Mayor Rybak (hey everyone, he's been mayor for a month now - let's not spell it Ryback), gets his staffing - on a 7-1 vote with 5 (!) abstentions. Gary Schiff is the bold soul who dared vote no. Your fence-sitters are: Sandy Colvin Roy, Dean Zimmermann, Robert Lilligren, Natalie Johnson Lee and Joe Biernat.
First, to defend Gary Schiff: while I do regard his role in the Ostrow presidential contretemps as a self-motivated flip-flop - he got the best deal for himself - I have to defend him against list criticism about abstaining on the 2001 pay-raise vote. To me, that was exactly the right thing to do: not vote on what would be setting your own salary. Gary was only sitting on the council then due to Kathy Thurber's early resignation. On the staffing vote, I gotta give him credit for daring to vote no. I'll admit - based only what I've read in the paper, not heard on MPR or anywhere else - that his logic seems flawed: a bunch of firefighters are nervous about budget cuts, so he votes AGAINST a mayor who cuts his own staffing budget 8 percent? Wouldn't that help save dough for the firefighters if everyone did that? Are council members cutting their staff budget 8 percent? As for the rest, c'mon folks, jump off the turnip truck! Either the mayor is royally screwing the downtrodden, in thrall to middle management, or he has discretion over his budget as long as he's not exceeding it. Take a side!! Personally - without knowing the receptionist in question, or any duties beyond answering phones - I would generally want my mayor to concentrate on people dealing with complicated policy than those who replicate phone-answering machines. We expect our council and mayor to be more dynamic and omnipresent than the prior regime: why wouldn't you want to concentrate money on policy people you believe effective - especially if you're cutting your staff budget another 30K beyond just the receptionist's salary? The rest seems like symbolic politics: defend the African-American receptionist (but don't pay the Asian-American policy advisor a few thou more!), and defend the low-paid worker who may, regardless, be redundant (oh, if only those policy advisors made half what we pay them, then certain council members would leap to their defense - as if making in the mid-50s is some Enron-like salary for an at-will employee!) Sorry, I just couldn't abstain from this one. David Brauer King Field - Ward 10 _________________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Get your free @yahoo.com address at http://mail.yahoo.com _______________________________________ Minneapolis Issues Forum - A Civil City Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy Post messages to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subscribe, Unsubscribe, Digest option, and more: http://e-democracy.org/mpls
