Gainesville City Commission approves EO Director contract for $172,500, postpones decision on Thelma Boltin Center, approves taxes and utility rates on second reading

BY JENNIFER CABRERA

GAINESVILLE, Fla. – During the morning session of the September 21 meeting, the Gainesville City Commission approved a contract to make Zeriah Folston the Equal Opportunity Director at a salary of $172,500 and postponed a decision on the Thelma Boltin Center.

In the evening session, they approved the same property taxes, utility rates, and budgets on second reading that were previously approved on September 7. A motion by Commissioner Casey Willits to reduce the property tax millage from 6.4297 to 6.4052 mills failed 3-3, with Commissioners Willits, Bryan Eastman, and Ed Book in support and Commissioner Desmon Duncan-Walker absent.

Employment contract for Equal Opportunity Director

The Commission considered a draft contract with Zeriah Folston to be the permanent Equal Opportunity Director for a salary of $172,500. A similar contract was previously considered on February 8, but Commissioner Cynthia Chestnut asked staff to do more research on appropriate salaries after she balked at a proposed salary of $218,000. 

A chart in the agenda backup provided information on salaries for all the City’s charter officers.

Chart from September 21 agenda backup

City staff used two studies to determine the market value of the City’s Equal Opportunity Director charter officer position; a 2023 Cody & Associates study provided a “market value” of $128,690 for the position, and a Korn-Ferry study from 2019 provided a market value of $188,748. Staff recommended a salary range between $151,247 and $169,873. Folston currently makes $151,247, and the negotiated salary of $172,500 was above the recommended range. 

Motions

Eastman made a motion to approve the contract with an amended salary of $173,100, but the motion did not attract a second. 

Willits made a motion to approve the contract with the salary of $172,500 that was negotiated between Mayor Harvey Ward and Folston, and Chestnut seconded the motion.

Duncan-Walker said she “struggled” with the contract because of the City’s budget issues; she also asked City Attorney Daniel Nee to explain something she had heard about a potential lawsuit “if we move forward in certain ways.”

Nee said the risk is with the Equal Pay Act “in the context of contemporaneous employees, where there’s been historical disparity and women being paid less than men.” He said that in this case, the previous Equal Opportunity Director, Teneeshia Marshall, made $167,700 with a car allowance that raised her total compensation to $173,100, the amount proposed by Eastman.

Ward said that “the job responsibilities have indeed increased over the last two-and-a-half years” and the negotiated salary is the midpoint in the Korn-Ferry study.

Public comment

During public comment, Dejeon Cain said the Commission needed to “look at what’s going on,” including federal and state Equal Opportunity complaints and “some other things that are going on, even in [Folston’s] office… You guys need to find someone with experience… and we need real leadership in that office.” He said employees in the office are being “mistreated,” an allegation that was discussed in a June 2022 report in which the investigator was clear that his inability to substantiate a claim of a hostile work environment was based on the definition and not on the pattern of Folston’s behavior that was consistently reported by employees in the office.

Armando Grundy-Gomes said the job duties doubled under Marshall and that Folston “has never done this work.” He said that despite the budget issues, the only cut to Charter Officer salaries in FY2024 will be a voluntary 5% cut to the City Manager’s salary. Referring to internal City reports, Grundy-Gomes said, “This is the same guy that said, ‘I have too many black people in my office.’… So I find that really rich. Really interesting.”

Eastman: “I think he’s very much qualified for the job”

In response to Grundy-Gomes, Ward asked Human Resources Director Laura Graetz how long Folston had been in the job, and she said he had been doing the job for about two and a half years, “off the top of my head.” He was actually hired as Interim Equal Opportunity Director on September 2, 2021, just over two years ago.

Eastman read from Folston’s resume, which includes City Manager jobs in Palatka and Archer and the Policy Oversight Administrator job with the City of Gainesville. Eastman said the job “touches on a whole lot of different things and requires, I think, a bit of broader oversight… I think he’s very much qualified for the job.”

Duncan-Walker said she valued the work done by all the Charter Officers, but “a lot of our salaries are just high,” particularly when the City has cut so many positions in an effort to balance their budget for FY2024.

Chestnut said Folston’s evaluation last year was 4.77 points out of 5. She added, “I regret that Mr. Folston and his family are having to go through this type of dialogue this morning. By every measure, he has achieved and done the job that we set out for him. And when a person does that, I think you need to reward them and pay them for it.”

The motion passed unanimously.

Thelma Boltin Center design contract

The Commission then took up the approval of a Task Assignment Amendment with Wannemacher Jensen Architects for design work related to the planned partial restoration of the Thelma A. Boltin Center for $469,318.

Public comment

During public comment, 12 people spoke in favor of pausing the process to engage more with the community, and two people asked the Commission to fully restore the building. Nobody spoke in favor of the “partial restoration” option, which would leave two walls standing while demolishing and rebuilding the rest.

Karen Arrington, Jo Beaty, and Paula Stahmer reminded Commissioners that the Historic Preservation element of the City’s Comprehensive Plan calls for preserving, protecting, enhancing, and supporting the historic, archaeological, and cultural resources within the city. Beaty said the City is “guilty of demolition by neglect” for not maintaining the roof and cutting off the electricity. 

Matthew Hurst advocated for what he called a “repair+” option, which would make the building usable again and also undo some previous changes, including partitions added in the east wing, to make it “a building closer to its original functioning while preserving the original structure.”

Tamara Robbins said the City should immediately put a tarp over the roof, and Jim Konish said the City should immediately fix the roof leak.

Several people reminded the Commission that the Thomas Center had been slated for demolition but was restored and is now a City building that is used nearly every day. 

One person said the east wing should not be preserved because it’s in a floodplain, but it could be converted to exterior space, perhaps with a bathroom that has exterior access for cyclists who could use it as a rest stop.

Motion

Following public comment, Eastman said he favored a balance between preserving historic buildings and continuing “to make sure that that history is still used by future generations”; he didn’t think the contract with the architect “balances that in the right way.” He made a motion to “table the contract and hold community engagement on the options for the future of Thelma Boltin and then return to the Commission in late 2023–November, December–with a decision on how to move forward.” Duncan-Walker seconded the motion.

Saco: “It’s keeping a building on life support”

Commissioner Reina Saco said she would not support the motion: “I am seeing a gross problem with Commissioners voting for something whole-heartedly, with full information from staff and with ample opportunity for the public to speak, and then a couple months later saying, ‘You know what? I was wrong, I didn’t do my reading, I don’t know what I’m talking about, let’s undo our decision.’ That is a problem.”

Saco said delaying would just increase the cost of whatever they decide to do and to “table it another six months forward–that is kicking the can down the road, that is refusing to do our job, that is leaving what everyone thinks is a historic treasure to rot, to not be usable, not really. It’s keeping a building on life support so that it slowly dies and becomes a bigger drain when we do finally decide to do something.”

In response to her comments, Eastman amended his motion to have staff come back by November 2. 

Eastman’s motion passed 5-2, with Willits and Saco in dissent.

Second motion

Following the vote, Commissioner Ed Book asked Andrew Persons, Special Adviser to the City Manager, what options the City has in preventing further damage. Persons said he doesn’t believe there is “active leaking” inside the building and that a tarp had not been placed on the roof because they wanted to keep additional weight off the roof to prevent further deterioration. 

Book made a three-part motion to direct staff to take any actions to mitigate damage to the Thelma Boltin Center during the process, request that the County take part in the discussions and consider adding funding to the effort, and research “historic funding sources that may help us inform our final decision-making.” Chestnut seconded the motion.

Eastman said there is a “structural imbalance” in taxes because properties in the City pay high County taxes, including Wild Spaces Public Places, that disproportionately go to the County, but the money tends to be spent in the unincorporated area. He favored asking the County to become “co-equal partners with us in the Thelma Boltin Center” and said that the County should put in half the money if they want to have a “strong say in it.”

Saco opposed voting for a “blank check to do whatever, that would be coming out of our General Fund, which isn’t budgeted for,” but Persons reiterated that any decisions on tarps, for example, are “not a funding issue.” Saco said, “My concern is that I don’t want to give staff, via a motion, a platform to do whatever, because that’s not how government should operate.”

Persons said his understanding was that staff would only do “very short-term, very immediate interventions… to prevent any water intrusion into the building as the Commission is continuing to deliberate on this issue.”

Saco: “I’m outnumbered and we’re going to make poor choices today.”

Saco said she would still not vote for it: “I think it really shows some inexperience in governance, to make such a motion, but I’m outnumbered and we’re going to make poor choices today.”

Willits was concerned about asking staff to “[walk] around with tarps and nail tarps down” because the building is currently considered to be unsafe. He also disagreed with partnering with the County because that could slow down decision-making.

Ward said the first part of the motion was just “a public reminder that staff already has the authority to do what is necessary.” 

The motion passed 5-2, with Willits and Saco in dissent.

  • Hope all of you liberal idiots are happy. You should at least get kissed before they stick it up your arse.

    You people are a joke. The laughing stock of Florida. The only people who come close to your idiocy are the residents of San Francisco and NYC, at least those who are still there voting for ignorance…or is it voting because of ignorance.

    • Yep, most of those salaries are 20 % to 50% higher than they were 4 years ago. Like Biden, they are BUYING approval to do what they want with little contrarian views (suck-ups, sycophants, butt kissers). Those charters know they’d never find a small to mid city with those salaries. These are salaries typical to those cities with 1m residents, not 130k.

  • $172500 for directing equal opportunities in a woke city where the only discrimination is against persons of palor. Nice work if, you know the rest.

  • This meeting really highlights the childishness, inexperience, and weak leadership of our Gainesville city commissioners and city government. None of these people would ever make it in the private sector.

    Let’s address the elephant in the room: the “Equal Opportunity Director” is a fake, do-nothing position, in a fake, do-nothing department.

    According to their own website, the Office of Equity and Inclusion “provides expertise, tools, data and programming to promote diversity, equity and inclusion”. This will come as a shock to our government employees, but this is standard work is done by Human Resources in the real world. Forget whether this practice has any real value or not, the fact remains that it is a standard part of any HR department’s job responsibilities.

    As a taxpayer, I want to hear from Human Resources Director Laura Graetz what cuts to salary and staff will be made to the city’s HR department since apparently Zeriah Folston is doing Laura’s job.

    I might as well do Laura’s job for her as well then: there are numerous red flags with Zeriah Folston’s job performance, and there is no way in hell he should be getting a 14% raise when the city is teetering on the edge of bankruptcy. The fact that she doesn’t have the courage to challenge city leadership with those facts demonstrate that she should not be in that position.

    What has Zeriah actually done to earn such a huge increase in salary for doing the exact same job he is currently doing? Must be absolutely game-changing, far in excess of the requirements for the job, right? No. In the words of Cynthia Chestnut: “he has achieved and done the job that we set out for him”. That’s it? He did his job? So will every city employee be getting a 14% raise for doing their job? Why or why not? If he simply does his job this year, will he also get a 14% raise? The real world doesn’t work like that, Cynthia.

    This January meeting with the woke leftists in Gainesville For All from is very telling. https://www.wuft.org/news/2023/01/19/gainesvilles-equity-director-gives-update-on-the-citys-efforts/

    Note how Zeriah struggles to describe what his department actually does. Oh, it’s a “catch-all”, it’s “very broad”, it’s “a long game”? In other words they have no results to show, no specific duties or performance metrics, and we should not expect to see any in the future. Classic red flags for underperforming / unnecessary departments. You could simply eliminate the entire department and get exactly the same results, i.e. nothing.

    The GFA also calls him out for trying to claim that they are the data-gathering stage, pointing out that they’ve had the data they need for five years already.

    The four simplistic “key strategies” outlined by Zeriah in the WUFT article, as dumb and misguided as they are, could be completed by any competent administrator in 6-9 months max. He has had 2.5 years.

    Lastly, Harvey Ward, Casey Willits, and Bryan “Jazzhands” Eastman must have had the same negotiating training as the idiots who traded pothead Britney Griner for the Russian arms dealer earlier this year. Two consulting reports give a recommended salary average of $158,719. The guy currently makes $151,247, basically recommending a 5% raise. These geniuses look at that recommendation and say “nah, it’s just taxpayer money–give the man another $14,000 on top of that”.

    The culture of low performance in our city government is absolutely disgraceful, and it comes from the top.

    • Why do you think Laura got the job??Overlooked twice for Asst Dir HR and then once or twice again for HR Director or Interim until there were simply no more options. She will roll over and play ball. She had a real estate background then hired as a training coordinator before moving up in Training. She has never held more responsibilities for HR outside of training.

  • One can’t help but wonder how the employee who takes out the trash, does the landscaping or wipes Ward’s & Commissioners’ crap off the toilet seat feel about their share of that $172,500 equal opportunity.
    Even more puzzling is why those people don’t vote or do more to get rid of the trash or at scrape the dung in City Hall.

  • Kudos to Cynthia Chestnut for pushing back on the salary but what about the hiring freeze and not filling vacant positions? How many policeman would that useless position fund?

    • Not enough! Even if GPD didn’t have hiring & retention problems right now, they couldn’t hire & train enough cops for this criminal-pandering utopia that GCC has spent the last 10 years creating.

  • Equal Opportunity Director at a salary of $172,500? Why in the hell is someone getting paid a disproportionately large salary to perform a do-nothing window dressing job while the shitty is beyond bankrupt???? WTH? Anyone have an explanation?

    • Heaven forbid a Caucasian even try to apply for such a position! Riots in the street and city hall to even discuss hiring someone not of color.

      • The position needs to be eliminated. It is useless, unnecessary and an insult to the taxpayers who fund it, whether they realize it or not. It is nothing more than extravagant woke virtue signaling at the taxpayers’ expense.

  • I’ll bet Zeriah Folston can’t even spell “fiscal incompetence.”

    Not that it really matters, as Saco said, “we’re going to make poor choices today.” That seems to be an every day occurrence for this group of idiots.

  • Everyone needs to pay attention as well to the sinister library district. A TWO MILLION dollar tax increase.

    • Librarians will likely be used for heavy ballot harvesting during Early Voting. Make sure the surveillance cameras are installed, too.

    • Speaking of the Duckpond, what is this fascination with that neighborhood?

      It’s a dump !

      • Some people like historic houses and antique cars. The houses are built much better, plus it is fun to restore them. It is close to most things and generally you are going the opposite way of the traffic. I lived in Haile Plantation for 9 years and they had more crime and vandalism there each year than we ever had in the Duck Pond in the 30 years I’ve lived here.

  • Zeriah fits right in with the miscreants that chose him. Didn’t do much checking on his sucess as city manager of Palatka or Archer. Palatka saw through him immeadiately and kicked him out. Not in Archer very long.

  • Something that may be being overlooked is how a City that prides itself on equality needs an Equal Opportunity Director at all.

    Think about it, most of the managerial positions are handpicked flunkies of the City Commission. If they are indeed all about equality, why would one be needed? It’s common sense and as unneeded as an elevator operator.

  • Waste of money. But I guess when not your money easy to spend.
    This is a best a part-time job or additional duty for H.R..

  • IT MUST BE NICE, JUST SET BACK AND GOUGE THE TAX PAYERS AND EARN A SALARY LIKE THAT, ANOTHER GREAT BRITAIN REVOLUTION IN THE MAKING.

  • It is really on the nose of this commission to vote to increase Folston’s salary to above the recommended range, specifically because he does not have the experience to justify that salary AND he has a hostile work environment report on his record, while they are planning to lay people off in a week and increase everyone’s property taxes. Talk about subsidizing their wants on the backs of employees and tax payers. Unbelievable.

  • When I fell for Gainesville and made it my home, this was a charming small north central Florida town with the cosmopolitan flavor and advantages of the state’s premier University as well as unmatched healthcare. Now it has the highest property taxes and utilities in the region, the second-highest cost of living in the state (this includes Miami, Tampa, Orlando, Boca Raton, Sarasota and Palm Beach!) combined with a murderous crime rate and the welcome sign prominently displayed for every homeless loser in the region. The Police department(s) (THREE…Five if you include Game and Wildlife and the FHP) have their hands full dealing with the homeless and the multiple felony outlaws that the state catches and releases at the local house of justice merry go ’round. Thank you lefty-Marxist pseudo intellectuals! Elections matter!

  • Duncan-Walker struggled with the $172,500 pay scale! Right….until everyone else approved it then her struggle was over.
    Democrats, you wonder why your taxes keep going up, and services go down?
    Here is the answer right here.

    • The real question should have been, “Why do we even need an EO director? That is the job of HR.”

  • The salaries are unbelievable for the upper management and charter positions. When the several “interim” charters got made permanent they all got huge salary bumps. If I’m not mistaken, they also got increases when made interim. Look at his salary history at Gainesville. Somebody should have looked into his background at Palatka and Archer. Anytime he speaks it is nothing but word salad. It’s an unecessary position and department that should fall under HR. Unbelievable.

  • The more I read the comments by the commissioners I realize how wrong I’ve been about them. They’re even bigger idiots than I thought. Especially Eastman. He said, there is a “structural imbalance” in taxes because properties in the City pay high County taxes, including Wild Spaces Public Places, that disproportionately go to the County.” He’s one of the problems the city residents have high taxes. His parents must have beat him silly with the stupid stick growing up.

  • Where in the world did they get those salary comparisons?? Gainesville has a population of 140,000. The top three charter positions are making at/above a QUARTER MILLION DOLLARS??? For a city with a population of 140,000!!! This is absolutely insane!! These idiots got themselves over a BILLION dollars in debt and they want to continue to spend their way out of debt. Idiots…absolute idiots.

  • They should have shuttered his whole department along with many others. Major corporations are firing their DEI people this year.

  • One thing for sure , Tik Tok, Tik Tok , October 1st, 2023 they will have to move on past the denial stage and pay back everything they have cost GRU and the Customer base Millions. Pucker up Butter Cups!

  • How is it that the City and SBAC get away with hiring people who have been determined to be ineffective and or incompetent in performing their duties in their previous position or with their prior employer?

    Only a bunch of people equally incompetent would do such a stupid thing. Maybe they do it because they feel it makes them look smarter.

    • Who else would want to work for this City, except people who are damaged goods. And even then they have to pay them more than anywhere else. Loyalty is expensive I suppose.

  • City’s EO director makes considerably more the the County’s EO director. And the General Manager and City Manager are both making a lot more than the County Manager. There is something wrong with that picutre.

  • I just hope the voters of Gainesville enjoy these idiots they vote into office.
    keep voting for idiot Democrats 29% property tax increases cuts to fire law enforcement funding a homeless shelter so the residents can break into to your home rob you. then hire someone at 172.500.00 a year for doing nothing. I hope the state gets to take over GRU and cuts the transfer to the city. So I get see what these idiot democrats do

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