Ferguson, MO  (KTRS)  Ferguson Mayor James Knowles denies rumors that a decision has been made on a new city manager.

This was in response to  Nicky Hawthone’s comments during the public open mic session at Tuesday night’s city council meeting. Hawthorne who is a volunteer for the city of Ferguson, told the mayor  and the city council she heard a decision has been made and that candidate doesn’t reflect the choice of the people.“I’m really quite sure that our opinion was very different from who I understand you picked to be the city manager. So what was the point of asking and making it seem like you care what we think.”

Knowles says this isn’t so. “There hasn’t been any decisions made. Small towns have the unfortunate reality of having a lot of small town rumors. We haven’t come to that conclusion yet.”

Knowles also said it’s unclear of when a decision is expected.

Meanwhile, Interim Police Chief Andre Anderson presented an update on Ferguson’s Community Policing Program. Anderson highlighted the “Business, Park, Walk, and Talk” initiative.

Anderson said since the launch of this initiative on October 24th, police officers ” have made 83 contacts with many of the businesses in the community and many of them have taken place on both West and South Florissant. While doing that we’re also obtaining emergency contact numbers so we’re able to communicate with the businesses in case there’s any type of an emergency.”
Anderson also announced another upcoming initiative called the “Problem Oriented Policing Training Session”. The session is open to the community and will be held at the Ferguson Community Center on November 18th at 7 o’clock.

An earlier version of this story referred to Ms. Hawthorne as an employee of the Ferguson Police Department. We have corrected this to show that she is a volunteer for the City of Ferguson.