Bill Earngey [Order this photo]

First a little focus. We have a Chamber of Commerce and a CAPC that take care of businesses in town. The Council is in the business of public health, public safety, general welfare, and public services like police, fire, public works, transit, etc.

  Supposedly, the city also runs itself as a business, bottom-line and all. Presently, our town's bottom-line has bottomed out.

  A good platform for a potential Council member would be to say, "Okay, let's run this town like a business, keeping in mind that the Council is already a board of directors; the mayor is the chairman."

  The Council's and mayor's jobs are mainly delegating authority to various public service department directors, like police and fire departments, via an annual budget, which the directors keep in balance.

  After the budget is set, the directors are on their own within the confines of their budgets. At this point the mayor and Council are pretty much through with the majority of their work.

  The Hospital, Cemetery, HDC and Planning commissions pick up a large part of the non-public services of the City, and are staffed by voluntary, unpaid city residents.

  Okay, now for a better mousetrap. The combined salaries of the mayor, Council, City Clerk, and Economic Development Coordinator are $90,400 per year. For that kind of money (honey) we could hire a professional city administrator who would be directly responsible to the Council and mayor. Also we could retain the services of a professional city planner who would organize and advise the HDC and Planning/Zoning Commissions, which would become Council Committees of three aldermen each.

  Odds and ends: the Clerk's $28,000. salary would be cut to $14,400, reducing the $90,400 to $76,000., which still leaves plenty of money for professionals. The Economic Development Coordinator position would surely be picked up by the Chamber of Commerce, which is where it belongs.

  P.S. Payment of the Council and mayor began in 1995, when the city was flush and the city had a paid administrator but an unpaid Council and mayor. The present annual combined mayor-Council salaries are $32,400. And we ain't that flush.