The Mancos and Dolores town boards teamed up Wednesday night to talk effective and ethical governance.
The governance workshop was led by Sam Mamet, executive director of the Colorado Municipal League.
Mamet covered issues including policy-setting, ethics, efficiency, and transparency in local government. Threaded throughout the presentation, he highlighted the importance of maintaining clearly defined roles and responsibilities in meetings and in town operations.
Policy-setting, Mamet said, is at the heart of being on a governing board. Policies are the ends, he said, while the means need to be determined, often by staff. However, these means are not always so easily determined.
“What’s the best interest of the public?” he said. “We should never, ever, ever take for granted our good citizens in our community. We should strive for transparency.”
At the same time, he added, they are not a “Roman Senate” putting their votes up for community consensus – they are tasked with making decisions, which involves ruffling feathers at times.
But it is important for a board to prove its capacity for efficient decision-making, he said. And a crucial manner of proving this is for a board to stick to its agenda, Mamet said.
“Efficiency means if we say we’re going to look at these issues this Tuesday night, that’s what you work on,” Mamet said. “And that’s what people expect. Rationale and analytical decision-making is always a template to follow. In other words, people want to know at the end of the day, ‘How did you actually reach the conclusions you did on that particular decision?’”
Governing boards also need to present a unified front, he said, even in the face of internal disagreements.
“Don’t demonize, ever, ever, ever, that particular trustee or councilmember who’s on the other side of the vote on that particular issue,” Mamet told the workshop attendees. “Because the next vote that comes up, you’re going to be working together. Nobody’s an enemy here.”
Targeting his crowd, Mamet noted that small town governance is especially intertwined with the community..
“Everybody, in a small town particularly, is connected in some way with everybody else,” he said. “There’s relationships in this community of Dolores and in Mancos. And utilize those, because people know each other, and they know things that are going on.”
During discussion, board members voiced concerns about balancing their roles as elected officials and community members.
“I’m active in the community, and there are constraints once you become a trustee,” said Mancos board member Betsy Harrison.
“It’s like walking on eggs,” added fellow trustee Ed Hallam. “You got to know what to say.”
A few Dolores board members asked about the process of handling complaints within boards and town staff. Mancos Town Administrator Heather Alvarez emphasized the importance of rigidly following an established chain of command.
“We have a very firm chain of command up and down,” Alvarez said. “And we absolutely enforce it. As the town manager, town administrator, I enforce it both ways.”
And professional decorum in all mediums is key, along with thick skin, attendees all agreed.
“Stay off Facebook,” said Mancos Mayor Queenie Barz.
And Mancos board member Cindy Simpson’s parting advice: “If you don’t want to see it as a headline, don’t ever say it or write it.”
ealvero@the-journal.com