Claremont City Council Special Meeting - June 30, 2026: FY26 Budget Review, Transfers, and City Manager Recruitment
Claremont City Council Special Meeting - June 30, 2026: FY26 Budget Review, Transfers, and City Manager Recruitment
At this special meeting on June 30, 2026, the Council reviewed the Fiscal Year 2026 budget, approved interdepartmental budget transfers to address overruns, and debated the process for recruiting a new city manager. No public comments were received.
Discussion Items
FY 2026 Budget Review
- City Finance Director (Ms. Bates) presented revenue and expenditure reports as of June 26, 2026, stating the bottom line was within acceptable range but some budget units exceeded allocations due to unanticipated expenses, including legal costs and police overtime.
- Council discussed police department overruns: Chief of Police noted that outside details generated projected revenue of over $80,000 against expenses around $60,000, but because municipal accounting requires expenditures to stay within budgeted lines, the department stopped vehicle maintenance and ammunition purchases to avoid further overages. He attributed part of the overage to the removal of health insurance costs from departmental budgets into a stabilization fund.
- Counselor Harsh warned against council members having direct conversations with city employees about budgets, emphasizing the council's role is to oversee the city manager, not department operations.
Resolution 2026-61: Interdepartmental Budget Transfers
- The resolution authorized transfers totalling $216,740 between budget units: $120,000 from planning to general services, $18,000 from executive to police, $30,000 from community center to police, $18,740 from finance to debt service, $200 from finance to assessing, and $30,000 from fire to communications, with no impact on the tax rate.
- A public hearing was opened and closed with no speakers. The resolution passed unanimously on a roll call vote (9-0).
City Manager Recruitment
- HR Director Shannon Thibodeau presented an in-house option using existing LinkedIn and Indeed accounts, outlining a 12-week timeline and noting she would act solely as a conduit for applications, not as a screener.
- Two external firms were considered: MRI (Municipal Resources Inc.), estimated at $12,000–$13,000, and Rethink Local (founded 2025), with monthly fees from $4,000 to $17,500. MRI had previously assisted Claremont with searches.
- Council debated the merits: some favored the in-house approach to save time and use already-paid services, while others preferred MRI for its professional network and ability to manage the process, especially given the need for an interim city manager.
- Concerns were raised about consistency, past council interference, and the challenge of coordinating nine councilors. Counselor Irish urged immediate action, while Counselor Kaloski stressed the importance of unity.
- A motion by Councilor O'Hearn, seconded by Assistant Mayor Mattow, authorized Mayor Gerard to negotiate a contract with MRI (including exploration of interim candidates) and bring it back to the Council for approval. The motion passed 8-1, with only Councilor Irish dissenting.
Key Outcomes
- Unanimous approval of Resolution 2026-61 for interdepartmental budget transfers.
- Council voted to proceed with MRI for city manager recruitment; mayor to negotiate terms and present contract at a future meeting.
- Council agreed to further discuss interim city manager options and the search committee structure at an upcoming regular meeting.
Meeting Transcript
Good evening. Welcome to Clamour City Council special meeting for Tuesday, June 30th, 2026. Would you mind joining me in the pledge this evening? I pledge to the flag of the United States of America and the Republic for which it stands for nation under God, indivisible with liberty and justice for all. Thank you. Ms. Bizarro, we have a moment. Can you get a roll call, please? Councilor O'Hearn. Present. Councillor Conswell. Here. Counselor Greenrose. Yeah. Assistant Mayor Mattow? Here. Counselor Klosky? Here. Counselor Demosh? Here. Counselor Hemingway? Present. Counselor Irish? Here. Mayor Gerard. Here. Thank you. Next up under new business, the fiscal year 2026 budget review. Miss Bates. Thank you, Mayor. So I provided you here with uh a budget budget reports for both revenues and expenditures as of 626 in the afternoon. So it included last week's posting of AP and payroll. And as you can see, I think we're in good shape bottom line budget-wise. We're a little bit closer than we have been in years past. So there won't be as much dropping into fund balance after we post everything this week. However, we're we're okay bottom line, but as you can see, we are also over on certain budget units. And this is because of a variety of reasons and some unanticipated things over the last year or so. Um but I think overall, uh looking at the numbers, we're good for FY26. Thank you. Does anybody have any questions for Miss Bates in regards to the information she's provided for us? Councillor Hearn. Just a question about the the memo you submitted. The second line it says the police government performed more special detailed work than anticipated and paid out more in overtime due to staffing changes in training. Correct. So I'm trying to understand what does outside details have to do with the overtime and training. They're two separate things. So the uh special detail, there's a comma, so it's they're two, we're talking about two separate things. Um they perform more special detail than normal. Um that's a budgeted item, but it you can never you never know what you're gonna do in special detail. Um and then they had over more overtime than normal because they had people in training and they had to cover they had to cover hours and they had to pay people to come in to train.
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