Nearly two months after the departure of longtime City Administrator Mark Vahlsing with no public explanation, Kenyon’s City Council has decided to bring in a veteran hand to serve as a temporary replacement.
A month after spurning a ready to go contract in favor of opening up the position to a variety of potential candidates, the council decided to hire the candidate it had interviewed first after all, longtime Prior Lake City Manager Frank Boyles.
Boyles will begin work at Kenyon City Hall this week for a contract that could extend up to six months, as the city looks for his eventual successor. It’s the third interim job he has held since retiring as Prior Lake’s City Manager in 2019 after a 26-year tenure.
City Attorney Scott Riggs said that Boyles’ longevity in Prior Lake was highly unusual in an occupation which has come to be marked by greater and greater turnover, with even Vahlsing’s 11-year tenure well above average by today’s standards.
Along with fulfilling a city administrator’s traditional responsibilities, including oversight over an ongoing pay study and upcoming audit and attending all City Council and Planning Commission meetings, Boyles will play an active role in helping to find a quality successor.
While the energetic yet experienced Boyles was always seen by the council as a strong candidate, several members expressed an interest in considering candidates who might bring deeper local ties, like recently retired Mound City Administrator Eric Hoversten.
In the end, the limited supply of even traditionally coveted municipal executive positions led the council back to the well-qualified, semi-retired Boyles, who will have an independent contractor status with flexible hours that will be much more limited than a traditional city executive.
Questioned as to how he would handle a crisis situation, Boyles recounted experiences of taking decisive and tough actions to resolve crises, including one situation where he was forced to fire an employee after their integrity was called into question.
Boyles also recounted his experiences as a city administrator in Nowthen, where not only the city administrator but all three administrative staff had resigned abruptly, pointing the finger at the mayor and one particular council member for creating a hostile work environment.
Working closely with the mayor, Boyles said he was able to get new staff hired and get the city back on track, a challenge which he said became more and more challenging as more problems were discovered which indicated the previous staff had been “over their head.”
As much as Vahlsing’s departure may have been abrupt and the circumstances behind it poorly explained, it’s unlikely to be nearly as complex and challenging as the divisive, emotionally charged situation Boyles came into in Nowthen.
Regardless, Boyles says he is up for the challenge and eager to get to work with the council. Though he could easily waltz into retirement, he said that a desire to serve and to be of service has brought him out of retirement, at least partially, again and again.
“I always take a lot of pleasure in building things, in repairing things, and sometimes those things are organizations,” Boyles said. “My hope is that by going from city to city and hopefully doing some positive things, it will be a better world.”
While Boyles has spent almost his entire career in Twin Cities area communities which are at least several times larger than Kenyon, he said that cities face many of the same challenges regardless of size and he looks forward to helping the Council to achieve its goals.
“What you discover is, the expectations of the various agencies you’re responsible to are the same whether I’ve got three people in my administrative department or 30,” Boyles said. “It’s the same amount of work distributed to far fewer people, so you’ve got to find a way to get it done.”
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