Palmer taps former Anchorage official as new city manager

What you need to know:

• The Palmer City Council has selected former Anchorage Deputy Manager Kolby Hickel Zerkel as the new Palmer city manager, with a salary of $170,000 plus relocation expenses. She will start in late April.
• Zerkel originally applied last year, but the job was given to Stephen Jellie, who resigned after 53 days.
• A lifelong Alaskan, Zerkel previously worked as a deputy manager in Anchorage and currently serves as director of state operations for Sen. Dan Sullivan. She plans to move to Palmer with her family by summer.

PALMER - The Palmer City Council will hire former Anchorage deputy manager Kolby Hickel Zerkel as the new city manager, officials announced at a council meeting Tuesday.

Zerkel will start the job in late April, council members said during the meeting. She has agreed to a salary of $170,000, plus relocation expenses to cover the cost of moving to the city, they said in an interview.

Zerkel first applied and interviewed for the job early last year when it was initially posted after longtime City Manager John Moosey announced his retirement. That search was halted and then restarted due to “potential” open meetings law violations during closed-door deliberations over finalists for the job. She then reapplied over the summer before the position was ultimately given to former City Manager Stephen Jellie. His employment contract called for a $150,000 annual salary.

Jellie resigned in October after the city attorney warned that his personnel practices in the city put Palmer at "imminent risk" of lawsuits. He received a $75,000 payout required by his contract and reaffirmed in a severance agreement. He held the job for 53 days. It was his third such resignation in less than two years.

Final details of Zerkel's employment contract are still under review, including terms related to any possible severance payments, said council members Carolina Graver and Josh Tudor, who sat on the hiring committee.

Contracts with previous Palmer city managers, including Jellie and Moosey, required a “for convenience“ severance payment equal to six months‘ salary, city records show. Rather than mirror those terms for Zerkel, the city is working with a human resources contractor to create a graduated scale that could change based on tenure, they said. The contract will go to the city council for a vote in the next few weeks, they said.

The hiring announcement follows months of delays as city officials worked with the contractor to compile and vet candidates' resumes, a step some council members said was not done properly before the city hired Jellie.

Officials last month sought to interview five of the 12 candidates who applied for the job when it was posted late last year, including Zerkel. Of those, three were still available, and Zerkel scored highest in both a candidate qualifications review conducted by the contractor and an interview with the city council.

Zerkel said she has been watching City Council meetings to keep up with current issues and hopes to create a quality workplace for city employees so Palmer can run smoothly.

“I’m looking forward to working with everyone on the city council and serving with integrity, transparency and collaboration with business leaders, residents and everyone in the community,” she said. “This is just going to be an open and transparent work environment, and we are going to move forward.”

A lifelong Alaskan who grew up in Southcentral, Zerkel currently works as director of state operations for Sen. Dan Sullivan, she said in an interview. She took that role in February, just before Palmer officials asked her to interview for the city manager position, and officials there knew she was still hoping to hear back from the city, she said.

From 2021 until early this year, Zerkel worked as a deputy manager for the Municipality of Anchorage where she oversaw several city departments including transportation services, the wastewater utility and the Port of Anchorage.

While her work for Anchorage was not the subject of public scrutiny, her employment was nonetheless linked to controversy because of widely reported behavior toward her by some officials associated with the administration of Anchorage Mayor Dave Bronson.

Zerkel said she worked hard not to let that situation affect her work for the city.

“I showed up every day and did my work and did it with integrity and professionalism,” she said. “You would never even know there was an issue.”

Zerkel said she is now looking forward to working for Palmer and getting to know the community.

“I have always been interested in the city manager job. It's a great career spot for me,” she said.

Zerkel lives in Anchorage with her husband and two children and plans to commute in for her first months, she said. She will look to make the move to Palmer over the summer so her 10-year-old daughter can finish out the year in her current school, she said.

Palmer law requires the city manager to live within city limits, and Zerkel expects her contract will give her 180 days to make the move, she said.

-- Contact Amy Bushatz at contact@matsunsentinel.com

This story was updated March 17 to reflect that a manager search last year was halted and then restarted due to “potential” open meetings law violations.