George Kolb, Charles Oliver and Patrick Salerno, introduced as city manager finalists Monday, all left manager jobs in the past four months after disagreements with their respective city councils.

At a brief Monday night news conference, they each downplayed their resignations as the result of shifting political winds or divergent philosophies. But their detractors back home maintained publicly that there were serious reasons to cut the men loose -- with six-figure severance packages, of course.

Durham council members, who will choose Patrick Baker's replacement, said the candidates' strengths, at least on paper, outweigh or diminish any excess baggage the three brought to the Bull City.

They now must try to glean whether the hubbubs that followed the hopefuls should disqualify any or all of them.

Kolb and Salerno were accused of being alternately heavy-handed or deceptive with their city councils, according to published reports in Wichita, Kan., and Sunrise, Fla., from where the two men respectively hail.

Oliver was quick to produce a resolution from the city of Peoria, Ill., expressing "appreciation to Randy Oliver as he completes his service as City Manager." But several Peoria council members decried a gag order that said none was permitted to make disparaging comments about Oliver as a condition of his severance package.

Mayor Bill Bell was asked whether City Council members, given some of the controversies that have plagued Baker's tenure, might have wanted to include a few not-so-recent managerial divorcees.

Turns out they wanted two acting city managers to join Kolb, Oliver and Salerno as finalists, but they balked at the notion of a public hiring process because it risked upsetting their current employers, Bell said.

Council members will have face-to-face conversations with each of the candidates today.

"It's never been a guarantee the ones we brought in would be the ones we chose," Bell said. "We just need to go through the process."

Council member Mike Woodard said the battle scars also are signs of experience. A key criterion for the council was to find a manager with a decades-long track record. That would be in sharp contrast to Baker, who took the reins with no previous managerial experience.

All three finalists are in their late 50s and have worked for numerous local governments.

"The kind of seasoned experienced city manager that we were looking for, somewhere along the line, may have done some things that citizens or media folks or their councils might not have agreed with," Woodard said. "My granddaddy told me if you're worried about stubbing your toe, you'll just stand still."

Oliver said the Durham job opening was one reason he stepped down.

"This opportunity came up, and I consider this to be an ideal opportunity," he said at the news conference.

Kolb faced scrutiny in Wichita for keeping council members in the dark about important projects, said former Mayor Carlos Mayans, a vocal detractor.

Questions were raised in 2005 about whether a company was given an inside track to build a new terminal at the city-owned airport. Mayans told The Wichita Eagle that he first learned about the contract from a reporter.

"You may know about this peripheral information, but we know nothing," Mayans told Kolb, according to the newspaper. "The first thing we do is we get a call from the media saying, 'Why is it that the city is doing this with this company?' "

Kolb defended himself Monday night.

"My communication style is a two-way street," he said. "I try to communicate with the council [and] the staff the issues as I become aware of them and try to keep an open-door policy."

Salerno faced similar questions in Sunrise, Fla., particularly after the election of Roger Wishner, a swing vote that turned a majority against Salerno.

Wishner accused Salerno of acting without the advice and consent of elected leaders.

"I was quoted as saying, 'When you've got Pat Salerno doing everything, what's the use in having a commission?' " Wishner said Monday.

Salerno said Monday that was just an excuse to get rid of him.

"Tell me what manager who doesn't [communicate with council] lasts 18 years in their community," he said.

(News researcher Susan Ebbs contributed to this article.)