15 Comments

Mrs Westfall is correct in speaking up no one person (Mayor) should have that much control of the citizens money and city control. The council members are just puppets this way.

I will take Charter government as the Citizens have more power if they really step up.

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100% agreed.

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Thank you, Mrs Westfall for being very clear and precise. Troy must reconsider what form of government they need and want. It is becoming increasingly clear Charter government is more inclusive.

Under Statutory form of government power is focused in too few people and we all know such power

becomes addictive for some people.

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In the 90's, sorry I can't remember the specific year, Mayor Pete Jenkins formed a committee of citizens to consider the question of changing our form of city government. I was honored to be on that committee.

If the committee recommended a change, another committee would write the charter. The proposed charter would then be, or not be, ratified by the citizens through an election.

We heard from the Service and Safety Director Larry Wolke, other staff members, representatives of surrounding cities with charter governments, and others.

My conclusion was that we should at least write a charter, and let the people decided if they want the change, but the majority of the committee believed we should not "fix what isn't broken"

These recent events has only strengthened my opinion.

However, the citizens MUST be involved! Only a very small amount of citizens voted in the last mayoral election, and this is too important for people to ignore.

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Yeah, it seems like every 20 to 30 years we have a discussion is had on what kind of governmental system we need to have. Perhaps it's time to have that discussion again.

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I'm not a bit surprised that Pete’s suggestion was shelved. We thought every mayor would more or less be like Pete Jenkins. Can you imagine our current Mayor coming up with that?

Personalities and competence aside, Charter governments do, in light of our present form, look appealing. However, a close examination of what the downside of such a change would be is warranted. I'll be looking forward to your guidance, Bill.

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I will dive deeper into this, but what I have learned is that it's not much the system you have, rather than the people you have in the system.

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Well that’s the truth

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Apr 5Edited

I have thought many a time in the last few weeks, "I can't even imagine what Pete Jenkins would think of the current city administration and the idea that they'd just say "screw 'em all" and get away with closing down Main Street for ten months."

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I can guarantee you that he would not stand for any of this. Nor would Mike.

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Agreed.

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What an absolute relief to hear Mrs. Westfall speak up. That can't put her in an easy position with her ongoing roles on council and the planning commission. But she's on the right side of the issue.

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She is not on the planning commission. The only elected official on the planning commission is the Mayor.

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Ah, right. Thanks for the correction. I was thinking park commissioners but my fingers typed planning commission. Either way, her role there has concluded.

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Yeah, she was on the Park Commission for a while, but she resigned that spot to be on council.

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