Retiree Jim Hock To Become Joliet City Manager Once Again

JOLIET, IL — Last week, Joliet Patch's editor suggested the Joliet City Council hire world-famous Joliet East High School graduate Lionel Richie as the next city manager, but that does not appear likely. What is likely is that the Joliet City Council will bring retired city manager Jim Hock out of retirement.

At 4 p.m. Thursday, Aug. 6, the Joliet City Council will convene to vote on the proposed contract to bring Hock out of retirement. Hock retired from Joliet in April 2017. As of last year, Hock was living in Michigan. He is highly regarded by Joliet City Councilman Pat Mudron, who has established a majority coalition on the council to block Mayor Bob O'Dekirk's agenda.

Mudron's coalition consists of himself, Mike Turk, Sherri Reardon, Don "Duck" Dickinson and Bettye Gavin, a former ally of O'Dekirk, who is now considered by the mayor as an adversary.

According to Thursday's meeting agenda, the council will consider a resolution to hire Hock.

The Joliet City Council has remained in a state of chaos since the divided council voted to oust Marty Shanahan as interim city manager in June 2019. Last summer, Mudron called Hock to discuss becoming the interim city manager, but Hock, who is already collecting a municipal government pension, could not agree on a contract.

In the end, the council moved past Hock and named city economic development director Steve Jones as interim city manager, giving Jones a raise of more than $40,000 to serve in the job.

Last fall and winter, Joliet did a national hiring search, and the two finalists included a former colleague of Hock's, J. Mark Rooney, and Will Jones, no relation to Steve Jones, of Mequon, Wis. In the end, the council chose not to offer the job to either of them.

Last month, following a tense city council meeting attended by several citizens criticizing Steve Jones and Joliet Police Chief Al Roechner regarding Eric Lurry's in-custody death, Steve Jones gave a one-month notice of his resignation. His last day of work is Aug. 7.

During the past two weeks, Joliet Patch produced multiple news articles indicating that front-runner Sabrina Spano withdrew her application from the city manager's job and so did the secondary candidate, Joliet real estate and development lawyer Michael Hansen.

Last week, Joliet Patch's editor penned a satirical column advocating that the Joliet City Council hire Lionel Richie as the city's next manager.