City officials close to negotiating with Abee

It has been one year without a McMinnville city administrator.

On Jan. 24, 2006 Herb Llewellyn?s resignation was submitted and accepted by the Board of Mayor and Aldermen amid a cloud of controversy.

Since that time, elected officials have gone through accepting r?sum?s, conducting interviews and performing background checks twice. In the first round, David Rutherford was the last man standing until he informed the city he no longer wanted to be considered for the position.

This month, elected officials have begun the investigation into the background of Glenn Abee, aka the last man standing during the second round of interviews.

According to Mayor Royce Davenport, everything seems promising and none of the background investigation he has done has turned up anything negative.

For that investigation, Davenport and Police Chief Charlie Sewell traveled to Montgomery County, Tenn. While there, they spoke to the current mayor, sheriff, a deputy and a purchasing agent for the county.

?The chief almost interrogated everyone we spoke to,? said Davenport. ?He would ask the same question but in different ways trying to find out anything we could about Abee. Everything was positive. We couldn?t find anyone who said anything negative.?

Though Abee has no direct experience with being a city administrator, he has had nine years in Montgomery County government and does meet all the education qualifications and related experience asked for the McMinnville position.

One thing that was expressed to Davenport and Sewell during their personal investigation of Abee was the extent of human resource experience Abee has had over the years, and his ability to get along with everyone.

While Davenport and Sewell interviewed people in Montgomery County, Jimmy Haley and Patti Nunley also did a little background check of their own. As reported to Mayor Davenport, they knew people in Clarksville, where Abee currently resides, and all the questions they asked came back with positive responses.

Given the positive feedback, Davenport is currently contacting all the aldermen to see if he should begin negotiations with Abee concerning his employment with the city.