Political Blogger Joe Monahan started in his January 30, 2018 blog article in part by posing the following question:

“Is Mayor Tim Keller having a hard time finding department directors for his administration?”

Joe Monahan goes on to say in his blog:

“The city website lists job openings for several department director positions, including two that had previously been announced as filled: Economic Development and Animal Welfare. This could mean a number of things. No doubt, Mayor Keller’s requirements are high, with many of his top personnel holding doctorates, juris doctorates, CPAs, MBAs or multiple degrees. But are they too high?
…
The Gators confirm that the new administration is having some difficulty filling positions citing, for example, the vacancy in the key City Attorney post.
Although the pay for these jobs is in the $100,000 area, top notch pros could fear the uncertainty since you serve at the pleasure of the mayor and there’s not much security. And many potential candidates are already making higher salaries. Also, we’ve lost a lot of talented Millennials to the better economies of neighboring states.
Another factor: The Dems have been out for 8 years and many on their city bench are retired or gone. Those left are the old guard. Mondragon is 75 and David Campbell, a former city CAO appointed by the mayor as new city planning director, is also in the Senior Citizen [demographics.]”

SENIOR CITIZEN DEMOGRAPHICS?

Too many people have a real hang up about age, especially when it comes to politics.

Back in October, 2017 candidate Tim Keller told me he wanted to attract and hire people within his own age group, which is understandable and can be appreciated, provided you can find qualified people.

What Mayor Tim Keller, age 40, is now discovering is he is going to have a real problem hiring experienced people from the private sector in his age group who actually know how to manage and willing to work for City Hall wages.

Age and academic credentials should not be the overriding determining factor to be a City Hall Director, but competency and management skills should be.

Just because a person is in their 50s and 60s should not exclude them from any management position.

Apparently, Mayor Keller has learned this fact seeing he has now appointed an Interim APD Chief in his mid-sixty’s who has now retired twice and a Planning Director in his mid-60’s who also left city hall some time ago.

Mayor Keller needs to attract people who are dedicated to public service for what the jobs pay and that is what the real problem is and age should have very little to do with it.

Mayor Keller was elected with huge support of the progressive wing of the Democrat Party, which I suspect the majority are in the 55+ age group.

I think it is safe to say the majority of people who voted in the last election have 15 to 25 years on Mayor Keller, or at least a lot more gray hair than he does.

It is disappointing that the Mayor Keller was unable to attract or convince Brian Colon and Gus Pedrotty to go to work for the City in some capacity in that both definitely have strengths they could have brought to the table.

I doubt seriously if Donald Trump, Hillary Clinton, Bernie Sanders, Joe Biden, John Mc Cain, Mitt Romney all who are over 70, would ever accept being discounted from holding office because of their age.