City Council Getting Closer...

Grand Terrace may eliminate assistant city manager position
Stephen Wall, Staff Writer
Posted: 06/10/2009 05:35:44 PM PDT

GRAND TERRACE - The City Council agreed Tuesday to move forward with a proposal to eliminate the assistant city manager position to help balance the 2009-2010 budget.
Unless he is hired as city manager, Assistant City Manager Steve Berry will be out of a job.

Berry came up with the budget-balancing plan in consultation with Finance Director Bernie Simon and former City Manager Tom Schwab.

Berry was named acting city manager in August, two months after Schwab was hospitalized with a subdural hematoma, a brain injury that nearly killed the 51-year-old resident.

Eliminating the $124,000-a-year assistant city manager position, along with other cuts, will produce a $57,829 surplus for the fiscal year starting July 1.

"This is the only way we can balance the budget," Berry said. "We have cut from the bottom. We need to look at cutting from the top."

Berry, a 46-year-old Riverside resident, said he will apply for the city manager job. The council is accepting applications for the position through Aug. 17 and is expected to make a decision around Oct. 1.

"I'm going to compete with whomever applies for the job. May the best person win," Berry said.

Mayor Maryetta Ferre said there are many cities the size of Grand Terrace that don't have an assistant city manager.

Ferre said Berry isn't assured of getting the city manager's job.

"I want to make it perfectly clear that it is level playing field," she said. "Everybody who applies will be considered."
Councilman Walt Stanckiewitz agreed.

"I don't think anyone is saying it's Steve's job," he said. "We're investing the money in doing the search and advertising the position. If he gets it, it will be because he's the best qualified."

The council is expected to adopt the budget June 23.

Paww adds:
I hope the City Clerk and or City Manager's Secretary apply for the City Manager Job and ask for a modest increase in their woman's pay which will save additional money for the city the City will still run like clock work without the Grandiose Back Room Deal Making, half baked contracts and side deals...

Steve Berry should look for work some where else... He has shamed the City of Grand Terrace enough. The budget he submitted first did not have the cut at the top... he continues to think of his own pocket first. He should go... and be glad if he is able to leave town without being in the back of a squad car with silver bracelets on his wrists.