Oddly, the Gargoyle Leader had a story about Home Rule today;
“This would be a more efficient government because you had one guy to answer to. That was the argument at the time,” said Bob Jamison, who has served on both the City Commission and City Council. “The mayor was the one that ran the show because he was the elected leader of the city.”
Problem is that under the current administration (or whatever you wanna call the clusterf**k) the department heads tell the mayor what to do and the mayor sidesteps the council.
“It was a new form of government and not as much power as the commission form. Not everyone knew how it operated,” she said.
That is the major problem with it, no checks and balances. Who is keeping the mayor accountable? Who is keeping the department heads accountable?
“Our new strong mayor form of government required the not-so-glorious but extremely important and complex task of reorganizing and synchronizing the former City Commission government of five kingdoms into a coordinated mayoral council,” Hanson said.
But this could have been accomplished under the old form of government. You don’t have to change the entire structure of city government to get a couple of departments to consolidate, you just change a couple of ordinances, have the council approve it, and it’s done.
But some residents, Jamison said, prefer the old system.
“I think both systems work,” he said. “No question about that.”
No, the old system worked better because citizens were better represented.