Interim city manager to start early

City Project Manager Mark Martinez is expected to be named Tucumcari’s interim city manager at Thursday’s Tucumcari City Commission meeting.

Thursday also marks the end of current City Manager Jared Langenegger’s tenure in that position, a job he has held since October 2014.

Langenegger’s last day was “accelerated” at a special meeting of the commission on March 5.

Langenegger said moving the date up from April 11 to Thursday was not his idea.

The discussion that led to changing his date of leaving was held in executive session, and neither Langenegger nor the commissioners would discuss details.

In the resumption of public proceedings that followed that meeting, Mayor Ruth Ann Litchfield said Langenegger had assured the commission that it was within the commission’s power to move up Langenegger’s last day.

The commission then voted to move Langenegger’s exit to Thursday. Two commissioners, District 5 Commissioner Todd Duplantis and District 2 Commissioner Amy Guiterrez paused before issuing their “yes” votes, while District 4 Commissioner Robert Lumpkin and District 1 Commissioner Ralph Moya delivered “yes” votes quickly.

Mayor Ruth Ann Litchfield issued the sole “no” vote without hesitation.

On Feb. 22, there was an exchange between Langenegger and District 1 Commissioner Ralph Moya about matters in which Moya said the city should have corrected situations that Langenegger said the city should not have handled.

That led to the commission scuttling the final “Items from Commissioner” agenda item on a 3-2 vote, and moving directly to adjournment.

Langenegger announced his resignation as city manager at a commission meeting on Jan. 11. The effective date was supposed to be April 11.

District 1 Commissioner Ralph Moya, smiling, voted "no" on accepting the resignation. At that time, Moya, as did the other commissioners, expressed gratitude to Langenegger for his service despite not always seeing eye-to-eye and regrets at his leaving.

"You've done a good job," Moya said to Langenegger during commissioner comments. "I'm very happy to have had you as the city manager.”

Langenegger earned more than $83,200 per year as city manager. In 2015, the commission approved a four-year contract to retain Langenegger.

Since Langenegger began his duties, the city commission has acted with consistent, usually unanimous unity on policy matters and city projects.