STUART \u2014 The fate of City Manager Michael Mortell will be determined Monday evening when a majority of the City Commission \u2014 Vice Mayor Christopher Collins and Commissioners Laura Giobbi and Sean Reed \u2014 vote during the meeting\u2019s final discussion and deliberation item.<\/p>\n
Since the election of Giobbi and Reed last year on slow-growth platforms, they have steadfastly followed the vice-mayor\u2019s 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.<\/p>\n
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\u2019s contract.<\/p>\n
\u201cFirst of all, I totally respect you, Mike, for what you\u2019ve done for the city, and what you do for the city,\u201d he said. \u201cI wasn\u2019t part of the hiring process for your position, but I\u2019d 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.\u201d<\/p>\n
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.<\/p>\n
Community Redevelopment Board Chairman Mark Brechbill was the first to speak, insisting that city managers had \u201cto make tough decisions, so you\u2019re not going to agree with all of them.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t agree with his answers all the time, but I think we\u2019re lucky to have somebody like him,\u201d he said of Mortell. \u201cHe\u2019s an attorney, he\u2019s got experience as a city manager [and] he\u2019s previously been an elected commissioner, so he understands the pressure you guys are under. Mr. Reed, I don\u2019t think we make a change just because we weren\u2019t there or we want to vet it again.\u201d<\/p>\n
The only people that subsequently came up to complain about Mortell, however, were activist Robin Cartwright \u2013 who opposed the Costco development and unsuccessfully lobbied the state\u2019s review board to nullify the city\u2019s land use changes that permitted it \u2013 and the owners of Stuart\u2019s oldest church building who blame him for errors made by a contractor under the city\u2019s Community Development Block Grant program.<\/p>\n
Former City Commissioner Merritt Matheson followed them to the podium.<\/p>\n
\u201cI guarantee you any future city manager is going to look at all of these meetings,\u201d he said. \u201cWhat do you think you\u2019re going to get after they see all these meetings and all these accusations? If there\u2019s 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\u2019m hearing is ways of trying to prove him wrong. He works for you. Go in, sit down and talk with him for an hour.\u201d<\/p>\n
For his part, Vice-Mayor Collins insisted he hadn\u2019t made a decision on firing Mortell at that moment.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was part of the Board that did hire Mike, and I would rather not go down that path,\u201d he said. \u201cIf anything \u2013 if the intent is to hire a new city manager \u2013 that we do so respectfully and not litigate him on the dais.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mortell briefly responded, saying that City Attorney Lee Baggett had previously informed him of Commissioner Reed\u2019s desire to review his contract.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe didn\u2019t put it on as an agenda item because I didn\u2019t think it was an action item,\u201d he said. \u201cIf 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\u2019t be answered on the spot, and to do so only serves to make staff look ineffective. I\u2019m truly surprised at the approach we\u2019re taking tonight because I have been available and no one\u2019s called me to discuss terminating me or to tell me why or even tell me which thing I did wrong in my job.\u201d<\/p>\n
After the Board ended up voting 3-2 \u2013 with Rich and Clark dissenting \u2013 to continue the discussion on Oct. 26, friends and supporters of Mortell held a rally Oct. 22 at Maria\u2019s Place in Downtown Stuart. Mortell did not attend personally but sent a message via John Gonzalez who had announced the event.<\/p>\n
\u201cAsk Stuart\u2019s 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,\u201d Gonzalez read that day.<\/p>\n
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.<\/p>\n
The Hometown News sent emails to the Commission majority members on Oct. 24 asking for concrete reasons for Mortell\u2019s dismissal.<\/p>\n
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.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen seeking information, it would be better to at least appear impartial,\u201d he wrote.<\/p>\n
Of the former city commissioners contacted by the Hometown News, Becky Bruner, Troy McDonald and Matheson, only the latter responded with comment.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m entirely disgusted by the absolute lack of transparency and the way they are approaching the issue,\u201d he said via email Oct. 24. \u201cI believe it\u2019s a commissioner\u2019s 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\u2019 obligation to explain their logic and reasoning to the voters, especially of issues of this magnitude.\u201d<\/p>\n
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 \u201cKeep Stuart Strong,\u201d encourages Mortell\u2019s supporters to wear purple to the meeting, which begins at 5 p.m. at City Hall.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"STUART \u2014 The fate of City Manager Michael Mortell will be determined Monday evening when a majority of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":22540,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[326,171,173,172],"class_list":{"0":"post-22539","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-port-st-lucie","8":"tag-martin","9":"tag-port-st-lucie","10":"tag-port-st-lucie-headlines","11":"tag-port-st-lucie-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22539","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=22539"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22539\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22540"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22539"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22539"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22539"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}