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National City approves police MOU and temporary pay differential for police chief serving as acting city manager
Summary
The National City Council approved a memorandum of understanding with the Police Officers Association and a temporary salary differential for Police Chief Alex Hernandez — $12,429 biweekly — while he serves as acting city manager. Public commenters questioned transparency and raised personnel concerns.
The National City Council on March 3 approved a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with the National City Police Officers Association and voted to grant Police Chief Alex Hernandez a temporary salary differential while he acts as city manager.
Mayor Ron Morrison said the supplemental pay is intended to compensate Hernandez for performing additional responsibilities, and described the hours the chief has put in while filling both roles. "This is just compensating him for the additional role he's taking on," Morrison said during the meeting.
The item on the council agenda described the compensation as $12,429 biweekly, characterized in the agenda text as "15% above his current salary rate" while serving as acting city manager. A member of the public who spoke during comments calculated that figure as about $324,000 annually; the council record shows the biweekly number but does not include an official annualized payroll calculation.
Councilmembers who spoke in favor framed the action as a short-term, lawful differential to align the acting chief's pay closer to what a city manager would receive. "I'm proud that we've actually been able to get everybody to the median in our city," a councilmember said during debate, thanking negotiators for completing the agreement with the police association. The council also moved and approved the Police Officers Association MOU earlier in the meeting; the public record for that motion in the transcript states, "Motion approved." (No roll-call tally or detailed vote count is recorded in the transcript for item 9.2 or item 9.3.)
Several public commenters objected to the timing and optics of granting higher pay to an official who holds both police and interim city-manager responsibilities. A resident who addressed the council raised questions about whether the arrangement equates to "double dipping" and repeated broader calls for transparency about personnel and budget decisions. Mayor Morrison and other councilmembers responded that the payment is not two checks simultaneously but a differential to reflect the additional duties and that the city is actively recruiting a permanent city manager.
The council did not discuss personnel disciplinary details in open session; later, the city attorney reported the council had convened in closed session earlier in the evening and "took no reportable actions." The council adjourned and scheduled its next meeting for March 17.
Actions recorded: the council approved the Police Officers Association MOU (item 9.2) and approved the acting city manager compensation (item 9.3) as described above. The transcript records motions and approvals but does not provide a roll-call tally for those two items.
