INDIANTOWN \u2013 The Indiantown Village Council majority voted Sept. 10 to award an open-ended employee contract with severance pay to a man its members appointed just nine days prior as acting Village manager during an eye-opening special meeting on Sept. 1 after a different majority fired Village Manager Taryn Kryzda without warning and without cause.<\/p>\n
The new interim manager, Michael Giardino, had previously begun work as the Stuart City manager on April 27, but fell victim to a major shift in that city\u2019s board after the August Primary Election.<\/p>\n
The same election toppled the apple cart even farther in Indiantown, with three new Council members swept into office on a wave of data center fear after long-term City Attorney Wade Vose had advised against imposing a moratorium last June and the Council concurred.<\/p>\n
As far as Giardino, he\u2019d only served the City of Stuart as manager for a scant few months until that Commission gave him the boot on Aug. 24. Vose had already tendered his resignation by the Sept. 1 meeting, admitting that night that he couldn\u2019t feasibly represent the Village in a potential lawsuit after recommending against a moratorium. Kryzda herself had no idea what was about to transpire that evening because the purpose of the meeting was to vote on a new interim attorney and direct staff to draft a moratorium resolution.<\/p>\n
After doing so, newly elected Councilman Anthony Dowling dropped the bomb by making a motion to cancel Kryzda\u2019s contract, which was seconded by newly elected Councilwoman Janet Hernandez.<\/p>\n
It passed 3-2, with Mayor Phyllis Waters-Brown and Councilwoman Vernestine Williams-Palmer dissenting. Although neither Dowling nor Hernandez acknowledged having collaborating on Kryzda\u2019s removal on the campaign trail like a Stuart commissioner and a candidate did with Giardino\u2019s firing, both did call Giardino separately on Sept. 1 and invited him to that evening\u2019s meeting, suggesting they might have a position for him.<\/p>\n
Fast-forward nine days later, and the meeting began with Giardino at the helm and Janette Smith \u2013 a colleague of Vose \u2013 serving as interim attorney. Smith began the discussion with an apology after Mayor Waters-Brown announced a resolution formalizing Giardino\u2019s temporary position.<\/p>\n
\u201cI did not know there was a resolution for the interim village manager,\u201d she said. \u201cOtherwise I would have had a resolution for you. If you review the item and have the discussion, it could be completed by a motion, similar to how you hired our firm bringing us in as the interim village attorney.\u201d<\/p>\n
Smith pointed out that Giardino was requesting Kryzda\u2019s contracted $163,904 salary and benefits, some of which got initial pushback from the mayor and others.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve only had one interim manager before,\u201d Waters-Brown said in reference to Kryzda. \u201cShe was not given a contract for a while. I would like for him to be paid biweekly without the severance, and I would love for it not to be a contract. I would like an request for proposals \u2013 that\u2019s what we talked about last week \u2013 and encourage the acting village manager to apply for that position.\u201d<\/p>\n
Council member Dowling immediately chimed in.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe only thing I would recommend is scratching the 20 weeks\u2019 severance,\u201d he said. \u201cEverything else looks fine for me.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat happened to wanting an RFP,\u201d Mayor Waters-Brown asked him.<\/p>\n
\u201cOh yeah, of course this is interim,\u201d Dowling answered. \u201cWe want to do the RFP like we discussed last week. If that\u2019s the process we go to, he can reapply.\u201d<\/p>\n
Councilwoman Hernandez sided with Dowling, also opposing any severance pay for Giardino.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe scratch out the severance, we keep the contract [and[ it\u2019d be a binding contract,\u201d she said. \u201cI do think the RFP for the village manager should not be that quick because we have a lot of things going on. I think we should start talking about that probably in six months.\u201d<\/p>\n
After Vice-Mayor Christa Miley \u2013 the other newly elected Council member \u2013 also agreed with Councilman Dowling, Giardino himself threw a wrench in the works by insisting he needed some kind of severance or a reduction in the resignation period.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf severance is off the table and I\u2019m still having to give you 60 days\u2019 notice, that\u2019s hard for a future employer to have to wait two months before I\u2019m allowed to come work if this doesn\u2019t work out,\u201d he said. \u201cI want this to work out. If we don\u2019t do severance, can we meet somewhere where those days can be reduced? Or if it doesn\u2019t work out on your end, maybe a couple weeks of severance.\u201d<\/p>\n
Vice-Mayor Miley still wanted to be more generous.<\/p>\n
\u201cHow about if we reduce from 60 to 30 days\u2019 notice, and instead of 20 weeks [severance], we do 10?\u201d she asked.<\/p>\n
Councilman Dowling still balked with part of that.<\/p>\n
\u201cI would agree with the 30 days,\u201d he said. \u201cI just haven\u2019t landed on any severance at all because of the interim title.\u201d<\/p>\n
After Concilwoman Hernadez questioned the interim attorney if severance was ever given to interim positions, Smith emphasized that all contracts were negotiated.<\/p>\n
\u201cI believe what you\u2019re doing now is providing a counter-offer,\u201d she said. \u201cAt the end of the day whatever you decide as the Council would be legally binding.\u201d<\/p>\n
Councilwoman Hernadez then flip-flopped on the severance issue.<\/p>\n
\u201cI concur with Vice-Mayor Miley in regards of her last offer,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Councilman Dowling informed his colleagues that the severance issue was \u201ca hard line\u201d for him, but after further conversation with Giardano, he crossed it himself.<\/p>\n
\u201cWould everyone be okay with the 30 days and eight weeks\u2019 severance?\u201d he asked his fellow Council members. \u201cThat\u2019s a compromise from none at all.\u201d<\/p>\n
Miley, however, wanted to stay with 10 weeks\u2019 severance. Sensing a potential stalemate, the interim Village manager counter-offered again.<\/p>\n
\u201cI will accept eight weeks severance and those terms right now,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
That was followed by public speakers Eric Miller and Kelsey Lea-Hing \u2013 who had both voraciously opposed data centers \u2013 now urging the Board to give Giardino the contract and severance pay. Fellow Linda Nycum held the opposite view, however.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019re going to be taking applications and comparing this gentleman with other applicants,\u201d she said. \u201cI don\u2019t see why you would want to lock yourselves in with a contract when you know you may decide to go with one of them. Then you\u2019re locked in with severance, etc. I don\u2019t think putting the RFP off for six months makes any sense.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Village Council then voted 4-1, with Mayor Waters-Brown dissenting, to approve the contract with 30 days\u2019 notice and eight weeks of severance. They also voted unanimously to issue the RFP for a permanent Village manager in six months.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"INDIANTOWN \u2013 The Indiantown Village Council majority voted Sept. 10 to award an open-ended employee contract with severance…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":412265,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[326,171,173,172],"class_list":["post-412264","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-port-st-lucie","tag-martin","tag-port-st-lucie","tag-port-st-lucie-headlines","tag-port-st-lucie-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/412264","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=412264"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/412264\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/412265"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=412264"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=412264"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=412264"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}