BANGS – Bangs filled a long-time void in its city government during a special called city council meeting Tuesday night, as Llano City Manager Erica Berry was unanimously approved to be the new City Administrator/EDC Director for the City of Bangs.
The job offer has been extended to Berry, who was not in attendance, and if accepted she is expected to start her new job around the first of August, according to Bangs Mayor Rick Phelps. Berry has been the city manager in Llano for a year, signing a one-year contract on Aug. 26, 2021, according to highlandernews.com. Berry also served as interim city manager in Llano for a number of months prior.
“It’s been a long time since Bangs has had a City Administrator,” Phelps said after the meeting. “Having somebody full time in a leadership position is nothing but positive. Erica Berry is someone who has so much experience with her contacts and writing grants and her coming here is an absolute blessing.”
Berry’s salary will be $90,000 per year with 75 percent paid by the City of Bangs and 25 percent paid by the Bangs Economic Development Corporation. There will be annual evaluations of Berry’s performance.
“She talked about what’s important to her and that’s the employees and getting to know them, and she really stresses training,” Phelps said of reasons why Berry stood out of the hiring committee. “She wants to be here for at least four years because she has three kids, and her son is a freshman, and she wants him to be able to start high school here and finish high school here. She’s really excited to be in a smaller community and excited to get embedded with our citizens and get to work.”
As for the perks of finally filling the City Administrator/EDC Director void, Phelps said, “It will be a huge relief to finally have someone in that role now. Billy Jordan, our public works director, has been working so hard and been taking care of things that he can now hand off to a city administrator to free him up for other things. And having that full time leadership face in City Hall will also take some things off our city secretary’s plate. From the time I got elected I wanted the right people in the right places and that’s what’s going on now, and she’s going to be a big asset.”
Regarding the top priorities for Berry, Phelps said, “Trying to attract new businesses to Bangs. Another thing we also talked about is there’s no telling how much Bangs has lost out on in grants because nobody knew how to write grants, so that’s going be something I let her know how important that is. Who knows what we can accomplish with getting grant money.”
As for the challenges that await Berry, Phelps said, “The biggest obstacle that she may face is right now the economy is not the greatest it’s ever been so she’s going to have to face that and figure out a way to work around that and make things happen.”
The duties of the Llano City Manager, according to the city’s official website, include “perform high level administrative, technical and professional work in directing and supervising the administration of city government. The city manager works under the direction of the city council and exercises supervision over all municipal employees either directly or through subordinate supervisors.”
Other responsibilities included:
- supervising all departments, agencies and offices of the city to achieve goals within available resources
- plan and organize workloads and staff assignments, trains and motivates assigned staff, reviews progress, and directs changes as needed
- appoints, removes, disciplines, and supervises all department heads, officers, and employees of the city, except members of the council
- assures effective and efficient use of budgeted funds, personnel, materials, facilities, and time
- assures that assigned areas of responsibility are performed within budget
- gathers and interprets data for studies and reports
- monitors revenues and expenditures in assigned area to assure sound fiscal control
- performs cost control activities
- prepares annual budget requests
- provides leadership and direction in the development of short- and long-range plans
“She currently has 50 employees and is coming to somewhere that has 12 employees,” Phelps said of Berry. “She has to work with an airport, electric grid, all kind of things there that she won’t have to do here so she’ll be able to concentrate on things that are solely Bangs. That’s going to free her up and give her a lot of time she’s not used to having in Llano.”
Also Tuesday night, the Bangs City Council unanimously approved the hiring of John Duarte as a police officer. Duarte will be sworn in at Bangs City Hall at 10 a.m. Wednesday.
Duarte, a San Angelo Central High School graduate, has previously worked in law enforcement in Tom Green County and Coleman County.
“As far as having another police officer, with us being a small town and always having issues in the past with the police department, it’s nice to have somebody with several years of experience wanting to join our department,” Phelps said.
Duarte will receive a salary of $44,000.
The hiring of Duarte will give Bangs two police officers as he joins Chief Robert Garcia, who was brought onboard in November 2021.
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