After the last election, the winner of course moved to city hall. He had
proclaimed that he was going to 'sweep city hall clean,' have an open
door policy, and fix the budget. OK. Fine. Roll it out, let's see your act.
Within a week or so he had removed the receptionist and some other low
level clerks, installed his staff, sans any receptionist, and had moved
the staff positions into higher wages than the positions had carried
under the previous administration.
At that point he had broken all three of his intentions. The one that
galled me the most was his failure to hire a receptionist. What it told
me about Rybak was that he devalued the work of a receptionist, thinking
that job irrelevant. It completely contradicts the notion of an open
door policy. The consequences are myriad and far reaching. *Phone
messages get lost, *visitors are greeted with confusion, *having an open
door implies someone is home. Things don't happen in a timely fashion.
In my estimation no office of any size over two inhabitants can operate
without competent clerks. That also appears to have been the conclusion
of every mayor preceding Rybak for a hundred years.
Then, of course, raising staff salaries for the remaining group out of
the wages of a receptionist and a couple of clerks meant he could
shuffle money into the pockets of his supporters and out of the picture
for running city hall well. Clerk positions are through civil service
process and the contenders are not of the mayor's choosing
It was also dumb. The administration we have had as a consequence has
religiously followed the path of not-quite-up-to-standard throughout.
Rybak had the opportunity to hire people who could have improved the
functioning of the city, but did not. Instance after instance when he
could have made decisions for the city, all of which impacted the budget
to one degree or another, Rybak made less than sterling decisions.
A few bad decisions are to be expected. Nobody's perfect. But decision
after decision? Over a period of 4 years? At some point one is forced to
say that this guy ain't got his act together OR follow the money and
see where it takes you.
Not a pretty picture.
WizardMarks, Central
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