FORT PIERCE, Fla. \u2014 Six months after taking the helm as Fort Pierce\u2019s city manager, Richard Chess is earning high marks from city commissioners, who say he\u2019s bringing stability and fresh direction to city operations.<\/p>\n
\u201cYour six months has been, you got thrown right into the deep-end and so far I’m very pleased,\u201d Mayor Linda Hudson said during a performance review at the city commission meeting Monday.<\/p>\n
Commissioners offered similar praise, describing Chess as a capable and strategic leader.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou truly are a chief executive officer and I say that as a true compliment,\u201d said Commissioner Michael Broderick. \u201cYou are skilled at it and I am confident that we are going to deal with one issue at a time.\u201d<\/p>\n
Chess, who previously served as Broward County\u2019s assistant general manager of transportation, stepped into the role after former City Manager Nick Mimms was fired following his arrest last year on charges of bid rigging and official misconduct. The scandal left the city searching for steady leadership to guide its recovery.<\/p>\n
During the selection process, Chess and City Clerk Linda Cox were the final two candidates for the role. When Chess was appointed, Commissioner Broderick and Mayor Hudson were among those who opposed the decision, but both now say their perspectives have changed.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was very impressed with what you have, the knowledge you gained, and I think that you’re a staff champion, and I appreciate that, except that you’re not a pushover,\u201d Hudson said.<\/p>\n
Broderick also acknowledged his shift in perspective. \u201cI was wrong and I admit it,\u201d he said. \u201cChange is here, it’s being implemented, and you have the respect of the city commission to get this done.\u201d<\/p>\n
Commissioner Arnold Gaines commended Chess for his proactive approach. \u201cI like how you have systematically started to not only attack and try to fix the problems but you are not afraid to call out the problems and bring it to our attention,\u201d Gaines said.<\/p>\n
After the review, Chess was granted a 5% raise in accordance with the terms of his contract. Commissioners also laid out clear expectations for his future leadership.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think that the King\u2019s Landing development which has now been approved and back on, that we need to really work closely with them and make sure that that is a success because that’s something that has been a long time coming,\u201d Hudson said.<\/p>\n
Gaines added a challenge for the city manager as he continues to settle in. \u201cYou had the first two months and you finally took off a glove. I’m asking you to take off both gloves and roll your sleeves up, and get down to doing what we hired you to do to address the issues that you know are there.\u201d<\/p>\n
As Chess looks ahead, city leaders say Chess is poised to steer Fort Pierce toward progress.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"FORT PIERCE, Fla. \u2014 Six months after taking the helm as Fort Pierce\u2019s city manager, Richard Chess is…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":20381,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[3305,16412,171,173,172,16413],"class_list":{"0":"post-20380","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-port-st-lucie","8":"tag-city-manager","9":"tag-nick-mimms","10":"tag-port-st-lucie","11":"tag-port-st-lucie-headlines","12":"tag-port-st-lucie-news","13":"tag-richard-chess"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20380","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=20380"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20380\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20381"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20380"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20380"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20380"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}