MARCO ISLAND — City Manager Steve Thompson is continuing to dodge bullets, many if not all of which were fired before he came to Marco Island.

Parks and Recreation Director Dana Souza served about eight weeks as interim city manager between late March and mid May. In that time he observed what he said appeared to be financial impropriety, staff impropriety and inadequate communication practices between city staff and City Council. These observations were noted in a “transition report” which was written in May to Thompson and released to City Council last week, coinciding with Souza’s decision to take a job in Greenville, S.C.

Council addressed the financial concerns at Monday’s council meeting by requesting bids for a city-wide thorough audit of the city’s books spanning back five years. While financial concerns will be addressed through the forensic audit in the coming months, some other issues are still left unanswered.

In addition to concerns raised in the transition report, Vice Chairman Frank Recker said he is concerned about a lack of follow-up by Thompson on a sexual harassment complaint that appeared to be mishandled by directors since it reportedly occurred in 2005.

Thompson said he was not aware of the sexual harassment complaint until Friday.

Recker said he has evidence to prove Thompson did know about the complaint since May, but was unable to produce those documents before press time.

A public records request for correspondence between Recker, Thompson, Souza, Finance Director Bill Harrison and City Clerk Laura Litzan on the issue during the month of May yielded the following response from city IT staffer Mark Jackson: “I only have access to all e-mails after July 1, 2008. I have passed your request on to the appropriate person,” Jackson wrote in an e-mail Thursday.

Thompson said he became aware of the city’s lack of public records maintenance soon after his arrival to the city. He directed the system be rectified and it has been, however public records including e-mails have not been properly maintained before his arrival, leaving many documents missing from the records.

According to Recker, he received a call from former city information technology employee Brian Housewert in April regarding the city’s audio video and IT department. Recker said he became involved with the IT department because he was eager to get City Council meetings broadcast on television.

Upon meeting with Housewert, who has since left the city’s employment, Recker learned that Housewert attempted to file a sexual harassment complaint against former city employee Mary McBane for an incident which occurred in 2005.

According to an April 20 memo sent from Recker to Souza and City Attorney Alan Garbriel, Housewert reported that McBane “took his hand and placed it on her breast wanting (Housewert) to feel the lump,” Recker wrote.

Housewert was not immediately available to comment on the incident.

Litzan and Harrison were reportedly made aware of the situation, but there is no record indicating any of it as of Thursday.

Thompson said he did not receive notice of Recker’s memo until Friday and once he received the memo, he immediately initiated an investigation into the sexual harassment allegation.

Souza notified Thompson that he believed it was appropriate to fire Litzan and Harrison in late April. Thompson said Souza did not mention the sexual harassment situation as the reason and even if Souza did, he would not recommend firing two directors at that time.

“There is a nationwide procedure for responding to sexual harassment allegations. First you initiate an investigation before taking any disciplinary action,” Thompson said.

He added that Litzan had numerous complaints about Souza, but neither have elaborated on those counter complaints.

Thompson described the recent allegations as a “gottcha environment” where city officials are blind sided on important issues which should be reported to each other “cleanly.”

Chairman Bill Trotter said he had the same concern and said that one of the primary issues to be addressed at the next council meeting is open communication in Marco’s government.

Trotter said he would like to have a discussion on creating “communication guidelines on what issues council should be made aware of ... In my opinion, it’s more about open information than changing the responsibility or role of the city manager.”

Trotter added that part of the “confusion is that a lot of these issues happened before Mr. Thompson was here.”

Other councilors, including Recker see it differently.

Recker said the financial issues and staff problems may indicate a need for a new form of city government including a “charter change to possibly a mayor form (of government.)”

The City Charter currently states: “No council member shall direct or request, or participate in the appointment or removal by the city manager of any employee … Any council member in violation of this provision shall be subject to recall.”

While Souza was never in risk of removal, several City Council members, including Recker, Rob Popoff and Chuck Kiester expressed an interest in appointing Souza to a new position of assistant city manager at some point.

Recker and Popoff said their interest in hiring Thompson for city manager in May was partially because they believed he would make Souza assistant manager.

“I would not have taken the position if that was a condition. It would violate the code of ethics,” Thompson said.

While Thompson said he would not accept the condition he said he did see potential in Souza holding an assistant city manager position in the future. Souza needed to acquire formal education, beginning with at least an undergraduate degree. Thompson offered suggestions for how he could prepare himself to segue from a parks and recreation leader to a city leader.

The city charter leaves council only this amount of room to look into staff matters: “For the purpose of inquiry.”

When asked if Thompson would take action against councilors to determine if they violated this portion of the charter, he said: “No.”

“The Marco Island City Charter specifically allows the City Council to inquire on personnel issues and city matters in general through the city manager with the underlying assumption that city employees and services are employed and provided without fear or favor,” Thompson added.

Litzan said “this is the prime example” of why the charter is needed. “In the midst of trying to respond to questions and public records requests about staff issues, employees are trying to do the business of the city.”

Litzan said no one was aware of Housewert’s complaint and still aren’t.

“This (April 20 memo) still is not from an employee. It’s hearsay at this point,” Litzan added.

Thompson said except for the Housewert issue as written by Recker, the inquiries from City Council were not new to him; he’d been working on all the issues Souza raised in his “transition report” for five months since he took over as manager.

Actions Thompson says he has taken in his five months as city manager to improve issues raised in Souza’s transition report include reviewing project expenses with the city’s auditors, changing the way information is presented to council during meetings and changing the public records request system.

As to whether Recker felt better knowing of Thompson’s attempts to improve dynamics that were set before his arrival, Recker said “no. I need two teddy bears now.”

The teddy bear comment was in reference to his statement after Thompson briefed council Monday on the actions he’s taken.

“Now I’m supposed to go home and grab my little teddy bear and sleep great?” Recker asked at that meeting.

Financial inquiries will be answered by a forensic audit. Thompson said he supports the process which may take three to six months as long as it’s a priority in the city worth spending the money.

The financial items in question such as staff recommendations on the septic tank replacement system and the Collier Boulevard project were made before his time, he said, so he has no personal worries. Thompson said the language of Souza’s questions in the report could be inflammatory, so since Souza chose not to publicize the document or send the internal staff issues to council, Thompson chose to follow suit and work on answering the questions Souza posed.

In terms of Souza’s question of whether staff had ever tried to mislead council, Thompson says he looked at directors’ intentions. Acknowledging that determining an “intent to deceive” on issues before his time required a “judgment call,” Thompson says he changed practices to avoid such questions in the future.

Now, before every City Council meeting, councilors are given the agenda with material supporting each item to be covered by a yellow sheet of paper — noting key elements.

In an Aug. 6 e-mail from Harrison to Thompson, Harrison responded to concerns about deceiving council saying “during Mr. Moss’s tenure as city manager, he felt that contract change orders did not require council approval, so long as funds were available ... ”

“This means if I approve a $20,000 patch in the road, staff can allocate $200,000 towards the project without council approval as long as the money is there,” Recker said, calling this policy which was in place under former Marco City Manager Bill Moss, who is now Naples City Manager, “ridiculous.”

Thompson said he has worked with council to change some policies.

In the past, the yellow sheet given to council as background on agenda items only included staff recommendations. Now Thompson has added alternatives, along with the financial impacts for all of the options council may take.

The upcoming audit and current sexual harassment investigation will likely yield more information about what actions Thompson and council may still need to take.

Trotter said more will also be investigated through Thompson’s six month review, which is set to begin at the Nov. 3 council meeting.

Recker has received many e-mails from residents expressing their gratitude for him bringing government issues out in the open.

“Has no one in the history of Marco Island required open accountability before?” Recker asked rhetorically.

While Trotter too said he his looking for open, honest communication, he hopes to deal with the issues through due process, giving all involved time to become fully informed on the issues.

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