Stockton City Manager Harry Black will stay with the city for four more years after the Stockton City Council voted 6–1 to renew his contract on Tuesday night.
Councilmember Michele Padilla was the lone dissenting vote, taking issue with the contract’s increase in Black’s pay and benefits.
His new contract, which includes an 8% raise to a yearly salary of $348,000, comes months after several members of the council reportedly attempted to oust him. Black will also receive an increased retirement contribution of 17%, up from 12.5%.
Councilmember Brando Villapudua thanked Black for his work in “the past, the present, and the future.”
In an interview with Stocktonia early Wednesday, Black said he appreciated the council’s “vote of confidence.”
“We’re in a good position, because we successfully navigated through the pandemic and we’ve discovered muscles that might not have been visible prior,” he said. “We’re ready.”
Black was hired as Stockton’s city manager just before the city went into lockdown in March 2020. He came to Stockton from Cincinnati followed by both successes and controversy in the cities he’d previously worked.
Under Black’s watch, Stockton entered a new era of potential economic growth following its 2012 bankruptcy and continued ranking as one of the most fiscally healthy cities in the country.
During the public comment period of Tuesday’s meeting, more than a dozen business, nonprofit and community leaders also praised Black for working with local organizations and steering the city through the COVID-19 pandemic.
But Black’s time in Stockton hasn’t always been smooth sailing.
In October, Padilla accused Black of fostering a culture of “bullying, hostility, and retaliation within city hall,” though she did not provide specifics. That same month, Black also survived two potential dismissal votes during closed session, the confidential part of City Council meetings.
Then in March of last year, Padilla, Mayor Kevin Lincoln and Councilmember Kimberly Warmsley allegedly voted to remove Black during a closed session, information that was controversially leaked at the time (both Warmsley and Lincoln voted Tuesday to approve Black’s new contract). According to the Brown Act, California’s open government meeting law, issues discussed in closed session cannot be disclosed publicly.
A vote to oust Black during that March closed session — if it took place — would have needed a majority of the council.
But despite any past opposition on the City Council to Black’s continued tenure, many prominent community leaders, including Stockton NAACP President Bobby Bivens, Community Medical Centers CEO Christine Noguera, and community organizer Toni McNeil, turned out on Tuesday to support him.
San Joaquin County Hispanic Chamber of Commerce CEO Lisa Vela also praised Black and the city for acting quickly during the onset of the pandemic.
“It was through the leadership of our city manager … that we were able to pivot very quickly and provide critical resources to the small business community,” she said.
Kristen Birtwhistle, head of United Way of San Joaquin, noted Black’s help in directing 30$ million in city funding to nonprofits.
“Harry Black is one of the hardest working leaders in recent city manager history and a friend to the nonprofit community,” Birtwhistle said.
Long-time Stockton politician and activist Ralph Lee White, who served on the City Council in the 1970s and 1980s, praised Black’s performance.
“He’s done the best job of any city manager I’ve ever had,” White said.
Not everyone, however, was enthusiastic about Black’s new contract, with a few members of the public saying they were concerned about city money being directed to the same nonprofits.
“It would be nice to see that not the same people are here, that the money is dished out to other organizations,” said Patricia Barrett, a member of several county boards and a frequent face at public comment.
Under Black, the city may face several major changes in the next several weeks and months, including a ballot measure in November on whether to institute binding arbitration for resolving contract disputes with police and fire unions. The mayor’s office and three City Council seats are also up for election.
There are also several potential policy and political changes in the coming weeks and months, including the recent U.S. Supreme Court ruling on homelessness and the November election.
Like many municipalities across the country, Stockton may also pursue more aggressive policies and enforcement towards people sleeping on the streets following the U.S. Supreme Court’s June decision in City of Grants Pass v. Johnson, a ruling condemned by many homeless advocates. A count conducted in January found nearly 3,000 unhoused people in Stockton, almost quadruple from the last count of 893 in 2022.
“We can’t continue to live this way,” Black said. “We’re going to have to do a … balancing act, preserving humanity, but at the same time addressing the problem.”
But the city has also had some success at tackling violent crime, Black said. He credited the Operation Ceasefire initiative, which included meetings with gang members and other high-risk people as well as law enforcement. Black pointed to a July study by researchers at the University of Pennsylvania that people who took part in the model were 40% less likely to be shot.
Black said he is hopeful about the city’s trajectory.
“Stockton is bankable,” he said. “Now we’re in a renewal phase, and that is a retooling of the city government, finding ways to grow the city, to grow the economy and to establish a 21st century city government organization.”