Letter to the Editor,
Rarely, if ever, have I written a letter to the editor or responded to posts on social media sites, but based on the various public commentary and events that have transpired during the most recent search for a new Isle of Palms City Administrator, I feel compelled to provide a few facts on the subject.
I will stay away from personal judgements of breach of trust and ethics, lack of integrity, or honesty, I will let you be the judge of that, I just want to provide a chronology of the facts.
In October 2024, Desiree Fragoso informed the IOP City Council of her plans to resign as the City Administrator. By city code, the Administration Committee, of which I was the Chair (Phillip Pounds became Charman on January 10, 2025), is responsible for leading a search for a new Administrator. There was no interest from any internal candidates, and in fact, I personally had a conversation with the Assistant Administrator, Douglas Kerr, regarding his plans. He emphatically said that he was not interested in the City Administrator position. He further said he planned to retire from the city and pursue employment in the private sector.
The Administration Committee then started the process of hiring a search firm to conduct a nationwide search for a new Administrator. After interviewing several firms, the Committee selected a local firm, Find Great People (FGP), to conduct the search. City Council approved FGP on November 12, 2024, and they started the search process.
The window for candidates to apply for the position closed on December 31, 2024. At that time, FGP had 79 applications and through initial screening they identified 25 applicants to move forward through their vetting process. By early January 2025, FGP had screened the list of 25 down to 14 candidates which were brought to the Administration Committee for review on January 10, 2025. The Committee identified 5 of the candidates to move forward through an interview process. On January 23 & 24, 2025, the Administration Committee interviewed the 5 candidates and selected 3 candidates as finalists to submit to City Council for interviews. It was decided that the second day of these interviews would not be a public meeting, so no vote was taken as to the final 3 candidates. The Committee selected February 13, 2025, as the date the candidates would be interviewed by City Council and FGP made plans and travel arrangements with the candidates.
This is where the process started to degrade. On Saturday January 25, 2025, Mayor Pounds called me with a proposal. He said he had a thought in the middle of the night that based on the “salary expectations” of the candidates, he went to Douglas Kerr and told him what the other candidates were expecting in salary and that Douglas told him that he would be interested in the City Administrator position at that compensation level. The mayor proposed that the Administration Committee ONLY bring Douglas Kerr to City Council for consideration and not bring forward the 3 other candidates. I told him I did not agree with that approach and reminded the mayor that we have not seen the candidates’ actual compensation, only what they expect from seeing our salary range, which is quite broad. I told him it would be highly unlikely that we would actually pay that amount. I suggested that other Council members also may not be on board with that proposal and that he contact them for their thoughts. I know the mayor contacted other Council members with the same proposal, including Katie Miars. It was clearly a blatant disregard for confidential information when the mayor decided to share the candidates’ expected salary information with Douglas Kerr and attempt to railroad the entire process by trying to submit only Douglas as the sole candidate to City Council.
On January 28, 2025, at the monthly City Council meeting, the mayor’s proposal was discussed in executive session. No decision was made or vote taken. On February 4, 2025, at an Administration Committee meeting, Douglas Kerr was interviewed for the Administrator position. Again, no vote was taken to move him forward in the process. All four candidates were interviewed by the City Council on February 13, 2025. No discussion or decision was made on the candidates at the meeting, as the meeting ended abruptly due to a Council Members violent behavior.
It seems that most of the dialogue and focus has been related to how information about this serious issue reached the press and became public, rather than what precipitated this issue for the city. I will let you decide if you are willing to accept the actions that occurred during this process, which includes our mayor making personal and unilateral assumptions about potential compensation offers to outside candidates and sharing that with a potential internal candidate, attempting to rush the selection process by pushing ONLY one candidate, and then shifting the blame to whoever made this public. Again, the IOP residents should review this series of events and be the judge of one’s integrity, ethics, or honesty.
My hope is for brighter days ahead regarding the governance of our beloved City, and I hope everyone can commit to do better…..
John Bogosian