Hopkins City Council Leans Toward Firm to Find Next City Manager

Hopkins is leaning toward contracting executive search firm Brimeyer Fursman to find its next city manager.

A straw poll among council members indicates that the Maplewood-based firm has the most support of the three that interviewed with council Tuesday night. Council could approve the deal, which wouldn't exceed $19,000, as early as next week.

Hopkins is looking for a new city manager following the departure of on March 16. Cities regularly use search firms to fill executive positions because council members, serving in part-time positions, typically don't have the time or expertise to vet candidates.

Search firms M&A Executive Search, Springsted Inc. competed with Brimeyer Fursman for the contract.

The council’s experience with Brimeyer Fursman sealed the deal. The group found Getschow, along with other staff.

“It’s just hard to go against the track record,” Mayor Gene Maxwell said.

A key part of the council’s inclination is the involvement of Senior Advisor Jim Brimeyer. He was a St. Louis Park city administrator before starting what would become Brimeyer Fursman. Over the years, he’s conducted more than 500 executive searches, including the Hopkins searches.

At Tuesday's work session, council members debated everything from cost to personality ticks among the search firms. 

Council quickly wrote off M&A. Councilman Rick Brausen noted that the firm had a key typo and hadn’t returned a call during an earlier reference check. Councilwoman Cheryl Youakim balked at the company’s $25,000 flat fee—the highest among the three firms—while, at the same time, seemingly placing more of the work on the city.

“It seemed like we’d be doing a lot of the driving of the bus,” she said.

Springsted's fee was $2,000 less than that of Brimeyer Fursman, and council members said they would be comfortable with either firm. 

Interim City Manager Jim Genellie went so far as to describe Brimeyer's personality as “prickly,” and Brausen said he doesn’t actually like Brimeyer. But both agreed that he gets results.

Firm president Richard Fursman now owns the company, and Brimeyer is a senior advisor. He’s also a member of the Metropolitan Council, which could soak up a huge portion of his time. Council noted that Brimeyer is important enough to the search that the mayor should clarify how involved he’ll be before Hopkins contracts with the firm.

Said Brausen: “I’ll give him the best compliment I could give him: He won me over.”

to read more about the search timeline. PDFs of the companies' proposals are in the gallery above.