Fred Meurer joined the City of Monterey in 1986, initially as the Special Projects Manager in the City Manager’s Office, and then as the City’s Public Works Director for the next five years. In July of 1991, the City Council appointed Meurer to the position of City Manager. Since his appointment, Meurer has been actively involved in reuniting City Hall
with its business and residential neighborhoods, and the business neighborhoods with the residential neighborhoods. He has overseen
the development of the City's neighborhood improvement, neighborhood policing, waterfront acquisition, main street, tourism development, and historic preservation programs. He has been effective in developing "preventive" programs in policing, fire protection, recreation and public works.

Meurer is also actively involved in developing cooperative relationships between the City and the Department of Defense (DoD) activities in Monterey in an effort to further increase DoD mission effectiveness while reducing their operating costs. His goal is to provide the same high quality municipal services to DoD activities and personnel as the City provides its civilian neighborhoods, while saving the City money by spreading its overhead over a larger base. Similar cooperative service agreements have been negotiated with other cities in the region.

Meurer graduated from the Military Academy at West Point in 1966. He received graduate degrees from Stanford University in water resources planning and civil engineering in 1971. He served overseas assignments in Germany, Viet Nam and Korea. His final active duty tour was as director of public works and housing at Fort Ord. He retired as a Colonel from the Army in 1986.