Communication Specialist

Join Our Team as a Communication Specialist
The City of Sheboygan is seeking a creative and strategic communicator to help manage public messaging and community engagement. In this role, you'll develop content, support outreach efforts, and coordinate communications across digital and traditional platforms. If you're passionate about clear communication and public service, we'd love to hear from you

Working with the Common Council, the community, and City staff, the Office of the City Administrator's responsibility is to professionally implement all Common Council policy decisions and efficiently direct the City's operations and activities in accordance with sound management principles. In addition, the City Administrator collaboratively prepares, reviews, and monitors the annual operating budget for the City. The City Administrator collaborates with the Mayor, City Attorney, City Clerk and all City departments.

Under general supervision of the City Administrator, this position performs work in planning, coordinating, and implementing a comprehensive strategic communications program for the City of Sheboygan. This role involves working with the City Administration department and City staff to coordinate all aspects of media relations, public information, crisis communication, and internal communications to ensure that the municipality's message is consistent, clear, and effectively delivered to all stakeholders. The position works closely with the City's leadership team and plays a key role in supporting the City's mission, goals, and objectives.This position requires a high level of confidentiality. All City employees are expected to be honest and truthful at all times.

• Develops and implements a comprehensive communication strategy aligned with the City's overall strategies and initiatives. ?
• Serves as the City's Public Information Officer (PIO) for the media, managing press inquiries, and facilitating interviews with municipal leaders.
• Builds and maintains positive relationships with local, regional, and national media outlets.
• Works with the City Administrator and/or departments to develop talking points, writes and distributes press releases, media advisories, and official statements.
• Plans and coordinates official events including press conferences, public announcements, and community events.
• Oversees communication strategies within the municipality to keep employees informed about policies, updates, and key developments.
• Leads the City's public relations team.
• Works with IT Staff to oversee the creation and distribution of content across various channels, including the City's website, social media, newsletters, print materials.
• Manages social media platforms to engage with the community and disseminate information and facilitates translation of communications into a variety of languages.
• Develops and executes crisis communication plans for emergencies, natural disasters, and other critical incidents and represents the City during these events to provide timely and accurate information to the public.?
• Works with appropriate city staff to develop and implement public information campaigns on issues such as safety, environmental initiatives, and other municipal programs.
• Creates and manages communication plans for specific projects, initiatives, and crisis situations.
• Develops and implements strategies for engaging with residents, businesses, and community organizations.
• Focuses on public relations efforts to build trust and community support for the City of Sheboygan.
• Organizes public meetings, town halls, and forums to gather community input and address concerns.
• Works with the Common Council and other stakeholders to communicate municipal priorities and initiatives.
• Prepares reports for municipal leadership on communication activities, media coverage, and public sentiment.
• Ensures that all communications comply with legal requirements, including privacy laws and regulations governing public information.
• Maintains high ethical standards in all communication activities.

Other Duties
Please note this job description is not designed to cover or contain a comprehensive listing of activities, duties or responsibilities that are required of the employee for this job. Duties, responsibilities and activities may change at any time with or without notice.

• High school diploma or equivalent required.
• Associate's degree in Public Relations, Marketing, or related field preferred.
• Three or more years of experience related communications or public relations required.
• Possession and maintenance of valid driver's license and auto insurance in accordance with state of Wisconsin law required.

In evaluating candidates for this position, the City may consider a combination of education, training, and experience which provides the necessary knowledge, skills, and abilities to perform the duties of the position.?

• Knowledge of media relations, public relations practices, and strategic communication methods.
• Knowledge of all aspects of external communications, including but not limited to social media, direct mail, online communications, conferences, press, and events.
• Skill in analyzing problems and developing appropriate recommendations; good management and conflict resolution skills; good team skills. ?
• Skill in developing, recommending, and promoting public information materials in a strategic context in keeping with the City's mission and goals. ?
• Skill in producing and promoting public information events, writing accurate news releases and public announcements, and reviewing and editing the work of others. ?
• Knowledge in providing on-air and live broadcast presentations. ?
• Strong interpersonal skills with the ability to build and maintain positive working relationships with media representatives, community leaders, and other stakeholders.
• Ability to research, locate information related to media requests or department communications, and critically evaluating the research findings. ?
• Ability to communicate effectively, both orally and in writing including capacity to communicate complex ideas compellingly to a variety of audiences across a multitude of media platforms. ?
• Ability to use principles of written communication, graphical layout and multimedia techniques appropriate to web-based communication, ensuring that work products are clear, usable, and effectively convey the intended message and information.?
• Ability to work independently without specific instructions and handle confidential material with discretion.
• Ability to proficiently utilize social media platforms, website content, a computer, and the required software.?
• Competent in Adobe and Microsoft Office with specific competence in Excel, Word, and Outlook.

Job offers for this position are contingent on the individual passing a pre-employment background check.

Work Environment
This position primarily works in an office setting but may have some off-site responsibilities. The employee is regularly required to stand, walk, bend, reach, lift up to 20 lbs, and handle office materials. The employee is occasionally required to work evenings or weekends to support City-sponsored special events. Such events will be known in advance such that call-ins should infrequently occur. Reasonable accommodation may be made to enable qualified individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions.