AUBURN – A contender for the city manager’s job withdrew from competition after his name was leaked and printed in his hometown newspaper Tuesday.

Lincoln Town Manager Glenn Aho was one of several candidates named in a weekly newspaper last Thursday as a possible successor to former Auburn City Manager Pat Finnigan, who left in June.

Mayor John Jenkins said information about Aho and several other applicants was leaked to the Twin City Times by a city councilor last week. On Tuesday, the Bangor Daily News reported that Aho was one of three top contenders for the Auburn job.

Aho declined to comment on whether his decision to withdraw from the interview process had anything to do with the leak, but he said a letter of apology from Mayor Jenkins made him feel better.

“It’s a very decent response to this,” Aho said Wednesday.

Jenkins said he was unhappy about the leak and felt he had to apologize to the candidates.

“We have all signed confidentiality agreements on this matter, and someone broke that,” Jenkins said. “Since none of them were willing to own up to this, I felt inclined to apologize. A harm has been done to our city and our reputation, and I hope that this matter has not caused a hardship for any of our candidates.”

Jenkins said the council identified a group of about 15 citizens to help with the interviews, and each signed an agreement not to disclose the names of the applicants. But only city councilors had copies of the candidates’ resumes, Jenkins said.

“Based on the level of detail that was leaked, it had to be a city councilor,” he said.

Maine law, under Title 30-A, section 2702, which applies only to municipalities, specifically defines applications, resumes and letters of recommendation for job candidates, among other things, to be confidential “and not open to public inspection,” making it illegal to release these records during the application process. Some application records may become public only after the candidate is hired.

Councilors who could be contacted on Wednesday said they were not responsible for the leak.

Ward 4 Councilor Bruce Bickford agreed that a councilor was likely responsible.

“Somebody had to have that book of resumes,” Bickford said. “I think that’s the only way they could have had those details.”

All said they were angry.

“I’d like to find out who the person is,” said Ward 1 Councilor Mike Farrell. “It just shows that someone in that room with us was not very trustworthy.”

Ward 5 Councilor Ray Berube said a councilor might have showed copies of the resumes to one of the other 15 citizens participating in the interviews.

“So it’s possible that this was not caused by a councilor,” Berube said. “Even so, I can’t imagine anyone would do this. Common sense just tells you that giving this information out is just going to hurt someone’s reputation. Politics is politics, but this just goes too far.”

Ward 3 Councilor Dan Herrick doubted a councilor was responsible.

“As far as I’m concerned, I can trust every councilor that sits there,” he said.

City Councilors Bob Menneally and Robert Hayes did not return calls. Councilor Ron Potvin could not be reached Wednesday.

Jenkins said some of the information in the Twin City Times story was incorrect as well as confidential, but he declined to say which part of the article he considered incorrect.

“If I provide that information to you, then I am guilty of the very thing that I’m asking the councilors not to do,” the mayor said.

The names of city manager candidates, in addition to Aho and acting City Manager Laurie Smith, that have previously been made public by way of the Twin City Times article are: Roland Miller, Auburn’s economic development director; Daniel F. Fitzpatrick, city manager of Peekskill, N.Y.; Barry M. Brenner, town administrator of Northborough, Mass.; Jeffrey K. Bridges of Andover, Kan.; Edward R. Clifford, former Biddeford city manager; Michael A. Lomardo, former Allegan County, Mich., administrator; Ron Singel, city manager of La Grande, Ore.; and Timothy C. Smith, town administrator of Wellfleet, Mass.