news-record.com

On Wednesday we covered Action Greensboro's forum on local government leadership. Sounds like a snoozer, right?

Not really, if you have the back story to what was said. We'll try to add some context here.

Much of the conversation centered around Guilford County, the retirement of former county manager David McNeill that was sudden, and the following resignations of deputy manager Ben Brown and county attorney Sharron Kurtz.

Mecklenburg County Manager Harry Jones, along with Mike Smith, the dean of the UNC School of Government, and John Alexander, professor of leadership at Elon University Law School spoke at the forum.

The way in which our city and county government operates is designed to keep politics from running the system. Back in the day this was to ensure that all sections of town are treated fairly. These days it has the same fundamentals, but also applies to hiring employees fairly, planning and other things. As we've gotten more advanced in technology and plans, higher levels of expertise are needed for jobs such as planning, land use and economic development, to name a few.

Essentially, the council-manager form of government keeps politicians from playing favorites. But it can go haywire, and some have mentioned in county halls that when Board of Commissioners Chairman Melvin "Skip" Alston and vice chairman Steve Arnold took power, they did so in order to put their hands directly on the day-to-day operations.

"And the people who are setting policy are getting into the administration of government," Alexander said, "and things may be less efficient and may be more political."

Shortly after Alston took power, he created committees to examine government operations, substance abuse, the budget, and hire a new manager and county attorney.

In that regard, they did put their hands on government in a greater way, with the promise of no property tax rate increase for 2009-10. That was delivered, as were numerous other cuts, and layoffs that affected some key employees and eliminated vacant positions.

Meanwhile, Arnold made a move that was uncharacteristic for a commissioner - sat in on county staff budget hearings. Typically, the county manager makes a budget with his or her staff and then delivers it to the commissioners for them to dissect and cut or add.

What's significant about those meetings is that they are closed-door. And though there's no quorum of elected officials present, if two or more commissioners are making decisions about public money then it begins to run into the grey area of North Carolina statute controlling open meetings.

Which the forum also addressed, on the question of transparency, and how Mecklenburg County does its business.

"We try to create that transparency by saying to our staff to make sure that they not give anything that gives any impression that you are tying to hide," Jones said, adding that he tells his staff to avoid the impression that "you are trying to hide the public’s business from the people."

When that works, we receive messages about county moves such as the hire of a new manager or plans to cut the budget. But we didn't even hear about the joint meeting called to reduce the bond sale, which saved county money, until 10 minutes before it happened.

When transparency doesn't seem to work, we have to ask for information about layoffs, departures of key county personnel and the way in which money is given out to community groups.

And let's be clear: this post is not a reporter's lament. It's about community perception of its government in distributing information on how its tax dollars are spent and high points from the forum.

"We as managers have an obligation that the media understand the policy that’s being proposed," Jones said. And that has happened, at times, between Guilford County and the N&R. Brenda Jones Fox, who is spotty about returning phone calls and messages, spent about an hour explaining the county budget to us one morning.

At other times, the communication is not so good. Only after a commissioner asked for it have we received information about the severance packages paid to laid off county employees. And then, the figure is a "to date" amount, not a total.

This is information, we feel, the county should be able to know.

On to other forum topics.

When filling jobs, professionals talk to one-another. In Guilford County, after a short search for applicants, the county promoted from within for its county manager. That is not uncommon practice in government, but Jones said he did field calls from people interested in the open manager's spot here.

"There are not many jobs that are open in North Carolina where I don’t get a phone call about that community," Jones said. "And I don’t criticize that community, but (Jones tells the potential applicant) there are questions that I have that you would like to have the headhunter answer."

When searching for a county attorney, local attorneys said that Guilford County would have trouble finding a staff member to put on board. Eventually the county hired a firm at a greater cost to the county, which is not uncommon for a county of this size.

There seemed to be an implication among the panelists that there's Guilford County has a reputation lately among its peers that's been tarnished.

But the meeting wasn't all about slamming the county, though Guilford County seemed to receive most of the pointed discussion. Alston was able to offer his thoughts, as well, and leaned on the successes of the Board of Commissioners.

"We’ve been able to cut out of the budget, $24 million," he said. "That’s leadership."

Then he spoke to the public.

"And call us. A lot of county officials are talked about, and not talked to. And if you talked to us, then you might understand the reasoning that (commissioners) do what they might do ... and I don't mind talking to anyone at all about what’s been happening over the last several months."

This is true. Alston is very responsive when called. For his corhort, Arnold, however, it's a different story. The number listed as his contact on the county's Web site - 887-8383 - is disconnected.

Then again, why should it be the responsibility of the public to contact their elected officials to find out what's going on? Why should the county's roughly 250,000 registered voters have to track down Alston themselves? Wouldn't that be a bit inefficient?

Tonight's local government forum at the Empire Room in downtown Greensboro featured Twitter as a main component of the event.

Some audience questions were sent through Twitter and through Action Greensboro's blog. Those people who were unable to attend (the event was capped at 250 people) could watch online and ask questions during a Q&A session with Mecklenburg County Manager Harry Jones, Dean of the UNC School of Government Mike Smith and John Alexander, professor of leadership at Elon University Law School.

And the conversation touched on issues such as turnover at the top administrative positions of Guilford County and Greensboro, how to grow wisely with neighboring towns and cities and what it means to have a separation between elected officials and government.

The speakers generally tended to agree that the separation between government and elected officials is a good thing and helps keep politics out of the day-to-day operations. Politics helps set policy that a county manager follows for a government's daily work.

"And you're taking better care of your resources," Smith said of the separation, "and less inclined to make decisions for inappropriate reasons."

And way down in big ol' Mecklenburg County, Jones has been paying attention to what's happening up here. He said that though he would never tell someone not to go somewhere for a job opening, he would suggest certain questions to ask of a community.

We've noted Guilford County's changes many times in recent months.

There weren't any major conclusions reached, and the language was mostly civil, for a civic process.

The overriding impression was that things here may not change drastically or immediately, but that maybe more people would be spurred to get involved in the community.

More community involvement by the people living here. Now that's something Scoop can get behind.

Action Greensboro is hosting a forum on local government that appears to have all the makings of creating a good conversation.

All 250 seats are taken at the Empire Room, where it will be held.

Those who weren't able to make it can still find a way to get a good shot of the action by viewing it online here.

Here's a primer of some topics of conversation expected tonight:

The council-manager form of government, and how the elected officials, managers and staff work in that system.

Increasing the cooperation between the cities and county, which has had a spotty history here.

Roles of media and the citizens in the government.

This should be an interesting forum. We'll be there, and will have something online as soon as we get back. And we hope to Twitter the event. Action Greensboro will, too.

Meanwhile, our fearless editor is taking bets on how many elected folks will show up.

No elected official likes to raise fees and taxes.

And that unease about spending taxpayer money had City Council members carefully considering their options about the 2010 water rates this week.

But Water Resources Director Allan Williams gave the council three options: use $2.1 million from a savings account; cut back maintenance projects to keep the rates flat; or increasing water rates by six percent.

Putting off work on water lines was not a popular option. And at first, only four council members liked the idea of dipping into the city’s reserves. But they also expressed concern about asking residents to pay more in a difficult economic time.

So Councilman Robbie Perkins tried to talk council members through the options.

“Ok, who wants to raise water rates six percent?” Perkins asked.

“That is not the right question,” Councilwoman T. Dianne Bellamy-Small said, to laughs from the audience.

Councilman Mike Barber offered another variation.

“Who wants to stab the taxpayer in the heart?”
 

UPDATE: The big table in the center of city hall's plaza level council room was decidedly empty come 3 p.m. on a recent Tuesday afternoon.

The staff members were there. The journalists had their laptops ready.

But most of the city council members -- the guests of honor of this and every council briefing -- were MIA.

Councilman Mike Barber took the opportunity to chastise the absent members for not showing up for the session, which was scheduled so council members could give the staff key recommendations about financial issues.

"Over the last few months, it's as though the council meetings aren't important enough to attend," he said.

Mayor Yvonne Johnson and Councilwoman T. Dianne Bellamy-Small were the other two members in attendance when Barber made his comment. Councilman Zack Matheny and Councilwoman Trudy Wade both came a few minutes late.

Barber has a point. Briefings in March and April were cancelled by council, sometimes because people were too busy to attend.

The issue made Scoop wonder, who has the best attendance record on council?

No council member has had perfect attendance since they took office in 2007 until May 2009, according to an analysis of the City Council meeting minutes compiled by the city clerk. For simplicity, Scoop’s analysis did not make any distinction between excused and unexcused absences.

Bellamy-Small has a near-perfect record.

She never missed a regular meeting. But she arrived late on one occasion noted in the minutes.

Wade came in a close second, with one absence.

Councilman Robbie Perkins wracked up the most absences, arriving late three times and being absent four times. Councilwoman Sandra Anderson Groat had one tardy and three absences; although during one of those meetings she participated via telephone for part of the session.

And Barber ends up in the middle with the rest of council members, who each had two to three occasions when they were late or absent. Barber had two absences (during one he made a guest appearance by telephone) and one tardy, as counted by the clerk.

The clerk’s office does not keep a record of attendance for council work sessions or the briefings that concerned Barber.

Scoop had incomplete records for those meetings, but can anecdotally verify Barber’s statement; they are not as well attended by council as regular meetings.

And so far as we can tell, the clerk’s minutes don’t always note if council members leave early, do the crossword during the meeting or sneak out of the council chambers to check the basketball scores.

So if you are using attendance as a measurement of your council member, make sure it isn’t the only tool you use to judge.

At the end of Thursday's Guilford County commissioners meeting, Commissioner Paul Gibson asked for some information that we've been trying to get for some time on the county's layoffs, early retirement and contract with a new county attorney.

"We have never gotten any figures on what the cost was for Guilford County on the early retirement packages that were offered," he asked County Manager Brenda Jones Fox. "I’d like to see what that package of early retirement has cost us."

This is stuff we asked about back when the early retirement was announced. And for the layoffs. And the day after it was announced that Nexsen Pruet would be the county's new top legal counsel, we asked Fox if she had details on the cost of the contract. Which she didn't have at the time, but last night said told Gibson that it was prepared.

That makes sense, somewhat, because it takes a little time to draw up contracts.

So now that a commissioner has asked for that stuff, does that mean that the rest of the public now gets to know?

That's what we hope to find out today. We asked Fox and other county staff this morning for the same information that Gibson asked for, which Fox said Thursday she would provide for all the commissioners.

Follow our Twitter feed for Guilford County commissioners here. Live meeting updates.

Because we can't get it all in the paper, and there were some interesting things said, here's more from the interviews on the city's statement of regret this week.

Bob Peters, who served on the Greensboro Truth and Reconciliation Commission:

"I don't demand apologies or regrets I’m happy when I get them," he said. He broke from other members on the commission on the issue of requesting the city offer an apology for the 1979 Nazi/Klan-CWP shootings.

"But to me the whole thing about the shootings on November 3, 1979, one of the main things that hit me was the extreme danger of using violent language. ... Violent language leads to violent actions and can lead to extreme actions. We had some of the extremely violent language on both sides."

Former Mayor Keith Holliday:

"Everybody would have treated this different if we had the ability of hindsight," he said, and then he spoke to some of the conspiracy theorists, who he does not agree with. "Does that mean that you end up placing blame in certain areas? And especially for those who are suspicious of government and the establishment?"

"And there is no way that I feel there was any orchestrated and police sort of openly turned their backs to have a gunfight. And I will never believe, based on what I know, that there was any conscious effort to let that happen."

Councilman Zack Matheny:

"The comments made, about taking a step back, that we’re taking a step back ... Do you think we’re at a lower point today than we were in November 3, 1979?"

"Is that a racial, a truly racial thing that happened? Or did it happen with the threat of unionizing a plant?" he said. "It started out with unionizing a plant. It started out with groups walking ... it didn't start out as a black white thing."

"As far as repair, we need to continue to have the conversation."

Councilwoman Goldie Wells:

"One thing you can do you can make it better, by just talking about the facts. And the things that keep us so bound are secrets and the lack of communication. We need to go on and talk about it and find out about why people feel the way they feel. We just need to talk and be honest."

"People don’t trust folks because they can’t be trusted. We’ve got to be trustworthy and trust others," she said.

It was a strange evening at the City Council Tuesday night, with the arrest of consultant Bill Burckley and a spat between council members.

You can read about Burckley here.

As for that fight, there was tension between City Council members Zack Matheny and Goldie Wells during the Truth and Reconciliation discussion.

Wells made a cutting remark to Matheny after he explained, in depth, his decision not to support the Human Relations Commission recommendation that the council should say it regrets the 1979 shooting.

At the end of eight hours worth of meetings, the pair exchanged words again when Matheny asked council members to change their Monday meeting time to 5 p.m.

He said it was difficult for him to take time off of work in the afternoons. Wells told him he had to make sacrifices to be a public servant.

After the meeting ended, Matheny was seen shouting at Wells about his job responsibilities and her treatment. Councilwoman Sandra Anderson Groat stepped in to defend Matheny against Wells. Other council members encouraged Matheny to move along and drop the matter.

Wells, who has butted heads with other council members before, she doesn’t think Matheny understands her.

“He doesn’t treat me like an elder,” she said Wednesday.

Matheny has said he doesn’t appreciate the way she treats or speaks to him, sometimes commenting about his youth. He is the youngest council member at age 36.

"I've take it for a while," Matheny said Wednesday. "What am I supposed to do? When are you (Wells) going to treat me like a council member? When wil you treat me like an equal?"

Looks like it wasn't all about the county budget this year.

Some more issues are up for discussion in Thursday's commissioners meeting. Here's the agenda.

We'll bet that the heavy equipment tax will receive some lengthy discussion.

Commissioners will also discuss ending health insurance in retirement for employees hired in the future. That would save the county money, but make working for government less attractive.

If commissioners pass the resolution, it doesn't appear to affect future employees. So, those currently working for the county would not lose their retirement health insurance benefits.

A mainstay of many government jobs is a healthy benefits package including insurance, retirement savings and other perks. It appears that some of those benefits may be going the way of some county jobs that were shed this year.