The Chelsea City Council wants to hear from residents before it grades City Manager Fidel Maltez. The council’s City Manager Evaluation Committee has opened an online feedback form, in English and Spanish, and will take comments until noon on Friday, November 27, the day after Thanksgiving.
The city posted the request on Facebook on Monday. The timing matters more than usual this year. On November 2, Maltez asked the council to extend his contract by four years, through December 31, 2031. The council sent that request to its Conference committee, and Councillor Todd Taylor asked that the committee wait until after the evaluation, so councillors can discuss the review before they take up the extension.
How to send feedback
- Online: the council’s City Manager Evaluation feedback form.
- Deadline: noon, Friday, November 27, 2026.
- Questions: Councillor Todd Taylor, chair of the City Manager Evaluation Committee, at [email protected].
The form is not anonymous. It requires your full name, an email address and your home address with your comments. The committee will see who sent each comment.
What the council grades
The committee rates the city manager in these areas of work:
- Budget and finance
- Economic development
- Neighborhood enhancement
- Community engagement and leadership
- Public safety
- Policy development and strategic thinking
- Policy execution
- Intergovernmental relations with the state and federal governments
- Public relations and media relations
- Overall effectiveness
Residents do not have to address every area. The form has one open box for comments, so a single paragraph about trash pickup, a street project or a call to City Hall counts as much as a full report card.
Why it matters
Under Chelsea’s charter the city manager runs day-to-day government and answers to the 11-member council, which hires, reviews and renews the manager. Maltez’s current contract, signed in October 2023, runs through December 31, 2027. The renewal he proposed keeps his salary structure, with a 3 percent raise each year, and calls for a council evaluation by April 1 of each year from 2028 through 2031.
The council has not set a date for the Conference committee to take up the extension.