5 City Manager Finalists Selected

Five finalists will travel to Sarasota this month to interview for the city manager job at . The Sarasota City Commission selected these five finalists via a straw poll for interviews:

• Thomas Barwin - Village Manager, Village of Oak Park, Illinois  -  2006 to 2012 
• Rick Chaffin -  Deputy City Manager, McKinney, Texas  -  2006 to 2012
• James Chisholm -  City Manager, Daytona Beach, Florida  -  2004 to present
• Barbara Lipscomb -  City Manager, City of Casselberry, Florida  -  2007 to 2012
• Edward Mitchell -  City Administrator, West Palm Beach, Florida, 1999 to present

The city manager would replace  earlier this year amid an investigation into the mishandling of sensitive email.  was hired to replace him following Lewis' final days of ending service as interim county administrator. 

The field was narrowed down to eight after 

A community reception will be held Friday, June 29   5:30 p.m. – 7 p.m. at the , 1845 34^th Street.  The public is invited to attend and meet the finalists.

The following day, Saturday, June 30, the finalists will interview with the City Commission, Citizens Panel and Department Heads at City Hall, 1565 First Street.

Finalists Background

Here's what we know so far about the finalists:

• Lipscomb was fired as Casselberry city manager in January because "it was time for a new top manager at City Hall and are looking for someone who can lure shops and other businesses into Casselberry, especially along the U.S. Highway 17-92 corridor," the Orlando Sentinel reported.

• Barwin already has another job prospect, thanks to reporting by  in Wisconsin. Waukesha Patch reports that Barwin is one of four finalists for a city administrator job in the Wisconsin city.

Before that, he resigned as Oak Park Village Manager in Illinois, reports :

"Barwin unexpectedly,, resigned from the Oak Park job back in February. The Oak Park Village Board declined to say if they'd forced him out. Still, he was gone nine days after making the sudden announcement"

Barwin is also receiving $125,000 in severance pay, OakPark.com reports.

• Chisholm made the final eight list for the Sarasota County administrator post but dropped out. He also sought a job as city manager in Hollywood, Florida, reported The Daytona Beach News-Journal.  

A few commissioners in Daytona Beach also critiqued Chisholm, the News-Journal reported:

“City Commissioner Patrick Henry accused Chisholm of setting policy without commissioners' approval, and City Commissioner Pam Woods questioned his ethics and trustworthiness.” 

• Mitchell also applied for the Sarasota County administrator job and made it to the final eight.

At the time, he complimented what Sarasota offers, he told The Palm Beach Post: 

"Sarasota is a very pretty part of the state of Florida; it's on the water; it has a triple-A bond rating," Mitchell said. "Those are things that definitely attracted me to the job."

In the same article, he received praise from commission members and the local firefighter union president called him “shrewd” and “tough.” 

• Little could be found about Chaffin except a Wiliiamson Herald story out of Franklin, Tennessee, when Chaffin applied for a job there in 2008, the Williamson Herald reported: 

"Chaffin and his family visited Franklin over the Labor Day weekend, making an 11-hour drive from McKinney, which has a population of 125,000 and has been the fastest growing city in the country over the past five years, with its population doubling since 2002. 

“I am actually very happy where I am,” Chaffin said of his current job. “I think, No. 1, for me on a personal level, I have a great job and great boss and co-workers, so I am not looking. It was very important to me that (Franklin) have a family character and that was the No. 1 criteria and it was evident that was the case.”

… 

Chaffin was not a candidate for that job, he said, adding he was comfortable in McKinney as assistant after having served previously as city manager in Roswell, Ga., a city of 90,000 and a northern suburb of Atlanta approximately 20 miles from downtown Atlanta which has also experienced tremendous growth over the past two decades, more than quadrupling its population."