Senior members of the village’s staff were reappointed to their positions Monday night following a unanimous vote by the council. Salaries, however, were not agreed to and an evaluation of the village administrator’s performance is incomplete.
Mayor Anthony Calderone said Village Administrator Mike Sturino has the full support of the council, but acknowledged that only one member of the five-person body has completed their evaluation of Sturino’s performance.
Each time that a new village council is seated following local elections, the village administrator and various department heads need to be reappointed. The new village council was sworn in on May 14 and has three new members. According to at least one freshman councilor, there is a learning curve in becoming familiar with the village’s operations before being comfortable with making decisions about top village staff.
“There’s three of us that are new to village operations and we’re all learning about the employees and the good things they do, so it makes sense that we needed a little time to get to know people and get to have a better feel for what’s going on before we make decisions like this,” said village council member Marty Tellalian.
The village administrator is typically the only top level village employee with an employment contract. Sturino has been working without a contract since May 1 when his previous agreement expired.
The council has not completed its evaluation of Sturino, but is committed to retaining him, according to several council members. Calderone said he has received only one formal evaluation of Sturino.
“Personally I’ve been slow about doing an evaluation,” council member Rory Hoskins said. “The mayor asked to do it about a month ago. I just haven’t gotten around to it, but we’re going to take care of it very soon.”
Under his previous contract, Sturino, who was initially hired in January of 2005, was paid $115,000 a year. A village document distributed to commissioners at their Aug. 27 meeting stipulates Sturino’s new salary will be roughly $125,000 to $137,000.
The hammering out of exact terms is merely a formality, according to Calderone.
“We committed to all the reappointments tonight,” Calderone said. “The contract is just a written memorialization of terms that we agreed to. So to me it’s not an urgent matter that it’s done, although we’d like to get it behind us. But it’s not going to make any difference of him working here or his performance.”
The council was not ready to determine any salaries Monday night Calderone said.
The council will likely be able to determine salaries by the next village council meeting on Sept. 10.
