Our View - Thursday

The right stuff

Here’s what we’d like to see in a city manager

It’s probably just an oversight, but we weren’t invited to question the three finalists for the city manager’s job, as part of the public panels to be held Friday. But these are some of the areas we would focus on if we were involved in the process.

We first would query the candidates about whether they plan to run city government with as much transparency as possible. Will the press and the public have to wheedle public information out of the city — as it did with the city bus audit — or will the city be more proactive about making all public documents available, understanding that, with few exceptions, government must be open to the people?

Too often, city gatekeepers seem to take delight in making outsiders jump through unnecessary hoops to access public information. We would like to see a city government that, instead of presuming everything is privileged until it is shown otherwise, insists everything be public unless compelled by law to keep it secret.

This city seems to be a hotbed of closed-door intrigues. Readers might recall how one company’s bid to break the city’s cable monopoly was turned down cold by city staff, all behind closed doors, without a single public meeting on the subject — at least until The Gazette broke the story. The people of Colorado Springs wanted more cable competition. They voted to end the monopoly when they had the chance. But they might not have had that chance, at least not as soon as they did, had these backroom dealings not become known.

More recently, we learned of secret negotiations going on over how to satisfy the U.S. Olympic Committee’s requirements for new office space not because the city was up front about what was going on, but because of media vigilance.

And even most of the city manager search has been done behind closed doors. Councilman Jerry Heimlicher argued in a recent letter that the city attorney says it is legal and that’s good enough for him (which proves nothing, except that the predilection for secrecy is shared by some elected and unelected officials). But there’s a difference between doing what’s legally permissible and doing what’s right in a free and open society. An open government doesn’t hide behind such legalisms or chastise the media for asking for more openness. A secretive government gives the impression, justified or not, that something’s not on the up and up.

Second in importance to transparency is accountability. We’ve pointed out before that the city has a dysfunctional governing model, in which authority and responsibility are scattered (in sometimes blurry ways) among City Council, a city manager and the heads of various enterprises. In such a situation, it’s often hard for the public to know where the buck stops. Until we adopt a more functional model, Colorado Springs needs a city manager that will hold himself or herself and others accountable.

Should the city manager have shared blame for the police evidence fiasco, for instance, or does the buck stop with the police chief? When the head of the city auditorium engages in managerial malpractice or the city’s primary transit contract is mishandled, who in city government should the people hold accountable?

Finally, we believe the city manager should take a vow of strict neutrality on policy questions which rightfully rest with City Council and the voters. Under former City Manager Lorne Kramer, especially late in his tenure, we saw a troubling tendency to drag supposedly apolitical city employees into policy disputes. The city’s cable access channel was used to disseminate ballot issue-related propaganda during a grudge match with Douglas Bruce.

Among the accolades poured on Kramer during his farewell festivities was that he helped get a number of tax increases approved. That’s inappropriate activity for a city manager, as an interested party and supposedly apolitical administrator, to engage in. The city manager isn’t a policymaker or a publicopinion shaper; he or she administers the city government according to policies made by City Council or the voters. That the passage of two tax increases and a stormwater “fee” were held up as Kramer’s greatest accomplishments is disturbing, since the law bars public officials from such activities.

Aside from a track record of competence in running a large city, the three most important qualifications we’re seeking in these candidates is an unwavering commitment to transparency, accountability and neutrality on policy disputes. And if the new manager can deal constructively with the criticism that comes his or her way, that would be nice, too.

Students want to protect themselves

Students at more than 110 colleges and universities are strapping on empty holsters to protest campus bans on concealed weapons. Many gun-rights activists believe the Virginia Tech shooter might have been stopped sooner by a student or teacher with a concealed carry permit and firearm on campus.

The reaction from officialdom was disappointing but not unexpected. Rick Amweg, assistant police chief at Ohio State University, told The Columbus Dispatch he understands the protest. “But I think it’s best that we have trained law-enforcement officers as the only ones armed on campus.”

Amweg must have missed the statistics that show armed citizens are great deterrents to criminal activity, most times without firing a shot.

If campus police were the only people possibly carrying weapons, Amweg’s statement might make sense. Banning concealed weapons on campus leaves people who follow the law no way to protect themselves from those who would ignore a gun ban. People want to be able to protect themselves.