The order for the interviews was randomly pulled out of a hat.

So uh we will begin this uh afternoon with our first applicant, Aaron Mitchell.

All right, and we'll start with roll call.

Yes, I'll start with Burns.

Here Miller, here, Homestead, Eric Pearson.

Randall, here, and young here.

Thank you.

All right, before we get going, does any council person have any questions about what we're going to do and how we're going to do it?

Yeah, um, can the audience hearing not very well.

Maybe um when it's your turn to um speak, just hold it closer to your uh mouth.

Yeah, I'm on.

Okay, if we're ready to go.

Uh Aaron, please come forward.

Thank you for joining us this afternoon on behalf of myself and the entire city council.

We welcome you to the city of Portage.

We are very appreciative of the time uh you have uh given will be giving us today and the preparation that you did to prepare for the interview.

So uh just to start with, my name is Patricia Randall and I am the mayor, and I'll just start to my left and we'll just have really brief introduction before the first question.

Hi, Erin, I'm Kathleen Elstead.

Nice to meet you.

And Nicole Miller.

Jim Pearson.

Hi, Chris Burns.

Thank you.

I do have some handouts real quick.

Hopefully for some of the things I might be referencing.

And like I said, we'll get an hour, so if there's something not covered, uh thank you.

All right, so um I have the first question, and um please take a couple of uh introduce yourself.

I guess we're just gonna have micro.

Uh uh introduce yourself in your own words, tell us what is shaped you as a manager, and what you would like to introduce is a um test as one of the networking.

We do have an IT department for calling in right now.

So we're close.

That's much less than seven days okay.

Yeah, yeah.

Uh Mitchell.

Lived in Southwest Michigan my entire life.

Went to Edwardsburg public school, so that's right down by the state line, but I've always been within probably 45 minutes of of Portage.

So in many ways, it is a home to me.

Um went to school at Western where I met my uh beautiful wife.

Uh we're I'm pretty sure it was on the flight football field for intermedial sports, if you're curious.

Um since then we had two wonderful children.

I uh stayed at home with them and uh helped raise them before I went into the management field and I joined the uh village of Decatur.

And before then I did have experience in assessing clerking and treasury.

So I did have quite a bit of different governmental experience before I started uh as a village manager in Decatur.

And from there I went to Apsego, and that is uh where I currently reside, and I love my job there, but I'm pretty excited about this opportunity uh going forward.

Uh I do feel like I bring a lot of uh a lot of experience.

I mean, yes, I've been there been managing for 10 years.

However, um it's it's I've gone through I've seen some stuff.

Uh Sigo when I got there, uh there's just a lot of uh unique events um that really l needed leadership to get through.

Um and it wasn't something that you can necessarily look in a book and find.

Oh no.

All right, I'll make it loud.

Um basically I I do feel like I'm bringing quite a bit to the people sometimes looking at.

Um thing that you've probably already done is a little bit of background and transparency and report.

I am agreement back.

I mean, that has been rubbed some people the wrong way.

But I've been told she said it is a uh a protected class, so I shouldn't be dismissed.

But no, in all honesty, obviously I try to use humor and uh sometimes bad jokes to break the ice because my position usually uh it's all about building relationships going forward.

And if you are talking to the city manager, there's a good chance that you've either been suing on a problem for multiple days, or it is very, very near to your heart.

And how you can get through that conversation, even if it's a self-conversation, um, it's beneficial going forward.

I do feel like having building relationships and doing the right thing is a lot of what this job is, and it's not always easy, but sometimes it is that's simple.