“Ooops, my bad.”
While not a direct quote of Mayor Tom Sidney’s, it still sort of captures his communication with Council about his lack of communication with Council.
As in he dropped the ball, and apologizes for the oversight, both statements that can, in fact be attributed to the mayor.
This is all about the performance review of the Chief Administrative Officer Gloria Raybone, the CAO hired by Council as a whole some months ago to bring in some direction to an otherwise seemingly moribund ship. Evidently there’s this minor annoyance of needing to have her position confirmed, as if these past several months were some sort of probationary period. It’s a pro-forma thing, just part of a regular protocol, a regular part of the hiring process.
And yet, wow, here we are with the CAO already confirmed in her position, yet without any input sought from any of the six members of Council who are not mayors. Because it appears CAO Raybone has been confirmed under the auspices of the town’s mayor himself, not because it’s allowed to be this way, but only because this is the way he prefers. Or, he just plain forgot.
It’s funny how a guy who’s been around Town Council for many years can overlook such an important piece off business, especially since he’s seen a lot of people come and go to and from the senior ranks of town administration.
And he did mention some life circumstances, some personal circumstances that may have impeded his duty to consult. Life being life, and with the possibility of misfortunes and cruelties abounding, we’re always going to be called upon to exercise some generosity of understanding when it comes to stuff like that, especially if it involves family.
That being said, it beggars belief to think that a mayor of some years experience, a former committee chair and Councillor himself, would fail to take the necessary and obvious steps needed to confirm the hire of someone or something as important as the CAO position.
Council wasn’t in much of a forgiving mood, though, almost as if this is something they’ve experienced before, and experienced often. What to them looks like a purposeful and intentional withholding of information caught their attention, and they were adamant that they take on their rightful role as part of the confirmation process.
As Councillor McWhirter said, “We hired her. We should be part of the process of confirming her.”
Nowhere did anyone say or indicate or suggest that CAO Raybone is doing a bad job and ought not to be confirmed. This is a simply a process thing, a basic requirement. But if the mayor “missed” his responsibilities to inform Council, it’s not exactly as if his shiny new CAO gave him any advice on the need for consultation either. So I guess it kind of got past the CAO as well, which is too bad because she’s supposed to be an expert on the rule book, right along with the Clerk, who was also evidently asleep at the switch, or had momentarily misplaced the hymn book she regularly sings from.
Because the only other possible alternative is that the two of them, maybe even the three of them, did this on purpose.
The mayor fell all over himself with apologies, and committed himself to sending out an email to all Council the very next morning (Wednesday), a generous move given Council has been after him since June to provide feedback. Today is another Tuesday, fully a week after the last Council meeting, and six days after that Wednesday morning commitment on the part of the mayor. I honestly have to wonder if that email actually landed in Council mailboxes on that morning, or on any other morning for that matter.
So it appears the confirmation and review process involving the hiring of the CAO is back on again, with November being mentioned as a target date for all of this to be done, only this time with Council approval.
It’s important to note that this end-run of Council by the mayor and any possible cronies was not the application off the so-called Strong Mayor Powers the mayor has at his disposal. The mayor is publicly against Strong Mayor Powers, or at least he is after he uses them to give the Clerk a big promotion unilaterally. It appears the mayor has a view that he, and only he, ought to have any meaningful input into the composition and titles of senior administration.
Perhaps, with the Little Red Book top of mind, it could be argued that the mayor could do this on his own.
I guess the anger and disappointment comes from another group of people, elected Councillors, who take the view that it could be argued that he can’t.
That’s the thing about little red books and the people who rely upon them for guidance. You can take the words in there and make them say whatever you want.
I imagine this will be followed-up upon at the next meeting of Council. And if that promised email did’t get sent, I’ll bet there will be some folks with something to say about that.
It might trigger another one of those “too many questions” crises.
NEWSMAGRENFREW 