{"id":147062,"date":"2026-03-24T15:54:15","date_gmt":"2026-03-24T15:54:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/147062\/"},"modified":"2026-03-24T15:54:15","modified_gmt":"2026-03-24T15:54:15","slug":"former-councilmember-takes-job-as-allentowns-new-human-resources-director-allentown-area","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/147062\/","title":{"rendered":"Former councilmember takes job as Allentown&#8217;s new human resources director | Allentown Area"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>ALLENTOWN, Pa. \u2013\u00a0Allentown City Council voted at a <a href=\"https:\/\/allentownpa.legistar.com\/MeetingDetail.aspx?ID=1276835&amp;GUID=0C8FBD91-DC18-4B4B-BB5D-B37297DFF171&amp;Options=&amp;Search=\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">special meeting Wednesday night<\/a> to appoint Marty Velazquez as the new human resources director at an annual salary of $122,947.<\/p>\n<p>Velazquez has a long career in human resources with Wells Fargo and had previously served as a councilmember.<\/p>\n<p>Mayor Matt Tuerk said he was thrilled to present Velazquez for the appointment.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Marty Velazquez is my nominee for director of human resources for the City of Allentown,&#8221; Tuerk said.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Some of you know Marty from his 12 years of distinguished service on this very City Council,&#8221; the mayor said. &#8220;He demonstrated over those 12 years deep commitment to the city and its people.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Marty is bringing that incredible combination of private sector HR experience and an intimate knowledge of our city government to this work,&#8221; Tuerk added. &#8220;He understands Allentown&#8217;s challenges and the opportunities.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;He is ideally suited to lead the HR department at this critical time,&#8221; the mayor said, &#8220;and I&#8217;m confident that his leadership skills and his professional experience and his strong dedication to the City of Allentown will help us build a stronger and more effective workforce that ultimately serves our community.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Council President\u00a0Daryl L. Hendricks called Velazquez &#8220;a breath of fresh&#8221; air coming into City Hall.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We&#8217;ve gone a long time without a director, a sorely needed position,&#8221; Hendricks said. &#8220;Thank you for your willingness to join us.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Councilmember Ed Zucal recused himself from the vote, saying that he worked the polls for Velazquez during his run for mayor, which ended in a defeat in 1997.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ALLENTOWN, Pa. \u2013\u00a0Allentown City Council voted at a special meeting Wednesday night to appoint Marty Velazquez as the&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":147063,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[119,2748,121,120,3001,67001,67002,67003,2459,67000],"class_list":["post-147062","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-allentown","tag-allentown","tag-allentown-city-council","tag-allentown-headlines","tag-allentown-news","tag-daryl-l-hendricks","tag-director-of-human-resources","tag-human-resource-director","tag-marty-velazquez","tag-matt-tuerk","tag-wells-fargo"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/147062","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=147062"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/147062\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/147063"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=147062"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=147062"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=147062"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}