For those of you who didn’t tune into channel 3 last night, the Lacey Mayor added to the agenda, just hours before the meeting, critical items that quite clearly had been planned for weeks. This determined lack of respect for the process of involving the community in important decisions for the city is demonstrative of his style of control—this could not be called leadership—of the city.
After canceling the last city council meeting (10/8), Graeme added to his mayoral report the item of his monologue on the fire district/city relationship and then a second report item on a Citizen Advisory Committee (CAC) regarding fire and EMS (emergency medical services). What Graeme presented was a series of slides, depicting a very clearly one sided and even at times inaccurate picture about the performance of the fire district. He even went on and further presented two contrasting positions regarding a city proposal and a fire district proposal for a new joint service contract. Some people who are privy to these documents (remember, they’re not public) have opined that the city, or in this case Graeme Sackrison, was never intent on making it work. In the city’s request, they asked the fire district to clearly take on more work, reduce perimeter/district service, and more importantly, wanted political control of the operations. Considering the degree of funding and the matter of control, it draws serious question if the contract thing was really ever meant to work or simply a drama act to help sell the position to the council. An “I tried” argument or referred to last night as “due diligence”.
What’s telling about last night is two key issues: the matter of control, and the degree in which certain council members will go to keep power. The issue of control is that the city is demanding control of the fire department but at the same time has refused to consider to jointly manage fire protection in such a way the city and district residents would have equal say and control. The only difference between a “regional fire authority” approach (what dozen of fire departments are doing in the state now) and the city’s approach/request is that the city council would not have direct say but city elected representatives would. What Graeme wants the fire district to do is have a junior taxing district/county fire department sign over their authority. This is at least a horrible dereliction of duty and potentially an illegal act for a fire district elected commissioner to do. Would a city council sign over all control to its city manager? That might be a bad example in Lacey, but you get the point.
The other issue was the matter of the “Citizen Advisory Commission” which is being used as a substitute for public hearing and input. For weeks, people have been calling city hall regarding the CAC, and not even getting the service of a return phone call, simply wanting answers to “how is the CAC picked”, “when was the group selected”, “when were the applications posted”, “what information was made available to the CAC”, and even who was named to the CAC. All of which are and should be matters of public record but clearly are not in open violation of the Open Public Meetings Act (OPMA).
On Wednesday night, the CAC met with Sackrison and they received his version of events and on Thursday night they agreed unanimously with Mr. Sackrison. There were minutes of this meeting with the city, but they are being actively kept confidential. Good thing we got to see them.
A review of the CAC membership revealed that the “cross section” of the community that Graeme described were in nearly every example a friend or a business relationship of the Graeme himself. Including public supporters, friends, dependant business partners, and those who have a pre-existing axe to grind with the fire department. The CAC was chosen to provide a specific rubber stamp and would have reached the conclusion every time especially considering the story they received. This group would have found OJ innocent a 100 times as long as Graeme was directing.
It’s beyond disappointing on how power will protect power and how honesty and integrity very clearly is not a consideration for some at city hall. The questions of fairness, equality, and personal agenda are far bigger concerns than the functions of fire service in Lacey, and without a doubt are becoming more apparent to more people every day.
“Courage is what it takes to stand up and speak; courage is also what it takes to sit down and listen.” Winston Churchill
“Absolute power corrupts absolutely.” Lord Acton