New city manager’s salary pegged at $171,000

A compensation package with annual pay of $171,500 for Nick Marano, city manager-designate, goes to Carson City’s Board of Supervisors on Thursday.

The proposed contract, which also calls for up to $10,000 for Marano to move his household here from Southern California, was negotiated with the retired Marine Corps colonel and current management consultant by Mayor Robert Crowell; Heather Renschler of Ralph Andersen and Associates, the city’s head hunting consultant; and District Attorney Neil Rombardo.

“The employee shall be paid biweekly base salary of $6,596.15 ($171,500),” says the proposed agreement with Marano that is set to be considered by the full board. Along with other benefits that can swell a compensation package by one-third to 40 percent, the new city manager will be paid a $3,900 automobile allowance and a $960 telephone allowance annually.

Marano’s predecessor, Larry Werner, was earning about $140,000 annually, plus benefits, when he retired effective Dec. 19. Werner currently is the interim Douglas County manager while that county seeks a new manager.

Thursday’s agenda also includes extensive potential discussion and possible action on capital projects linked to the one-eighth-of-a-penny city sales-tax hike enacted recently. Among those projects is a multi-purpose athletic center that was proposed for Russell Way next to the Boys & Girls Clubs of Western Nevada, but which could be sited instead at Mills Park.

A separate agenda item would direct the Public Works and the Parks and Recreation departments to consider Mills Park as an alternative site for the project, which would cost in excess of $8 million wherever it is located. However, mostly Quality of Life (Question 19) funds set aside earlier will be used for the MAC, but also some money from the recent city sales-tax hike bonding authority.

At either site selected, the tentative time line envisions a contract by November and construction startup next spring.

Other capital projects included on other time lines, yet keyed to that recent sales-tax hike, are an animal shelter, upgrades for cultural uses at the Community Center, and street-scape enhancements along Carson Street in business districts north, south and downtown, as well as similar improvements in the business district along East William Street.