When City Manager Becky Hawke came in, many employees said they had high hopes, particularly as she spoke about bringing up staff wages and listening to their needs. But a string of high-profile firings, a restructuring some felt was chaotic, and uncertainty about job security have led many employees to search for a new job. Current and former city staff who spoke to WHQR describe a disintegration of their morale and workplace culture. Numerous current and former staff members say they were and are looking to leave, and say they are heartbroken over the city’s current situation.
Hawke, on the other hand, paints a rosier picture. In an interview with WHQR, she addressed staff concerns and criticisms, though in some places she was limited by personnel laws and pending litigation — the city is facing at least two lawsuits, one directly tied to the city reorganization.
Hawke suggested concerns are coming from a minority of staff. She said her reorganization has created new efficiencies, and while some staff may be taking on added work, they are only putting an increased workload where there’s available capacity. As for the firings, she said they are for cause, and categorically denied they were related to the reorganization. (Note: The full audio of WHQR's interview with Hawke is available at the end of this article.)
High-profile firings left some staff unnerved
Becky Hawke came into the city in June of 2025 after a lengthy search to replace City Manager Tony Caudle, who was handpicked to replace longtime City Manager Sterling Cheatham. Caudle was an institutional pick, a former deputy city manager following in the footsteps of a nearly 20-year reign by Cheatham. By most accounts, Caudle maintained the status quo — Hawke has worked to change it.
Speaking to WHQR, Hawke was reluctant to offer any criticisms of past administrators, saying she wasn’t there and doesn’t know if they knew what she eventually learned when it came to employees who were fired. But she has said that she wanted to focus on accountability, while also improving efficiency and compensation.
Not long after she was appointed, she hired Dennis LaCaria, formerly head of the massive facilities division of Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools, for the new role of chief of staff. Hawke said she knew LaCaria from her time as town manager of Matthews, NC. She said she felt LaCaria had the "right attitude" but was clear with him that he'd have to apply, and if he wasn't the most qualified, he wouldn't get the job. LaCaria has since been Hawke's right-hand man, given the latitude to move across departments and, as she said, "unstick what's stuck."
Hawke said her interview process included a positive reaction toward her living wage proposal, and a note from the council that they wanted to see Capital Improvement Projects move along more quickly. And, she said, they asked about an organizational realignment.
“It wasn't prescriptive in terms of we think that you need to do X, so much as there was a belief that perhaps there were some efficiencies that could be improved on, or there were some teamwork dynamics that could be improved on, and so, so one of the direct questions was, would you be willing to undertake an organizational realignment if we hired you?” she explained.
While Hawke said she didn’t come into the city with the aim of firing or pushing people out, but over the last year, that is what happened.
It started with a few high-profile exits: Deputy Manager Chad McEwen and Director of Economic Development Aubrey Parsley resigned in November. Watchers of city hall figured it might have been distaste for Hawke’s new ways of doing things, or frustration that they hadn’t gotten promotions to the position themselves.
But in December, major firings at Recycling and Trash Services shook the city’s staff to their core.
WHQR has interviewed more than a dozen current and former staff members, and is granting them anonymity because they fear professional consequences for speaking out.
In December, Dave Mayes and Rick Porter were fired without any previous warning, right around the holidays. Both had positive reputations, but Mayes in particular, being the department head, was very well regarded both within and outside his department. The allegations against him were related to permitting time theft and a few other allegations, but multiple staff members questioned why he would be blamed for that kind of behavior — particularly since he wasn’t apparently clued into the investigation.
One current staff member said, “Dave is a very principled man. Would he try to help you and work through a difficult situation if he found one? Of course he would, because that’s what good people do. But fraud and crap? If you think a director of a department is standing by the time card machine to see if people are clocking others in, that’s ridiculous. No department chief would.” They added, “Everybody was put on notice. If [Mayes and Porter] can get fired, anybody can get fired.”
A current staff member from another part of the organization said that Mayes’ firing shocked him.
“He was like way up there in the chain of command, like he was a supervisor over supervisors, and from what I remember of him, he was really big on helping out,” he said, noting Mayes’ efforts to help victims of Hurricane Florence. “My dealings with Dave Mayes weren't a lot, but the times I did deal with him, the guy was fantastic. I could never say, ‘Oh yeah, I could see where they fired him.’ I can't say that at all. I haven't had that many dealings with him, but the times I did, he seemed like he was an upright guy.”
Current and former city council members have said much the same about Mayes. Based on WHQR’s interviews, his firing was a shock to staff, who felt his ‘termination,’ as the city called it, told everyone in the city government that their jobs weren’t safe. Mayes had no disciplinary record, had been with the city for nearly 30 years at the city, and was given no warning before he was put on administrative leave and eventually fired.
The city doesn’t comment on specific disciplinary actions related to individual staff members. But asked generally about the terminations, Hawke said they were for cause.
“I can speak to who I am, both as a person and as a manager. I would never clean house for the sake of cleaning house,” she said.
She added that she hasn’t been seeking to fire people: she’s just addressed what comes before her. “While some of the people who have left were there for a long time, that's certainly not everybody who has left, and there are also lots of people who've been there for a long time who remain, and they're there, and they're doing a great job. We have no reason to think otherwise, and they seem to be very happy, satisfied employees,” she said.
To be clear, not everyone at the city felt the place was run perfectly before Hawke’s tenure. One former staffer who left for personal reasons said he had high hopes when Hawke came in, and felt particularly compelled by her commitment to a living wage. Her talk of accountability sounded good, too — plenty of staff told WHQR that the city is a bit entrenched in old ways of doing things, and that there’s a good ole boy’s network that might do with clearing out.
“At first it seemed like, yeah, she's cutting some bad employees, but now it just seems like, if someone's willing to go against the grain, they're getting their guns,” he said. “I personally think Dave and Rick got screwed over.”
Others said they wanted to see certain managers removed, but that’s not who they’ve seen taken out of the city. Multiple current staff pointed to managers and leaders who have been problematic in some way, but have kept their jobs. They questioned why people they respected were removed, and people they feared have stayed.
Firings lacked warnings, transparency
The firing of Mayes and Porter left many wondering about the security of their own jobs. But for those who didn’t know the terminated top admin well, it didn’t necessarily seem like a signal — until they lost their jobs, too.
One former staff member who spoke with WHQR about the experience said his termination letter was full of half-truths. “Honestly, that's probably what happened with Rick and Dave, is they just started digging in and then making assumptions about what they found,” he said.
WHQR spoke with a total of seven former staff members. They didn’t all have the same experience, precisely. But there were common threads: Almost none had been put on Performance Improvement Plans within the prior year. Some were under investigation and didn’t know it until the moment they were called to HR.
“I walked to HR, and that was it. I didn't have any sort of word, I had no idea what was happening. I wasn't offered the ability to resign. It was just a straight firing,” one said.
Some were put on administrative leave while under investigation, told not to contact anyone at the city. Others kept working while under investigation, then were fired either not knowing they’d been under investigation or fired after months of silence on the investigation and its findings.
That lack of transparency into the investigation process left some staffers reeling. Some said they didn’t get to present evidence to push back on allegations: in one case, a staff member was told to attend a meeting about the results of their investigation. At the meeting, they tried to log into their computer to refute a claim about their conduct, and found they had already been locked out of the system while walking to the meeting room, before they knew they’d be fired.
Another former staff member learned that some evidence against him came from written documentation. He asked to see it, to know what they were claiming about him, and was never shown the evidence that allegedly proved his guilt.
“It hurts that as a long-time employee, they didn’t have the least bit of trust or transparency with me,” he said.
Still others were pushed out without specifically being fired — either told to step back from their duties to wait out retirement, or told their resignation was being enacted immediately, rather than on the timeline they had previously agreed to with their supervisor. Some employees told WHQR that while they were not fired, they were given little practical alternative to resigning. While the city has not directly commented on these situations, it did acknowledge at least four "resignations in lieu.”
In several cases, the cause was unclear — particularly for those pushed out rather than fired. They are left reading the tea leaves, trying to make sense of the city cutting ties with them, in some cases, after decades of service. Was it the joke I made a few hours ago? Was it that comment in that staff meeting last week? They still do not know.
WHQR asked Hawke about the firings, and she said: “Every situation is unique, and so every situation is looked at in terms of what is the opportunity to repair and retain versus is there something that crosses a line to the level that we're not able to do that,” she said. “But there are certain actions that, if they violate trust, if they, you know, are not reporting things that they're required to report, you know, there are certain things that, perhaps the action might be viewed or portrayed as minor, but it's what it actually means about the situation, and our ability to have that employee in a position of trust and have them an equal, respected part of the team.”
She added, “Sometimes it is directly to termination.”
With respect to staff filing grievances about the disciplinary action, she said they all have the chance to get their case reviewed by a panel, with two of the three members selected by the staff member under review. Their recommendation is then sent to Hawke, and she said, “I have not overturned any actions that have gone through the grievance process, that administrative process, but all of the recommendations from staff have also been unanimous to uphold the action that was taken.”
Still, staff members who’ve lost their jobs say they weren’t given enough information about the allegations against them to allow them to levy any kind of defense. They also lost access to their city computer, email, and all records they used in their work, and so were left without any method of providing evidence to refute the claims against them.
For long-time staff members, the sudden ouster was devastating. Decades of service to the city, lost in the blink of an eye.
“What hurts about the whole thing is — you don’t do this work for glory. It’s public service,” one former staffer said. “I got to be a part of doing things for my community with a team I built. I was in it for that. And I was not given the choice of whether I could continue doing that or not.”
For others, it was a tremendous financial burden and shock. One staff member said they nearly lost his house — particularly since the city fought their application for unemployment. A few were left financially bereft, citing that as the main reason they haven’t filed a suit against the city. Some have said they could file a lawsuit, but they want to just turn the page and move on.
In fiscal year 2025-2026, during which Hawke has been manager, there have been 39 dismissals, 4 employees resigned in lieu (RIL), and 83 resignations, as of May 14, 2026. That’s almost double the number of dismissals at the previous fiscal year, which includes the rest of May and June. Staff haven’t yet provided updated numbers to include the rest of the fiscal year. Communications staff noted that resignations are down 23% compared to two years prior, though the data doesn’t include the last month and a half of the fiscal year.
One former staffer says they worry what the loss of long-time staff will mean for the city. “They’ve dismantled so many departments and gotten rid of so much institutional knowledge. It’s scary that it can happen with one appointment.”
A Q&A gone wrong
The firings led to a major decline in morale for some staff within the tower – the staff’s name for the new Skyline Center city hall that overlooks the river.
“Everybody is scared shitless for their jobs,” one current staffer said.
Asked if she felt secure in her job, another staff member said, “Definitely not secure. I don't think anyone is.”
Employees who spoke to WHQR said the firings left a lot of staff members feeling like there was no guarantee they’d have a job the next day. And it wasn’t just the risk of losing the job – it’s the feeling that it could be any trumped-up cause. That’s something one staffer brought up anonymously during a Q&A with the new city manager.
Since starting her work at the city of Wilmington, City Manager Becky Hawke has been hosting quarterly town halls with staff. WHQR obtained one of these town halls after hearing concern about statements by Hawke during the Q&A. The April 28th meeting included a discussion of Hawke’s popular living wage proposal, benefits, and other typical workplace issues.
But during the Q&A, one staffer sent a text to Hawke asking a question, which Hawke called “a fun one” before reading it to the staff: “There's been a lot of attrition lately. We see or hear about a lot of people leaving or being dismissed. Is there anything we should know about that, just to address any rumors that may be going around on the causes?”
Hawke’s response to that texted question was three minutes long, and the audio is available below. In short, she said, terminations are based on justified causes, not anything trumped up.
“But if you knowingly break the rules with intention, with malice, that is a problem. If you abuse your position and the access that you have, that is a problem. If you don't treat people well in a documented way, that is a problem. If you know about things that you have an obligation to report and you don't, and we can prove it, that is a problem. It's all we're doing. That's it. I- There's zero reason to fear for your job,” Hawke said.
She continued: “If you fear for your job, I want you to do some soul searching. Is it because you're a fearful person, or is it because there are things that you need to adjust about what you're doing? If you realize that it's the latter. Please make those adjustments. If you realize it's the former, we have a great EAP program [Employee Assistance Program], and I recommend that you take advantage of it.”
She went on to commend the staff with long tenure at the city for their service.
Hawke and city comms staff have noted that this was just one part of a much longer town hall, during which Hawke took any question that was offered and answered candidly, without resorting to a script or prepared statements. Still, some members who heard her comments were concerned and took it to be quite dismissive of their fears.
In particular, Hawke’s reference to the EAP program rankled some staffers. EAP is a city benefit that provides free support for counseling, legal issues, and work-life balance. But because it does include counseling, some heard Hawke’s statement as ‘if you’re worried about getting fired, you need mental health help’ – and it did not land well.
Some staffers also questioned the explanation for the firings and resignations. Many were long-time colleagues of those who’ve lost their jobs, and heard rumors about causes that didn’t make perfect sense to them.
Kathryn Thurston’s forced resignation is a good example.
In her lawsuit against the city, she wrote that the stated cause was accessing a permit for an accessory dwelling on her own property from internal county systems. Under the city’s standard disciplinary procedure, an employee would get a warning and a performance review with the opportunity to improve before dismissal, unless they were involved in a major violation. Examples include gambling while on duty, willfully filing falsified records, and sexual misconduct — seemingly far more egregious cases than the permit issue provided as the central cause for Thurston’s dismissal.
One of the terminated employees expected job security, with years and years on the job and no disciplinary file to speak of. After some of the initial top-level exits, a colleague came to him voicing fear for their job. He told them, “We do things the right way in this department. What do we have to worry about?” And two weeks later, he was put on administrative leave.
Another former staffer put it succinctly: “If you do something they don't like, you're gone,” he said.
Other former staff members who heard about Hawke’s statements said it was inaccurate to some degree. This new version of accountability doesn’t leave room for mistakes, they said. Compare the new method of firing to the previous policy, one pointed out. That policy gave people the opportunity to improve, with a feeling that managers owed it to staff to help them learn on the job.
A former staff member explained the city’s progressive disciplinary policy. You get a level 1 reminder, a level 2 reminder, a suspension, and then a termination. Other current and former employees corroborated that description.
“There’s also the allowance for a department director to skip levels of that policy. For example, if you’re caught drinking on the job, it probably won’t be very good for you. It’s an egregious offense and would warrant termination,” that former staffer said. They said there was no precedent for the way Hawke used the disciplinary policy to skip levels and go straight to firing. “They chose to take whatever they found for us and put us in the category of saying it’s bad enough to make termination the right result.”
WHQR asked Hawke about that Q&A and the response from employees, and she said, “A single question out of the entire 25 minutes was asking anything about people leaving. It wasn't phrased in a way that was expressing fear. It was just like, ‘hey, is there anything that we need to know about.’ The answer that I gave was three and a half minutes long. I think it was rather comprehensive to the extent that I'm able to talk about why some folks have left, and you know it certainly wasn't meant to be a disrespectful response.”
She said it’s human nature to be a bit anxious when change is happening around you, but they are limited by personnel protection laws from sharing details about what the fired staff have done, beyond what’s available in their personnel files. “We're not looking to get rid of people, so only as something may come up in the future would we then maybe have to do that,” she said, adding that it’s “a normal part of business that does happen sometimes.”
But Hawke said she hopes people will realize they don’t need to be concerned as they realize, “Hey, I'm here, I'm respected, I'm doing my job, I'm getting good feedback from my supervisor, you know, everything's calm, and that they realize that whatever concerns they had in the past were not something that they needed to actually have concern about.”
Fear and loathing in the tower
Staff who remain in the tower say it’s clear as day that you can be fired for just about anything. “If you can equate accountability to punishing or threatening, that’s what it is,” one staff member said. “People are being escorted out, which tells me they aren’t getting any objective warning that they need to fix their behavior. They’re not transparent.”
Many are afraid to speak up and voice their opinions, as they fear doing so would put their head on the chopping block. Said one former staffer, “I think everyone who is still there is doing everything they can to endear themselves to Becky and [Chief of Staff] Dennis [LaCaria], so they look like loyal followers.”
One current staffer said, “I want to stay under the radar and get the work done.”
She said she’s seen colleagues get scolded for not looking cheerful enough, but she and her colleagues are feeling numb from all the chaos and fear. “There’s just so much shady crap. If it’s legal, it’s not right. You’re no longer coming into work to do a good day’s work for the city. You’re coming in to cover your ass and get a paycheck.”
She added that there’s an expectation that everyone gets in line with current leadership: no pushback. “They’re so focused on making sure you’re thinking what they want you to think,” she said. Other staff have said there seems to be little interest from top management in pushback or outsider ideas. “My boss knows how to kiss butt, and I think that's the only reason why she's still around,” one said.
Another current staffer agreed. “They know what they're going to do, and like, as long as you give them an opinion that confirms what they want to do, then they listen, but anything else just falls on deaf ears. Everyone's just smiling and nodding and saying ‘yes sir, yes ma'am. I think that's a great idea,’ and get going at it’ because we're all afraid of getting fired, or somehow being labeled as, like, you know, a bad employee, a problematic employee.”
Asked about employee fears, Hawke said, “I don't believe that myself or any member of management that I'm aware of has given any member of staff reason to legitimately be fearful of their job, and so if they're feeling that way, like I don't know what else you can do, besides reiterate it, demonstrate it through your actions, and then give it time.”
Some staff said they’re being micromanaged to a degree that has slowed down their workflows. Another staff member said, “We used to be able to call people and ask questions, and now we're told no, it has to go through [my supervisor], so she's micromanaging everything, and it's just, it's too much.”
That’s referencing Hawke’s chief of staff, LaCaria, who staff say has made his own contributions to morale problems. Multiple staff, current and former, have noted LaCaria’s tendency to walk the hallways of the tower.
“I see Dennis walking around a lot. Why he's walking around, I don't really know. Some folks suspect that he's trying to catch people not doing what they're supposed to,” one staff member said.
Asked about this criticism, Hawke said, “Has work increased for some people? Absolutely, but we were mindful in how we looked to increase that work, where we identified that there was capacity to add the work, and then we added it. It wasn't just, hey, do this, figure it out, and just get it done.”
She added, “If that [just get it done] is being said, the entire sentence is, you know, within the law, within code, within the rules, within the policies, and so there's no skimping on any of that, but do I think that some employees are maybe a little bit more pressed than they used to be? Quite possible. Do I think that that's a bad thing? No. You know, I think a little bit of pressure and a to-do list that you need to kind of keep on track to be able to make sure that you're getting everything done.”
The city’s stated guiding principles for management include values: inclusion, accountability, collaboration, and creativity. The definition of accountability is, “we feel a sense of personal responsibility for our shared work, striving for excellence in what we do and holding ourselves accountable for the results.” The definition for collaboration is, “we understand that success is something we achieve together – not alone – and that working as teams across departments and with the community builds trust in our work and our organization.”
Former staff said they don’t recognize these values in current management.
The War Room
In March, Hawke implemented a restructuring. She declined interviews related to it at the time, and the only available information was a new organizational chart and her comments to city council.
That came out of “the war room,” as Hawke called it: a room where she and her top staff move sticky notes around on windows, with names and titles attached to them.
She described it in a January staff town hall: “There is a room in this building where, if you think about all 1,200 of you, and kind of keeping every position straight, and who's doing what, and what job title might be changing, and is there a person in it, or is it vacant, and does it have special funding, does it not? It's a lot to keep track of, and so every position and every person was literally printed out on a card and mapped to make sure that nobody got missed.”
Hawke has consistently said the restructuring was unrelated to any firings. Hawke told the full city staff about the restructuring in a January employee town hall meeting.
“We've got some departments that maybe don't always talk to each other in all the ways that we would want them to. And so for the last number of months we've been locking ourselves in a room and really trying to think through from the ground up what are some ways that we can realign the organization to try to make some improvements? It has not been done in a vacuum. I have been working with our Deputy City Managers, Thom Moton and Mary Vigue, as well as our Chief of Staff, Dennis LaCaria, and our Human Resources Director, Clayton Roberts, to kind of rip things apart, put them together, put things on the wall, see what makes sense,” she said.
Hawke also described discussions with department heads during that January town hall. Hawke said the restructuring was 90-95% complete by that point.
And in her comments to staff, she described it as still flexible. “As long as we are legal, as long as we stay within budget, as long as we stay within our FTE count, we can continue to maneuver as necessary,” she said. “This is looking to update our structures and our reporting, we're looking to align staff services and resources, and to support efficiency, collaboration, and coordination. This is not a reduction in staff in any way, shape, or form. If you are employed with the City of Wilmington, you have a job on the other side of this reorganization.”
Hawke also said some employees’ “work may shift,” and others may come under new supervisors. “We hope that employees will be open and flexible in understanding that, like any organization, we need to evolve and we need to hopefully stay open to what that may look like,” she said in the town hall.
It’s true that no staff were laid off as a result of the reorganization. But some staff describe shifts in their work that left them aimless or unmoored. One noted that no one asked them what they do every day before they were reassigned. Others said they were given the work of several other employees — and either struggle under the burden or were eventually fired for not performing optimally under the new conditions.
One employee found herself in a new job that was unconnected with her training and a health risk because of a prior back surgery.
That staff member was a member of the surveying team, which no longer exists. When she was moved to her new position, which Hawke said was inspections. That employee declined to be interviewed for this story, but did confirm that she was not asked about her physical abilities before being put in the role. She described it as a “terrible employee experience” that forced her to leave the city and find a new job.
When WHQR described that situation to Hawke, she said, “Every job has an essential functions list, of how much you need to be able to lift, and you know, do, and all of that, and we would, we would not ever like put somebody into a job that we were transferring them into without making sure that they could do that work. So that's news to me, like I'm happy to look into it, but that's nothing that ever, that ever came to my attention.”
Another current staff member described that surveyor’s experience, and added, “It’s not a termination, but she’s pushing people out by putting them on jobs where – they spent tens of thousands of dollars getting training on something and then they’re put on a job that has nothing to do with it.”
That staff member noted concerns about the lack of a surveying team: Hawke said there’s one city surveyor left.
“It’s not like we don’t need the services – the surveying still needs to be done, we’re just paying the contract rate,” they said. “You never save money when you do it on contract.”
Several employees reported that they were moved into departments with interim leadership or with leadership who haven’t been hired yet, leaving them unsure how to go about finding information about their jobs. And given conditions in the tower and the spate of firings, many felt it was safer not to ask any difficult questions.
For others, the work is changed. One staff member described their new team members: “They’re doing the best they can in jobs they’re not qualified for – they don’t know what they’re doing! But if you can’t pick it up fast enough, you’re done,” she said.
Hawke, in her January meeting, said that staff would be given training for their new work. “If there's additional training that might be needed if things are changing, then that training is provided fully. This is about success for each and every one of you, and this is about success for the organization. So, this is not a backhanded way to cut positions or cut people or reduce staff where we think we want to. Again, some duties may change, but the people have a job to go along with it, if they choose to, and that applies to every single position in the organization,” she said at the time.
A current staffer who has witnessed colleagues thrust into new positions pushed back on that, saying staff aren’t getting training.
“It’s pretty much sink or swim on their own. I’ve not heard of anyone getting legit training outside of YouTube videos and maybe some sort of document,” they said.
Another staff member said he has colleagues who don’t know what their new jobs actually are. “He still doesn't seem super clear on what his new role is, despite having known for going on four months now that he is moving into a new role, but there's still no clarity on what his role will actually entail, and at one point, he was going to have folks under him. It looks like that's not the case.”
Hawke addressed that in an interview with WHQR.
“Every position had a new job description created with it, so there's.. I haven't heard that directly, but that job description exists that they would have received, and they should have gone over it with their supervisor if they're somehow still not clear,“ she said.
In some cases, though, staff have been moved to new departments that have a vacancy in leadership. Or they’ve been put under new managers who haven’t worked with them before, and may not know what that employee should be doing either.
For other employees, there is clarity about what their new work is, but it isn’t anything they’re happy or satisfied with. One staff member gave it as a metaphor.
“It's like a carpenter, like you might have a trim carpenter or a finish carpenter. That carpenter knows how to work with wood. They might be able to frame the house if they had to, and it wouldn't be a bad job, like they could do it, but they're not going to do it as quickly, they're not going to do this efficiently, and they just don't have the same background, and they might miss doing the thing that they loved doing that they got into,” they said.
Increased Workloads
Workloads in some departments have gotten a lot tougher, since staff haven’t been replaced.
During budget discussions in June, Councilmember David Joyner asked Hawke to explain the restructuring, asking her, “Over the course of our organizational realignment, over the course of the year, we have not laid off a single individual, but we have eliminated how many positions by consolidating workloads, restructuring teams, etc.”
Becky Hawke responded to say the city, “eliminated 29 FTEs through the organizational realignment, and then there are a few new positions in this budget in our IT department, things that we talked about, but your net result is still more than 20 positions less in this budget than there are in the current budget.”
The impact has hit some of the lower-level workers hard.
“They have said that they're not replacing people, so when somebody leaves, other people have to take on their duties and aren’t given a choice,” one current staff member said.
Several staff members have said they’re taking on additional work for one or two people who no longer work with the city. One said it’s not done with a lot of empathy, either: “Dennis’s favorite line is, ‘just make it happen. Just do it. So you do 60-hour weeks, and no one cares.”
At the same time, the city is becoming more top-heavy, according to low-level staff. “There were 21 department heads, now there’s 26. Not all of them had assistant managers, now they all do, and some have more than one,” a staffer explained. They said, “I personally thought the city was getting top-heavy before, but now it’s getting even bigger.”
Hawke said there’s a purpose to it: “It's actually created more opportunity for there to be pathways for people to have career ladders, but managers are still working managers. There is nobody that I expect to be sitting behind a desk, just like, you know, approving things.”
But current staff say it’s led to micromanagement. That’s a phrase multiple staff members brought up across multiple departments.
“They'll promote somebody internally, but then, by the way, we're not filling backfilling your position, so have fun doing both of those jobs,” one current staffer said.
And from a completely different department, a former staff member ended up taking on the work of one and a half other positions after the restructuring, in addition to his existing duties. He said he was ultimately fired for not completing all his assigned work duties.
“I was doing about as well as I could, you know, considering I was fucking drowning every single day,” he said.
Hawke responded to general concerns about morale when interviewed by WHQR.
“I don't know of any organization where 100% of the staff is completely satisfied and thrilled to come to work every day,” Hawke said. “So I think that there is certainly some segment of the organization that perhaps is not fully happy. Sure, I guess my question is, but why, and what is it that's driving that? Because I certainly know who I am, I know how I treat people.”
She continued, “I know how I have articulated our positions and our commitments to supporting the organization over and over and over again. I think that has been demonstrated by how I have tried to open up lines of communication in the time that I've been here, which my understanding is that those are new and they seem to be well received, and you know, understand that some people may fill in the blanks or have a different perception of things, but, but ultimately, I feel like we are doing our very best.”
Generally speaking, many current and former staff described the restructuring as chaotic.
“It's really surprising that they made all of these changes all at once, instead of taking a more gradual approach, so that we could do things right, instead of throwing it all together and in fixing the things that broke,” one said.
Some of the decisions made simply don’t make sense to the staff who remain. Hawke’s general strategy has been to put like with like: all outreach staff are now grouped together in the communications and engagement department.
Asked if those efforts are leading to more efficiency, one staff member said, “No, not at all. They’re just looking at it on paper. Engineering with engineering, zoning with zoning. There are all kinds of engineering, all kinds of zoning. They never put any thought or effort into figuring out why it was the way it was.”
Others agreed.
“If you don't think about it, the changes seem to make sense, but as soon as you delve into the processes and what the actual changes mean for how work is going to proceed, they are not helpful and are going to slow work down and probably cost the city,” said a staffer.
He left room for it to work out in the long run, though. He said, “Eventually it may settle into some sort of a rhythm, but I think that there's just a large mismatch of skills and backgrounds and what folks are being asked to do.”
Future changes, silver linings
The restructuring is not yet complete, according to Hawke, and she’s willing to consider modifications if some of the changes are flawed.
“We've also left the door open that you know we want people to give this sort of the honest college try, but if we find that something isn't working, then we're able to reassess and figure out, is there something else that we need to do? This doesn't need to be set in stone,” she said.
She added that changes are still coming for the Police Department, though those decisions will largely be handled by Police Chief Ryan Zuidema.
When it comes to the future of the city, staff who talked to WHQR largely say they want the chaos to end. They want to feel secure in their jobs. And they want to go back to the feeling of pride they had in their work.
Some do say there have been positive changes. One staff member declined an interview, but said they had positive experiences under both administrations they’ve worked under. Another who has been critical of the new administration commended a few things that have happened- like efficiencies within her department she’d been seeking for years.
“So, some of that stuff has changed, so that's great. So, I want to try to be fair, like, you know, she got everybody these raises, that's a big deal for a lot of people,” she said.
It is commendable, many staff said, to give living wage raises to staff at every level. It’s particularly meaningful for those at the low end of the spectrum: firefighters, police officers, and trash collectors who are now making $7,000 to $15,000 more per year. They haven’t seen that on their paychecks yet, but Hawke suspects it will boost morale.
Staff who spoke to WHQR aren’t so sure. They’re not in this job for the money; they’re in it to serve the public, for job security, and to have consistency day to day. Some are stressed because they aren’t getting that anymore — and said they’d give up the 20% pay increase to go back to how things were. Several described a change in culture from enjoying their colleagues and daily work to showing up just to get a paycheck.
Asked why she was willing to speak with WHQR, despite feeling a risk to her job in doing so, one person said she hopes for change.
“Morale needs to go back up. I think there needs to be more communication. They said that part of the reason why they're changing this stuff, is because of silos, but they've created even more. Treating people with dignity, not making us work so much,” she said.
Another said she’d like to see Wilmington City Council get involved.
She said, “It would be nice if they seem to care about how employees were experiencing this, and not just what it was going to do to citizens. We are, citizens, most of us, you know, and a raise is great, but actually destroying the morale of all of your employees, or of most of your employees, is just really not a great long-term strategy.”
WHQR asked Hawke if she would consider doing a climate survey within the city government to assess the concerns raised. “I would never not be open to that, but that isn't something that I'm seeing as necessary when we don't have an overabundance of resignations at this point in time,” she said. “The feedback from management is positive, and quite frankly, we just were able to deliver a nice increase for people, so if anything, it would probably be skewed highly on the happiness factor, because that's very fresh. So, I don't even know that the results would be accurate right now.”
Editor's note: The city requested that WHQR's full, unedited interview with City Manager Becky Hawke, which they also video recorded for "archival purposes," be made available. You can find it below.
