Austin and Albert Lea will no longer share a finance director.

The cities have discontinued the shared services agreement for Finance Director Tom Dankert after about a month.

City Council members in Albert Lea and Austin voted to approve the shared services agreement in late February. Now Dankert will return to a full-time position in Austin.

“Trying to do two full-time jobs with one person was much, much more difficult than we envisioned,” interim Albert Lea City Manager Pat McGarvey said.

Under the agreement, Dankert had the flexibility to work on each city’s business per his own determination and would not receive any additional salary other than a travel stipend on days he worked between the two.

“The concept of sharing municipal staff is attractive, but sharing the time of the finance director between two municipal corporations is not working out during these times of financial upheaval in municipal government,” Austin City Administrator Jim Hurm said in the press release.

The arrangement, which had been active for about a month, was also not working because the two cities have different financial systems, as well as similar financial deadlines, which would leave Dankert scrambling to complete necessary tasks.

Though the arrangement was an answer to the vacancy in Albert Lea’s finance director position, McGarvey said the city will likely go back to paying consultant firm AEM Financial Solutions in lieu of a finance director — at least until new Albert Lea City Manager Chad Adams begins in June.

The city had been paying AEM Financial Solutions to come into Albert Lea one day per week, plus give time in its home office, after former Finance Director Rhonda Moen accepted a job as finance director in Owatonna in October 2010.

The firm was paid $110 to $120 per hour and $60 per hour for travel time to and from Albert Lea.

“We appreciate this trial opportunity given by the city of Austin to share these services, and we wish to thank Mr. Dankert for his excellent work,” McGarvey said.