There’s an episode of Seinfeld where George asks his neighbor Newman, a mailman, why he’s not at work.
“I called in sick,” Newman says. “I don’t work in the rain.”
“You don’t work in the rain?” George replies, incredulous. “You’re a mailman. ‘Neither rain nor sleet nor snow…’ It’s the first one!”
The latest mayor-council flap reminded me of this scene. Last Tuesday, Mayor Hayward sent a memo to council members directing them not to communicate directly with city employees:
To improve the efficiency of City operations, and to ensure complete communications and follow up among City Council members, departments, and the Mayor’s Office, I request that all future communications and dealings between the individual City Council members and City employees be done through the Mayor.
There’s a story about the memo in today’s PNJ, “Councilwoman threatens Hayward with lawsuit over communication policy.” As the article describes it, the mayor’s memo was just a reminder of what the charter says: “Neither the City Council nor council members shall give orders to any such officer or employee, either publicly or privately.” Councilwoman Sherri Myers is mad about this, and she’s retained an attorney to represent her in the matter. Yada yada yada.
Except, to my knowledge, no council member was trying to “give orders” to city staff. If they were, then the mayor is quite right to put a stop to it, and there’s a good conversation to be had about the importance of insulating employees from political pressures. But if we’re looking to the charter for guidance, there’s another important passage that delineates the council’s right to request information from staff. Here’s the full section 4.04(b), “Interference with Administration”:
Except for the purpose of inquiries and investigations made in good faith, the City Council or Council Members shall deal with the City officers and employees, who are subject to the direction and supervision of the Mayor, solely through the Mayor. Neither the City Council nor Council Members shall give orders to any such officer or employee, either publicly or privately. It is the express intent of this Charter that recommendations for improvement of municipal governmental operations by individual Council Members be made solely to and through the Mayor.
“Except for the purpose of inquiries…” To paraphrase George Costanza: it’s the first part! That’s the part that council members say conflicts with the mayor’s memo. That’s the phrase at the crux of Councilwoman Myers’ complaint. Yet when the PNJ story quotes the charter’s “parameters for council members’ dealings with employees,” that passage is curiously omitted. There’s a reference to it deep in the story, but instead of quoting the charter directly, it’s mentioned as the opinion of Alistair McKenzie, Myers’ attorney: “McKenzie said he agrees that the charter does not allow council members to give orders to city employees. But he said council members still have the right under the charter to make ‘good faith’ inquiries to city employees — something he said Hayward’s policy prevents.”
Oddly, when the PNJ story was first published yesterday (“Councilwoman threatens legal action against mayor“), it contained a direct quote of the relevant passage. By the time it was printed in the physical paper (and republished online this morning), that passage was gone.
Sometimes stories need to be trimmed for print, but that doesn’t seem to be the case here. Yesterday’s story was only 377 words, while today’s version is 834 words. Yet the six words that are arguably the most relevant to the issue — “Except for the purpose of inquiries” — were completely buried.
In other words, they yada yada’d over the best part!
6 comments
phedup says:
May 24, 2012
I understand that there is a movement afoot to alter the Charter again. Maybe this time everyone will take a deep breath, take a pause, and read the document before they fall all over one another to see who can be the most progressive.
What a Joke says:
May 24, 2012
Thanks so much for posting this clarification. Rick Outzen is portraying this memo as the Mayor trying to protect city employees from the political interference of City council members. City employees aren’t afraid of the City council. They’re afraid of the Mayor firing employees without cause. They wish that council members could protect them. The charter is clear — council members are allowed to make inquiries but they aren’t allowed to issue orders. The Mayor clearly wants to prohibit all interaction between Council members & employees & that’s not what the Charter calls for.
Xochitl says:
May 24, 2012
‘
No, the Mayor and his people want to make sure that any citizen that wants something out of the city must first ask for a favor from the Mayor. This puts the Mayor in position to get a favor in return. It also cuts the City Council members out of any interaction with people from their district. Why would you ever talk to your City Councilman, since they really can’t do anything. You would go straight to the person who can help you.
Absolute power……….corrupts absolutely!
The sole reason for having a City Manager form of government is that it prohibits this sort of centalized dictatorship, which in turn prohibits corruption. The City Manager form of government was much more “progressive” when the city adopted it decades ago. Pensacola took ten steps backwards when it approved a government led by a dictatorship.
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Dale Parker says:
May 24, 2012
Here is what is obvious, before the Charter vote everyone one of these idiotic council members were touting how awesome this charter was, it was going to make Pensacola Great, blah blah blah.
Well not one if these idiots ever read it. In fact, there NEVER read ANYTHING. It has always amazed me that they supported, actually that our citizens supported a charter that basically relegated the Council to nothing. THEY ACTUALLY VOTED THEMSELVES IRRELEVANT! WE as citizens actually reduced out influence by weakening the council.
SO, EVERYONE got what they deserved! I for one saw this coming.
Citizen Kane says:
May 25, 2012
The Mayor’s memo is even worse when you consider the email sent by his spokesman Travis Peterson during the budget process last year, obtained by Maren Deweese’s public records request, where Peterson talks about “pressuring council to pass it” (the budget) by only releasing the info they want to the media, AND to the council:
“? What exactly do we send to Council for budget briefings?
I like John’s idea of discussing their district projects but they will probably expect more. Also attached is Yvette’s draft budget brief…very numbers-oriented. I believe this is something we can tailor for our budget meetings w/ council to release only what we want. That way if it leaks that revenues are down, or that we have a hole to plug, it’s no big deal – that’s not news. HOW we plug those holes or reorg is the story.”
http://ricksblog.biz/councilwoman-deweese-budget-email-and-the-other-half-the-message/
When the Mayor and his staff shamelessly scheme to hide potentially damaging information from Council to make sure they pass the Mayor’s budget, and then they tell Council that all their information MUST come straight from the Mayor (more restricted than ANY other citizen who requests information), it’s obvious Council would not get the accurate, unbiased info they need to consider a budget.
Enough is enough!!
What a way to run a city says:
May 25, 2012
Citizen is right. Take a look at DeWeese’s website. It appears that the PNJ is just writing stories based on what spokesman Travis tells them to write. Maybe that is why most people don’t bother to read the so called new stories.
And the other burning issue of concern to our council during our plight to attract residents and improve property values is whether to change the city code to allow chickens to be raised in the city limits!
There are obvious reasons that chickens raising was banned in the city limits decades ago!