Houghton selects new city manager

The Houghton City Council has selected its new city manager.

After months of looking over many applications, the Houghton City Council has unanimously chosen Eric Waara to become the next city manager of Houghton.

The announcement was made Wednesday night at the last city council meeting of 2013.

Waara said he was excited after Mayor Robert Blackon announced his name.

“Of course happy with how the decision turned out. I’m looking forward to the challenge now,” he said.

Current City Manager Scott MacInnes will be stepping down in February.  He said the council made a great choice because he is very familiar with Waara’s work.

“I’ve worked alongside Eric on projects for about fifteen years now and I think the city is going to be in great hands.  Eric is energetic, hardworking, and he’s got a great personality,” MacInnes said.  “I know employees respect him so we’re going to be off and running here and I’m looking forward to working side by side with him.”

Waara said he already has plans on what he wants to tackle first.

“I think the first thing to tackle is really getting farmiliar with the city’s budget and looking at how it interfaces with the master plan because the city can work its way into forwarding the master plan along with business and civic groups.”