Monroe police chief gets more pay for his extra duties

Published 11:01 pm Thursday, July 23, 2009

MONROE — City leaders have decided to give Police Chief Tim Quenzer $2,500 more a month to also run City Hall.

The move comes seven months after they buttonholed him to do both jobs for no extra pay.

The contract the City Council approved Tuesday night requires Quenzer to continue serving as interim city administrator until February. He’ll also continue as the city’s top police officer, and he is supposed to handle the duties of the city’s human resource director and risk manager until that position is filled as well.

Under the terms of the contract, the city can cancel the extra compensation at any time. His additional compensation, which will be on top of the $123,228 he already receives each year, is set to end when Quenzer goes back to working his original job.

Monroe leaders have struggled for weeks to come to a decision about how to compensate Quenzer for extra work at a time when the city is struggling to pay its bills.

The city, which has about 16,500 residents, already has asked all city employees, including Quenzer, to take two unpaid days. It has laid off employees and left other positions unfilled.

The City Council didn’t have the cash to hire a new person to run City Hall after it fired its previous city administrator late last year and was required under contract to pay him nine months of salary and benefits.

City leaders found themselves in an uncomfortable position when the police chief in June asked for $4,000 more a month, plus back pay.

Most of Tuesday’s 80-minute meeting was dominated by a debate about the contract for Quenzer’s additional compensation. The city attorney had drawn up a contract to pay him an extra $3,000 a month. City leaders, mindful of the bleak budget outlook, were concerned that Quenzer’s compensation package might come at the expense of more city-employee furloughs, layoffs or positions left open.

“This is not about job performance,” councilman John Stima said. “This is about how much money we have.”

Quenzer read the council a letter in which he agreed the mess had been caused by a communication failure. He suggested part of that communication gap might have been caused by a lengthy City Council closed-door session about his pay that took place Jan. 6. Quenzer was not part of that discussion.

The police chief outlined the measures he had taken to help shore up the city’s budget, including weekly meetings with department heads. He said that $1.3 million had been shaved from earlier spending plans.

Quenzer told the council he didn’t care for how some city leaders had used the issue as a political football in an election year. He also said it wasn’t fair for the city to ask him to cut his own earnings by 30 percent while taking on more duties for Monroe. He dropped a lucrative consulting job with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to take care of the city’s business, he said.

“I can’t continue to use my savings to supplement the city of Monroe,” he said.

Councilman David Kennedy suggested the city offer Quenzer $2,000 more a month. After more discussion, Kennedy asked the council to bump up the chief’s pay to $2,500, to increase the likelihood the chief would sign the contract. The council agreed.

Councilman Tony Balk cast the lone vote against approving the contract. Balk said if he had known in January about the chief’s consulting job he would have advised then that Quenzer not take on the extra work for Monroe.