By Curmudgeon
This morning's Standard-Examiner has up an interesting story speculating on whether there will be a change in Council leadership when the new Ogden City Council meets in January.
• Power shift possible / Does change loom for council leadership in wake of elections?Here is the lede:
OGDEN -- Two veteran city councilmen may be ready for a change in leadership when the council reorganizes in January. Councilman Brandon Stephenson, who wasn't up for re-election Tuesday, didn't mention Chairwoman Amy Wicks by name but said the council needs more balanced leadership that doesn't constantly attack the administration.There follows a lot of yammering from Mr. Stephenson about the Council leadership needing to communicate better with the mayor -- though nothing about the Mayor needing to communicate better with the Council. [By the way, asking Godfrey sycophant Stephenson for his opinion about the job Council Chair Amy Wicks has done, as Chair, is not unlike asking Glen Beck hows she thinks President Obama is doing as President.]
In his comments to the SE, Mr. Stephenson was merely reading the script Hizonnah prepared for him. Doubt that? Here's what Mayor Godfrey told the SE about a possible change in Council leadership:
Godfrey declined to say who he would like to see as council chairman, but added the individual should be willing to communicate with the administration."Open, free flowing regular dialogue would be ideal," he said.Notice that Hizzonah's view is that all change must come from the Council side. Nothing by way of a shift toward honesty and openness from him is even hinted at.
The story includes comments from Councilman Stephens, who is seeking the job as Council Chair himself, and other Council members who dutifully intone the usual bromides in favor of effective communication and the like.
What those commenting do not discuss in the story -- and in Mr. Stephenson's case, it's plain why -- is why communications between the Mayor and the Council are so poor. Mr. Stephenson never so much as mentions the repeated dishonesty when dealing with the Council [remember the agreement he made with the Council regarding what the city's lobbyist would work on, which agreement he promptly broke to instruct the lobbyist secretly remove the Council's ability to replace him as head of the RDA? Just one example.], or withheld information from the Council he ought to have divulged [remember the administration's email cautioning against letting the Council find out the Administration was trying to wash grant funds through UTA to pay for a gondola consultant? Or when the Administration told the Council it had no right to even ask who the Administration intended to sell public property to? Just two examples]. Nary a word about the Mayor's long record of failing to communicate honestly or fully with the Council from Mr. Stephenson. Or Mr. Stephens, for that matter.
It was an interesting story, and a potential change in Council leadership is news. And Mr. Schwebke sought comment from many on the Council, and from Ms. Wicks [who alleged some duplicity on the part of the SE Editorial Board, which allegations Mr. Schwebke rightly included in his piece.]
The larger question the story raises is whether the SE Editorial Board will recognize that fixing the admittedly abysmal state of Mayor-Council relations will require, for openers a substantial shift in how it communicates on the part of the Mayor and his staff, and not just on the part of the Council.
