The Planning Commission Meeting begins at 3pm rather than the normal 4pm giving an indication that there will be a lot to discuss:

1. The Sage Lane issue is up for a vote by the Planning Commission so that they can present their recommendations to the Town Council at the following Town Council Meeting
2. Main St. Baptist Church comes back for a repeat performance of the Conditional Use Permit that they are requesting be renewed. This is for the industrialized building units they have been using for offices and classrooms at 106 W. Main St. for several years now. There will be a vote to determine a recommendation to present to Town Council.
3. Another Conditional Use Permit concerns a request for a game room to be added to the businesses at 1225 Roanoke Street. There will be a vote to determine a recommendation to present to Town Council.
4. A rezoning request will be discussed for property on the southern side of Radford St. west of Melody Drive where it is requested that the zoning be changed from Agricultural to Single-Family Residential. This is a 8.25 acre plot and the public hearing on this matter will be held on the same night at the Town Council meeting.
5. A Conditional Use Permit for a commercial garage at 1020 Radford St. will be discussed with a public hearing to be held at the following Town Council Meeting.
6. A review of a Conditional use Permit at 155 Howery St. for a major home occupation will be done to insure compliance with the conditions.

A few hours later, at 7:30pm, Christiansburg Town Council will meet.

There are 2 Joint Public Hearings: 1) the Rezoning request noted in #4 above, and 2) the Conditional Use Permit (CUP) noted in #5 above. Joint Public Hearings are the time where citizens have the opportunity to address issues and bring forth information that the Town Council may find useful in making decisions on the issues.

There is a PUBLIC HEARING concerning the Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) – Consolidated Plan and Annual Action Plan. This involves federal grant money that can be used for specific types of projects. The intended projects are required to address the issues and needs most relevant to low and moderate income citizens. The proposals found in the links I have provided show the intention of adding additional sidewalks in some areas of town. You might want to set aside some time to at least scan these documents to see what is being discussed.

Then we get to the Regular Meeting where the Planning Commission will provide their recommendations to Town Council on a) the CUP for Main St. Baptist Church (see above #2), b) the CUP for the game room at 1225 Roanoke ST (see above #3), and last but certainly not least — c) the rezoning of the Albert Land, LP property that includes the Sage Lane issues.

Following that will be a presentation from Ms. Rebecca Martin concerning the Christiansburg Bus System. This is where citizens may get an idea of any changes to bus routes that are being considered, or even if the bus service might be discontinued.

Next on the agenda is a open forum where any citizen may address Council on any issue, concern, kudos, etc.

Once all of that is out of the way, we move into part III of the agenda. This is the section where the public is silent and the Council makes their decisions known. They will be voting on: a) the CUP for Main St. Baptist Church (see above #2), b) the CUP for the game room at 1225 Roanoke ST (see above #3), and last but certainly not least — c) the rezoning of the Albert Land, LP property that includes the Sage Lane issues.

Potential budget cuts are again on the agenda for discussion. This is followed by a “Memorandum of Understanding — Sustainable Communities Consortium.” (The link is to a Roanoke Times article discussing this project. I was unable to find any information on the Town’s website.)

Next to last for the evening is the report of the Street Committee. Although the Town has many different committees, this is the only one that routinely provides reports to the Town Council. On this evening, they will primarily work on subdivision plat changes and lot line adjustments.

Finally, the last item of the agenda is the Town Manager’s Report where the Town Manager will provide the monthly bills to be paid and progress reports on various projects in the works.

Now, if you didn’t get much of a chance to grab a bite between the two meetings, after adjournment, you might want to wander over to Macados’ or over to Sonic for a bit of a snack or hmm…maybe an ice cream sundae.

Please try to come. Every decision made by Town Council has the potential of having a positive or negative impact upon every citizen. Just because it is not happening in ‘your backyard’ doesn’t mean that it will not affect you in the long run. Listening, asking questions, and talking with other citizens is the best way to keep yourself informed. Who knows, you may have the perfect answer to some problem that arises. Hope to see you there.

Here are a few observations/questions about why this and many other development issues have come up.

1. Poor to non-existent planning.
2. Council not being fully informed before making decisions.
3. Planning Commission not being fully informed before making recommendations.
4. Planning Dept. staff not knowing what information the Planning Commission and/or Town Council need to know in order to make informed decisions.
5. Planning Commission and/or Town Council not wanting to know the information required to make informed decisions.
6. Someone dictating what the Planning Dept. staff is allowed to present to the Town Council and/or Planning Commission, created a very skewed view of things.

At the July 12th Planning Commission Meeting, I reviewed what the Town is calling Staff Analysis packages. These are the packets of information that are provided to Planning Commission and then to Town Council in order for those elected and appointed officials to know the impact on rezoning/development on the Town as a whole and on neighborhoods specifically. It was all I could do to keep from laughing hysterically.

Take a look for yourself. Then take a look at samples I got from other jurisdictions for a comparison.

1. Christiansburg Staff Analysis
2. Examples from other jurisdictions:  Sample 1 Sample 2

You will quickly note that the information that is provided to Commissioners and Council is far more extensive in other jurisdictions.

When I asked Planning Director Wingfield why there was so little information, he responded that he had been told by the Town Manager what was to be given in the report and that the Town Council has said what it is that they wanted.

This sets up two distinctive scenarios: 1) the Town Manager has been controlling what the appointed and elected officials see in relation to any proposed development or rezoning, and 2) the Council members are expected to know what it is that is available for them to ask for and that they have the knowledge/training to know what is important.

I believe that it is part of most programs offering Planning Degrees for students to learn what should be included in such documents. Also, I do not believe that we have any elected or appointed personnel who have degrees in planning. This makes it a lot like going to a proctologist for a toothache! Hello….get a clue…people who are trained to do something, have been examined for their knowledge on that something, might…just might have a tad bit more knowledge than those who do not. In fact, if I am not mistaken, isn’t that why the Town of Christiansburg pays the money that they do for Planners, because of their knowledge.

Talk about waste of taxpayer money. If you are not going to let someone do what they are trained to do then why have people with the training?

If you don’t have people trained making assessments and giving advice, then don’t be surprised when you have problems with whatever area they are working in….i.e., traffic, stormwater, legal issues, etc. You can expect to see problems and LAWSUITS when professional staff members are restricted or incapable of doing the very jobs that they were hired to do.

More on Sage Lane to come, particularly how easily the ‘emergency access’ can be dealt with WITHOUT having to have a ‘road’ there to create traffic issues.

As a side note, Mr. Huppert noted that he was now seeing people out working on sidewalks and that maybe the focus of the Planning Commission on sidewalks contributed to that behavior. Personally, I doubt it. I think it is far more likely that increased activities on sidewalks, groundskeeping, road repair,  landscaping, street cleaning, and other such area, is more likely a function of the fact that with the Aquatic Center finally ‘finished’, all of those town workers were were diverted from their normal jobs to work on the Aquatic Center suddenly find themselves being allowed to work on the routine daily issues of a town.

The Aquatic Center cost town taxpayers a lot more than just the money for the building. Diverting Town staff from their regular duties to work on the Aquatic Center meant that things did not get done! Even the Town Manager has acknowledged that to cut any personnel would mean having to cut services. It should come as no surprise to citizens that basic services were dropped in order to have people work on the Aquatic Center. Town Council has asked for an accounting of the number of town staff hours involved in the development of the Aquatic Center several times in the past and only vague responses have been received.

Maybe the only way that Council could find out the answer to that question would be to ask the workers themselves. Cutting services to taxpayers is not the right way to get the work done at the Aquatic Center. Reportedly, town staff was used to save money. Perhaps this also contributed to the multiple DCR violations on the site for erosion and sediment control as well.

• Revenue from local taxes and fees increased by 120.06%
• Expenditures increased by 120.32%

Expenses:

• Government Admin Expenses increased by 156.35%
• Public Safety Expenses increased by 234.30%
• Public Works Expenses increased by 128.30%
• Parks & Recreation Expenses increased by 315.24%

Revenue:

• Real Property Revenue increased by 156.20%
• Public Service Corporation Revenue increased by 34.39%
• Machinery and Tools Revenue increased by 178.34%
• Penalties decreased by 36.53%
• Interest increased by 0.79%
• Other Local Taxes increased by 173.44%
• Permits, Fees, & Licenses increased by 241.76%
• Charges for Services increased by 374.55%
• Miscellaneous Revenue increased by 1,499.73%

Specific to Local Revenue:

• Local Sales and Use Tax increased by 87.14%
• Business License Taxes increased by 264.35%
• Franchise License Tax dropped by 18.69%
• Hotel and Motel Taxes increased by 359.70%
• Restaurant and Food Taxes increased by 192.83%

Safety Expenses:

• Law Enforcement and Traffic Control expenses increased by 223.16%
• Fire and Rescue Services expenses increased by 322.66%
• Inspections expenses increased by 176.02%
• Overall increase for services 234.30%

Services:

• Maintenance of Highways, etc. expenses increased by 111.23%
• Sanitation and Waste Removal expenses increased by 200.67%
• Maintenance, Bldgs. and Grounds expenses increased by 42.08%
• Total Increase in expenses of 128.30
• Revenue from Local Charges for these services increased by 395.33%

Parks and Recreation:

• Expenses increased by 319.59%
• Revenues from local charges for services increased by 206.04%

Government Operation:

• Personal Services expenses increased by 202.32%
• Fringe Benefits expenses increased by 332.50%
• Contractural Services expenses increased by 287.43%

Gross Debt:

• Total Gross Debt of the town increased by 205.02%
• Other General Government debt increased by 221.49%
• Enterprise Activities debt increased by 181.36%
• Unfunded Debt has increased by 205.47%

Well, there are the numbers. Feel free to go to the APA site and check for yourselves. Do remember however, that these numbers do not include any of the 2010 fiscal year information where a more than $2 million deficit is hanging. Maybe there is something to be said for Mr. Lemley’s ‘pay as you go’ philosophy that didn’t stay around after he left.

The simple fact is that if the ‘goes out’ is higher than the ‘comes in’ things have to change. Keeping this 14 year pattern going in the same direction is only going to worsen the problem. Town Council needs to get involved in decisions involving expenditures and more aggressively monitor what is spent and where. The Town Council get routing reports from the Town Manager and absolutely nothing in this article should come as a surprise to any of them. After all, it only took me a couple of hours to get all the reports and set up multiple spreadsheets for analysis and I am not a high paid professional. In fact, I did it for free. Now, what will the Town Council do about the budget, expenses, and revenue?

Radford and Christiansburg have very different contract issues for very different reasons.

Radford officials have at the front of their concerns list making sure that citizens are protected by insuring that the position of town attorney is being put out for bid and a new contract developed. An interesting aside to this is “who is writing the contract?” The rfp and contract do not, in any way, exclude the current town attorney from competing for, and winning said contract. It is a far and open process. Radford is simply joining the growing number of jurisdictions who are moving to a dedicated attorney.

Christiansburg, on the other hand, is involved with allowing the Town Manager to compile a contract for him that is in his best interest. The sample document used by the Town Manager is one that is provided at a website that focuses on the needs of those appointed officials, regardless of whether or not it is in the best interest of the Town.

While the contract itself has not become public knowledge, the sample contract used for the C’burg Town Manager contract is available online. Clearly, this is a document written to protect the Town Manager NOT the town. It will be interesting to see if the town attorney suggests modifications that support the interests the town or those of the Manager. It will also be interesting to see which of the ‘elected officials’ are supporting the town’s interest and which support the manager’s interest.

Given the Town of Christiansburg’s history of getting into contracts, discovering that mistakes were made, and then struggling to get out of those contracts (Tourism Development, Blacksburg Transit). It would be silly for them to enter into ANY contract that lasted for more than one year.

As to the Town Manager’s dedication to the citizens of the Town, all one needs to do is to read the original contract he set up with VT for the Aquatic Center, then read the one that was finalized after citizen uproar forced a re-evaluation. The version here shows the changes made in red. Please note that the Town Manger was essentially the only one working up this contract with the Town Attorney reviewing it. He was all but giving the Aquatic Center to VT.

So, in light of the compared progressive and regressive actions of the two jurisdictions, I have a survey that people can take to evaluate the performance of Mayor, Council, and Town Manager in 4 areas:

Your participation will be greatly appreciated.

Christiansburg council discusses contract for manager – Roanoke.com

Why rush a contract? – Roanoke.com

It appears that someone outside of town government has received a copy of that document. Since it wasn’t me, I had to resort to a more inquisitive approach to try to determine what might be up.

Starting with the assumption that the Town Manager is not an Attorney as well as an Engineer, I went back through the data on the ‘pay the bills’ sheets looking for any organizations that the Town might be paying membership fees to that would offer this type of document.

My first look was to the VML site where I found nothing. After a few more trial and error episodes, I finally landed at the ICMA site online where they have a sample government document “Model Employment Agreement that is a downloadable pdf format. Since I did a fairly extensive search and this is the only model I have found, I feel it is safe to assume that this model document is likely to have formed the basis for the Town Manager’s contract. You can view the document as a pdf here or simply click on the link on the ICMA page above. (Please note that this particular document was generated in 2003 and there is no evidence to indicate updates have occurred. This could mean that parts of the document are no longer consistent with State Codes.)

You will find a lot of blank spots on this document which would be where the specifics of a given contract were denoted such as the length of time that the document is in effect. That could be 3 months, 1 year, 3 years, 10 years, etc.

Page 1 of the document (page 3 of the pdf), under Section 3: Compensation subsection C provides information on an annual basis to increase compensation with 4 options available. All of the options address pay increases or bonuses (read the document for more details).

Oops! Sorry got ahead of myself. Start with the Table of Contents. Here is where you can get an overview of everything covered in the document. For example:

• Section 6 Automobile

• Section 7 Retirement

• Section 8 General Business Expenses

• Section 9 Termination

• Section 10 Severance

• Section 11 Resignation

• Section 12 Performance Evaluation

• Section 13 Hours of Work

• Section 14 Outside Activities

• Section 15 Moving and Relocation Expenses

• Section 16 Home Sale and Purchase Expenses

I included those examples because if a precedent is set whereby such a contract is used in the future for the hiring of any new Town Manager, Section 15 and 16 could be particularly important.

Section 9 includes a lot of Termination related details such as #2:

2. If the Employer, citizens or legislature acts to amend any provisions of the [charter, code, enabling legislation] pertaining to the role, powers, duties, authority, responsibilities of the Employee’s position that substantially changes the form of government, the Employee shall have the right to declare that such amendments constitute termination.

So, not only the Town, but the citizens and EVEN THE STATE OF VIRGINIA are limited in making any legitimate changes to the Town Managers functions without the Town Manager being able to decide he has thus been terminated and is entitled to all benefits under the terms of termination.

No reduction in pay can occur unless it is applied equally to all department heads. (How does that encourage good performance?) There are several options listed there which all have the Town as the short end of the financial stick. However, Section 11 gives the Town Manager the right to resign any time he wants without having the town for any inconvenience or extra expense the town incurs due to his actions.

Section 10: Severance, recommends a minimum of one years salary at current pay to be paid in a lump sum. (Glance back at termination section to see that virtually any reason for the Town Manager leaving his position, including breach of contract by either party, warrants this severance pay.)

Section 17: Indemnification, even requires that the Town go beyond the applicable Federal, State, and Local Law to provide legal coverage for the Town manager “against any tort, professional liability claim or demand or other legal action, whether groundless or otherwise, arising out of an alleged act or omission occurring the the performance of Employee’s duties”… This even includes independent legal council for the Town Manager at the Town’s expense.

Please read this document. If you have any information as to how accurately this reflects the contract that the Town Council is currently working on, I would love to hear about it.

I cannot believe that this sort of manipulation is under consideration by our Council. At first, I was irate about the timing. Now, I am just disgusted in general.

I want to know what Town Council members knew about this before it was presented by the Mayor in those nice little manilla envelopes. I want to know what Council members may have even provided feedback in setting up the final copy that includes all of the dates and rates.

If Town Council and the Town Manager had any hopes of restoring trust with citizens, this should just about ‘sink that ship’. But, obviously, it is business as usual with no respect for citizens.

This just totally STINKS!!! Read it and form your own opinion.

CMA site online where they have a sample government document “Model Employment Agreement

As to a roughly 3 year contract, there are citizens who have complained to the Town Manager about problems for years without the problem ever being addressed. Maybe that contract should include something whereby he is responsible for paying for the damages to property from sewer and stormwater, for devaluation of homes because of that and because of poor decisions made (i.e., Aquatic Center expansion). Maybe he needs to cover the costs for every time DCR has had to come in and enforce the very laws that the Town is suppose to be enforcing concerning Erosion and Sediment Control.

Maybe, just maybe, if the Council and Town Manager had paid a bit more attention to what citizens wanted instead of what they wanted, citizens would be a bit more agreeable to this contract.

This is the site of the Virginia Department of Criminal Justice Services that is dedicated to the Certified Crime Prevention Program. You will find a brief history of the project, links to the Manuals used for Certification and Re-Certification.

Then, incentives for localities are discussed including:

• giving the police department preference in state criminal justice grant application process
• a marketing tool for tourists, businesses, conference planners, and people considering relocating to the region
• citizens in Certified Crime Prevention Communities can be eligible for discounts on insurance premiums (you’ll need to contact your agent about this)

Next is a lit of the eligibility requirements that must be met in order to be in the program. These are pretty much self explanatory and fall upon the police department to fulfill.

Then to the really interesting part. There are 12 Core Community Safety Elements Needed to Qualify: 9direct from the website:

1. Development of a local community crime prevention/community safety council or coalition.
2. A DCJS-certified crime prevention specialist assigned to crime prevention duties in the law enforcement agency.
3. A neighborhood watch program with training and documented support of watches.
4. Community policing or a crime control planning process.
5. Organized distribution of community safety information (literature, videos, and Internet resources) to citizens.
6. An identifiable staff person or planning committee trained to conduct community security and safety assessments of at-risk neighborhoods and businesses.
7. Functional crime analysis capability.
8. Identifiable staff person or persons trained to conduct school safety assessments/audits (applicable only to jurisdictions operating schools).
9. A business watch program with training and documented support of watches.
10. Access to a victim/witness services program.
11. A delinquency prevention program targeting at-risk youth.
12. Local law enforcement agency must either be accredited or seeking accreditation from the Virginia Law Enforcement Professional Standards Commission (VLEPSC) or CALEA.

Then there is a huge list of  Optional Community Safety Elements of which a minimum of 7 is needed to comply. (from the website)

• Class Action, DARE or a similar school-based drug-abuse prevention program
• McGruff House program
• Employee Watch program
• TRIAD Program
• National Night Out
• Crime Solvers/Stoppers
• Gun safety program
• Crime prevention newsletter
• School resource police officer
• Annual crime prevention awards
• Campus crime prevention outreach
• Crime prevention speaker’s bureau
• Domestic violence response program
• Inter-agency code enforcement team
• School violence prevention curriculum
• Cooperative agreements between jurisdictions around crime/community safety issues
• Crime prevention in public housing
• Contact list and process for crime prevention liaison with community leaders and groups
• “Zero tolerance” policies in schools
• Fatherhood responsibility/accountability initiative
• YAADAP
• Truancy prevention initiatives
• School crime lines
• Pre-trial corrections program
• Any other programs deemed appropriate by the New Partnership Commission for Community Safety

There are links to the Certified Crime Prevention Community Program Manual and the Certified Crime Prevention Community Re-Certification Guidelines that have a lot of information as well.

If you dig around on the Town of Christiansburg website, you can find a page for the Police Department that provides information specific to the programs offered to citizens. In addition to the 12 required programs, they offer DARE, TRIAD, Gun Safety, School Resource Officer, Interagency Code Enforcement, Domestic Violence Program, and Project Lifesaver.

For further information on any of these programs or some of the additional programs you would like to see offered, Contact the Police Department and speak with Sgt. Kevin Tucker.

If you are interested in finding out how this might save you money on your insurance, you will need to contact your insurance agent.

Please take some time to check out these resources.

During the last few minutes,  an event occurred which has not been seen in Christiansburg Council Chamber in decades (if not in forever). The Mayor rose from his seat and picked up a packet of manila envelopes. He told council members that he was passing this out and that it contained “Confidential Personnel Information” upon which he hoped Council could act at the next Town Council meeting.

Obviously, this had to be big news for it to be announced in such an unusual manner. (Usually, these things are just passed out to council without citizens having any knowledge.) Clearly, it was intended to make people aware that the information contained was confidential and they wanted the audience to be sure and understand that fact.

Unusual behavior always captures my interest. So, I found myself wondering what could be up? Was someone resigning or something? Was this the resignation of the Chief of the Rescue Squad that some had been expecting? I have been keeping track of bills affecting FOIA and could not think of anything that would have precipitated such a change. Guess my only other option would be to go to the LIS website, pull up the FOIA Codes and start reading again. Here is what I found:

• From: § 2.2-3705.1. Exclusions to application of chapter; exclusions of general application to public bodies. The following records are excluded from the provisions of this chapter but may be disclosed by the custodian in his discretion, except where such disclosure is prohibited by law:
  • 1. Personnel records containing information concerning identifiable individuals, except that access shall not be denied to the person who is the subject thereof. Any person who is the subject of any personnel record and who is 18 years of age or older may waive, in writing, the protections afforded by this subdivision. If the protections are so waived, the public body shall open such records for inspection and copying.
• § 2.2-3705.8. Limitation on record exclusions.
  • A. Neither any provision of this chapter nor any provision of Chapter 38 (§ 2.2-3800 et seq.) of this title shall be construed as denying public access to (i) contracts between a public body and its officers or employees, other than contracts settling public employee employment disputes held confidential as personnel records under § 2.2-3705.1; (ii) records of the position, job classification, official salary or rate of pay of, and records of the allowances or reimbursements for expenses paid to any officer, official or employee of a public body; or (iii) the compensation or benefits paid by any corporation organized by the Virginia Retirement System or its officers or employees.
  • The provisions of this subsection, however, shall not require public access to records of the official salaries or rates of pay of public employees whose annual rate of pay is $10,000 or less.
  • B. Nothing in this chapter shall be construed as denying public access to the nonexempt portions of a report of a consultant hired by or at the request of a local public body or the mayor or chief executive or administrative officer of such public body if (i) the contents of such report have been distributed or disclosed to members of the local public body or (ii) the local public body has scheduled any action on a matter that is the subject of the consultant’s report.

As a quick aside, I see that my favorite section of the code still exists:)

• § 2.2-3707. Meetings to be public; notice of meetings; recordings; minutes.
  • H. Any person may photograph, film, record or otherwise reproduce any portion of a meeting required to be open. The public body conducting the meeting may adopt rules governing the placement and use of equipment necessary for broadcasting, photographing, filming or recording a meeting to prevent interference with the proceedings.

When “Confidential Information” is involved, one can reasonably expect a ‘closed meeting’ to be just around the corner for discussion (remember that no action can be taken during the ‘closed meeting’, just a discussion on the matter to be acted upon. Since the Mayor did note it was confidential personnel information, that narrows the scope of what would constitute such a meeting. This information can also be found in the FOIA. Here are those sections applicable to ‘personnel’:

• § 2.2-3711. Closed meetings authorized for certain limited purposes.
  • A. Public bodies may hold closed meetings only for the following purposes:
    • 1. Discussion, consideration, or interviews of prospective candidates for employment; assignment, appointment, promotion, performance, demotion, salaries, disciplining, or resignation of specific public officers, appointees, or employees of any public body; and evaluation of performance of departments or schools of public institutions of higher education where such evaluation will necessarily involve discussion of the performance of specific individuals. Any teacher shall be permitted to be present during a closed meeting in which there is a discussion or consideration of a disciplinary matter that involves the teacher and some student and the student involved in the matter is present, provided the teacher makes a written request to be present to the presiding officer of the appropriate board.
    • 4. The protection of the privacy of individuals in personal matters not related to public business.
    • B. No resolution, ordinance, rule, contract, regulation or motion adopted, passed or agreed to in a closed meeting shall become effective unless the public body, following the meeting, reconvenes in open meeting and takes a vote of the membership on such resolution, ordinance, rule, contract, regulation, or motion that shall have its substance reasonably identified in the open meeting.
    • C. Public officers improperly selected due to the failure of the public body to comply with the other provisions of this section shall be de facto officers and, as such, their official actions are valid until they obtain notice of the legal defect in their election.

Given the above excerpts from FOIA (the full text is available at the Legislative Information System website), it would seem reasonable to assume that either someone is resigning or someone is being disciplined. However, in order to make reasonable assumptions, one must be operating within a ‘reasonable environment’. Since we’re dealing with the Christiansburg Town Council, where the ‘reasonable person’ test would be hard pressed to find a basis for comparison, who knows. Rumors are already running rampant with the most common two being the Rescue Chief or the Town Manager are resigning. Perhaps a FOIA request is in order so that if it is refused the actual statue involved would be noted. That would at least give people a general idea but no specifics.

This should make it a lot easier for those of you who are using this as a way to look up information. However, let me remind you that while the Charter gives certain powers to the Mayor and Town Council, the Town Code then takes those powers and distributes them to others, well, one other, the Town Manager.

The Town Charter puts the burden of doing these things squarely upon the shoulders of the Town Council and the Town Manager. In giving those responsibilities to the Town Manager, the Town Council & Mayor DO NOT give up accountability. They are accountable for how the Town Manager performs. The Town Council and Mayor have a responsibility to followup, to audit, to monitor, and anything else necessary to insure that the tasks that they have delegated to the Town Manager are being performed properly. Should they find that this is not being done, then they have a right and a responsibility to make the necessary changes to correct the problems. This includes actions up to and including removal of the Town Manager from his position. The Town Manager works under a year to year contract and all that is really involved is for the council to vote against reinstating his contract again.

That said, once again I will point out that it is the responsibility of Town Council and Mayor to monitor the Town Manager’s performance. If they are not doing this, that is not a problem that would go away with removal of the Town Manager. It would simply establish the dynamics whereby similar problems would lead to discontent with any future Town Managers.

Over and over again, in the minutes, at the Town Council meetings, and in discussions with citizens, I have heard where problems have been brought to Town Council’s attention, the problem has been referred to the Town Manager, sometimes (not very often) a followup question asking in the problem was resolved was asked, and the answer was “Yes”. Then, months, and sometimes years later, the problem is again brought forward with citizens asking when the issue is going to be fixed.

This would indicate that there is no index of problems/complaints with documentation noting actions taken by the Town to correct or review the situation, measures taken (or not taken), and verification with the complainant that the issue has been resolved. However, since they are required by law to keep just such a record and to hold complaints in an active file until they are resolved, there must be one somewhere. Obviously, there is no verification by the Town Council other than to ask the Town Manager. It might be a nice step for Town Council to start something new and do followup with citizens to see if things are corrected to the satisfaction of citizens for a change.

Have fun with the Town Charter, it is quite informative.

While I was doing this, I found something kind of interesting:

What this means to me is that members of Town Council have a right and a responsibility to ‘police their own’. I have found nothing in the Town Council Minutes since July 2001 to indicate that this process has ever been utilize, but it is available. Why heck, if applied it could generate funds for the town, sort of a ‘user’s fee’:)

Anyway, the newer ‘bookmarked’ version of the Town Charter will be online soon at myvaresources.com. I’ll post an announcement here, on facebook, and send out the usual email notices when it is completed.