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St. Pete Beach manager settles in to new job, city
By AMY WIMMER, Times Staff Writer ST. PETE BEACH -- Tom DeCesare, the mayor of Madeira Beach, trusts Mike Bonfield. He thinks he's a man of integrity. A consummate professional. DeCesare just isn't sure he would play poker with the guy. "He's a good man to work with. He listens intently, and he answers any questions that come up," said DeCesare, whose city is looking for a new city manager now that Bonfield, Madeira Beach's administrator for the past three years, has taken the top job in St. Pete Beach. "But for the most part, he's a good card player. You're not sure what he's thinking." St. Pete Beach now will have its chance to get to know Michael P. Bonfield, 42, who has built a life and career in Pinellas County, all within 10 miles of St. Pete Beach. The city administrator grew up in Gulfport and holds degrees from three local colleges. He also brings with him to St. Pete Beach 20 years of experience in Pinellas government. One thing he hasn't brought with him so far are personal items for the office. He occupies former City Manager Carl Schwing's space for the next couple of months but won't be hanging anything on the walls. In a couple of months, he and the staff will move to a new City Hall. The new, $3.4-million municipal headquarters -- one wrought with controversy since its inception -- is just one of the changes on the horizon as Bonfield settles into St. Pete Beach. He arrives on the barrier islands' largest beach city as it deals with morale problems in the police department and controversial changes to the city's land development code. Given St. Pete Beach's appetite for local politics, the city election in March is shaping up to be a heated one. But Bonfield said he doesn't think of St. Pete Beach as a factious town. "In the day and a half I've been here, I haven't observed that," he said. "I don't know that anything that's gone on in St. Pete Beach is any different than anywhere else." Bonfield, described by former bosses as thoughtful and honest, said he isn't the type of manager who will make immediate changes at City Hall. He said he understands that a certain amount of angst comes with getting a new boss, and for now, he wants to reassure employees by getting to know them and letting them know it's time to move forward after six months without a full-time city manager. "For me, I need to really get a grasp on the operation and our strengths and our weaknesses and put together a plan from there," he said. Schwing resigned suddenly in July after employee complaints about him reached city commissioners. The commission feared he did not have the confidence of city staff. St. Pete Beach hired Bonfield with aspirations that he could do for the city what he did elsewhere: attract millions of dollars in grants. Yet last year, when it came time for Bonfield's annual review, two Madeira Beach commissioners expressed some disappointment in his performance. Jan Sturgis said she thought Bonfield was slightly inexperienced for the city manager job when he arrived, though she thinks St. Pete Beach will benefit from what he learned in Madeira. "We were the first city that Mike was city manager of. He could really work with anyone, and I hated to lose Mike," Sturgis said Tuesday. "I just felt since he was new to our city, that he had to grow into the job." For now, Bonfield has no concrete plans for how he will address issues in the St. Pete Beach Police Department, where anonymous letters sent from an officer to the city manager's office in the past year led to an investigation into how the police chief and his two captains cooperate with each other. Bonfield took last week off, in between his last day in Madeira Beach and his first day 7 miles to the south. He spent the week golfing, fishing and, he says, not thinking much about his plans. He didn't play any poker either, though Bonfield has heard DeCesare quip before that he would be good at the game. "My whole life, I probably have just been a person who doesn't show a lot of emotion," Bonfield said. "Part of that's probably just because you get your mind going when you're talking to people, and I start thinking about things. I'm not a big poker player." Word around Madeira Beach was that Bonfield's career goal is to one day return to his hometown and take the city manager reins when Lee, 47, leaves Gulfport. Bonfield, who has three sons, lives in Gulfport with his wife, Carrie, and made his continued residence there part of his negotiated deals with both St. Pete Beach and Madeira Beach. But Bonfield said he lives in Gulfport because it is more affordable than beach living. He had no comment about aspirations to work in Gulfport. "It's not that I want to do that or that I don't want to do that," he said. "I'm happy to be here (in St. Pete Beach), and I hope I'm here for a long time." In the meantime, his family is happy with the job change, Bonfield said. Madeira Beach supplied a Buick LeSabre as the city car for the city manager; St. Pete Beach, a Ford Expedition. "My kids think it's cool," he said. "They look at those important distinctions."
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