City manager might work for Uniontown
A report charting the future of Uniontown states the obvious by suggesting that the city would do well to consider hiring a full-time city manager. Unfortunately, given the current cast of mayor and council, the recommendation appears dead on arrival. “There’s nothing wrong with suggesting and discussing ways to improve the city, but I don’t think a manager is needed,” said Mayor James Sileo.
Sileo and two of the four councilmen are advanced in age, retired from the work force and devote most of the 9-to-5 day parked at city hall, dabbling in the broad and the minute business of running a third-class city. They are paid very little for this public service, and the mayor often pats himself and the others on the back for doing a good job running their departments. While this arrangement might suit them and keep the status quo, politics change, and there is no guarantee that a change in leadership would elicit the same level of involvement.
Sileo and councilmen Blair Jones and Bob Cerjanic’s dedication can’t be challenged. But what of their effectiveness?
The way Uniontown’s government is structured, services are divided into separate categories, such as fire, police, sanitation, streets and finances, with each department having a full-time supervisor who reports to either the mayor or a designated council member. Each department basically is dependent on the mix of personalities and the ability of its council member to gain support from colleagues. The mayor and council members tend to become protective of their own little fiefdoms. Few innovative efforts are initiated, and change is rarely embraced.
The current setup protects the power of the mayor and council and can leave the departments hostage to either meddling micro-managers or absentee councilmen. Important decisions can fall through the cracks. Employee morale can suffer if one department thinks it’s shortchanged, arguments over budgets and spending can break out, and issues that don’t fall neatly into one of the departments cause confusion.
Compartmentalizing might not be the best way to run a city. The mayor and council are and should be in charge of setting Uniontown’s course through developing budgets and policies that employees are expected to carry out. Although we are reluctant to suggest that another layer should be added to any government, the case can be made to hire a competent city manager to oversee council’s initiatives and handle the day-to-day management tasks on an even keel. The expense of salary and benefits for a good city manager can often be recouped either through more cost-effective management and purchasing practices or by aggressive and innovative pursuit of grants.
Sileo should not be so quick to dismiss the idea of a city manager. Instead he should signal the committee that it should dig further and then weigh the costs and benefits.