FORT PIERCE \u2013 Fort Pierce City Manager Richard Chess received unanimous endorsements Monday during his first, six-month job performance review, including from the only city commissioner who voted against his hiring and his internal competitor for the job.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn hindsight, I was wrong,\u201d declared Commissioner Michael Broderick. \u201cIt was not about the quality of the man, by any means. A massive amount of change was required to address our bottomless pit of problems.<\/p>\n
\u201cI believe we have the man in the job at the time we need him.\u201d<\/p>\n
City Clerk Linda Cox, who came within one commission vote of having the job, also praised Chess, saying, \u201cWe make a great team.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m really happy he\u2019s here,\u201d Cox said Monday night.<\/p>\n
Chess, who came to Fort Pierce in April from his position as assistant general manager of finance for Broward County Transportation, was hired in a competitive process following the 2024 arrest of former city manager Nicholas Mimms on charges of bid tampering and official misconduct. He has pleaded not guilty and awaits trial.<\/p>\n
Chess\u2019 contract provided for a 5 percent pay increase after six months, following a positive job performance review by commissioners. That will bump his annual salary to $210,000, still below what Chess was earning at his former job.<\/p>\n
Mayor Linda Hudson suggested Monday that Chess may be in the market for an additional deputy manager to oversee areas including city purchasing and code enforcement, both issues that have been in the spotlight recently. The city has been without its second deputy city manager since a retirement earlier this year.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m impressed with the knowledge you\u2019ve gained and that you\u2019re a staff champion, but not a pushover,\u201d Hudson said. \u201c…You\u2019ve been thrown right into the deep end and, so far, I\u2019m very pleased.\u201d<\/p>\n
Commissioner Arnold Gaines said Chess has ushered a \u201cchange in atmosphere at city hall\u201d and praised him for his willingness to \u201cattack and fix problems.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s going to do what\u2019s right, what\u2019s best for the entire city,\u201d said Gaines. \u201cTake off both gloves and get down to what we hired you to do so we can get the city back. Whatever you see is wrong, make it right.\u201d<\/p>\n
Commissioner Curtis Johnson Jr. concurred, saying he\u2019s relying on Chess to \u201cmake the tough decisions here\u201d and praising the city manager for his \u201cgreat start.\u201d<\/p>\n
Among Chess\u2019 priorities now is the selection of a new police chief and \u201cgetting out there in the community more.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"FORT PIERCE \u2013 Fort Pierce City Manager Richard Chess received unanimous endorsements Monday during his first, six-month job…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":15522,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[171,173,172,563],"class_list":{"0":"post-15521","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-port-st-lucie","8":"tag-port-st-lucie","9":"tag-port-st-lucie-headlines","10":"tag-port-st-lucie-news","11":"tag-st_lucie"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15521","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15521"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15521\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15522"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15521"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15521"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15521"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}