Debra Jones has been elected to the Williston City Council without opposition.
By Terry Witt – Spotlight Senior Reporter
Williston City Manager Scott Lippmann advised board members Tuesday that Duke Energy has notified the city of a proposed 30 percent increase in electric rates by 2022.
The city purchases electricity from Duke Energy and resells it through a city-owned municipal utility to its residents, but Lippmann hasn’t decided what to do about the coming increase.
“We are looking at what our alternatives might be because the rates that they are proposing for 2022 are a significant increase over what we have now,” Lippmann said. “They are talking about maybe a 30 percent increase, which is huge. We don’t want to take a 30 percent increase.”
Council members didn’t have much to say about the announcement. Councilman Charles Goodman said he couldn’t recall receiving the rate proposal by email. Lippmann said he would send it to Goodman.
New Council Member
Former Williston City Council President Debra Jones has been elected to the City Council.
She will replace current Council President Nancy Wininger who decided not to run for re-election.
In Friday’s qualifying, Jones was the only candidate to qualify for Wininger’s seat. Wininger did not qualify.
Mayor Jerry Robinson and Councilman Charles Goodman were re-elected to their posts without opposition.
Jones will take office in mid-April. Since there were no contested races, the city has cancelled the March 3 city election.
Wininger said she had been planning to retire from the council as early as last summer.
“My husband and I decided early last summer that this takes a lot of time, a lot of effort. This is my second term. I will not be running for a third term,” she said. “I am so glad I have done this. I cannot tell you how much I learned and what an opportunity to serve; but there are other ways to serve, so Debra ran for my open seat.”
Wininger has also complained in many council meetings about the Sunshine Law, and how it restricts council members from discussing public business in private, and Tuesday night was no exception. She mentioned during a discussion of Lippmann’s annual evaluation that she hasn’t been able to talk to council members about the written comments of her fellow council members. She therefore favored a workshop to publicly discuss the council’s ideas on what improvements they want to see in the city manager.
A workshop last week to discuss Lippmann’s job duties was cancelled when Wininger was called away to a family medical emergency. She requested the workshop.
The other three council members present Tuesday night weren’t interested in holding the workshop, so they agreed by consensus (without a vote) to cancel the workshop.
Councilman Justin Head said he didn’t see any need for a workshop when Lippmann had already seen the council’s comments in writing.
“Personally I understand there were some things discussed, but I also feel with the job duties we already have in place, he has information from the evaluation of what we would like to see and expect,” Head said.
Wininger was prepared to go along with the cancellation as long her fellow council members let Lippmann know what they expect of him.
Head responded that the evaluation was completed, Lippmann’s score was compiled and he didn’t think anything more needed to be done.
“We accept the evaluation and move on,” Head said.
“And that’s what we do every year,” Wininger responded. “We accept it and we move on. We don’t tell him what we want him to do. That’s not right.”
Lippmann is a contract employee, which means he doesn’t fall into the same category as other city employees that work for him.
Goodman said the council had traditionally allowed the city manager and clerk to decide whether they wanted to discuss their evaluations publicly. If they didn’t want to discuss the evaluations, the council didn’t talk about the evaluations publicly.
Lippmann’s Pay Raise?
Head asked whether the council was interested in giving Lippmann the same pay raise the rank and file employees received this year – 2 percent.
“All the other employees with the city got a 2 percent raise. I completely understand this individual is a contract individual. Are we considering a 2 percent raise for the city manager or are we not considering anything?
Goodman said his reading of Lippmann’s contract is that he received two pay raises his first year in office, but after that any future increases in compensation must be discussed by the full board and approved by resolution.
“If you want to give a raise, put it on as an agenda item,” Goodman said.
Wininger said she interpreted the contract to say that Lippmann was to receive the first two raises, “but didn’t say anything after that.”
“Oh, it was very clear to me,” Goodman said.
“Ok, then we won’t rehash that,” Wininger responded.
“The contract specifically says any raise for the city manager after these two raises comes at the will of the city council and by resolution,” Goodman said.
Wright’s Pay Increase
On a related issue, Goodman asked whether the city council was being notified of any changes in the pay of city employees.
Head responded that the council was notified by the city‘s finance director, Steven Bloom, that Clerk Latricia Wright’s salary was raised by 2 percent retroactively to when other employees got the raise. The council approved her raise at a previous meeting
The question of how Lippmann received pay raises for several years without full council approval was a sore spot with Goodman and other council members. Some council members said they knew nothing about the raises. The council stripped Lippmann of pay raises for several years.
Council members said in the future they wanted to be notified by Bloom of any changes in the salary of employees, particularly Lippmann and Wright. Bloom notified them of Wright’s pay increase. Lippmann said he notified Bloom that in the future he was to notify council members of salary increases.
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City of Williston Regular Meeting January 21, 2020; Posted January 22, 2020
