Vicksburg’s two aldermen say they’re willing to work Mayor George Flaggs Jr. on a plan to supervise the city’s nine divisions, but the mayor needs to provide some direction and insight where he wants to go with city government.

“If we’re going to do something like this (supervise divisions), we need to discuss it; the three of us come together and discuss it,” South Ward Alderman Willis Thompson said. “Over the last year or so, we’ve been talking about this. We need to get together and talk about it. We need to have a discussion on what the expectations are and what he’s trying to accomplish.”

Thompson’s comments came after Flaggs presented a resolution at Monday’s meeting of the Board of Mayor and Aldermen placing different city divisions under himself, Thompson and North Ward Aldermen Michael Mayfield.

Under the resolution, which was not voted on, Flaggs designated the fire and police departments, city attorney and the finance and administration divisions — which include the city clerk and accounting director — under his direct supervision. Mayfield was placed over public works and community development, and Thompson, information technology, recreation and human resources. The resolution was similar to the division of supervision the mayor and aldermen agreed to shortly after taking office in July 2013, and in some ways similar to Flagg’s proposed charter amendments he introduced in June. Under that proposal, he also wanted the authority to hire and fire department heads.

Mayfield and Thompson also opposed the plan, with Mayfield expressing disgust and leaving the meeting before it adjourned.

The resolution introduced Monday did not include authority to fire a division head.

Flaggs said Monday the resolution would give the board better oversight “so that we can be more responsible to the city, and I think it will help us in moving the city forward, and that’s probably one of the most urgent things we can do. I just want to set accountability.”

“I don’t want to make this a political issue,” Flaggs said after the meeting.

“What I simply want to do is to be in a position where we can create more responsibility and oversight because I’m of the opinion we waste a lot of money with not having anybody to oversee the day to day operations of the divisions.

“All I did was take the organizational chart we’ve got and gave supervision to it.”

Thompson said he opposed the resolution because he believes the offices of city attorney and city clerk should answer to the board.

“The legal department and the clerk should report to everybody because of the nature of their jobs,” he said. “In the legal matters, we all need to updated on everything. We need to know what’s going on.”

Traditionally, he said, the South Ward alderman has been over the fire department, adding, “ I just thought in regards of everything going on between the mayor and the fire chief, somebody else needed to step in.”

Thompson added Flaggs meets weekly with the division heads.

“I don’t meet with them and neither does Mr. Mayfield,” he said. “It gives him the time he needs with the division heads. I’ve never told a division head to do anything contrary to what he’s wanted him to do.”

Mayfield said Flaggs told him about the resolution, but he and the mayor did not get an opportunity to discuss it before it was introduced. He recalled the 2013 plan to divide supervision over the city divisions, “and two, three months later, I don’t know what happened, he felt that was not working for what he wanted, and he went back and changed all of it. In my opinion, it’s gone down hill ever since.”

“To this day, I don’t know what he’s looking for,” Mayfield said. “Every time he puts one (plan) on the table, he seems to change it. I just don’t know what he’s really looking for. It keeps changing. I just kind of look at it (and) usually I’ll talk to him about, but you’re just dumfounded to know what he’s really looking for. What does he really want? He flip-flops.”

He said he and Thompson and I have worked well with Flaggs “and always tried to do what we think is best for the employees and personnel and the appearance of the city.

“(But) we can never figure out where he’s coming from, and that makes it hard to work with him,” Mayfield said.

“All I know is that three people can’t run this city,” Flaggs said.

“You can’t run this city with three different visions and agendas, and it just looks like my hands are tied as to taking this city to the next level. There’s so much more that can be done in this city and I’ve got a proven record of it. Look what we’ve done in two years with me leading. I don’t want to fire nobody. I just want day-to-day oversight. Right now, we’ve got three different agendas. I just believe in structure.”