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The Pleasanton City Council did not end up voting on what would have been a procedural consent calendar move to increase City Manager Gerry Beaudin’s severance package amid some criticism from the public.
Under the proposal, Beaudin’s contract would have been amended to provide an extra six months of severance so that should a future City Council terminate the contract without criminal cause, his salary, medical and dental insurance will be covered for a full year.
Mayor Karla Brown, who signed the staff report, told the line of people who spoke on the topic during public comments at last week’s council meeting that staff did have a presentation ready to go and that the council was going to discuss the item after Vice Mayor Julie Testa originally pulled the item from consent — which are items considered routine in nature and typically approved by a single vote.
But shortly after the item was pulled from consent, Councilmember Jack Balch asked to continue the item, saying he needed “additional time to think about it” after he received a public comment earlier that day regarding the item.
Most of the people who spoke during the Nov. 19 council meeting defended Beaudin, saying he at least deserves a better severance package in lieu of a salary increase for all of the work he has done over the past two years.
“I think he has proven himself a great leader,” Pleasanton Cultural Arts Council president Kelly Cousins said during the meeting.
However, a couple of residents like Vin Pohray said that while he doesn’t have anything personal against Beaudin, he doesn’t think increasing the city manager’s severance package is the best idea.
Pohray said a typical severance package equates to two weeks per year an employee works at a job. In a supplemental written comment he submitted on Tuesday, Pohray said “most employers offer 1 week (per) year as severance.”
He said the six months currently being given to Beaudin equates to 13 years of service and that giving him the full year sets a bad precedent for other employees who might want the same thing and in addition, the extra severance — if Beaudin is fired from his position — would be costly to the city.
“The current package that is on the board adds roughly around $400,000 to the outgoing bill of someone we may be letting go of,” Pohray said.
But as the staff report states, Beaudin, who received a positive evaluation from the current council during the summer, is not being recommended for a raise due to the city’s fiscal constraints.
The report states that “adjustments to management staff classifications, including the city manager, will require near-term evaluation to keep pace with the market” — which is the argument Cousins made during her comments.
Pleasanton’s city manager has an annual salary that is 7% less than the average pay among his peers in comparable Bay Area cities, including a lower rate than Livermore’s Marianna Marysheva and first-year Dublin City Manager Colleen Tribby – whose contracts also include a 12-month severance stipulation. According to those peers’ employment contracts with their respective cities, they each received 12 months severance right off the bat.
Cousins also said she believes this past election season has a lot to do with people not wanting to give Beaudin the severance package increase.
“Given the malice and misinformation that we saw in the past election where Mr. Beaudin has been maligned along with the majority on the council, I think he needs to have this kind of reassurance,” Cousins said.
Other residents like Linda Garbarino and Sandy Yamaoda — who along with Cousins have all aligned themselves mostly with the council majority in the past — also said Beaudin is one of the most honest people who deserves the increase. Cousins said especially during these upcoming times of budget reductions, the city cannot afford to lose Beaudin just because the city couldn’t compete with surrounding agencies.
“These terms of the city manager’s employment contract are recommended to be updated in the agreement to be consistent with the best practices represented in the survey data of the 16 comparison cities,” Brown’s staff report states.
But for residents like Rick Schempp, the main issue was that he felt the council snuck the item into the consent calendar without allowing for input from the public.
He said the timing of putting the item on last week’s agenda after the recent elections seemed odd given that Beaudin’s performance evaluation was held back in summer and he thought it would be best to wait until the new council is sworn in before voting on the item.
“The optics on this matter are not good,” Schempp said. “This could be viewed in a more positive light by the residents if the matter was handed over to the incoming mayor and council.”
Pleasanton school board set to vote on canceling certain employee layoff noticesApril 16, 2026 7:42 am
Just wondering if Mayor Brown had won the election, would this proposal have been brought forward at this time? The optics of this are terrible given his performance review was apparently during the summer.