The NJ reported on this proposal by Councilman Bud Freel to reduce the size of City Council from 13 members to 9 on Monday. This evening, there will be a City Council meeting where there will be a debate and vote on a Resolution (pdf) from Charles Potter that opposes any reduction. His resolution has 7 co-sponsors, meaning that any plan to reduce the size of the City Council is probably dead. That doesn’t mean that there won’t be fireworks tonite.
The savings from eliminating 4 Council people is about $140,000. Not a great deal of money, but every bit counts when the City budget proposal is a sea of cutbacks (not enough) and tax hikes. And if you are paying attention, the budget situation isn’t likely to be much better for a few years. A City that is cutting back on some services can certainly take a look at its legislative body to rethink its own operation to see where they might contribute to the financial solution. A City Council that is likely to vote for tax increases can’t afford to be known as privileging themselves over taxpayers.
There is no doubt that the City has gotten alot smaller since the last reorganization. And there is no doubt that some members of City Council are more functional than others. The resulting shakeup from consolidation and downsizing would be good for the city — certainly alot better than the fairly dysfunctional groove the Council is in now. Two of the sponsors of this resolution — Trippi Congo and Justin Wright have been trying to distinguish themselves as *change* agents, agitating for changes and accountability from the Administration (not very effectively). I don’t quite understand how
can represent yourself as a change agent for anything if you aren’t willing to re-evaluate your own organization. Wright and Congo have been showily voting “present” for some Council items — ostensibly to make the point that they want some changes and responsiveness from the Administration. Not that this impresses the Administration any, and it would surprise me if their constituents thought this was useful. But you can’t ask for more accountability and more constituent focus if you aren’t willing to get that done in your own house.
Co-sponsors — Griffiths, Brown, Potter, and Shabazz aren’t much of a surprise in rushing to shield themselves from any possible change or challenges. As a group, they haven’t been especially effective in holding the Administration accountable, and apparently they won’t be doing that for City Council, either. But certainly there will be plenty of City taxpayers who will remind these folks that they weren’t particularly interested in contributing to a solution that not only would help patch the budget hole, but might be a more efficient governing model. Heaven knows they certainly need it.
One of the other things that I would endorse for the Wilmington City Council would be cutting back their meeting schedule to once per month, maybe increasing the number of meetings in Budget season. There is unlikely much in terms of savings from that, but may impose better order on the way the Council operates. Probably not, but one can hope.