Mora City Council votes to 'recast the net' in city administrator search

The Mora City Council voted to "recast the net" with the search process for the city administrator position in a split 3-2 vote at Tuesday's meeting.

Interviews were held with two internal candidates — Human Resources Director Mandi Yoder and City Clerk Natasha Segelstrom — over the past couple of weeks.

Yoder interviewed for the position at council meetings on Nov. 25 and Dec. 2. Segelstrom's interviews — conducted remotely by interim city administrator Joe Kohlgraf on Dec. 4 and 10 — were presented to the council on Tuesday.

"Really, there are two issues at play here," said mayor Jake Mathison. "There's the issue of did we have good enough due diligence on the process, and do we need to open this up. And then there's also the issue of which of the two internal candidates. So there are multiple things going on here."

During a lengthy discussion, council member Shane Knutson expressed concerns with the internal hiring process.

"I don't think it's a real big shock to anybody that I probably prefer before we settle on an internal candidate, I think we should re-throw the net and lock the process down better on how we would hire, and I think it should have external help," Knutson said. "I don't like disrespecting people that put in the time and effort to do the interviews, and I feel that, in a lot of ways, that's what we'll end up doing. But my position is that the process needed to be tighter."

Council member Dave Youngquist also said he'd like to see the scope of the search widened.

"If it's a worry of putting one or the other into that position and possibly losing them due to burnout and stress and whatnot, then we probably never should have bothered to hire from within," Youngquist said. "Because there's a good chance of that happening with anybody you put into that position."

Council member Jen Henry also reminded the council about guidance received that "the open market looks bleak" for hiring externally.

"I've also been through multiple of these hires where we did go out for open hiring, and the results were also not good," Mathison added.

Knutson made the motion to effectively fail the current search, with a second from Youngquist.

Knutson, Youngquist, and Henry voted in favor of the motion, with Mathison and Pioske voting no.