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A small city by the lake was facing a budget crisis, so it hired Sandy Miller as manager to clean up the mess. Miller came with a deep understanding of fiscal issues, but over time city employees complained about his behavior, describing him as “arrogant,” “rude,” “vicious” and “intimidating.”
In Miller’s performance evaluation, City Councilor Greco gave the manager a “very poor rating” for the way he deals with people but was willing to overlook the lack of people skills because “he is doing a good job as city manager.”
We’re talking about South Burlington, right? Where Miller was recently fired as city manager for his “aggressive” behavior?
Nope. It was Geneva, N.Y., in 1999, where Miller was also terminated as city manager. The councilor wasn’t Rosanne Greco of South Burlington. It was John Greco, one of dozens of Geneva officials interviewed for an exhaustive fact-finding report that investigated complaints lodged against Miller by the head of the city’s Human Rights Commission.
Seven Days obtained a copy of the 89-page report authored by Gerald L. Paley, who was hired as special counsel to examine the complaints against Miller. Though Paley concluded that Miller’s behavior toward associates was not sexist or racist, as alleged, his report raised serious questions about Miller’s behavior toward coworkers and ordered him to undergo formal sensitivity training “with the goal of improving his interpersonal skills.”
Paley also concluded that Miller retalitated against the head of the Human Rights Commission, a black woman with whom he had a long-running feud, by rejecting her for a city job on questionable grounds.
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Someone should tell him that you can make difficult decisions that are tough for people to hear in a way that doesn’t cause every employee you’ve had to hate you. Part of being a CEO is leading an organization of people, promoting positive morale and instilling confidence in your leadership. Clearly, whatever his technical abilities, Sandy Miller is unskilled at best at those parts of being a manager.
Colchester is looking for a Manager I wonder if they are considering Miller? On second thought, probably not, but stranger things have happened.
How about the dumb city council who hired him????? I’d fire their asses for wasting money if I resided in So Burl!
Tracking his employment geographically it seems New Hampshire should be on the lookout for this guy.
What a great story about the bum. I’ve heard some horror stories from some of our city employees that would shock people.
So why couldn’t our lousy city council do a background check on the bum before they hired him. And who gives someone an open ended contract and pay them if they want him to leave? What kind of idiots do that, oh yeah, our stupid city council. I wish we could fire them all now instead of waiting for their term to end and voting them out.