By Dalia Diaz
Filling a job is supposed to be uncomplicated. For many, there is a sense of urgency about recruitment, retention and succession planning. As states and localities have tried to modernize the way they attract and retain public workers, some best practices have emerged. However, for the City of Lawrence, it seems that the City Council (and Mayor Rivera) can almost never apply those best practices.
If the City Council can’t get or retain the talent the city needs to provide services, then they are failing the residents of Lawrence. The image and pettiness of politics of the council and the mayor do not help with hiring. Unsurprisingly, much of the challenge on retention as well as hiring comes down to power. The power to keep positions and departments under one or more people’s control to install political power plays between the executive and legislative group. At this point, it’s just best to create a ‘do not hire’ list.
For many of us, there is no problem with the process of selecting a City Attorney. The problem is the political fracas. A primary reason why council members have virtually no role with regard to individual city employees is that applicable law provides that council members will act as a body, not as individuals. So the current issue of not having a permanent City Attorney and currently no Assistant Attorney is the fault of the City Council. The council, failed late last year, to vote for a permanent City Attorney by leaving the situation unresolved, thereby creating a whole new set of issues when Mayor Rivera terminated the assistant attorney.
Some of the blame, for not having a permanent city attorney and an assistant attorney falls to Mayor Rivera. By influencing councilmembers with benefits and future giveaways in order to get his candidate in as City Attorney, could call the question of whether Mayor Rivera created an environment of workplace harassment for Brian Corrigan by terminating his employment.
It could also be established that the Mayor’s decision was not legitimate by Brian showing that he was clearly better qualified than the chosen candidate because his qualifications were so much better that no one would have made the same decision.
Except, many of us know that Mayor Rivera’s primary selection for the City Attorney (Eileen O’Connor Bernal) was not the better-qualified person. Mayor Rivera has retaliated against Attorney Corrigan because Brian had the audacity to apply for the City Attorney position, was highest scored interviewed candidate, and influenced a couple of city council members to vote for him a City Attorney.
In Lawrence, your chance of promotion depends on your relationship with people (Council and Mayor). It also depends on your political affiliation or whether you held signs for a political opponent or supported another. This is sad because the only chance that you should be promoted is your qualification, experience, and performance.
Additionally, for Mayor Rivera to say that the better compromise is Attorney Raquel Ruano is a total disrespect to Attorney Ruano. Attorney Ruano should never be a compromise, but a qualified person.
We should ask ourselves why the powers that be send an overseer, receiver and all types of controls to Lawrence. Then we see the dysfunctional system in which the residents have to endure and sometimes wonder whether it’s the dysfunctional relationships of the City Council and its Mayor.
So, it’s time to kind of take a different role at making sure that the City Attorney’s office is either staff appropriately and professionally or take all of the city’s legal work to outside counsel. The latter will cost millions of dollars. In the last few years, there has been a tumultuous period in which the city has shed workers faster than it can replace them.
I am a long way from trusting anyone on council ever again. However, I want to say that the job of the council president is to a create “team-building” workshop that the residents hope would resolve personal conflicts and help council “move forward.” His job as council president is to train and develop elected officials. The council president, if nothing else, must be a coalition-builder and problem solver. He is not.
There’s a lot of partisan bickering to the point where recently we can barely pass only stop signs and handicap ordinances … How do you get people to work together if the City Council can’t function? You are supposed to be an example to your workforce!
