Wichita’s three finalists for city manager offered different visions for city government Tuesday night at a news conference followed by a public forum.
The City Council will ultimately decide who gets the job. But the public and reporters got to ask the questions on Tuesday night.
Donte Martin, a 53-year-old assistant city manager for Wichita, had the home-field advantage. He has worked for the city for 25 years in multiple leadership roles, including as the court administrator. He’s familiar with most of the city’s departments and department heads.
Mark Freitag, 59, began working in local government after a lengthy military career. From 2022 to 2024, Freitag was the city manager for Westminster, Colorado, a Denver suburb about halfway between the Colorado state capital and Boulder. Prior to that, he was the city manager for 11 years in Janesville, Wisconsin.
Dennis Marstall is a 56-year-old county administrator for Lancaster County, S.C., a suburb of Charlotte, N.C. He spent decades working in local government and nonprofit roles in the Charlotte area before returning to his hometown of Manhattan, Kansas, to be assistant city manager there.
City manager finalists on safeguarding taxpayer dollars
The city manager position was created to shield the business of the city from a political spoils system that once plagued city governments across the country. The Eagle asked all three candidates to explain how they would safeguard taxpayer money from political and private business interests.
Freitag said four guiding principles will help protect the city’s residents from graft. “You know, first and foremost, public servants need to really do four things: No. 1, they need to be accessible. Two, they need to be responsive. Three, transparent. And four – and that’s the key piece here – accountable.
"And so, you know, if we’re doing those four things and managing the city’s money under those four kind of pillars, I’m confident in the city’s ability to be responsible with city tax dollars and certainly sensitive to the community’s interest and desires for accountability.”
Marstall talked about strategic planning and community priorities.
“Well, it’s been a great experience here, learning more about the city’s budget, understanding how resources are deployed, thinking about utilizing it for staffing needs, but overall the service delivery – I’m thinking again about what are some of the policies that help drive that – but with the budget, it’s a mathematical equation that what the revenues are, we’ve got to work within, certainly. But I think really, that goes back to the strategic plan, that goes back to a community survey, that goes back to the business community and what they see as priorities, and really thinking about a 10-year plan for capital.
"And if you stick to the plan, you follow the strategic plan, that’s where you follow the dollars. And so I think it is a simple formula in that regard, but it’s more, much more complex, as usually needs outgrow what are some of the service requests and service delivery. So, it’s a balance every year, certainly, and that’s where it is a collaboration. We do get community input. We do have all the priorities of the mayor and council, and we go back to the strategic plan, and we fund to that.
"And what we have to tell people is we may not get to your priority this year, but if we have a 10-year plan, we can put that on the 10-year plan. I think that keeps some of the focus on making sure we’re following a plan and not getting sidetracked by different individual requests and individual different projects that we can incorporate, but maybe just not on the timeline someone might be wanting.”
Martin said he would be able to protect taxpayer dollars by making decisions based on the public interest.
“I believe that we have to keep the public benefit in mind. Whether you’re an elected official or you’re appointed and you’re working as a part of staff, we always lead, or should lead, with the public benefit. And we should be able to clearly identify and articulate what the public benefit is. If there are decisions that are being made and you have a belief that there may be some undue influence, it is leaning into the concerns that you have and having conversations that bring us back to public benefit and, ultimately, transparency and accountability, realizing that any decision we make impacts our community. It’s not something that we can do in isolation.
"And so understanding the public benefit, being able to articulate the risk and the concern with any decision that’s being considered, and then through leadership hopefully landing at a point where the public benefit influences greatly in terms of the decision.”
On federal government policies
Under Wichita’s council-manager government, the City Council sets policies while the city manager is in charge of the day-to-day operations of the city. Put another way, the city’s 3,000 full-time employees answer to the city manager, who answers to the City Council.
The city accepts hundreds of millions of dollars in federal funds each year, but cities have come under increasing pressure from the Trump administration to fall in line with his priorities – such as ending diversity, equity and inclusion programs or enforcing immigration laws – or risk losing funding.
The Eagle asked all three candidates what level of cooperation cities such as Wichita should have with the federal government when it comes to immigration enforcement and other political priorities of the Trump administration.
“That largely depends on the issue that we’re talking about,” Martin said. “I believe that local government – cities – should work in partnership, not only with the federal government but with the state government, where there is alignment, understanding there is a separation of government, and we may not always align.
“Our role as far as local government, the city of Wichita, is to represent what’s in the best interest of our local community, understanding the national context, if we partner with state and local federal government partners."
Marstall said he’s willing to make changes to align with federal and state requirements.
“We always see the federal government as a partner,” Marstall said. “We also see the state as a partner. So there are parameters that come with strings attached. We understand that; it’s always been the case. But we’ve just got to do our job, deliver what we promise on the programs that they’re funding, and we’ve just got to stick to our plan. And if there’s some adjustments because of the federal government policies or changes, we’ll adjust, too.”
Freitag said he will follow the law, whatever it says.
“I’m a firm believer that, you know, the city ought to operate within the laws of the United States, the laws and statutes of the state of Kansas, and certainly the local laws and ordinances, and as long as we’re walking in accordance with those lines and those words, then I think we’re in a good place.”
Addressing housing issues
At the public forum, the candidates took questions submitted by the public on a number of issues, including homelessness.
Freitag reflected on his time in both cities he managed on how to address homelessness, focusing on how Westminster collaborated with surrounding cities and counties to help address their needs.
“It’s not an easy problem set,” he said. “It does take the community to resolve those issues, there are nonprofit strengths, there are city strengths, and then there are other resources out there.”
Marstall said the city should take a “housing first” approach to addressing homelessness.
“How can we get people stabilized with housing?” Marstall said. “Then you focus on the root causes of homelessness, whether it is they’ve had a medical issue or job loss, or they do have substance abuse or mental health issues.”
Martin pointed out that the city is already working on addressing homelessness in the city, specifically with Second Light fully opening in the spring with wrap around services.
“I feel confident in the direction we’re going,” Martin said. “It’s going to take time. I know we wish the problem would be solved tomorrow.”
Reaction to the city manager process, candidates
Activist Faith Martin, who sat on the city’s committee to select a new police chief in 2022, attended the forum. She said she favored Marstall and Donte Martin to be the finalist for city manager.
“I would probably go with Donte,” she said, “just because I’ve already worked with him, but I think ... Dennis would be a good candidate as well.”
Celeste Racette, Save Century II organizer and private-citizen watchdog of the city’s finances, left the forum after the first speaker, Freitag, finished answering pre-screened questions without being asked any of the questions she submitted to the city.
She approached Freitag during a break and found out he did not have an internal auditor at the two previous cities where he was a leader.
“If we don’t have an opportunity to find out if they have the expertise to manage our financial deficit and to find out whether they think it’s important to have oversight and controls, internal controls, what’s the point of this? I’m leaving,” Racette said.
The city said earlier that it planned to extend an offer to the next city manager sometime after Thanksgiving, with a public council vote in early December. The council is set to discuss the choices before the holiday, after the city manager selection committee makes its recommendation by the end of this week.
Current City Manager Robert Layton plans to retire by the end of the year.
This story was shared as part of the Wichita Journalism Collaborative, a coalition of newsrooms — including KMUW — and community partners joining forces to help meet news and information needs in and around Wichita.
