Council seeks to revise job description
By DAN MORIARTY
Staff Writer
WESTFIELD – The City Council voted Thursday to reject a job description for the position of City Treasurer, returning the document to Mayor Daniel M. Knapik for further revision.
At-large Councilor Brent B. Bean II, chairman of the council’s Personnel Action Committee, said the job description needs to reflect the current duties of the treasurer, as he made the motion to return the document to Knapik.
Bean said Monday that city regulations require the City Council to vote on a job description submitted by the city’s executive branch within two meetings. Knapik submitted the treasurer job description to the council on January 19, 2012.
“It came to us a month ago, so if we didn’t act (Thursday, Feb, 16) it would have gone into effect,”Bean said. “I asked the council to reject it so the mayor can resubmit it again with some revisions, housekeeping stuff.”
Bean said he discussed that process with Knapik before making the motion to return the job description to the mayor.
Bean said that he intends to slate a PAC session next week and invite the current City Treasurer, Greg I. Kallfa, to that session, to help the committee define the duties of that position.
Kallfa was hired 28 years ago to serve as the city’s Collector/Treasurer. Those two positions were separated into independent departments in 1999 when Michael McMahon was hired to serve as the City Collector.
“That post has morphed so much over the years,” Bean said. “I want to get Greg’s input on how we should craft the job position, what he does, when he does it. We’d be short-changing ourselves if we didn’t get Greg to participate. It’s a very important position and I don’t want to rush through this process.”
“It’s an opportunity to update the duties of that position,” he said.
Knapik said this morning that technology has had a significant impact on the performance of the city treasurer function.
“This is a City Council appointment,” Knapik said. “I think the council has seen the way I’ve approached crafting job descriptions and are following that model.”
“The position needs to reflect all of the new technology,” Knapik said. “The job has evolved enormously since Greg took office.”
“If we don’t get it right, that office has a broad impact on city operations, it impacts our ability to pay our bills, it impacts our payroll functions,” he said.
“I’ve encouraged Brent to get started early because I’d like to have a one month overlap, with the new person working with Greg, so they see the entire cycle for that month,” Knapik said. “The (FY2013) budget will reflect that overlap of salaries.”
Knapik said that the Council should adopt an aggressive timetable for funding a suitable candidate.
“They have to advertise the position, evaluate the candidates who respond, interview candidates and make the appointment, hopefully by August,” Knapik said. “The selected candidate will have to give notice to their current employer.”
“They may have to go through that cycle more than once, to find a top quality candidate,” Knapik said. “If they find that they don’t like any of the candidates in the initial posting of the position, they may have to post it more than once.”
Dan Moriarty can be reached at [email protected]
