The one thing that bothers me the most in the campaign being waged by Accountability Comes to Town (ACT) to have an elected mayor is that they will not get what they think they will get if this proposal is approved by the voters.
The elected mayor will not be a member of the council and will not have a vote. Therefore the mayor will not have the ability to run the city any way he or she wants to. The mayor must run the city in accordance with the city charter, city ordinances and any other laws. Only the council can change city ordinances, not the mayor. This is no different than with a city manager, so what is ACT gaining with an elected mayor?
One letter writer to this paper said: “A strong and active mayor, on the other hand, would have the power to re-organize staffing needs.” A city manager can re-organize staffing needs just the same as a mayor. Neither of them can do anything outside of what the council has authorized in the budget. So an elected mayor will not get them anything they don’t already have in this regard.
Various letters to the editor have mentioned projects the council approved in the past that they believe were a waste of money. The implication is that an elected mayor could have made a difference and stopped those projects. The mayor will have no vote. He or she will have a veto, but it only takes five votes to override this veto. This does not give the mayor much power, so what does ACT think they are getting with an elected mayor?
Therefore, why make this change, especially when our city is a large complex city and being the CEO requires someone with training and experience. A city manager has to pass much scrutiny by professional recruiters to show that they are qualified. A mayor running for election only has to be a registered voter of the city and a resident of the city for at least one year next preceding election (RCW 35A.12.030).
Everyone needs to think about why we need this change when so little will be gained, but we could be stuck with an untrained, unqualified person trying to run our city. The mayor’s job is as a manager. What managerial experience does Jim Ferrell have? Vote no.
Don Dennis, Federal Way
