Santa Clarita / Antelope Valley : Lancaster Council Extends City Manager’s Contract Through ’98 : Government: Two members and many residents denounce James C. Gilley’s new pay and severance package as too generous.

After a boisterous three-hour hearing, the City Council voted to extend City Manager James C. Gilley’s contract despite a public outcry over several provisions, including his salary and severance pay.

Gilley’s contract, which was due to expire in August, 1997, was extended on a 3-2 vote for another year at an annual salary of $127,000, with pay raises linked to the yearly increase in the consumer price index.

Also, according to the new agreement, if the council fires him before the contract runs out, Gilley must receive 180 days notice and a cash payout equal to 18 months salary.

Before voting for the new contract, Mayor Frank Roberts and Councilmen Henry Hearns and George Runner threw out two other controversial provisions. One would have automatically extended Gilley’s contract for another year each August. The second would have allowed him to receive up to 30 months extra pay as a consultant if Gilley was fired by a 3-2 vote of the council.

The contract was debated before a standing-room-only crowd of more than 300 people, many of whom protested that the agreement was too generous. “Nobody gets this kind of golden parachute,” complained resident Richard Wood. “This is an extremely irresponsible action.”

Wood said council members who approved the new contract were “going to be staring a recall in the face.”

But Councilman Runner dismissed the public outcry as “a bit orchestrated and a bit unnecessary in many ways. It’s easy to whip up a frenzy.”

Runner also alleged that the protest was part of a calculated effort to oust Gilley from his post.

The protest was stirred up in part by the two newest council members, Michael Singer and Deborah Shelton, who voted against the contract changes. After learning about the proposal late Friday, Singer and Shelton contacted reporters over the weekend to denounce the agreement and the way it was added to the meeting agenda at the last minute.

The two council members charged that timing of the posting was meant to keep public attention from the matter. Singer denied in an interview Tuesday that his actions were aimed at removing Gilley, and during the meeting, Shelton insisted, “It was only my intent to inform the citizens, not to inflame them.”

Shelton asked that the vote on the contract changes be postponed so that she would have more time to study Gilley’s contract and to compare it to those of other city managers. “Am I giving away the farm?” she asked at the meeting. “I don’t really know.”

Gilley was Lancaster’s city manager from July, 1981, until July, 1988, when a new City Council majority voted to remove him. Two other men served short stints as city manager before Hearns, who was then mayor, urged Gilley to return to the city post in August, 1991.

After hearing more than two dozen speakers criticize the provisions of his extended contract, Gilley himself said he had “never been through a meeting like I just went through.” But he added, “I recognize that if you can’t take the heat, you shouldn’t take the seat.”

He also told the audience: “I didn’t ask for this job. They convinced me to give up a business where I didn’t have to be a whipping boy. The council made a commitment to me at the time.”

At the time he returned to the post, Gilley was part-owner of a local real estate firm and a lobbyist for a major home-builder. As a condition of his return, he asked for and received a three-year contract that required the council to pay him for all remaining months if he was fired before his contract expired. That remained in force in 1993 when the council extended the contract through 1997.

But a new state law forbids cities from giving a fired administrator more than 18 months severance pay.

The 30-month consulting contract was proposed as a way to give Gilley the same financial security he received under the old agreement, city officials said.

Another new state law requires that Gilley’s contract negotiations now be conducted in public, instead of behind closed doors, as had been done in the past.