By GARRET JAROS/YachatsNews
YACHATS — After 10 days on the job, Yachats’ new interim city manager Rick Sant dove headlong into the deep end of the municipal pool with a no holds barred assessment of the city’s state of affairs during last week’s city council meeting.
There was no sugar coating or varnishing of opinion as Sant delivered his city manager’s report, which honed in on a critique of the town’s governmental strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats.
“The threats are scary and to be honest with you, we’re kind of in the danger zone here,” Sant said. “We need to get this corrected.
Sant – the third interim manager since 2021 — replaces former city manager Heide Lambert, who resigned May 31 after 15 months on the job. The city has hired a search firm to find a permanent manager, a process that could take 4-6 months. Sant, 68, is a former Southern California newspaper manager who has lived in Yachats just over three years.
In the gloves off portion of Sant’s presentation Wednesday, he cited insufficiently trained city staff, low morale, a staff shortage, volunteer groups competing with city hall, slow project approval, a stalled and outdated comprehensive plan, citizen concerns on the back burner, after-the-fact communication and significant computer problems.
However, before the onslaught of body blows and occasionally in between, Sant delivered some roundhouses of praise that began with the city’s strengths.
“The volunteers in the city – unbelievable,” Sant said. “Our commissions and committees … I’ve never seen anything like it. Extremely powerful potential.”
Sant called chamber of commerce director Bobbi Price a “rock star” and noted how “fantastic” and what a “great resource” the Yachats Youth and Family Activities Program is. The public works staff were called “great” and managing “well-funded” facilities.
“We’ve got the best grant writers in the world,” Sant said. “The grant award success is unbelievable. If you took away the volunteers and the grant writing, this would be a different city and it wouldn’t be good. So, I think that’s really huge.”
Weaknesses
City hall staff have not been sufficiently trained and in a couple of instances had “zero idea what they were doing” and walked into Sant’s office to ask for help, he said.
Volunteer groups feel that they have not always received support from city hall and “I think they feel like maybe there’s almost some competition with city hall.”
The project approval process has been slow and Sant is concerned that the city’s comprehensive plan is not taken into consideration when addressing issues. He used an example of a business taking on excess work and responsibility that doesn’t fit with the company’s vision or abilities.
“I’m not sure we have a comprehensive plan that we all can agree upon,” he said. “In my viewpoint, communication across the entire city structure, that’s city council — no offense guys — city hall for sure, communication is sometimes after the fact, not always clear. I think we can do better.”
The lack of staffing in city hall has caused citizens and groups to not receive the attention they deserve because of a sheer backlog of work.
“We’ve got stuff going back for ages,” Sant said. “And I’m sure I’m not shocking any of you. You’re probably all thinking ‘Yeah, I know.’”
Opportunities
Sant wants to fully leverage the commissions by encouraging increased coordination among them and the committees and to get that accomplished he wants to start a roundtable that brings them together.
“You know what, we’re going to rule the world if we get that going,” he said. “I think we can better define targets and goals for each commission so there isn’t overlap. I think there’s maybe a little ‘No, that’s our thing,’ ‘No, that’s our thing.’ Let’s get that cleared up. Let’s figure out who’s doing what, create a (better) comprehensive plan that takes into account a rapidly changing world.”
The plan needs to be forward-thinking, asking where will the world is headed and where the city wants to fit into that future, Sant said. It is also time to streamline plan acceptance and to have implementation that aligns with the city’s comprehensive plan.
There is an opportunity to rapidly train city hall staff, which is already happening internally, but Sant is working on pulling in outside resources as well.
“We’re going to review job alignment and staffing so it is efficient,” he said. “I know we’re not aligned in there, meaning that we should just be a lot more effective and a lot more efficient.”
City hall also needs better backup for its IT systems, which Sant said has been a “nightmare” since a power outage June 9.
Threats
“City hall is understaffed and morale was really low,” Sant said. “Really low. Really low. It’s getting better. I think the folks in there are believing.”
But there is a high level of frustration and a general sense of hopelessness that it is never going to get better, he added, because staff lacks training and processes have been abandoned or seriously broken down.
“This is a big worry for me,” Sant said. “I’ve got the auditor coming in as soon as possible to help us and we know most of what we need to do but I’m going to get the auditor in there and we’re going to go through everything, we’re going to get controls back in place. And I’m confident nothing big has happened, nothing serious has happened, but we’ve got to get that correct right away.”
Inadequacies in staff skillsets are hampering city hall’s ability to respond to complaints and concerns. There is a large backlog of problems including billing questions and code enforcement issues and the overall system is dysfunctional.
“Again, I’m not sure we’ve got the right people in the right spots doing the right things,” Sant said.
Hope
Despite the city being up against the administrative ropes, Sant assured the council and the public of a comeback not a knockdown.
“We’re already working on it,” he said. “After telling you all this scary stuff, I want to assure you, we are going to get this straightened out and I think within a few months (city hall) is going to be a place that people want to work. Morale will be high — people will feel proud about what they’re doing.”
Respecting and taking care of staff is crucial, which is something Sant isn’t so sure the city has been doing.
“I’m not going to get on my soapbox yet,” he said and laughed. “I’ll need a month or two to tell you why we have not been fair with them. But I’m actually really optimistic and really excited. There’s lots of stuff that’s goofy. But nothing insurmountable.”
Laying it all out and addressing the issues is the only way to move forward, Sant said. He recognizes the public is frustrated and encouraged people to reach out to him if things don’t begin to improve.
“We’re going to be successful and successful means helping the citizens of Yachats live their lives,” he said. “We should not be making it hard for you. We should be making it as easy as we can.”
In closing his report Sant said one of the exciting things on the horizon is a $100,000 resiliency grant the city has received, which he called potentially transformative for Yachats.
Sant also touched on the possible hidden and concerning costs of refurbishing the Little Log Church Museum and removing an old, buried but empty diesel fuel tank from the Commons parking lot. And he drew big laughs from those in attendance when he mentioned the city would be placing heart defibrillators throughout town.
“We’re going to get one in city hall, we’re going to get one over here (the Commons), we’re going to get one for the guys that are working out in the field, and then we’ve got to figure out where else? I mean everybody in Yachats is like 80 years old. We’ve got to do something before somebody takes a dive on us and we have no way to help them.”
In other business Wednesday, the council:
- Approved without discussion the 2023-24 city budget and passed resolutions for urban renewal, state revenue sharing, and the capital improvement plan;
- Discussed a 1½-year grant-funded parking study that concluded there is enough parking downtown, visitors just need to know where to find it;
- Approved a Dahl Disposal Service rate increase of 9.18 percent beginning in July; and
- Said the city will begin mailing notices to the public about new hedge, wall and fence height regulations.
- Garret Jaros is YachatsNews’ full-time reporter and can be reached at GJaros@YachatsNews.com
It is interesting to read the new city manager’s report about the sorry, but improving, state of the Yachats City staff, systems, and processes immediately after reading the article about Anne Stott’s resignation which included a full throated endorsement of Heidi Lambert’s leadership. I trust Anne Stott believes she was acting in the best interests of the city, but the record would suggest she wasn’t seeing the situation clearly. This Yachats resident is experiencing new hope for a less fractious and more cohesive city council.
Interesting take on the beautiful city of Yachats. No mention of the homeless population? How about planting native plants three days before the start of summer after two years in storage? As the little log church rots before our eyes? Of all the code enforcement issues … hedge,wall and fence heights? Sounds like Mr. Sant has his eyes open about things, maybe a little more focus as time rolls on.
Thank you, Rick Sant, for stepping up to the plate so very well… Much needed and appreciated!
This guy sounds like the answer to our prayers. Yachats is a fabulous community that needs to get back to basics, like processing our water payments 😉 Thank you and good luck, Mr. Sant!