On November 10th Tulsa citizens will be asked to vote on a charter change proposal that would modify council terms from two to three years and would stagger those terms so that every year three of the nine councilors would be up for election. Further, for the first three years, the terms for the three sets of three would be 1 year for the first three districts, 2 for the second and 3 for the third.
In my first post we talked about the faulty assertion that this change will protect the continuity of the council. In review, aside from the first council, there has never been a council will all freshmen members. This current council has decades of experience and only 2 freshman councilors. I've yet to see a council with out continuity.
So if the benefit is not the continuity of the council, what is the benefit? Or more precisely who will be the beneficiary of this change? The most important beneficiary of any change in government should be the people. Unfortunately this charger change doesn't benefit you, it benefits professional campaign managers, and it benefits crummy councilors that need to be voted out of office.
We have already established that the supposed benefit to the electorate of a council with continuity is bunk. But even it it wasn't, this charter change presupposes that it is in your best interest to have continuity in the council. What if it was the will of all nine districts to get rid of a particularly crummy council? Under this change it would take Tulsans up to 3 years to get rid of them all. But again, this has never happened so what is the point of the change?
With two-year-terms there is a 50/50 chance that controversial issues decided by the council will fall on an election year. Should they want to get re-elected, the council must keep their constituency in mind when deciding issues that might anger them. Under this proposed change, there would be only a 1 in 3 chance that any one councilor would be in danger of feeling the wrath of an enraged electorate. This change could emboldened the council to act on issues that run contrary to the wishes their district. Councilors that anger their district have everything to gain from this change. If they happen to upset constituents the first year of their term, they will now have 2 long years to hope their actions are forgotten. All the councilors, crummy or not, will benefit as they will no longer have to run for re-election every other year. This benefit should not be understated; having two whole years to prepare for re-election is an amazing gift.
Perhaps the greatest beneficiary of this change are the few professional campaign managers who focus on local elections. These guys will now have the certainty of a job every year. There is a certain kind of candidate that pairs particularity well with some of Tulsa's "finest" campaign managers. (The kind with deep pockets and mid-town way of thinking) This change make it easier for these parings to happen, and provide these managers not only the chance of more business, but a council election job every year, instead of every other year.
Do you really want every year to be an city council election year? Do you really want to provide the council cover and protection from re-election? Do you really want give the guys behind some of the more negative ads you've seen this election year more busness?
I didn't think so. Don't forget to vote against this charter change. On November 10th, vote NO on staggered three-year council terms
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