Council Sets Framework Members Agree On Top 3 Goals And How To Achieve Them

It may not have been all peace, love and understanding, but for a City Council many believed would be noted for its rancor, it was pretty close.

Huddled together in an all-day retreat Saturday to discuss their goals for 2000, council members emerged shaking hands, optimistic and encouraged about the upcoming year.

The council prioritized 10 issues to focus on, and laid out the specific ground work for three: managing the transition to the strong mayor form of government, finishing the growth management process and stimulating economic development.

But perhaps more important, the council achieved a degree of harmony, complete with good-natured kidding and gracious appreciation for each other’s comments and suggestions. The tired audience of onlookers applauded the spirit of cooperation.

“Today demonstrated that we can work together, ” said first-year Councilman Steve Corker. “We can be respectful.”

That wasn’t always the case in the council’s only other encounter as a group, last week’s council meeting, which was punctuated by fierce questioning and a combative tone.

Some of the members who arrived at the retreat, held at Spokane Intercollegiate Research and Technology Institute, expected more of the same.

“I think it was a lot better,” said Councilwoman Roberta Greene.

“We actually came out with measurables: goals, agreements. When I think about where we were when we first came into the room and where we’re leaving, it’s amazing.”

Much of the credit was given to the retreat’s moderator, Mark Yeoell, vice president of John Scherer and Associates, a management consulting firm.

With a disarming British accent and carefully laid out rules of engagement, Yeoell had the council members dutifully following orders and patiently listening to one another. And while some members confessed to early skepticism about his new management techniques - Yeoell drew “polarity maps” to explain “creative tension” and help the council become a “high-performing team” - they liked the results enough to ask him back for a second retreat.

“Would he run for council president?” Councilwoman Cherie Rodgers joked after the meeting.

It didn’t all go smoothly.

There were significant disagreements, perhaps most glaringly over the need to immediately start the process of reorganizing city government. Councilman Steve Eugster argued for rapid change so strong mayor candidates and voters would know the boundaries of the new office. Greene said the new mayor should have a role in establishing the structure of the new city government.

“I know you wrote the initiative, Steve, but there is nowhere in there that sets it up all down the line,” she said.

Ultimately, they compromised, with the council agreeing to let an outside efficiency consultant recommend changes and the timetable for initiating them.

The council also set a year-end deadline for the completion of the comprehensive plan, the necessary document to comply with the state’s Growth Management Act, and to develop a task force to appraise the council on business initiatives.

The council needs a body to help it communicate with the city’s various economic development groups, said Mayor John Talbott.

“We need to bring the council and the groups together so we’re not out there searching for information,” Talbott said. “We need to know exactly where the private sector is going with economic development so we can position ourselves to help them.”

The council members reached their list of priorities by first coming up with nine categories, then by voting with stickers on the topics that were of the highest importance. The council agreed unanimously that the transition to strong mayor was of the highest priority, with growth management and economic development high on the list.

Next came revitalizing neighborhoods, followed by fixing streets, enhancing funding for public safety and expanding on the higher education and high-tech campus of SIRTI and Riverpoint Education Park.

In a three-way tie for ninth on the list, with no votes as priorities, came movement toward regional government, protecting and enhancing the environment, and promoting open, responsible government.