Council Meeting

Missed the meeting last night, only getting there in time to talk with Councilman Lance Jack and council candidate Mike Riler afterward (and to get told by city manager Allen Gill that he could not discuss the circumstances regarding Beth Ponce's resignation/administrative leave).  The C'dale Times covered the council but spent all of its space discussing procedural problems during the meeting and the time  spent by Brent Ritzel and Pricilla Pimentel chiding the council for its choice of Lee Fronabarger as the replacement for Joel Fritzler.  Mayor Fritzler's plan to move citizen comments to the end of the meeting lasted all of about five minutes as council decided to put them on the agenda earlier, allowing Ritzel and Pimentel to have their say and not have to sit through the entire meeting.


The Southern, meanwhile, skipped over the Fronabarger discussion, focusing instead on the votes to ban the sale of  bath sales aka synthetic cocaine within city limits and to appoint the city manager as the hearing officer for the Liquor Control Commission.  Both passed, albeit with lots of discussion.

After the meeting,  Mike Riley indicated he planned to attended council meetings on a regular basis in the future, likely setting himself up for another run two years hence, whilst Jack said his attention, for the foreseeable future, was focused on acquiring his long sought liquor license for Fat Pattie's.

New Finance Director

From a press release sent out by the city:

City Manager Allen Gill has announced the appointment of Mr. Donald Ursini as Finance Director for the City of Carbondale.  Mr. Ursini will assume the position on May 16, 2011, replacing Ernest Tessone who is retiring as Finance Director after serving the City for over 11 years. 

Mr. Ursini has Bachelor of Science and Master of Business Administration degrees from Northern Illinois University, with a finance emphasis in both degrees.  He has held corporate financial management positions for over 30 years.  For 17 years, he held financial management positions with the Marmon Corporation, including most recently as Vice President of Finance of the Penn Aluminum Company in Murphysboro, Illinois.  City Manager Gill stated that Mr. Ursini’s strong background in corporate finance will transfer directly to managing the financial affairs of the City of Carbondale.  Governmental accounting has different rules than private sector accounting, which will take some time to learn, but accounting for City utility operations is much like private enterprises.

This appointment is the culmination of a lengthy search process, which included advertising in publications as well as professional association web sites.  An interview committee assisted in the process, including the City Manager, Director of Development Services Kevin Baity, Director of Administrative Services Deborah McCoy, and a representative of the City’s auditing Firm of Kerber Eck and Braeckel.