To the editor:

I have been a municipal finance director and city clerk for over 21 years, the last almost 19 years in Langley. I am strongly opposed to Proposition 1 on the Langley ballot in August to change to a council-manager form of government.

I have looked over the website provided by the “Yes on Langley Proposition 1” committee. I fail to see any facts to back up the reasons given for Langley needing an expensive and unnecessary change in city government.

The website states that having a hired professional manager frees up the mayor (a council member appointed by the rest of the council) and council to focus on community leadership and policy direction. How? What would be different for the council that would make them free to concentrate on policy now that they would be directing the manager?

They state that there would be better opportunities for citizen participation and citizens would have more opportunities to have their concerns heard by leadership. How is that? What would make it easier for citizen participation? There is no explanation for these assertions. A mayor is elected by the people he represents and is accountable to them; a manager is hired by and accountable to the council only.

They also state that it would be more cost effective to have a manager. How? Where are those savings? Is the city going to let more staff go? Would the manager take over doing staff work?

The website uses the costs in the 2010 Langley budget for the mayor and his assistant and ignores the fact that those costs were reduced in the 2011 budget and if the change of government does not go through, the next mayor has announced he wants a much smaller salary without benefits and without an assistant resulting in further savings to the city and its citizens.

They go on to list the costs of administrations in other small cities. All the cities listed with the exception of Carnation, are mayor-council cities with a paid mayor and a paid administrator. City administrators in small cities are not paid as highly as city managers.

If you average the costs in the cities they list for mayors and administrators, the average cost is $96,947 per year.  The cost in Carnation, the one city they list with a manager is $140,326 annually. That is $43,379 more than the average city with a paid mayor and administrator. Langley’s next mayor has no plans for an administrator or assistant saving considerably more.

The proponents on Prop. 1 state that a city manager would provide better working conditions for staff. Once again, my question as a city staff member is, how?

They state that conditions change dramatically with each new administration. True, yet they would also change dramatically with each new manager.

Turnover in city managers is high, with an average of two to five years in each city. Any time the staff remains and the boss is changed, conditions are going to change for staff.

They say that a manager would spend less time in meetings with department heads because a manager would not have to be educated by staff. Meetings are usually more centered on what is going on, not educating mayors and the amount of meetings held are totally dependant on the manager/mayor’s style of management.

Another assertion is that a professional city manager would belong to professional associations so that he/she would have free resources and networking. This is true. It is also true that the mayor and department heads currently belong to many professional municipal associations and also have and use this to access to free resources and networking.

It is also stated that because a manager would know about municipal law, the city would save on legal services. There is no evidence to back this up. Mercer Island (a council-manager city) was just fined $90,000 for withholding records from a former employee. Yakima (a council-manager city) just settled a legal suit brought by three of its police officers. Tacoma’s city manager was sued for firing a city employee. Having a manager cannot assure low legal fees.

The website also talks about Langley’s large $4.6 million budget and states that a 5 percent improvement in efficiency is worth $230,000. That $4.6 million is all the revenue that the city has, not the amount that is spent per year.

For all funds, the average actual expenditures per year are about $2.7 million which includes transfers and expenditures made from one fund to another. The $4.6 million budget is the city’s overall budget for capital improvements, reserves, water, sewer and stormwater utilities, cemetery, streets, etc. The general fund budget which pays for most city services is $1.3 million.

The council-mayor form of government is the most used form of government in cities of Langley’s size in this state. The only other city in the state with a population under 2,500 that has a council-manager form of government is Carnation.

The form of government we have is not broken and doesn’t need fixing. There will be some mayors who are better administrators than others; the same is true of city managers.

A change of government in Langley is not what is needed. I urge all city residents to vote no on Prop. 1.

DEBBIE MAHLER

Clinton