FAIRMONT– The Fairmont City Council continued interviews of city administrator candidates on Friday by speaking with Pat Oman and Dana Schoening. The council had interviewed three other candidates, Scott Hilderbrand, Lou Leone and Sam Demel, on Thursday.

Both Thursday and Friday’s interviews were open to the public and a broadcast of them was made available following the last interview on Friday afternoon.

Just as on Thursday, Rachel Viesselman, the city’s Human Resources Manager, acted as moderator and Michael Brethorst, a senior consultant with MGT, the firm that’s aiding the city with this process, was also present.

To start on Friday, the council interviewed Oman. He is the only internal candidate as he’s currently

the Community Development Director for the city of Fairmont in which he manages four departments in the city. Oman holds a Master’s degree in Business Administration and possesses more than 10 years of experience in both city and county administration.

Speaking to what he has enjoyed about his current or former role, as well as the strengths he would bring to the position, Oman touched on what he has been able to work on in Fairmont over the past year.

“I think the positive changes that we’ve made in community development in those four departments allowed me to want to take a step farther and say, ‘I think I want to do administration,'” Oman said.

As for how he would develop strong internal and external relationships, Oman said he’s made it a habit to sit down one on one with council members and gain an understanding of their priorities and the direction they want to go.

“As a city administrator, I would ask, ‘how are you measuring me?’ … I want to know the performance measures that monthly, quarterly and annually you expect me to fulfill and the projects that you as a governing body expect me to implement,” Oman said.

Oman was also asked how he would engage with community members who are particularly vocal or highly active, especially when their focus is on the city or its staff.

“We have that right now with a number of committees I’m involved in,” Oman said. “I appreciate that we have proactive citizens that want to ask tough questions and engage staff. We have to take the energies that they have and put it in a way that will be helpful.”

He added that social media can be tricky and said he thinks someone should be monitoring it. Oman said he would like all division directors to be actively looking at social media and when they see something out there that’s not accurate, they should respond to it.

“Being proactive on social media is important, but there’s a demographic that is not on social media,” Oman pointed out.

He was also asked how he would communicate with employees across the organization dispersed across different locations and shifts.

“My approach is going to be starting with my direct reports and establish, with board approval, performance measures and objectives that the city council wants to see across the city and then work with division directors… to establish their own objectives and performance measures and have that filter down to the managerial units and the boots on the ground employees,” Oman said.

He spoke about how he makes himself available, even on weekends and days off, to take calls from citizens or legislative leaders.

“I think as public servants, that’s a low hanging fruit thing that we can do,” Oman said.

Both Council Members Randy Lubenow and Britney Kawecki asked Oman why he was interested in applying for this job, especially considering he knows and has experienced challenges the city is facing.

Oman said he was aware of the challenges even before applying for the Community Development Director position.

“I think the city council and employees care about this community,” Oman said. You can care about the community but there are certain pathways to get to the projects and initiatives that we want to get to.”

He also that while he saw conflicts here, he enjoys being able to solve problems.

“The bigger the challenge, the greater the return if you can solve it. That’s what attracts me to positions.”

When it was his turn, Oman asked each of the council members what their top priority is for the city administrator. The answers were varied and included growth and development, climate and budget.

Next, the council virtually interviewed Schoening, who is currently the city manager of Tuttle, Oklahoma, a city of about 8,400. He has about six years of city management experience but has held a director position for the past two decades.

In his current role, he said he enjoys the direct contact and facilitating with the city council and staff on identifying priorities and working to put them in place.

Speaking to a project he’s lead that he’s proud of, Schoening said that when he was an assistant city manager, he had to assess programming and that the solid waste collect program has not been reinvested into for over a decade and was outdated. He worked with the city council on how to improve the program and ended up going with a different firm to facilitate it.

Schoening was also asked how he would engage with community members who are particularly vocal or highly active, especially when their focus is on the city or its staff.

“If we focus on the community as a whole and those that want to be engaged, either in person at council meetings or in meetings, that’s something that I welcome.”

He said that another way he’s encouraged this is to do listening sessions with stakeholder organizations in order to gain perspective and answer any questions.

Schoening also touched on social media and said in his current role the city uses its social media page as well as a newsletter to get information out to residents.

When asked his style when meeting with the leadership team, Schoening said he likes to build team chemistry and also meet weekly with an agenda.

“I believe it’s very important to have engagement in those meetings… it’s building that camaraderie where we’re assisting together. It’s very collaborative internally,” he said.

Schoening was asked to speak about communication and how he would keep the council informed. He said he would have monthly workshop meetings to discuss different items as things come up.

“Communication any which way we can do it is important to build a good relationship,” Schoening said.

As for how he would uphold the city’s mission and vision, Schoening said he thinks it’s good to talk about the city’s mission, vision and values in order to get everyone on the same page.

“We certainly need to look at those overtime and provide processes to re-look and make sure they’re the same.. it’s really upholding them and having a discussion,” he said.

If the city is following its own mission and vision, Schoening said it should be a well-oiled machine.

He was invited to speak about what excited him most about the position in Fairmont and talked abut the lakes and recreational opportunities here. From a professional standpoint, Schoening said there is good capacity and assets that can be worked with. He also touched on the planned corridor work and said he has experienced and could help with it.

“It appears, based on my readings and looking at the community, that it wants to put in some progressive opportunities. The community is a perfect example of that,” Schoening said.

There was also an opportunity for Schoening to ask questions and he inquired what the council was expecting of him. Like he told other candidates, Council Member Jay Maynard said he was looking for someone who “wouldn’t run away screaming,” and would help the council “lower the temperature among itself.”

Lubenow acknowledged that the council often disagrees, but said if the administrator can listen to all sides and try to meet people halfway, everyone could meet in the middle.

Following both interviews on Friday, Brethorst suggested that the council whittle down the five candidates interviewed to three.

Lubenow asked if the council could write down their top choices to start in order to remain anonymous.

Once they were tallied, the top choices were Hilderbrand and Schoening, who each got four votes. Oman and Leone each got three votes.

The council then proceeded to talk about what they liked and didn’t like about the various candidates and ultimately chose to reach out to Hilderbrand, Oman and Schoening for second round interviews at a later time yet to be determined.