Augusta’s Charter Review Committee will hear from another key witness to the consolidated government’s lifelong power struggle Thursday: former administrator Fred Russell.
Russell is on the 10 a.m. meeting agenda to address “practices and pitfalls,” things he might have learned serving the local government for 13 years. The former deputy police chief joined the city in 2002, then succeeded his former Richmond, Va., colleague George Kolb as Augusta administrator in 2005.
Russell becomes the fourth former city official to formally address the committee, following former mayors Bob Young, Deke Copenhaver and Hardie Davis.
While the former mayors spoke of ways to streamline authority or work with the commission, Russell was once at the center of an effort to increase the administrator’s authority.
Given authority around 2011 to hire and fire, outsource, restructure and award larger-than-usual raises, Russell implemented a reorganization accompanied by layoffs and raises. It put him in the line of fire and critics called it an abuse of power.
The committee is expected to hear from Russell as well as regularly attending speakers Lawrence Brennan, Clarence Kendrick and Moses Todd.
Then at subcommittee meetings, which start at 1:30 p.m., members will take up several measures related to implementing a county manager structure that member Lonnie Wimberly is recommending.
Under the proposal, the manager reports directly to the commission and may hire and fire department heads with commission consent. The mayor loses his current vote on all commission matters and is given only a vote to break ties.
Wimberly first brought the recommendations to the Form of Government subcommittee Aug. 7, but tabled them until an Aug. 21 meeting, when they were left off the agenda and the meeting changed to a workshop.
The subcommittee also is set to consider a means of “removing the city manager” in another agenda item. The item gives the mayor the ability to hire and fire the manager but asks whether a simple majority or supermajority of commission votes is needed to uphold it.
The Finance subcommittee, which meets before the Form of Government subcommittee, has on the agenda asking Tax Commissioner T. Chris Johnson to speak about collecting taxes and fees and a discussion of budget preparation.
