West Memphis council votes to drop residency requirement for most city jobs

West Memphis council votes to drop residency requirement for most city jobs

Councilman lone voice of dissent for policy change

news@theeveningtimes.com

West Memphis city council eased county residency requirements for most city employees, but it was not unanimous. Councilman Marco McClendon voiced opposition and voted nay.

The measure developed in the city personnel committee comprised of city employees from city departments. Human Resource Director Janice Coleman said the measure was born out of need.

“We’ve had problems with multiple hires,” said Coleman. “Utility engineers we went without for more than a year. It was difficult to get those folks locally, or to get them (to move) here. A lot of specialized fields its hard to get. Then if we get them here we have trouble retaining.”

Ward representatives examined the residency requirement and shared observations with the city board as it considered the final vote.

“If I’m in Turrell, if I’m in Horseshoe, or Southaven or Mid-Town (Memphis), all four places take about the same time to get here.”

Councilman Wayne Croom drew on his hiring experiences in private industry.

“You don’t want to restrict your hiring pool,” said Croom. “You do not want to hire somebody that is not as talented because of their address.”

Lorraine Robinson appreciated the talent of West Memphis teachers that commuted across the tristate area and thought it would be good for city hiring too.

“We have talented teachers from around the Mid-South,” said Robinson.

“The city has exhausted every resource to get key people and this is something we need to do.”

Mayor Bill Johnson issued his recommendation.

“I’ll be honest with you, they don’t need to live here,” said Johnson. “Getting to work has never been a problem. They get here whenever we need them, even in a tornado. We don’t need a requirement that they live in the city. We need to hire the best qualified person available,; that’s the thing to do.”

Councilman Ramona Taylor sits on the personnel committee and examined the shortcomings of the old residency policy as she considered her vote.

“City managers want to offer a position, but can’t offer the position to the talented individual because the candidate lives in Memphis,” said Taylor. “They look here and at an engineering firm, then they go to the engineering firm and we loose out because they live in Memphis.”

The H.R. Director recapped the rationale and noted an exception. If a position required a quick on call response time , a residency requirement would be written into the job posting. Exceptions handled any other way extended the time for job offers and qualified candidates drop out. County residency has been a hurdle for some applicants won’t jump.

McClendon expressed his dissent and promoted an option.

“I just don’t see the need to open it up,” said Mc-Clendon. “We could call on city council for exceptions.”

The idea looked like a burdensome form of micromanagement to the mayor.

He thought the city needed to be more flexibility in ex- tending authorized job offers in a competitive hiring market.

“When you have to poll 10 people before you hire somebody you’re getting out there,” said Johnson.

The H.R. director said time was of the essence in any bona fide job offer.

Coleman again pointed to engineer positions vacated for more than a year.

“We’ve extended uncounted offers and could not get a response,” said Coleman. “If they have a house somewhere else, it has made a lot of back and forth. They ended up taking jobs elsewhere.”

The Human Resource Deportment

surveyed city administrators about the residency

requirement, and received feedback to waive the inside the county rule.

After the recommendation of the personnel committee and the managers survey, Coleman moved the recommendation forward to city council. But none of that served to pacify the concerns of the lone dissenter on city council, Marco Mc-Clendon.

“I don’t agree,” said Mc-Clendon. “I think we should at least try to keep our people in Crittenden County. We should always try to exhaust all possibilities to get some one local.

Just to waive all residency requirements, I do not agree with that.”

Some city employees already live outside the county boundaries according to the mayor.

“We have some key people that would not be here working for us if they were required to be in West Memphis,” said Johnson.

“If they live in Olive Branch or Southhaven, I just don’t know if that is the best thing for West Memphis,” said McClendon. ‘We need to hire as many people as we can that are right here from West Memphis and live in the county. But just to open everything up to everybody is not right.”

By John Rech