'

What did the administration offer Hopewell?

In a July 7 letter to council, state Finance Secretary Stephen Cummings said the Youngkin administration was willing to pay Hopewell $200,000 to replace Manker and city Finance Director Michael Terry with experienced interims who would lead a six-month effort to implement financial policies that could turn the city around. Because of the delay in getting audits, the state said Hopewell’s credit rating has dropped to the point where it could not issue bonds for needed capital improvements.

That six months would have given Hopewell time to advertise for, vet and hire a permanent city manager, Cummings’ letter said. In the meantime, Manker would serve as deputy city manager and IT director, and could be considered a viable candidate for the permanent job.

In exchange, these “independent” interims as the letter addressed them would implement policies spelled out in a report from the outside accounting firm hired by the Youngkin administration to audit Hopewell’s financial practices. The state would be allowed to approve the list of interim candidates for city manager and finance director, and look over the city’s shoulder while the process is carried out.

The letter did not state what Terry’s role in that interim period would have been.

“We believe that these experienced, independent resources … will be critical to successful implementation and support the delivery of a successful audit for fiscal year 2024,” Cummings wrote in the letter.

That letter went unanswered, so on Tuesday, Cummings sent a follow-up letter that started with “given that we appear to be shut out of the process …"

In that letter, Cummings denied that political agendas drove the request. According to the secretary, the General Assembly’s key budget-writing committees [House Appropriations and Senate Finance & Appropriations] signed off on the offer. Given that Republicans control the House committee and Democrats the Senate panel, that demonstrated the offer had bipartisan support.

“This is an offer of other Virginia taxpayers’ money to help Hopewell get back on track with full access to capital markets for future growth,” Cummings wrote. While existing Hopewell staff might be able to handle current issues and long-term department goals, “this is not a time or an issue to learn on the job.”

“You need experienced leadership to work in partnership with your [project management organization] to lead this process,” the letter read.

The letter also was critical of some of the councilors who have been in office for a long time, saying “for whatever reason, they have not been able to find a way to resolve those issues. Four of the seven, including Mayor Johnny Partin Jr., are in either their first or second terms on the dais.

“That is of great concern to us,” Cummings wrote, adding that tough decisions need to be made “to ensure the prompt return of Hopewell to a place of financial transparency and stability.”

Vote rejects state overtures

Holloway, one of four to vote Manker into the job permanently, called the correspondence “a letter of bribery” from the administration to force Hopewell to do what the state wants. Initially, he said, the state told council the only thing it could do to help was make recommendations and pay for the outside auditors. When councilors asked about future funding from the state, they were told there was no more money available.

“Once they found out we were going to hire Dr. Manker as our city manager [and] they did not think we were going to get the vote, that became a separate issue,” he said. “That’s a letter of bribery."

Joyner, who pushed unsuccessfully for approval of the state’s recommendation, said the state “has been very generous” in helping Hopewell by paying for the outside audit and now offering to pay for the interims. As a deputy to the interim, Manker would “be mentored by an expert in the field” to boost her credentials for the job.

“We’re in a very serious situation,” Joyner said. “We’ve not had a clean audit in a decade.”

Joyner began to read the July 18 letter from Cummings into the record but was stopped when several councilors claimed she violated council rules by exceeding the three-minute time limit council’s rules allow for a member’s comments. That set off a series of votes to shut off discussion on not just Joyner’s motion but also Harris’ follow-up motion to hire Manker.

When all was said and done, Harris and Holloway were joined by Vice Mayor Jasmine Gore and Ward 5 Councilor Janice Denton in the vote to hire Manker. Joyner, Partin and Ward 6 Councilor Brenda Pelham dissented.

Youngkin administration spokesperson Macaulay Porter told The Progress-Index Wednesday morning they would have no comment on council’s action “at this time.”

Bill Atkinson (he/him/his) is an award-winning journalist who covers breaking news, government and politics. Reach him at batkinson@progress-index.com or on Twitter at @BAtkinson_PI.

This article originally appeared on The Progress-Index: Hopewell appoints interim city manager to full-time status