A job announcement on the city of Elizabeth City’s website indicates the city is seeking a new finance director — though as of Wednesday current finance director Alicia Steward still held the position.
City Council voted 8-0 Monday night to allow City Manager Montré Freeman to advertise for a new finance director at the city’s online jobs page. Council cast their votes without discussing Freeman’s request after returning from a closed session at Monday’s regular council meeting.
The job announcement was posted Tuesday and is scheduled to close shortly after noon on Aug. 9.
According to the notice, the finance director’s duties include monitoring and revising finance and accounting policies and procedures, advising the city manager of financial matters, compiling estimates of revenues and expenditures for the city’s budget, among several other responsibilities.
“This position is responsible for the establishment, maintenance and enforcement of the financial administrative operations of the City of Elizabeth City,” the announcement states. “These operations include but are not limited to the following: governmental accounting and financial reporting, budgeting, payroll accounting, cash management, debt management, investment management, bank relations, inventory management, fixed asset accounting and procurement.”
The position comes with an annual salary of between $105,000 and $130,000.
Despite the job announcement, Mayor Kirk Rivers said Wednesday that Steward is still the city’s finance director. He declined to elaborate, noting that the finance director’s immediate supervisor is the city manager, Freeman. Freeman did not respond to a request for comment on Steward’s status with the city.
Steward’s salary was $92,310 as of June 27, according to the city.
The search for a new finance director comes as the city continues to retain the bookkeeping services of the Greg Isley CPA firm and financial consultant Susan Tezai.
To help deal with city bookkeeping problems, City Council voted unanimously in July 2023 to hire Tezai to assist with managing Elizabeth City’s finances. The city is also paying the Greg Isley CPA firm to help manage its books.
In late June, a city resident emailed the city asking for an update on the city’s involvement with Tezai and the Grey Isley firm.
Freeman responded to the resident by saying that both parties are still employed by the city. The Greg Isley firm has been paid a total of about $700,000 so far. Tezai is being paid the salary and benefits that would otherwise be used to pay an assistant city manager, which amounts to about $172,000, Freeman said.
A city official said Wednesday the city’s 2024-25 budget will spend about $100,000 for Isley’s services and another $170,000 for Tezai’s services.
The job announcement also comes on the heels of City Council approving Freeman’s request to amend the 2023-24 fiscal budget, which expired on June 30. His amendment request was made moments after council approved the fiscal year 2024-25 budget during a special called meeting, Friday, June 28.
The amendment sought to appropriate $296,000 in interest earned off investments and another $42,000 in late-fee collections to cover overspending — primarily on salaries and wages in seven city departments — in the city’s just concluded 2023-24 budget.
After a lengthy discussion, councilors voted 3-2 to approve Freeman’s amendment request.
The 2024-25 fiscal year began on July 1. In theory, because the city’s current budget was compiled using salary information that had not accounted for nearly $350,000 in overspending in the previous budget, the current year’s budget could already be that far in the red.
Freeman and Steward explained to council that the requested appropriation would not affect the city’s fund balance and that any monies not applied to over expenditures would go to fund balance.
The city has been on the Local Government Commission’s Unit Assistance list since 2020. The LCG, a division of the state Treasurer’s Office, publishes the list periodically throughout the year to identify units of local government with “concerns related to (their) general fund, water/sewer quick ratio, income, and cash flow, and internal controls.”
State Treasurer Dale Folwell has been a critic of the city’s financial management over the past two years, even suggesting at one point that city officials should ask the LGC to take over management of the city’s finances. In an interview last December, he said both the General Assembly and the N.C. League of Municipalities should take a look at Elizabeth City’s finances.
Folwell also has said that the city shouldn’t be paying for outside financial assistance for work that should be performed by city staff.
“I don’t think anybody given some of small things that we are hearing that they are spending huge amounts of money on, I’m not sure anybody is fully comfortable they have the money to pay for any of this stuff,” Folwell said.
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