MILL CREEK — Mayor Pam Pruitt gets to keep the gavel as she presides at City Council meetings for the next two years.

The seven-member council elected Pruitt to the helm with a 5-to-2 vote Tuesday evening.

Longtime Councilmembers Mike Todd and Donna Michelson opposed Pruitt’s selection to a third term as mayor. They cast ballots for Todd, who has held the position twice.

“I’ve seen Mike as mayor and he does a great job,” said Michelson, also a former mayor. “He does so many things for the city.”

Pruitt has been mayor since she was elected to the council in 2014. She previously served as a councilwoman from 1988 to 1995, including a two-year stint as mayor in 1992 and 1993.

Now, Pruitt said, she wants to help the council set a vision and stay out of the way while City Manager Rebecca Polizzotto carries it out.

Mill Creek is among five Snohomish County cities that have a strong city manager or council-manager government. Generally, that means the city manager handles business as the chief executive officer, while the council sets policy as its board of directors.

Polizzotto was hired in April after the council forced former City Manager Ken Armstrong to resign. The move continued a pattern of Mill Creek ousting half of its city managers since incorporation in 1983.

Now, Pruitt said, the council and the city manager are making progress.

“We’re actually working well together,” she said. “There was a time where that was less so.”

Pruitt commended Polizzotto for finding ways to solve problems that have long faced Mill Creek. In September, the council gave her the green light to move forward with plans to find space for a senior center and city departments, and to make Mill Creek run more efficiently by reorganizing staff.

In the next two years, the council plans to work on balancing the budget, providing more services, fostering economic development, building ballfields and negotiating a new contract for fire protection beyond 2016, Pruitt said.

Councilman Brian Holtzclaw will continue to lead alongside Pruitt. The council unanimously elected him to a two-year term as mayor pro-tem Tuesday. He was appointed to the position last year after former Councilman Mark Harmsworth resigned to serve in the state House of Representatives.

Three returning councilmen, Vincent Cavaleri, Mark Bond and Todd, were sworn in Tuesday for four-year terms that end in 2019. Pruitt, Holtzclaw, Michelson and Sean Kelly’s terms expire in 2017.

Amy Nile: 425-339-3192; anile@heraldnet.com. Twitter: @AmyNileReports.