Mayor John Howe says it is simply a matter of Armento resigning her office and working with the city to find suitable terms.

"Valerie resigned, we took a look at her contract, negotiated a settlement, and I wish her well," Howe said.

For the interim period, the city announced on Oct. 6 that Senior Assistant City Attorney Joan Borger will become acting city attorney when Armento leaves.

But Armento--and the separation agreement both parties signed--suggest a different set of circumstances. According to the agreement, the settlement is to resolve a contractual dispute between Armento and the city.

The separation agreement also comes after months of closed sessions regarding

the city attorney, including two meetings the week before the agreement was signed.

Armento said the dispute arose in late July and early August, when the council expressed interest in her not continuing her employment with the city.

Howe said that was not the case, maintaining that the city attorney came to the council with the desire to resign.

According to the contract she signed on Sept. 30, 1997, after her first five years of employment, there are three "rollover years" in which the city or Armento can end the contract if notice is given in the first quarter of the year. If such a notice were given, her position would terminate at the end of that calendar year.

Because the problems arose in the middle of this year, the earliest the council could seek to end her contract would have been the first three months of 2005, with her work then ending Dec. 31, 2005.

According to the agreement signed by both parties, Armento is staying on the city's payroll until Sept. 30, 2005, and will collect her full pay and benefits until then.

At the close of the workday on Oct. 15, Armento will be considered "on leave with pay" for the rest of her time with the city. According to the agreement, Armento agreed to submit a letter of resignation on that date as well.

While the city cannot release exact salary figures, her contract calls for her to receive 90 percent of what the city manager makes, which is close to $200,000 a year, not including her benefits, which some estimate could bring the total figure close to $250,000.

Armento said the problems between her and the council boiled down to a poor working relationship.

"This council did not make much of an attempt to establish a working relationship," Armento said. "There tends to be more interaction, and more communication" in other city attorney­council relationships.

Armento started working in Sunnyvale at the beginning of 1991 and said that this council definitely seemed less intent on establishing a good relationship with her than past councils.

In regard to the question of there being a poor working relationship, Howe said that there was no animosity between himself and the city attorney, nor had he seen any from the other council members.

After her work with the city ends, Armento said she's going to take the rest of the year on sabbatical and then begin entertaining other municipal law offers. She said she's going to miss working with a number of people in the city, especially the other three attorneys she worked with.

She said that in her absence--because each attorney carries a full workload--the office will be stretched thin, and some items may take longer to address, if they can be addressed at all.