New government will get needed work done
I’ll vote “yes” for the new charter this November, and for the council-manager form of government (now the mostused form in the U.S).
Two concerns about our current commission structure are the interference of politics in city services, and the lack of institutional memory. Only a few examples: a part-time city attorney found federal/state grant applications overlooked by previous administrations; a newly-elected finance commissioner had to hire the previous deputy commissioner (of a different party) as a consultant to get the database password; a mayor took office (again, from a different party) to find a year’s worth of files missing.
I once attended the city’s presentation by a Smart City Planning consultant. She began, “We were here ten years ago with the same information. Oh, well, let’s hope this time it sticks.” Where is our upgraded police station? Our much-needed third fire station? Twenty years and counting.
On the city’s website, click on “View by Separate Agenda Items” on the Sept. 5 Council Meeting Webcast; select the Public Works agenda. You’ll find a 28-minute discussion of our dog-licensing ordinance (up for review), how the numbers of licenses greatly underrepresents our dog population; then confusion and basic questions, unanswered, by council. A similarly unproductive discussion, years ago, prompted a resident to submit a comprehensive report on dog licensing to council. As we can
see by the still-significant shortfall in dog licenses, no effective changes were made. (Many items, large and small, suffer a similar fate.)
A city manager and appropriate staff will research the definition, parameters, and best practices of all items up for renewal, and submit a recommendation — then the council may adopt the improvements in an amended ordinance. Done.
The office of city manager will “triage” projects and keep track of deadlines and procedures. Substantial savings can be had with improved efficiency, longer institutional memory, and better organization. Other benefits will be ours to discover.
On www.itstimesaratoga.com, watch an interview with Matt Horn, city manager of Geneva (pop. 8,000) — and former assistant city manager in a city of 120,000 — to hear a cogent, persuasive account of the best-practice dynamics of the Council-Manager form of government.
Please support the new city charter this November. For more information, visit www.itstimesaratoga. com. Jackie Pardon Saratoga Springs
Letters should be e-mailed to letters@saratogian.com. Letters should be around 400 words in length and include the author’s name, address and phone number for verification purposes. The deadline for letters related to the Nov. 7 election, including the proposed Saratoga Springs charter change, is 5 p.m. Friday, Oct. 27. No letters will be accepted after that time. Letters will be published as they are received.