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FAIRFIELD, IOWA -- The city of Fairfield has announced its choice for a new city administrator, and he's experienced in Iowa city government.

Kevin Flanagan is currently the city manager for Denison, Iowa, a city with a population of around 7,200. Fairfield's previous administrator, Jeff Clawson, retired last week in order to move back to Illinois.

Fairfield mayor Ed Malloy said he was impressed with the number and quality of applicants.

"We were looking for somebody with experience managing a city somewhat close to our size, we realized that a lot of applicants are going to come from smaller cities and are looking for a move up and that's understandable," Malloy said. "We had 48 applicants, we were very pleased with that and we had a lot of choices."

Ultimately, Flanagan was chosen because of strong interviews and his experience in business and construction and he was unanimously chosen by the Fairfield City Council and department heads. He is scheduled to begin in Fairfield in June.

"We're going to give him the time to wind down what he's doing for the city of Denison and when we get here, we'll probably go into some prioritization and maybe some strategic planning," Malloy said.

As city administrator, Flanagan will be responsible for all city operations, managing department heads and will be on call at all times to answer questions to the public.