Mayor Julie Moore Wolfe announced this morning that the Decatur City Council has unanimously asked Scot Wrighton to be the city’s next city manager. The Mayor also announced that she has called a special meeting of the City Council for Monday evening, January 14, to approve an employment agreement.
A press conference will be held at 1 p.m. today in the City Council Chamber on the 3rd floor of the Decatur Civic Center to introduce Mr. Wrighton. The Decatur Civic Center is located at 1 Gary K. Anderson Plaza in Decatur.
Scot Wrighton is currently the city manager of Streator, Illinois, a position he has held for more than four years. He also served as Streator’s city manager from 1987 to 1994. Between his two terms as Streator city manager, Wrighton served as the city manager of Kirksville, Missouri for nine years; on the faculty of the University of Georgia’s Carl Vinson Institute of Government for six years; and as the city manager of a private new urbanism development project in India for five years. Early in his career, Wrighton’s first municipal manager’s job was village administrator of Mt. Zion; so after more than 30 years he will now be returning to Macon County.
“Scot has not pursued the normal city manager career route,” said Mayor Moore Wolfe, “but his rich diversity of professional experiences and his change-agent skills seemed like the exact leadership style the City Council was searching for in a new city manager for Decatur, and we are anxious for him to start his new duties.”
The consulting firm of GovHR was retained by the city to conduct the city manager search, help the City Council select finalists, schedule interviews and negotiate an employment agreement.
Although Wrighton had met twice with the Decatur City Council in December (once as a group, and then individually with each councilmember), he is meeting with Decatur’s senior staff and department heads for the first time this morning. The Mayor’s office will work with media outlets to arrange interviews with Mr. Wrighton as desired.
