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Talent tables decision on new administrator By WENDY SIPOREN TALENT -- The City Council put off a decision between two interim city administrator candidates Wednesday, opting to deliberate further on Monday. Former city administrator Preston Polasek resigned last week after a marathon closed session called by the City Council to consider complaints against him. He was on the job just seven weeks. Wednesday's meeting to discuss the administrator candidates was in closed session, and their names were not made public. Monday's meeting, another closed session, begins at 6:45 p.m. at City Hall, 204 E. Main St. One familiar face will be joining the search committee to find a permanent replacement for Polasek. Former City Councilwoman Joi Riley was appointed to Position 1 on the council. The council chose Doug Turner to fill the second vacancy in Position 4. The vacancies occurred because two former council members moved to Ashland. Riley and Turner will have to run in the November 2000 elections to keep their seats on the council. "It feels like coming back home," said Riley, who has spent the last seven months renovating a house in Medford. She says she wants to do a better job of balancing her personal and public commitments and won't be as involved during this term as she was previously. A newcomer to Talent city government, Turner says he has a lot to learn and doesn't bring a set agenda to the position. "I think we are facing a lot of challenges in terms of population growth," said Turner, a financial services manager with US Cellular. "I would like to participate in proactively developing quality of life and services that we are going to enjoy. ... I don't want to see Talent develop into a bedroom community that lacks essential services." Turner has a background in management and financial planning and says he is committed to making sure the city's finances stay reasonable. In other action, the council voted not to pursue an extension of the Talent-Ashland-Phoenix water intertie that would have extended the pipeline closer to Ashland and closer to the site of Talent's new water reservoir on Belmont Road. Even with financial contributions from Ashland, the additional 7,500 feet of oversized pipe would have cost the city $1.5 million more than is budgeted for the project. Project engineers needed the decision from the council to complete project designs. Construction of six miles of 24-inch pipeline from Medford to Talent along Highway 99 will take a full year, according to project manager Bob Schneider of Montgomery Watson Engineering. Talent will need to enlarge its water distribution pipeline through town in 10 years when projected demands exceed the capacity of the system, according to Schneider. But Talent public works director Tim Dedrick has said that planned capital improvements to the city's water distribution system will extend the time before the city faces another major upgrade. Mail Tribune Copyright � The Mail Tribune 1999, Medford, Oregon USA