By Jim Sack

The new council asserted their power early in last night’s meeting with a quick three to six denial of a contract between the administration and a project management company. City Utilities had proposed a two-year contract and a representative gave a long-winded explanation of the project, of the need for a consultant, of the qualifications of that consultant who had worked or the city at one time, and as to why a two-year contract was preferable to a shorter iteration. Both Dr. John Crawford and Tom Didier took mild umbrage at the proposal citing their participation on the Professional Services Committee which is soon to issue new guidelines on how consultants should be hired by the city and by city utilities. The two men led the party-line vote to send the bill back for a rewrite. Simply, they proposed the bill be written for a one year period. Mr. Crawford and Didier, with the support of all the Republicans on council, believed a two-year contract might somehow fail compliance with the new, yet-to-be-minted, guidelines.

There was no rancor in the discussion, as would certainly have been the case last year; the matter was politely discussed, moved, seconded, debated and tossed to the wolves.

On the meeting went, mostly through a slew of service contracts and purchase contracts for chemicals and materials. We learned that 2010 was a very bad year for water breaks and that Water Maintenance is still repairing old problems. We learned we are getting our moneys-worth out of certain fire hydrants purchased by the city before the Great War and still in use. We learned that the center of town will be ripped up in the years to come as the sewer separator project lays parallel lines on the near west side. Brick streets, however, will be rebuilt as original. We also learned that Russ Jehl had asked for a copy of the city budget but had not yet received said copy, so he abstained on a number of votes for lack of information upon which to base a decision. We further learned that the city purchasing department managed a number of reverse auctions in the previous years that saved taxpayers considerably in matters of buying the chemicals that “flavor” our water. And, finally, we learned from Tom Didier that the taste of the water here is fall better than that in Indianapolis where he recently visited. Good to know.

Of course, there was a bit of a fight last night: Mitch Harper defended his bill, shall we call it the Redman Rule, that will allow citizen to speak more frequently to council. Policy now is that citizens are allowed mic time at the end of the regular session only every two weeks, or in legal public hearings. The setting for public speaking time is a bit intimidating. One stands behind a lectern under a spot light some thirty feet from council who are arrayed in their togas on the raised dais. They sit in in a stony-faced semi-circle peering down over their glasses at the petitioning peasant. There is no response from on high. To the side, a police officer stands ready to haul the miscreant away should his petitions irk the mighty. It is not a welcoming place. James Redman, on the other hand, managed to speak to council from a less formal and distant place, the witness chair immediately at the end of the committee table. His comments about the paucity of trails and bike paths on the southeast side was a conversation, a front-porch chat with glasses of sweetened tea and a few laughs. Mr. Redman conducted a dialogue, or a multi-logue, as it may be. That is what Mr. Harper envisions.

So, the councilman from the Fourth proposed that citizens’ brains be picked in that more informal manner and more frequently. His proposed law was criticized as unnecessary by Dr. Crawford and council President Smith. Harper was mildly indignant and he was supported by Messrs. Shoaff, Paddock, Didier and Jehl in passing the bill, 5-4. Shoaff later recounted that during the Calhoun Street debate of four years ago he had three citizens prepared to speak on that issue and they were told to go away by the committee chair. So, the Harper Free-Speech Act of 2012 passed out of committee and will win passage in the regular session as one or two more council members will switch over in support.

Ironically, during the many, many public hearings and at that regular open-mic moment there are very, very few citizens who avail themselves of the chance to speak or vent or illuminate. Perhaps Mr. Harper might wish to encourage the troops a bit to speak truth to power. He has an opportunity coming up.

The other lingering business concerning council was discussed at the head of the meeting by President Smith as he organized the body to discuss the very expensive and surprising repairs to elevators in the recently renovated city hall. He asked a consensus of the body as to how and when administration representatives might come down to explain the “unexpected” $900,000 repair bill, the biggest of a string of surprise overruns. Mr. Smith wants to know who inspected the elevators, when they were inspected and what the report concluded. He might also wish to know why the administration has chosen to solicit repair money through the more compliant and much less inquisitive Redevelopment Commission. He has a dozen more questions, as do most of the rest of council.

The matter is now set for the fifth Tuesday meeting of council on January 31st. Three birds with one stone. Mr. Smith gets to put council to work on their customary fifth Tuesday off, one of his stated goals. Council and the public will get a chance to see the new openness and cooperation of the administration, and the Redman-Harper Rule on citizen participation will be tested.

Bottom line: we all should want to know whether we bought a pig in a poke. The gavel will fall at 5:30pm.

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 18th, 2012 at 1:02 pm and is filed under City & County Government, Fort Wayne. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.