Migut signs contract, city manager picks narrowed down to two

Migut signs contract, city manager

picks narrowed down to two

BY TERRY SCHMIDA

Marathon has a new city attorney, and should soon have a new city manager.

David Migut, who was selected at the town’s top legal eagle by the City Council earlier this month, signed an employment contract on July 28. Meanwhile, the council has narrowed down to two its options for hiring a city manager to replace the outgoing Mike Puto.

“We took our five candidates and did Skype interviews with them last Thursday and Friday,” Vice Mayor Mark Senmartin said Wednesday. “And last night (July 28) we whittled it down to two people, Charles Lindsey, and Lyndon Bonner, who are going to be coming down here for in-person interviews. The clerk is calling them both today to see if they can make it down here for our meeting on Aug. 11. With any luck, at that meeting we can vote to hire one of them, and then move forward with contract negotiations.”

Senmartin added that while he’s happy to interview both candidates for the job, Lindsey’s experience as the former operations manager at Coast Guard Station Marathon, from 2010-13, gives him a leg up on the competition.

“I think I’m happiest with Lindsey right now,” he said. “It’s important to note that Lindsey was a Coast Guard commander here before, and his wife was a Marathon High School teacher, so he’s lived here and knows the town. But I am not completely sold. The other guy has to be given a fair shake.”

For his part, Bonner served as the city manager of North Miami beach during 2011 and 2012, and claims to have visited Marathon numerous times.

Senmartin and the other council members have been looking for a new city manager since Puto informed them in April that he would be vacating his position before the new year – or sooner, if they could find a replacement before.

The vice mayor said Wednesday that the council will likely have its man under contract by the end of September.

“It’s conceivable that by Sept. 1 we could have a new manager in place,” Senmartin said. “The hiring process has taken a little bit longer than we expected, but as I made clear from the beginning, I wanted us to hire a good, qualified person. We had Mr. Puto in place, so there wasn’t an emergency.”

Upon being informed that he had won the city attorney job, on July 14, David Migut said that he would be able to “work within [the] framework” of the $395,000 being budgeted for the in-house legal department’s first year.

“We might even be able to shave that a little bit,” he added.

Migut has practiced law in St. Johns County, south of Jacksonville, since 2011. Before that, he served as the assistant city attorney for the City of Fort Myers, between April 2002 and June 2011. He holds a law degree from the University of Florida.