08 June 2006

Council Should Vote on City Manager Nominee

City Council says the mayor needs to submit multiple candidates for city manager so that they can choose who is best. Mayor Mallory says he just needs to submit one name for an up or down vote.

I haven’t read the city charter, but I’ve watched Mallory over the years, and I’ve noticed that he’s a careful study of rules, procedure and regulations. So if I had to guess who read the charter correctly, I’d guess Mallory.

But it’s another point that gets under my skin: council members aren’t complaining that there are better candidates out there. They are only complaining that they don’t get to interview more candidates. But the only reason they have given for interviewing more candidates is that they want to interview more candidates.

What this tells me is that these council members do not know what they want in a city manager, whereas Mark Mallory does. If they knew what they were looking for, they would quickly interview Milton Dohoney and ask him about the specific issues that matter to them. But they don’t know what issues matter to them, so they can only carp about not having more choices.

It’s like asking for a multiple choice test because you’re not quite ready for fill-in-the-blanks.

Valerie Lemmie lambasted council for micromanaging everything on the city manager’s desk, and it looks like the new council is doing the same thing before it even hires someone. If they can’t say exactly what they are looking for and why Milton Dohoney does or does not meet their expectations, then they shouldn’t make excuses and blame the mayor for it. They should either abstain or vote based on his background and qualifications.

1 comment:

Someone said...

If you want to read some relevent portions of the charter, or find the online searchable version, read this.

It should clarify the issue in a way the Enquirer has not.