{"id":74074,"date":"2019-08-21T11:54:16","date_gmt":"2019-08-21T17:54:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/durango-city-manager-ron-leblanc-announces-retirement\/"},"modified":"2019-08-21T17:54:16","modified_gmt":"2019-08-21T17:54:16","slug":"durango-city-manager-ron-leblanc-announces-retirement","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/durango-city-manager-ron-leblanc-announces-retirement\/","title":{"rendered":"Durango City Manager Ron LeBlanc announces retirement"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Ron
Ron LeBlanc, Durango city manager for 12 years, walks on Thomas Avenue earlier this year, a street that needs to be re-engineered to deal with water drainage, curbs and sidewalks. LeBlanc announced Tuesday night he plans to retire in 2020.<\/span>Jerry McBride\/Durango Herald file<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Durango City Manager Ron LeBlanc, who has served as the city\u2019s top administrator for more than a decade, announced this week he plans to retire early next year.<\/p>\n

The announcement came Tuesday evening at the end of the Durango City Council\u2019s meeting. City Council hired LeBlanc on Oct. 23, 2007, after former City Manager Robert Ledger retired from a decades-long career.<\/p>\n

In his time as city manager, LeBlanc has orchestrated the largest city investment ever in the reconstruction of the Santa Rita Wastewater Treatment facility; acquired a bond, with voter approval, to repave Florida Road; and has hired three police chiefs. His salary, including benefits, is $195,582, according to the 2019 approved city budget.<\/p>\n

\u201cI plan to retire in early 2020,\u201d LeBlanc said Tuesday, reading from a script. \u201cThis has been a good run.\u201d<\/p>\n

City councilors thanked the city manager for the heads-up, for his nearly 12 years of service and for, in LeBlanc\u2019s words, \u201cmy desire to assist the City Council with an orderly transition.\u201d<\/p>\n

Dean Brookie, the most-senior member of City Council, said: \u201cWe\u2019ll have future comments, definitely, once that sinks in a little bit.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"LeBlanc\"
LeBlanc<\/span>du1-i-syn<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

LeBlanc did not return a phone call Wednesday seeking comment.<\/p>\n

Mayor Melissa Youssef said LeBlanc\u2019s announcement took councilors by surprise. \u201cI think it goes without saying that the past four months, there\u2019s been a significant amount of conflict between staff and council,\u201d she said. \u201cThis is an opportunity to look forward to the future in a positive way.\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s too soon to say exactly what actions or policy decisions City Council will pursue, Youssef said. The council is a five-member board and no individual makes final decisions.<\/p>\n

However, as the chosen point person and facilitator for local policy decisions, she said it is important councilors engage with residents and businesses. There are plenty of resources council may use to help the board manage the transition from one city manager to another.<\/p>\n

\u201cFirst of all, we will immediately begin to address it as a council, probably next week,\u201d Youssef said. \u201cI have been through several leadership transitions. There are well-outlined procedures that we will follow closely.\u201d<\/p>\n

Al Harper, owner of the Durango & Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad, said that after working with city and county managers all over the country, he can confidently say LeBlanc \u201cis an outstanding city manager.\u201d<\/p>\n

The two didn\u2019t always agree \u2013 \u201che told me \u2018no\u2019 many times,\u201d Harper said. But Harper said \u201che\u2019s been forthright and honest.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s a reliable government official you could count on,\u201d he said of LeBlanc. \u201cYou could reason with him. If you have the facts, then he\u2019ll listen to you. And if you don\u2019t have the facts, he\u2019ll flat tell you no.\u201d<\/p>\n

LeBlanc said no to Durango Fire Protection District plenty of times, too, said Fire Chief Hal Doughty. Doughty said he\u2019s \u201cnot surprised that he\u2019s chosen to leave based on the current lay of the land.\u201d<\/p>\n

The City Council began encouraging \u201caccountability, transparency and open and inclusive collaboration\u201d when two new members joined in April, the mayor said. The community has been advocating some of the policies, like a measurable evaluation for council-appointed employees, and more robust opportunities for public commenting on the city manager\u2019s performance, she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt would have been, for Ron (LeBlanc) to go through it \u2013 a complete shift in processes,\u201d Youssef said. \u201cI\u2019m not certain how welcomed that would have been. Change can be difficult, especially when you\u2019ve been in the system for 12 years.\u201d<\/p>\n

Doughty said, \u201cI feel like Ron has a kind of personality where he can be definitely perceived as hard to get along with. My experience with him is that he\u2019s been very fair, truthful. He says \u2018no\u2019 to you when he feels it\u2019s in the best interest of the city.\u201d<\/p>\n

The City Council now has a lot of work to do, Youssef said. She hopes to engage with professional city and county manager organizations. The more public engagement, the better, the mayor said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI see this as a rare opportunity to set a new direction, build an inspiring vision and establish an opportunity to affect change from the inside out and create a new culture that is better for business, residents and organizations,\u201d Youssef said.<\/p>\n

bhauff@durangoherald.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

administrator plans to step down \u2018in early 2020\u2019<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":74075,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[4584,1020,507],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-74074","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-city-manager-ron-leblanc","tag-durango-city-council","tag-durango-city-officials"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74074","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=74074"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74074\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/74075"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=74074"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=74074"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=74074"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=74074"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}