When the City of Vicksburg paid the $360,484 bill for its 2008 audit, more than $200,000 of it went to one man, former city clerk and strategic planner Paul Rogers.

Rogers retired in June 1999, but returned two months later to work for the city for 12½ years. During that time, according to city records, he was paid more than $1 million.

Records from the city’s accounting office and human resources department obtained through the Freedom of Information Act show the city paid Rogers $1.36 million from August 1999 until March.

During that period, Rogers worked as a consultant to the city for two years; was the city’s strategic planner for eight years, 2001 to 2009, under the administration of then-Mayor Laurence Leyens; and worked part-time under the administration of Mayor Paul Winfield, from 2009 to March, assisting with the city’s 2008 audit. City salaries are based on the calendar year.

From 2006 to 2008, Rogers was paid about $150,000 a year.

“Given the position and his expertise, $153,000 was not out of scale for a planner for a city the size of Vicksburg,” said Dr. Bethany Stitch, associate director of the John C. Stennis Institute of Government at Mississippi State University.

“Cities the size of Atlanta pay financial planners $300,000 to $400,000 a year. Some cities, however, pay the same job $45,000 a year,” she said.

“It was not a matter of him asking us, but us asking him,” Leyens said of the decision to hire Rogers. “Paul Rogers is without question the most capable and informed person in the state when it comes to municipal finance and accounting.”

“Paul had so much experience,” said South Ward Alderman Sid Beauman, who was in his first term when Rogers was rehired. “He did computer work. Paul was way ahead of his time with computer programming.”

State law requires municipalities to hire an outside accountant for each audit, but the city must have one person, or a group, to prepare the information for the independent auditor.

During most of the 12½ years Rogers worked for the city after returning in 1999, Rogers was the city’s highest paid employee. Here is a breakdown of his association with the City of Vicksburg:

• Rogers retired in June 1999 with a salary of $68,174.86. He had worked for the city 22 years as city clerk and comptroller.

• In August of that same year, Rogers was rehired as a part-time consultant at $60 an hour. That position lasted until July 2001.

• In July 2001, Rogers was hired by the Leyens administration as strategic planner with a starting salary of $98,500 a year. At the time, Leyens’ salary as mayor was $56,531.

Leyens and Rogers said at the time and later that his salary was negotiated. Rogers said he based the salary on the number of hours he would be working on the job.

“He was losing money coming out of retirement, so we had to offer something to compensate him for his loss,” Leyens said. “He really saved the city money, because we would have had to hire three people to do what he did. He was the best person we could have found, period.”

“I was supposed to work 40 hours, but the job really took 50 to 60,” Rogers said, “so I based the salary on what I would make working 50 to 60 hours a week. Toward the end, (in 2011-12) I was losing money, about $1,000 a month.”

• In October 2005, Rogers’ salary was increased to $73.94 an hour, or $153,800 annually.

From 2001 until Rogers’ second retirement in 2009, Leyens said, Rogers supervised the city’s accounting department and handled the city’s finances, including preparing the city budgets, working on audits and in 2008 installing MUNIS, a financial software program for cities. He also consulted with city purchasing director Tim Smith on natural gas purchases for the city.

“He worked with the department heads to prepare their budgets and helped consolidate the city’s checking accounts,” Leyens said.

Rogers described his work with the city from 2001 to 2009 as similar to that of a city manager.

“I worked primarily with the city’s budget and finances,” he said. “I did things that I did not do as city clerk. As city clerk, I didn’t work with the board. As strategic planner, I worked with the board and the department heads and worked on the audits.”

Those duties are now handled by city accounting director Doug Whittington, who was hired in July 2008 to replace Rogers.

Rogers said consolidating the city’s checking accounts involved combining the city’s 30 accounts into one. All the funds were funneled into one account, he said, and the money was allocated to the different departments. Surplus funds were invested.

• In June 2009, as the Leyens administration was leaving office, Rogers retired for a second time.

• In July 2009, under the new Winfield administration, he was hired as a part-time employee to work on the 2008 budget. From July until the end of 2009, he was paid about $36,000. In 2010, he was paid $75,716.

• The board in July 2011 made Rogers’ position full-time so he could help with the 2008 audit. He was paid $106,821 in 2011 and about $6,997 in 2012.

“We had found ourselves way behind on the audits,” North Ward Alderman Michael Mayfield said. He said Rogers was rehired in 2009 because “he had as much history of the city as any employee in Vicksburg.

“It was his expertise and his knowledge,” he said. “He knew who he needed and where he needed to go, at which areas to look. Toward the end, he was slowly working his way out of a job.”

Mayfield doesn’t believe Rogers will be rehired by the city.

“I don’t see that happening. He was hired for a specific purpose and that’s been completed,” he said. “But I can’t speak for future administrations.”