Sedalia council picks Myers as city administrator

City leaders announced Wednesday the selection of Frank L. Myers to take over the role of city administrator.

Myers is coming to Sedalia from Glendale, a suburb of St. Louis, where he served as city administrator for the last two years. The Sedalia City Council approved the hire during a closed session after its regular meeting Monday.

The city has been searching for a new administrator since former City Administrator Keith Riesberg left in November to take the same job in O’Fallon. After receiving applications from more than 40 candidates from across the country, an administrator selection committee narrowed down the list over the following months.

Mayor Elaine Horn said Myers stood out from other applicants because he has more than 25 years of experience in managing city governments. Myers has served as city administrator or manager in several communities, most recently for Crestwood, Mo., Matteson, Ill., Trotwood, Ohio, and West Warwick, R.I.

“He has more than 25 years of experience in city government and he has a lot of strengths,” Horn said. “One of them I am really excited about is he has some great (experience) in housing ... and he also has some retail background.”

Myers said he applied for the position to be closer to his family — his mother lives in Warsaw — and for the opportunity to return to managing a community of Sedalia’s size.

“I wanted to get back to an organization with a larger budget and challenges,” Myers said. “I saw this as an opportunity to sharpen the skills I’ve developed throughout my career.”

Myers cited his financial management skills and community development experience as his greatest strengths. He said he has been successful in upgrading local housing stock, promoting retail business development and turning around communities facing financial distress.

In West Warwick and Crestwood, Myers inherited positions in communities that had fallen on hard financial times.

Through establishing more conservative revenue projections and working to promote a psychology of saving money, he was able to restore West Warwick’s bond rating and eliminate short-term debt in both communities within his first year on the job.

“I think having that culmination of experience in working with very difficult situations and then you step into a community where the fundamentals are better, you still need to apply the same principles of good fiscal management and focused, targeted priorities to get things accomplished,” Myers said.

Horn believed Myers’ background in community housing and economic development will complement the manufacturing and industrial focus of the local economic development board.

“I think he brings a lot of good community development,” Horn said. “He’s got retail experience and has worked on bringing in retail businesses as city administrator. I know it’s a very competitive field, but with his background I think he will be a real asset.”

She said his experience in grant writing also could benefit the city as competition for grant funding has picked up during the economic slump.

Myers said his strategy in community management is to take direction from political leadership and develop a focused plan of action to achieve the city’s goals. He believed the mayor and City Council should set a course for the city with input from the public, and the role of city staff is to mobilize the community’s resources to implement that strategic plan.

“My priorities are to create a framework by which the mayor and City Council can reach a consensus on a strategic direction for the community and to help achieve that,” Myers said.

Improving the city’s housing stock, maintaining its aging infrastructure and helping revitalize downtown are a few of the areas Myers hopes to address once he takes the position.

“Sedalia has an incredible downtown, but it is struggling with some vacant storefronts,” he said. “I look forward to working with Downtown Development and city leaders to breathe some life into downtown.”

He said Sedalia can capitalize on its broad industrial base, status as a regional market center and strong local health care and education opportunities to continue on its path toward future development.

Myers will officially take over the position April 5.