By DONALD WITTKOWSKI
Frank Donato is a wanted man.
It appears that Ocean City’s chief financial officer will be temporarily helping out in Sea Isle City after all.
Sea Isle’s City Council is expected to approve a resolution at its meeting Tuesday formally appointing Donato as the interim CFO until March 7.
The move comes less than two weeks after Ocean City’s Council rejected a proposed shared services agreement with Sea Isle that would have allowed Donato to serve as Sea Isle’s interim CFO, in addition to performing his duties in Ocean City.
However, Sea Isle’s resolution notes that Donato “has agreed to accept” the temporary CFO appointment. In another resolution up for approval, Council is expected to confirm Mayor Leonard Desiderio’s appointment of Jennifer McIver as Sea Isle’s new full-time CFO beginning March 7.
Donato will continue in his role as Ocean City’s full-time CFO, even though he will also serve on an interim basis in Sea Isle. He was originally expected to help out with Sea Isle’s finances on an interim basis starting last week as part of the proposed shared services agreement between both towns.
Sea Isle was in need of an interim chief financial officer following the retirement of its full-time CFO Paula Doll in January and the time it would take the city to hire Doll’s permanent replacement.
Ocean City’s governing body, though, turned down the shared services agreement with Sea Isle by a 5-2 vote during its Jan. 27 meeting. The Council members who voted against the agreement expressed concerns about sharing a top executive such as Donato with another town. They also said they wanted Donato to focus exclusively on his duties in Ocean City.
Complimenting his financial expertise, some of the Council members called Donato a “rock star” and the “best of the best.”
“I struggle with letting such a rock star go,” Council President Bob Barr said of Donato while voting against the shared services agreement on Jan. 27.
Barr declined to comment Monday when asked about Sea Isle’s resolution appointing Donato on an interim basis.
Although Ocean City rejected the shared services agreement, Donato has unilaterally decided to help out in Sea Isle as interim CFO. Ocean City Mayor Jay Gillian said Donato has the right to seek outside employment under the administrative code.
“The Ocean City administration attempted to go the shared services route, which would have saved money for Ocean City taxpayers. But there is nothing in the administrative code that prevents Frank from seeking outside employment,” Gillian said in an email Monday.
Gillian, Donato and others in the administration supported the shared services agreement, noting the close relationship that Ocean City and Sea Isle normally have as neighboring towns.
There are already instances in which Ocean City and Sea Isle share the same executives. Among them, George Savastano serves as the business administrator for both towns and Neil Byrne is the construction official for Ocean City and Sea Isle.
The proposed shared services agreement for the interim CFO called for Sea Isle to pay Ocean City $7,000 per month for Donato’s services. Donato would have been given a monthly stipend of $2,000 from that payment.
Sea Isle’s resolution that Council will consider Tuesday does not give any financial terms. It says that Donato’s term as interim CFO will run from Feb. 1 to March 7. After March 7, Sea Isle’s new full-time CFO will take over.
Katherine Custer, Sea Isle’s public information officer, said the appointment of Donato as interim CFO will be explained at Tuesday’s Council meeting.
During remarks at the Ocean City Council meeting on Jan. 27, Donato repeatedly assured the governing body that he would not spend a lot of time in Sea Isle and would be able to temporarily split his duties between both towns without hurting Ocean City.
“I don’t plan on letting anything slip here,” he said.
Noting that Ocean City and Sea Isle have traditionally had strong relations as fellow Cape May County shore towns, Donato also said he felt it would be a good “neighborly thing to do.”
Donato also said he did not want to see Sea Isle stuck “behind the eight ball” by not having a CFO for a while following the January retirement of its former CFO.
But some Ocean City Council members questioned whether any rivalries or conflicts could crop up between Ocean City and Sea Isle if Donato represented both towns. They wondered, for instance, what might happen if both towns were competing for the same grants.
Ocean City Councilman Terry Crowley Jr., who was the first Council member to raise objections about the shared services agreement during the Jan. 27 meeting, said he was worried about the possibility of Donato being “pulled in different directions” by serving both towns.
“I just think they need to be fully engaged on what’s best for Ocean City,” Crowley said of the town’s senior executives.
The proposed agreement, had it been approved, would have allowed Donato to help out in Sea Isle up until June 30. Ocean City, though, would have had the option of ending the agreement within 30 days if things did not work out.
