The Stockton City Council has approved a resolution to extend City Manager Harry Black’s employment contract and increase his salary.
Black was appointed to his position in January 2020 following his time as the finance director for the city of Baltimore and his role as city manager of the city of Cincinnati.
Prior to the vote, Councilmember Michele Padilla said Black had put the city in a strong financial position, but despite his success she could not support the magnitude of his salary increase.
The motion was ultimately passed 6-1 with Padilla dissenting.
Black’s annual salary previously was $322,285 and will now be increased to $348,068.
During public comment, various community members and leaders took the podium to express their support of Black’s contract agreement and pointed out the achievements of the city manager thus far.
Kristen Spracher-Birtwhistle, CEO of United Way of San Joaquin County, said Black had directed close to $30 million to many diverse nonprofits across the city in support of their missions.
“Harry Black was one of the hardest working leaders in recent city manager history and a friend to our nonprofit community,” Spracher-Birtwhistle said.
Others who spoke about Black said he had managed to progress the city out of bankruptcy and managed the city during the pandemic.
“Mr. Black, through leadership, despite being relatively new to the community, was able to form partnerships with a lot of local nonprofits to address the needs that the pandemic created, whether it was food scarcity, housing assistance, utility assistance, mortgage assistance,” said Jose Rodriguez, president of El Concilio, a nonprofit organization that offers a multitude of services primarily to the Central Valley’s Hispanic population. “I believe that the city of Stockton has benefited from his hard work and so that’s why I took the time from normally watching the meeting at home, to come here to express my full support for City Manager Harry Black.”
Backlash at Black
In Black’s time serving in the position, despite progress made, he faced backlash and allegations last year.
In 2023, the City Council agenda listed a possible disciplinary action against him.
At a meeting last year, it was unclear why Black was facing possible employee discipline due to the meeting being held in closed session. A closed session is a formal meeting or part of a meeting that is closed to the public or to all but members of an organization or group.
Any of the discussions that take place in the closed session portion of a meeting are subject to confidentiality rules.
A similar agenda item for performance evaluation was listed for the Oct. 17, 2023, City Council meeting.
Motecuzoma Sanchez, founder of the 209 Times news outlet, alleged that Black was facing dismissal because of a complaint that Sanchez filed earlier this year with the city auditor.
Ultimately action was not taken against Black.
In the spring and early summer of 2024, the Stockton City Council authorized an extensive performance evaluation of Black, facilitated by outside counsel.
The evaluation included surveys, interviews with every department head and deputy department head in the city, as well as outreach to the union leadership for feedback on Black’s performance.
Victoria Franco is a reporter based in Stockton covering San Joaquin County for Bay City News Foundation and its nonprofit news site Local News Matters. She is a Report for America corps member.
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