{"id":2448258,"date":"2019-09-02T21:04:01","date_gmt":"2019-09-03T03:04:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.aspentimes.com\/news\/aspens-next-city-manager-to-take-reins-after-a-19-year-reign-by-predecessor\/"},"modified":"2019-09-02T21:04:01","modified_gmt":"2019-09-03T03:04:01","slug":"aspens-next-city-manager-to-take-reins-after-a-19-year-reign-by-predecessor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/local-news\/aspens-next-city-manager-to-take-reins-after-a-19-year-reign-by-predecessor\/","title":{"rendered":"Aspen\u2019s next city manager to take reins after a 19-year reign by predecessor"},"content":{"rendered":"
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When Aspen City Council approves an employment contract<\/a> with Sara Ott to be the next city manager likely Tuesday afternoon, it will be a formality.<\/p>\n

Albeit a big formality. It will secure Ott in a position that she has held in interim since February after Steve Barwick was asked to resign a month earlier for a series of communication missteps<\/a> with the public.<\/p>\n

Ott was one of two assistant city managers under Barwick; Barry Crook was the other and he was asked to leave in December<\/a> after a blow up with the all-volunteer housing board and its executive director.<\/p>\n

With Crook and Barwick gone, it left Ott as the only one in the City Manager\u2019s Office<\/a> to run the municipal government and its 320-plus employees.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve been steering the ship for nine months,\u201d she said last week, after the city announced tha Ott was picked over two other finalists for the permanent job.<\/p>\n

Ott said it is too early to discuss what staffing hires and adjustments will be made in the City Manager\u2019s Office, but listening to the community is priority No. 1.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe organizational structure is not ideal,\u201d she said of the department. \u201cBut I want to hear from the community and make sure the changes I am thinking about are in line with what they want.\u201d<\/p>\n

Currently serving in the assistant city manager roles are Scott Miller, public works director, and Alissa Farrell, director of human resources.<\/p>\n

Ott\u2019s contract to serve as interim city manager expired Sunday. She was being paid $195,255. Her new salary, $203,000, will be retroactive from that date if council approves the contract Tuesday.<\/p>\n

There were a total of 64 applicants for the city\u2019s top administrative job, which was advertised through the national search firm Peckham & McKenney.<\/p>\n

The original pool of applicants was culled to four finalists, one of whom dropped out before the interview process.<\/p>\n

Ott beat out Robb Etnyre, the general manager and CEO of Tahoe Donner in Truckee, California, and Katherine Lewis, senior city attorney for Salt Lake City Corp.<\/p>\n

The finalists met with city staff and members of the public<\/a>, who were then asked to fill out feedback cards for council to help weigh its decision.<\/p>\n

Mayor Torre acknowledged that he\u2019s heard concerns from some city employees about Ott, but the mayor said Ott\u2019s qualifications, experience and dedication won out.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s no decision that will make everyone happy,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019m excited to work with her.\u201d<\/p>\n

csackariason@aspentimes.com<\/a><\/p>\n

via:: The Aspen Times<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When Aspen City Council approves an employment contract with Sara Ott to be the next city manager likely Tuesday afternoon, it will be a formality. Albeit a big formality. It will secure Ott in a position that she has held in interim since February after Steve Barwick was asked to resign a month earlier for […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[49],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-2448258","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-local-news"},"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-26 03:14:58","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSPN The Valley's Quality Rock","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2448258","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2448258"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2448258\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2448258"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2448258"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2448258"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}