BY FREDA MIKLIN
GOVERNMENTAL REPORTER
At a study session of the Aurora City Council held via remote participation on August 7, the council discussed City of Aurora Resolution R2023-93 (the Resolution), “expressing the Aurora City Council’s desire to oppose a Mayor/Council form of city government.”
The Resolution, sponsored by Council Member Juan Marcano, who is an announced candidate for mayor in November, pertains to a ballot initiative that has been preliminarily certified to be submitted to the city’s voters on November 7.
The Resolution contains assertions that:
“The circulators for the (Ballot) Initiative utilized deceptive practices to obtain signatures from the public;”
“The Council/Manager form of City government combines the strong political leadership of elected officials with the strong managerial experience of an appointed manager or administrator;”
“The Mayor will not have the same strong managerial experience and public administration background that an appointed manager would have;”
“The City’s (current) Council/Manager form of government has ten Council Members and a Mayor with diverse backgrounds and experience that represent the whole City;”
“The Council does not want to allow nepotism and cronyism that are seen in other Mayor/Council forms of City government;”
“The Council does not want to allow the Mayor’s Office to be subject to the highest bidder;”
“The Council does not want to see favoritism because of campaign support.”
During the discussion of the Resolution, Council Member Marcano said, “I think that supporting one form of government and taking opposition against a specific measure, especially for the reasons in the recitals…I think it’s important that the public understand that we are united in doing so and this is an opportunity for us to take that stance.”
Council Member Steve Sundberg observed that the Mayor/Council form of government “is working in other cities,” and he named Denver and Colorado Springs as examples. Noting that, “This hasn’t been debated at all,” he asked, “What would proponents say about how this would benefit our city? “
Mayor Coffman, who has donated $10,000 to support the Ballot Initiative, answered, “Having an elected official who is accountable directly to the people, that can have a vision for the city in terms of the direction, the development of the budget— there is so much policy involved in the budget, it ought to be an elected official that does that.”
In describing the contents of the Ballot Initiative, he said, “There is an extra check and balance by having veto authority over the decisions made by Council. But, at the same time, there is a check and balance because Council, at any time, with merely six votes, can refer all or part of the initiative back to the voters for reconsideration.” He noted that that happened in Denver, where some mayoral powers were changed to require council consent. Coffman continued, “We’re the 51st largest city in America and we have the urban challenges of race, poverty, and crime. I think it’s time to make a change.”
Mayor Pro Tem Curtis Gardner responded, “The size of the city is not in any way relevant to the structure of government. Some of the largest cities in America, including Dallas, the fourth largest city in the US, (along with) Phoenix, San Jose, and Charlotte are all city manager forms of government. Some of the most corruptly run cities in the U.S., including New York, Los Angeles, and Chicago are strong mayor cities… Denver is…taking away power from their strong mayor, including requiring Council approval of mayoral appointees…In a dozen ways, perhaps more, this proposal goes further than even the strong mayor powers given to Denver…and Colorado Springs.”
Gardner said it wasn’t fair to compare Aurora to Denver or Colorado Springs because there are important differences between what is proposed in the ballot initiative and how the system works in those cities.
Coffman countered that the ballot initiative was “based on Colorado Springs” and that few cities administered either the mayor/council system or the council/manager form of government exactly the same way.
The mayor continued, “A city manager is not directly accountable to the voters. He is accountable to the city council, so, six members of the city council can do away with the city manager, whereas the mayor is directly accountable to the people and not to the city council.”
Council Member Alison Coombs pointed out that no elected official in Aurora has been held accountable by the voters in the past four years because the only mechanism available to do so is a recall election “and that hasn’t happened, even though people have been incredibly upset about decisions made by elected officials in this city.”
She continued, “When there have been issues with the city manager, elected officials who are as accountable to the people as the mayor, have…directed the city manager to address those issues being raised by their constituents…I don’t think anything in the petition that you put forward makes it any easier for people to hold the mayor accountable than it is for council to hold the city manager accountable to our constituents. So, I fail to see how this (Ballot Initiative) increases accountability to the voters by vesting all that authority…in one person instead of across 11 people.”
Mayor Coffman responded, “I mentioned a vision. This council has established virtually no vision for the growth of this city in terms of economic development… The city manager unilaterally has the authority to move money around and could in fact initiate an economic development plan, but he’s accountable to the Council and the Council would probably dismiss him if he did that.” He continued, “The city manager could establish whole departments without the consent of council. In fact, that was done by the last city manager who established a DEI (Diversity Equity and Inclusion) office without the consent of council,” which Coombs disputed.
She continued, “I believe we’ll have the economic development conversation moving forward…It’s in public records that this council supports developing a comprehensive economic development plan. We just don’t support one that has a complete lack of details going into the conversation.” Coffman answered, “I differ with you on that. I think that Council has not moved forward.”
Council Member Juan Marcano talked about the process used in Colorado Springs to adopt the Mayor/Council form of government, adding that, for Aurora, “This is a very costly initiative that could potentially really be disruptive to city services.”
When Coffman polled the council on the Resolution to oppose the ballot initiative, Council Members Coombs, Gardner, Jurinsky, Lawson, Marcano, and Murillo indicated they were in favor. Council Member Zvonek indicated he was against. Council Members Bergan, Medina, and Sundberg did not respond. On that basis, Mayor Coffman declared the resolution would move forward for an official vote at the August 14 city council meeting, where it was placed on the consent agenda and where it was adopted without any further discussion by the mayor or any council members.
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