A few days ago, ballots showed Olympia and Tumwater voters rejecting, by nearly 2 to 1, the proposal to dissolve the two city fire departments and form a sort-of regional fire authority.
It would only have been a “sort of” regional fire authority because Lacey Fire District 3, already independent of city government, didn’t even need to wait for the election to see the writing on the wall; it declined to participate without even considering asking its voters.
In the wake of such a landslide defeat, our city councils may be tempted to just treat the issue like the proverbial red hot stove and stay as far from it as possible. And it would certainly be easy for elected officials to just say “The voters have spoken” and get onto other subjects as quickly as possible.
But that would do us all a disservice. Because the crushing “No” vote reflects a pretty substantial mismatch between the opinions of the two councils that voted to put the question on the ballot and the opinions of a substantial supermajority of the people they serve.
And with the results now in view, do the city council members think the
voters got it wrong, and that the proposal should have passed? And if so, do they
intend to re-work the idea and bring it back to voters? Presumably the regional
fire authority scheme was aimed at solving some kind of problem; what was that
problem? And what do city officials intend to do about that problem now that
their first idea earned so little public support?
The taxpayers of both cities just spent a lot of money to conduct an election
for just this one question. For that reason alone, residents deserve some out-loud
public reflection from the city councils about the vote results and the alternatives
to address whatever problem or problems that made them reach for a regional
fire authority as a solution to it. One topic the cities might usefully consider
thinking about out loud is why, if regionalizing services is good for firefighting,
why not for all services by merging the two cities?
After all, it’s not every day that cities propose to lop off some of their most
historic core functions and give them over to a new single-purpose special district.
What made them propose such a thing in this instance? And what’s next now that
the voters refused to go along?
~ John Gear, Olympia
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jimlazar
It would be useful to see a full accounting of what the Cities spent for this failure.
First, they hired a very expensive consultant to help design the flawed Fire Benefit Charge mechanism.
Then, they devoted a lot of staff and City Council time to meetings. As Councilmember Huynh said, "we had a lot of meetings and worked really hard on this." Except at all of those meetings, they only listed to the City Staff and the consultant. They never invited the public to sit at the table and ask hard questions. Lots of money spent.
They devoted a lot of staff time to answering questions, including dozens of public records requests that were needed for the public to actually learn what they were proposing. That's where we found their proposed salary schedules, the actual fact that they planned zero new firefighters, and other things. More money spent.
After they voted to put it on the ballot, the City staff (and perhaps yet another consultant) spent time drafting a blatantly promotional mailer, to convince voters to approve the RFA. More money spent.
City council members and firefighters, including the Fire Chief, attended a lot of public forums to discuss the proposal. More time spent, and time is money.
Then, of course, they had to pay the County Auditor to run a special single-issue election. They could have waited until August, when an election was being held anyway, but they were in a hurry-up before the public finds out how bad this is frame of mind. More money spent.
There are now several complaints filed with the Public Disclosure Commission against the individuals at the Cities who put together and authorize the spending on the promotional fliers. I'll bet the Cities are spending more money on attorneys to "defend" these people for having (allegedly) broken the law. More money spent.
I hope there is a comprehensive tabulation of the time and money spent for staff, consultants, printing, mailing, meetings, meeting spaces, attorneys and more for this mistake. We should hold the elected officials accountable for this waste.
Tuesday, May 2, 2023 Report this
Claire
Mr. Lazar is correct. The proposed RFA was ill conceived, misrepresented, falsely promoted and DOA. The citizenry appropriately rejected Prop 1.
Any further attempt should be soundly rejected as well.
Tuesday, May 2, 2023 Report this
Tractor1
The statement that the two city councils and the public have a wide difference. of opinions should be examined. How dare the councils don't agree with the voters! The public should be castigated for not agreeing with their public servants,Pretty cheeky on the publics part.
But remember it is "we the people" not the elected officials who decide what is best for us.
Tuesday, May 2, 2023 Report this
jhender
Now if only we could get the ill-conceived "Zero-Parking Proposal" requirements on a ballot the local citizenry might be able to reverse the city planning commission's decision. Depending on real estate developers to do the right thing when it's in their economic interest not to is the apotheosis of naiveté.
Tuesday, May 2, 2023 Report this