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Luzerne County Councilman Rick Morelli said the time has come to start the search for a new county manager.
The turnaround is significant because six of 11 county council members now support replacing Robert Lawton, who was hired in February 2012 as the county’s first non-interim manager under the new home rule government structure.
However, the home rule charter requires a vote of seven — a majority plus one — to remove the manager.
Five council members have repeatedly criticized Lawton and unsuccessfully voted to fire him in January: Stephen A. Urban, Stephen J. Urban, Edward Brominski, Kathy Dobash and Eileen Sorokas.
It’s unclear if one of the remaining five — Tim McGinley, Harry Haas, Rick Williams, James Bobeck and Linda McClosky Houck — will join Morelli and the others in seeking a new manager.
McGinley said he was “very surprised” to read in the newspaper that Lawton is a finalist for an administrator job in Yuma County, Arizona, because Lawton had halted his job search last spring.
Lawton had said he wanted to stay put, at least temporarily, to finish several ongoing projects that have since wrapped up.
“I’d like to hear his rationale behind it. I like to give people an opportunity to express themselves, and based on the information, I’ll make my decision,” McGinley said.
Lawton has declined to publicly discuss his job search and could not be reached for comment on Morelli’s interest in seeking a new manager.
Morelli, a home rule charter drafter wrapping up his fourth year on council, said he is not proposing immediate termination of Lawton but wants to set a timeline to “move forward with a transition process.”
“I want to put something in place that this council will start actively recruiting for a new manager and put a time frame on it,” Morelli said.
Morelli said his discovery that Lawton is again seeking another job was the “final straw,” prompting him to push for a new manager search.
“It’s obvious he’s interested in leaving, and we have a responsibility on our end to ensure we have everything in place to move forward,” Morelli said.
He said other developments have made him increasingly uncomfortable with continuing on the same leadership path.
For example, he said a brief email Friday was council’s first knowledge that the state has been conducting an ongoing review of the county Children and Youth agency that led to a license downgrade. A high caseworker vacancy rate was cited as one of the main problems, and Morelli said council members were never briefed on severe staffing shortages or concerns about high caseloads.
“What I’m seeing too often is finding out after the fact. If we have a better understanding of what’s going on in each of these divisions, we could plan accordingly,” he said.
Morelli also pointed to the growing deficit and the late approval of a hazard mitigation plan that could have jeopardized disaster assistance funding.
He said Lawton has “done a very good job in many ways.”
“It’s not all bad. He did a very good job transitioning from the old to new government, but in order for us to move to that next level, I think a change in management would probably be best at this point in time,” he said.
If the manager search passes, Morelli said he won’t be locking the next council into a replacement because the selection would spill into 2016.
Six of 11 council seats are up for grabs. McGinley, Brominski and both Urbans are seeking re-election, but Morelli and Bobeck are not.
The council-adopted manager hiring plan estimates the recruitment and selection process will take 25 to 28 weeks, in part because a home rule-required outside committee must seek, screen and recommend applicants to council.
At least two months will be needed to convene this committee because council members must publicly advertise committee seats and screen and rank committee applicants before choosing up to five members who will serve.
Morelli noted the county has no second-in-command trained to take over if Lawton finds another job and provides two week’s notice.
“For us to sit back and wait and see if he gets another job without doing anything is unacceptable,” he said.