Leaders to gather for all-day session

ALBANY, Ga. — Monday, the Albany City Commission will meet together as a body outside of the downtown business district for the first time in a year at a retreat to set its 2011 priorities.

The commission will gather for an all-day session today at the Albany Fire Department’s Multi-use training facility off of Honeysuckle Drive in Southeastern Dougherty County.

While past retreats have been held out-of-county at the resort at Lake Blackshear, today’s commission retreat will take place inside the training center’s newly-completed classroom space and meeting area.

According to the agenda provided to the media Friday, the meeting — which will start at 8:30 a.m. and adjourn at 4 p.m. — will focus on the roles and expectations of the commission, discussion of the commission priorities and discussion of future concerns and issues.

Likely to be tops on the agenda for discussion will be the environment the commission intends to set for the new incoming city manager, who will likely be hired by the end of Spring.

Current City Manager Alfred Lott has announced his intentions to leave office on March 2, and the commission will officially vote at its night meeting later this month to tap Assistant City Manager James Taylor to serve as interim city manager on March 3.

Colin Baenzinger, the headhunter hired to recruit candidates for the job, tells The Herald that about 60 candidates have applied for the job.

Both Taylor and Assistant City Manager Wes Smith have applied for the permanent position.

Whomever the new city manager will be, he or she stands to assume responsibility over several key developments throughout the city over the coming year.

Their first priority, depending on when they’re hired and step foot in the office, will be to present the FY2012 budget to the city commission.

That budget — which will likely also be discussed by the commission today — will likely be cut yet again as revenues continue to be slow to climb out of an economic recession and thanks to a new spendthrift Congress who hands appear gripped tightly on the purse strings to federal funding for local governments.

Additionally, the commission and city leadership will oversee construction of a three-phase airport renovation project which includes millions in federal and sales tax funding for a new terminal.

City staff are also working with state officials on dismantling the Broad Avenue Bridge and construction of a replacement bridge which will reopen both corridors of traffic connecting East and West Albany. That project is slated to start this summer.

Also likely to be discussed is the city’s continued push to take down blighted or vacant structures across the city — namely the efforts to demolish the former Heritage House hotel on Oglethorpe Boulevard and the former Pritchett Ford dealership on Slappey Boulevard.