Personnel committee approves posting for executive secretary and votes to enter closed session on hiring

The Personnel and Administration Committee of the St. Louis City Board of Aldermen voted Thursday to post an open executive secretary position and later voted to enter closed session to discuss additional board hires.

President Green opened the discussion by saying the committee would take up “hiring for or opening up to hire for another executive secretary,” noting that Garrett is leaving for a position in the mayor’s office. The committee approved a motion to post the executive secretary position “at the current salary level” for a minimum of two weeks; the motion was moved by the alderman from the third and seconded by the alderman from the fourteenth. Hearing no objection to previous role, the chair declared the motion passed.

Committee members then voted to meet in closed session to discuss hiring of legislative assistants and other employees. President Green moved to go into closed session “pursuant to Missouri State statute 6 10 dot 0 2 1 3 and section 6 10 dot 0 2 2 in order to discuss the hiring of employees for the board of aldermen.” The motion was seconded and approved by roll call; the roll call on the recorded motion showed Vice Chair Khan voting aye, Alderman Aldridge recorded as present and President Green voting aye (tally recorded in the meeting as two ayes and one present). The committee reconvened later and repeated a motion to go into closed session for the same purpose; that motion also passed by roll call with the same recorded pattern.

The committee chair and staff said specifics about candidate names and hiring deliberations were being handled in closed session and were not disclosed in the public record. Members noted that any final hires would still require the appropriate public approvals or follow-up votes as required by committee and full-board rules.

Committee members and staff also discussed procedural next steps: the executive secretary posting will be placed live for a minimum two-week window at the current salary level; staff indicated they would bring back any required documents or recommendations to the committee after the closed-session deliberations conclude.

No final hiring decisions or candidate names were announced in open session. The committee cited Missouri statutes (as invoked in the motion) to support meeting in closed session for personnel matters.