STUART — The fate of City Manager Michael Mortell will be determined Monday evening when a majority of the City Commission — Vice Mayor Christopher Collins and Commissioners Laura Giobbi and Sean Reed — vote during the meeting’s final discussion and deliberation item.
Since the election of Giobbi and Reed last year on slow-growth platforms, they have steadfastly followed the vice-mayor’s lead on any and all issues related to commercial and residential development, and in particular, the rejection of city support for a Brightline train station downtown. Except for some rare instances, almost all Commission votes for which the board has been divided have fallen along 3-2 lines, with Mayor Rich Campbell and Commissioner Eula Clark dissenting.
That was no different on Oct. 13, when the board reached its final item that evening requested by Commissioner Reed to discuss the city manager’s contract.
“First of all, I totally respect you, Mike, for what you’ve done for the city, and what you do for the city,” he said. “I wasn’t part of the hiring process for your position, but I’d like to ask publicly for your resignation and for us to go look for a city manager so I can be part of that new process moving forward.”
Reed then turned that idea into a motion that included appointing Finance Director Louis Boglioli as acting city manager. Vice-Mayor Christopher Collins seconded it for discussion, Mayor Rich invited the public to comment and a handful of people came to the podium to speak.
Community Redevelopment Board Chairman Mark Brechbill was the first to speak, insisting that city managers had “to make tough decisions, so you’re not going to agree with all of them.”
“I don’t agree with his answers all the time, but I think we’re lucky to have somebody like him,” he said of Mortell. “He’s an attorney, he’s got experience as a city manager [and] he’s previously been an elected commissioner, so he understands the pressure you guys are under. Mr. Reed, I don’t think we make a change just because we weren’t there or we want to vet it again.”
The only people that subsequently came up to complain about Mortell, however, were activist Robin Cartwright – who opposed the Costco development and unsuccessfully lobbied the state’s review board to nullify the city’s land use changes that permitted it – and the owners of Stuart’s oldest church building who blame him for errors made by a contractor under the city’s Community Development Block Grant program.
Former City Commissioner Merritt Matheson followed them to the podium.
“I guarantee you any future city manager is going to look at all of these meetings,” he said. “What do you think you’re going to get after they see all these meetings and all these accusations? If there’s a reason to remove someone, lay out the facts, make this a courtroom [and] prove your case. Every two weeks, the city attorney and the city manager come for a job interview. You guys are their boss, but you get a lot more done if you work with your boss. Meeting after meeting, all I’m hearing is ways of trying to prove him wrong. He works for you. Go in, sit down and talk with him for an hour.”
For his part, Vice-Mayor Collins insisted he hadn’t made a decision on firing Mortell at that moment.
“I was part of the Board that did hire Mike, and I would rather not go down that path,” he said. “If anything – if the intent is to hire a new city manager – that we do so respectfully and not litigate him on the dais.”
Mortell briefly responded, saying that City Attorney Lee Baggett had previously informed him of Commissioner Reed’s desire to review his contract.
“We didn’t put it on as an agenda item because I didn’t think it was an action item,” he said. “If you look at the code of conduct, it says when preparing for commission meetings, commissioners should direct questions ahead of time to the city manager so that staff can provide the desired information at the Commission meeting. Meeting by ambush is never acceptable. There are an infinite number of questions that an elected official can ask that can’t be answered on the spot, and to do so only serves to make staff look ineffective. I’m truly surprised at the approach we’re taking tonight because I have been available and no one’s called me to discuss terminating me or to tell me why or even tell me which thing I did wrong in my job.”
After the Board ended up voting 3-2 – with Rich and Clark dissenting – to continue the discussion on Oct. 26, friends and supporters of Mortell held a rally Oct. 22 at Maria’s Place in Downtown Stuart. Mortell did not attend personally but sent a message via John Gonzalez who had announced the event.
“Ask Stuart’s elected officials to leave politics out of the administration of the city and allow me to continue serving, so that I can demonstrate once again that my only directive has always been, and continues to be, advancing the best interests of the City of Stuart,” Gonzalez read that day.
Mortell has been with the city for more than two decades, serving first as an elected commissioner and then as city attorney for 10 years until he was hired as city manager in 2023.
The Hometown News sent emails to the Commission majority members on Oct. 24 asking for concrete reasons for Mortell’s dismissal.
While Commissioner Reed did respond to both email and telephone saying he would specify his reasons on Oct. 26, Vice-Mayor Collins simply accused the reporter of being biased and showing impartiality without explaining how the questions or statements were biased.
“When seeking information, it would be better to at least appear impartial,” he wrote.
Of the former city commissioners contacted by the Hometown News, Becky Bruner, Troy McDonald and Matheson, only the latter responded with comment.
“I’m entirely disgusted by the absolute lack of transparency and the way they are approaching the issue,” he said via email Oct. 24. “I believe it’s a commissioner’s obligation to routinely meet with a city manager, as well as the city attorney, and discuss performance and goals frequently. I also believe it is the commissioners’ obligation to explain their logic and reasoning to the voters, especially of issues of this magnitude.”
On Oct. 24, the Stuart/Martin County Chamber of Commerce sent out an email blast with a poster inviting the public to attend the Oct. 27 meeting in support of the current city manager. The poster, titled “Keep Stuart Strong,” encourages Mortell’s supporters to wear purple to the meeting, which begins at 5 p.m. at City Hall.