My meetings with the town manager

I hope my initial impressions of Longboat Key's new town manager are more prescient than Commissioner Brenner's previous evaluation of our town government. So far Commission Brenner's positive evaluations have been shown, by later events, to have been somewhat premature. To date Bruce St. Denis and Monica Simpson have been fired. I sincerely hope that our finance and utilities directors fare better. For the two former town employees Commissioner Brenner's positive evaluations have been oscvlvm mortis (the kiss of death).

I have had two lengthy meetings with Dave Bullock. I am impressed.

My first meeting with Mr. Bullock occurred soon after he took over as the town manager. The meeting was both friendly and professional. I was immediately struck with his obvious smarts and professional experience. If anything, I came away from my first meeting with the town manager feeling that I had gained a better understanding of the technical aspects of town management as a result of our talk. The two of us discussed current issues confronting Longboat Key, along with the political, legal and financial hurtles associated with getting things done in municipal government. It was apparent to me that Dave Bullock is an expert on the philosophy of government and its intricacies.

Mr. Bullock expressed his belief that he intended to approach every challenge from an informed perspective. However, he also stated that be believed that there was a counter-balancing need to act in a timely manner, as opposed to endlessly discussing an issue. He and I may disagree about the point in the process where action is appropriate and discussion ends. As town manager that is his prerogative, since his success will be measured by his effectiveness.

I believe that Longboat Key, and most especially the commission, will welcome a consummate professional guiding the town towards our future. When I was a commissioner I complained about the then town manager giving the commission inadequate information and his agenda of choices, thus preventing the commission from making well-informed decisions. I hope those days are behind us and we will witness a government process without agendas and inadequate information.

My second meeting with Mr. Bullock took place last week and was more focused. I specifically wanted to address town communications policy and beach management. To my surprise Mr. Bullock was not only up to speed in many aspects of these two areas, he was ahead of the curve in analysing various cost/benefits scenarios for any discussions about community wifi. What a pleasant surprise!

The two of us discussed alternative beach management technologies. I found the discussion to be open with the added input from a seasoned municipal government manager who understands the challenges of the state permitting process and state agency agendas. We talked about who should pay for what. I like debating with someone who enters the discussion as a professional, interested in positive outcomes and not afraid to look down the road with a realistic yet positive attitude.

In short I could find nothing about Mr. Bullock that was disconcerting. I see an intelligent hard working quick learner with little or no political agenda. What a refreshing change. I hope the commissioners will avail themselves of his professionalism and open their eyes to what he presents to them for their consideration.

And you thought I didn't know how to tell a happy story.

Dancing in the Dark

I have looked at Longboat Key's town manager form of government and the strong mayor form of government that exists on Anna Maria Island. Certainly neither form of government is perfect and each has its challenges. However, I do see some important differences and perhaps some advantages to the strong mayor form of government.

One of the three planks in my campaign for commissioner centered on the inability of our commissioners to always make truly informed decisions. When it comes to the large and complex, and often the most expensive issues, the commission too often operates as a rubber stamp for the programs and policies of the town manager. I am not slighting our town manager as I have always found him to be a consummate professional with considerable political aplomb. I see the problem as a flaw in an unpaid commission where no one runs for office, and the inability of the commission to learn about and grasp the subtleties often inherent in large programs such as beach management or reclaimed waster. In the case of reclaimed water, the taxpayers spent over $3 million for little more than two bottles of water. The reclaimed water project was complex and relied on the advice of a single contractor with much to be gained from the project. Perhaps if the town had sought the advice of other experts in the field, the taxpayers would not have wasted $3+ million.

The Longboat Key beach management issue once again demonstrates that the commissioners are called upon to make decisions about technical matters they clearly did not understand. The town manager brought in two "experts" to educate the commission about alternative technologies for maintaining beaches. At the end of the day the commissioners were forced to accept the town manager's position, that there are no alternatives to sand dredging, since the commissioners had nowhere near enough knowledge about the subject to form their own informed opinions. I feel this occurs too often. Yet what can be done about the situation when we are lucky not to have to appoint commissioners when a commission seat goes unwanted.

In the process of convincing the commission that there are no possible alternatives to dredging, the town managed managed to sidestep the question of why he wants to advance the scheduled beach project. Again I do not believe all the commissioners were even aware that advancing the beach project may be more costly in the long-run than remaining on schedule. It appears the town manager was able to substitute alternatives as the criteria for advancing the beach project, instead of discussing financial costs, needs or long-range fiscal planning.

The Anna Maria Island communities have strong mayor governments with no town manager. In those communities each member of the commission is personally responsible for some aspect of the town's operations, whether it be finance or water/sewer or beach maintenance or some other department. The Anna Maria form of government requires commissioners to have personal knowledge and experience as a required part of their job description. On Longboat the commissioners do not have to do or know anything. Yet we ask them to make decisions that often have large consequences and high price-tags.

Last week the commissioners decided to advance the next $54 million beach dredging one year. I do not believe that all the commissioners were cognizant of the financial ramifications of their decisions, yet they were asked to decide anyway. I also saw the commissioners agree that there are no alternatives to dredging after listening to the town manager's experts. Yet I felt that few of the commissioners had any real background or knowledge about alternative beach maintenance technologies, even the ones that have existed on Longboat for over a decade, as was pointed out by former mayor Brown in his column this week.

I believe there might have been a different discussion on Anna Maria where at least one of the commissioners would have been intimately involved with beach maintenance as a part of his day-to-day duties in a strong mayor form of government.

I am not the only columnist to have written about the apparent weaknesses in our town manager form of government, in these times of fiscal stress and evermore technically complex problems to be solved.

Since there is little chance that we will transform our government, I am proposing, once again, that the commission retain its own consultants and expert advisers, as needed, as a counterpoint to the town manager's agenda and "Golden Rolodex" of consultants.

We cannot afford to make mistakes.