I received the following email from a member of the Common Council. I have altered the letter to preserve the anonymity of the author. The email is in black, my reply appears in blue.
Mr. Adams,
I understand that you, like a fair number of others, do not like some of the provisions in the 2008 budget. However, I do not think that it is fair for you to completely blame Kevin [Brunner] for the Common Council’s actions. We voted 4-3 to hire an additional police officer, which obviously means a majority of the council. You cannot expect Kevin to question his boss’ decisions publicly in his weekly report, whether he agrees with us or not (which you should probably look into before claiming that he was in support of our action). It is true that he did not mention the contingency fund contribution loss, but he also did not mention several funding sources of the many of our projects, items, and services. If you want someone to blame for the the budget, blame me. I was one of the seven voting members and Kevin was not. I stand by my vote 100%, but I think that you should give criticism where it’s due, even if it means more heat on me…I can handle it.
Again, thank you for sharing your opinions with our community; it really does help me do a better job.
Adams:
Thanks very much for your email, and thanks for reading. You are correct that I do not favor some of the last-minute changes to the budget, and I think that the overall direction is misguided: more spending, a larger levy in absolute and relative terms. It’s a recipe for a less competitive city. I also believe the addition of another officer will achieve little except the perception of achieving something. As I wrote, I expected the vote to be 5-2 in favor of an additional sworn officer, elimination of other proposed positions, and spending of tens of thousands from the contingency fund.
My analysis about the odd process was, however, independent of the items in the amendment. In that regard, as an organizational matter, the process (in the weeks leading up to the vote) suggests something lacking. That’s the cardinal point of my criticism of City Manager Brunner in the post to which you refer.
The city manager oversaw the presentation to Council of the entire proposed budget. This process lasted for weeks, over several Council sessions. It is a process that in form and substance is a key part of a city manager’s job. Preparation and shepherding the budget proposal before Council is a core function of the city manager. This is true both in understanding and practice. The entire set of 2008 presentations of the budget shows how this is, in fact, the intended process – that the city manager (and through him his department heads) present the budget to Council.
If there were a great – long-standing — need for an additional sworn officer, then there is no real excuse for not having identified it sooner, prioritized it, and included it initially in the 2008 proposal. Here’s what this suggests to me:
(1) The need for another officer was not prioritized properly. That could be because Coan did not express the need clearly at the preparation stage, or Brunner did not accurately perceive the need as communicated.
(2) If the need arose after the initial preparation, then either Coan did not communicate it to Brunner, Coan communicated it to Brunner and Brunner rejected it, or Coan communicated it, and Brunner left Coan to go searching for votes on his, Coan’s, own.
(3) If Coan ignored Brunner, or went around him after objection, then it shows the challenge Brunner has managing the budget process when the police want something. I cannot imagine any other department head trying something similar.
In any event, the orderly process was upended in two weeks’ time, and that reveals a lack of managerial influence. You’re right that Brunner did not, and could not, vote for the amendment authorizing another officer. His challenge is different – how did Coan come to dominate this last-minute matter, and how is it that the city manager stood by, so to speak? Calculated only as a matter of strength, it would have been better for Brunner to take a stand – clearly – one way or the other than to give an equivocal answer (‘you don’t have to do this now.’) I was surprised that there was not, from our city manager, a firm recommendation one way or the other.
In any organization, one of the most telling developments is when someone’s management of one of his core tasks is circumvented, or ignored. Worse, by far, is when the manager allows that to happen with excessive deference.
I am, indisputably, a critic of Coan’s leadership. Nonetheless, I expected his favored amendment to pass. I did not expect – at all – that the city manager wouldn’t take a clear stand one way or the other. (Your implication that the city manager was opposed, I think, strengthens my argument. My point was not that he agreed inwardly; it was that he was too deferential outwardly.) Even if deference were his default position, so to speak, I would have expected that the need for clarity (win or lose) would have guided his actions. It didn’t, and that’s an odd turn. It would have been more advantageous to lose after a clear statement of principle. In his weekly report, I think it was foolish for the city manager to sugarcoat the result. It might have been better to say nothing than to describe it as was described in the weekly report.
There are worse things than taking a position on principle and losing; I was on the losing side of this issue, after all. I don’t feel bad about not being on the majority side. I feel that I make my views clear, even if I may not prevail on an issue.
Best regards,
Adams