Clayton named interim City Manager

Director of Administrative Services Marc Clayton was named interim city manager at a Commerce City Council meeting March 8 after current city manager Dion Miller was suspended with pay the week before.

Clayton said he could not comment on why Miller was suspended.

The meeting, which is usually held Tuesday nights, was called to order to address the vacant city manager position left by the suspended Miller. Mayor Quay Throgmorton made a statement expressing his distaste with the actions of the Council prior to the vote. He said the vote taken on March 4 to suspend Miller was outside of the parameters of the Council as named by Commerce's city charter.

"I found nothing in the charter, which gives the Council the right to suspend the city manager," he said.

According to Throgmorton, the capabilities of the Council regarding the City Council's ability to remove the city manager does not match what is laid out in Miller's employee contract. The charter does allow for the Council to vote on whether or not to fire the city manager, but there must be a four-fifths majority in order to remove the city manager. When Miller was suspended there was only a three-fifths majority.

Once Throgmorton finished explaining his problems with the issue, he exited the meeting.

"I will not vote on this action because I don't believe I have the right to do so," he said.

Mayor Pro-Tem Billie Biggerstaff said although she thought Miller was a nice man, she felt he was not doing his job correctly.

"I've never seen morale so low with our city employees," she said.

According to Biggerstaff, the major reason the Council called for his suspension was due to lack of proactiveness in addressing issues that came across his desk. She cited a specific incident where Miller was supposed to work on renewing Commerce's county health license but failed to do so before the deadline.

"He has a problem not being able to make decisions quickly," she said.

Taking care of employee needs is another reason Biggerstaff said the Council voted to remove Miller. She said city employees do no make a lot of money and do the jobs mostly for the love of Commerce. Due to these reasons, she said she needed to stand up.

"I felt like somebody had to speak up and old granny spoke up," she said.

Biggerstaff conducted the rest of the meeting. Councilman Bob Monday said he also felt the Council had acted outside of their charter. He asked City Attorney Jim McLeroy if he felt the Council had exceeded their bounds. McLeroy said he believed the Council's decision was valid.

Clayton said he looked forward to taking to job and doing his best for Commerce. He said he has been interim city manager once before.

"All I have to do is do right by Commerce," he said.

Councilman Richard Hill presented to motion to vote on Clayton. The motion was seconded and passed three to zero with Monday and Throgmorton abstaining.