Council Wants State to Name CFO

A City Council resolution up for consideration Monday asks the state Department of Community Affairs to appoint a temporary certified municipal finance officer immediately, citing a lack of response from Mayor Sharon Robinson-Briggs on the issue.

The city has had no chief finance officer since Peter Sepelya retired in December 2007. The post is a statutory one, required of every municipality in the state. The city has also lacked a permanent director of Administration, Finance, Health & Social Services for some time, leading to fears that fiscal responsibilities may not have been adequately upheld.

Although the administration sought to convince Councilman Adrian Mapp, a certified CFO, to take the post, Mapp has resisted. The gamble Mapp would have had to take to accept the offer would be that he would relinquish his council post and its benefits for an admittedly higher-paying job, but one from which he might be dismissed at any time. Mapp has been at odds with the Regular Democratic Organization for several years due to his loyalty to Plainfield's New Democrats faction. By taking the job, he would be at the mercy of the RDOs.

Although the mayor said she expected to have a CFO by April 1, the administration has had an extension to July 19 to come up with a CFO.

The succession of Administration & Finance directors since 2006 has included Norton Bonaparte, a former city administrator who left in March 2006 to become the first city manager of Topeka, Kans.; City Administrator Carlton McGee in acting capacity until he left in late 2006; Raiford Daniels, who left in December 2007; new City Administrator Marc Dashield in acting capacity; Douglas Peck, from April to December 2008; Dashield again in acting capacity until Bibi Taylor was hired in July 2009; and Taylor again in acting capacity as well as being city administrator since January.

AFH&SS is the largest department, with 13 divisions. As Plaintalker has previously stated, it needs its own permanent director (and maybe a realignment of divisions).

Although these are two different but related issues, action is needed. It may seem presumptuous of the governing body to override a non-responsive administration and go directly to the state for relief on the lack of a CFO. And the move is likely to provoke a response from the mayor. But how long can the city go on with such important staff lacking?

--Bernice Paglia