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closeSan Luis Obispo City Manager Ken Hampian is leaving his job after 20 years at City Hall and a total of 35 years in public service, but he refuses to call it retirement.
“It’s not retirement. It’s a new phase of my life,” the 57-year-old said.
His departure will be effective Jan. 1, but he plans to be flexible in case the city needs his services a little longer to train a new city manager.
The first thing Mayor Dave Romero did when he heard was cry.
“I cried first thing because Ken has been an outstanding manager besides being a really really good friend,” he said.
Hampian said he will continue to live in San Luis Obispo, and plans to engage in a myriad of things that will include traveling, writing, teaching, consulting and more. One of his first tasks is writing a municipal finance book with colleagues for the Sonoma Press.
His departure announcement comes after the city approved a two-year budget that is settled until 2011. Hampian noted in his letter to the council that it can choose a new city manager in advance of the next two-year financial plan to be approved in July 2011.
“I strongly believe that handing the baton to a new city manager in January 2010 is the best way for me to care for, and honor, an organization that has given me so much,” he wrote.
Hampian was selected by former City Manager John Dunn to serve as assistant city manager in 1989, after serving in city government in Fresno and Oxnard and for the federal government.
The City Council unanimously appointed him in late 2000.
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