Cincy CM Smeared By FOP President in Disgusting Attack

Two black female city managers running some of the largest cities in America face some daunting challenges ahead.

In Cincinnati, Sheryl Long has been thrust into multiple high-profile controversies over the past year. In Sacramento, Maraskeshia Smith begins her tenure with a council comprised of several self-serving, back-stabbing politicos. While navigating that gauntlet she will also face a massive budget deficit because that council spends like drunken sailors even after they were warned repeatedly by the legendary Howard Chan.

In Episodes 112 and 113 of the City Manager Unfiltered Podcast I interviewed a former Sacramento councilman to discuss the challenges facing Smith.

Finally, I was stunned when I learned a community with 30 years of stable leadership decided to hire an out-of-state elected official without any prior city management experience.

All that and more news after the job postings.

Bombarded by a spate of high profile incidents, Cincinnati City Manager Sheryl Long finds herself not just in the trenches of managing the organization -- but fighting a PR war in the local media.

Most recently, the FOP president falsely attacked her with claims that she was working on a "massive settlement" with the family of a cop killer stating that "crime literally pays in Cincinnati under this City Manager."

This bizarre story features a young man who was killed by a Cincinnati police officer who was cleared of any wrongdoing. The following day his father ran over and killed a Hamilton County sheriff deputy.

Long pushed back stating that these "reckless, speculative, and highly inflammatory statements...only do further harm to both our police officers and the wider Cincinnati community."

When ICMA insider Bill Fraser was pushed out by the governing body after 30 years of leading Montpelier, I figured that the city would hire a seasoned veteran to lead the organization. Instead, the council opted to tap an elected official from Colorado without any previous city management experience.

Kelly McNicholas Kury is currently a County Commissioner for Pitkin County. She has 12 years of experience at the city and county government level, according to a news release from the City of Montpelier.

I contacted Ian Coyle of Pracademic Partners who led the recruitment and he stated that she did serve as a department director and other roles on the administrative side in local government before being elected.

Anecdotally — it seems like more and more governing bodies are opting to appoint politicos to city and county executive roles. A couple of weeks ago in South Carolina, a former state legislator was tapped to lead Oconee County.