Serving Lucas, Ottawa, Sandusky and Wood Counties
Former Northwood city councilman Dave Gallaher, who served from 1993 to 2013, is in the process of gathering signatures for a proposed amendment to the city’s charter.
“It will make the city better,” he said. “That's the bottom line. I have my own opinion on every member of council and what they're doing and how well they're doing for the city, but I'm convinced that even if I disagree with them, every one of them is doing the best they can. I can't fault them on effort, but I'm frustrated.”
Thus, Gallaher is proposing an amendment that states “no member of council shall interfere with, direct, or attempt to direct the city administrator or any employee in the performance of their duties, except through the city administrator and the mayor as provided in this charter.”
“When someone calls a council member and says, my trash wasn't picked up, then the council member gets on the phone and tries to represent that person. When they say ‘the neighbor's yard is unkempt,’ then they get on the phone and they call the city, and they step in to represent that person.
“That's really nice, except for the fact that it morphs into something where council is giving direction at times to employees, department heads, and the administrator. And that gums up the works. That creates a situation where, no matter how good the intention is, it messes with the schedules.
“It creates confusion with employees. And it moves the scheduled responsibilities that the department heads or the administrator might have to a different time or day because they're too busy responding to what the council members see as a need in the city.”
Gallaher’s proposal would implement a process where any resident, officer, or employee of the city may file a written complaint alleging a violation of this action, and upon receipt of the complaint, the mayor must refer the matter for independent review by a qualified third-party investigator not employed by the city within 10 days.
The investigator shall have demonstrated professional experience in public administration, labor relations, ethics compliance, or municipal law. Additionally, the investigator shall be selected from a pre-approved list of firms or professionals established by ordinance and approved by council prior to any complaint being filed.
Furthermore, the investigator shall conduct an impartial investigation and issue written findings within 45 days of referral, delivering the findings to the mayor, city council, and the complainant. The findings shall be made available to the public and maintained as a permanent record of the city.
“I spent a lot of years on council, so I kind of know what it's like to be in that seat, and there is no training for council members,” Gallaher said. “Everybody, every position in the city, you cannot get a job cutting grass in this city unless you can prove that you know how to cut grass, and you cannot be a police officer unless you're certified. You can't be a firefighter unless you go to school.
“Every position in our city has requirements before you can be hired. Council doesn't have that. It's on-the-job training. Council members come in and many of them do not have any political experience, and for some people that’s appealing, so they vote for him. ‘Well, the guy’s not a politician, so I'll vote for him.’ And that's what gets them elected.
“But once they're elected, then it's on-the-job training. They look at everybody else, and they see what they're doing. And they think, well, that must be my job. That's the way they approach it. They're doing their best to be responsive to the people that voted for them.”
If the independent review investigator finds that a council member has interfered with administration or city operations, council shall hold a public meeting within 30 days to consider appropriate corrective action, which may include: a formal resolution of censure, removal from committee assignments, mandatory ethics or governance training, or referral of the findings to the Wood County Prosecutor or the Ohio Ethics Commission if warranted.
All findings, corrective actions, and council resolutions taken under this section shall be maintained as public record and posted on the city’s official website for a period of not less than five years.
Finally, any repeated or willful interference by a council member shall constitute malfeasance in office as defined under Ohio law and may be grounds for recall by the electors as identified in this charter.
Gallaher said this is a way to hold council members accountable during their four-year term in office.
“At different times, obviously, the general public gets frustrated with council members because of the way they vote or because of what they say,” he said. “And right now, the voters are the people that put these people in office. They elect the mayor and all of council. And then there's four years, and they get a chance to elect them again or get a new representative. But in between that four years, the people have no control at all. There's nothing they can do except if they want to call for a recall on an elected member.”
Gallaher said the current application of the process can tend to be inefficient.
“If you read the charter, the charter clearly states that the administrator is responsible for the daily operation of the city,” he said. “The mayor is not responsible for the daily operation of the city. The mayor is responsible to the people for how the city is operated, but he's not responsible for the daily operation.
“The mayor has to instruct the administrator about where he wants to go and what he wants to do. Now that's the administrator's job to make sure that's done. The administrator works with the department heads and gives them the same instruction — here's where we're going, here's what I want done. It's a department head's job to make sure the employees are doing that. And that's what makes the city move. Now, if we have other input to the administrator from council members, now instead of having one person set the direction of the city, we've got one person and seven council members trying to set the direction of the city It's not very efficient.”
PEOPLE ARE NOT THE PROBLEM
“The problem here is not the people, as I see it,” Gallaher said. “The problem is the process. And what we have to do is we have to remind the council members that your job is from this point to this point and stay in those parameters and let the rest of the city operate the way it should.
“If this amendment is approved, it’s going to make the city much more efficient. It's going to give the administrator more time to do what he needs to get done because he's not going to have to deal with council members getting involved in daily operations. It's going to make the department heads more efficient. It's even going to make council members more efficient because they can focus on the things that they really need to get done.
SPEED LIMIT SIGN
“At the opposite end of it, you can look at this as a speed limit sign. We all drive down the roads, and we drive past a hundred speed limit signs. And for the most part, you never even see them because you know kind of, well, this is kind of a 35-mile-an-hour road, or this is a 50. If you don't know, then you do look for the speed limit sign. If you're not sure, you look for that sign to say, how fast should I be going?
“Well, this amendment is nothing more than a speed limit sign for council. If they're doing everything they should be doing according to the charter currently, this amendment will have no effect on them whatsoever. They'll never hear of it.
“If, in fact, they're not doing that, and if they're coloring outside the lines a little bit, then this is an opportunity for a correction to make them better council members. It’s progress.”
GETTING BACK ON TRACK
“The amendment gives a chance for corrective action,” Gallaher said. “I've been very vocal in the past, and I've attended council meetings, and time after time, I've voiced my opinion that council does not have any responsibilities for supervision of the city. In our charter, there's no allowance for a council member to any employee, none at all, zero. But that's just my opinion.
“I go to council, and I share that opinion, but when push comes to shove, I tell them I see a problem. One of council’s responsibilities is to interpret the charter. They read the charter, I hope. And obviously they don't see a problem, but I see it in the charter. It spells it out in the charter. If council doesn't recognize that problem as a problem, then they're not going to act on it.
“What this amendment does is provide clarity. It can’t be more clear. It provides clarity to what council's responsibility is. And then if there is a problem, it provides a way to fix that problem by someone reporting it. Then after that, there’s a process the mayor has to do.
TRANSPARENCY
“What this amendment does is first, it sets the rules,” Gallaher said. “It sets the lines that shouldn't be crossed. Those rules are very clear. It sets the lines that are very clear to what council's responsibilities are not. Now if you color outside those lines, there's a corrective action. The most important part of this whole amendment is it's transparent. There's no one that's going to be able to say this was a cover up or you guys didn't tell me. Once that complaint is written, everything is transparent. It's public knowledge.
“And even if you read into it, when there is a finding, it's attached to the website, the city's website, for five years. People can go back and see if a council member has been called on the carpet four or five times in four years, you be the judge, you decide if it's valid or not. It’s transparent and in the last forum, that's what everyone wanted, more transparency. This is transparency.”
NEXT STEPS
Gallaher is working on getting approximately 400 signatures, which equates to over 10 percent of around 3,000 registered voters in the city. He will then present it to the city clerk, who will document the petition, accept it, and turn it over to council. From there, council must deliver it to the board of elections in Wood County. The board of elections will certify all the signatures, make sure they're all proper, make sure the petition's proper, make sure the amendment is proper. And then it'll go on the ballot.
“I don’t want it to seem like this was an afterthought or a response to the election,” Gallaher said. “I want to make sure people understood I've been working on this for a while, and I've been just kind of sitting on it. It's not to have more confusion or to have more distraction during the election.”
Gallaher said that while he and some volunteers will be out gathering signatures in the city, residents can also visit his Facebook page, titled “Northwood In Focus 2.0,” where they can message him with any questions or interest in signing.
“This has been kind of a busy year for Northwood as far as some really important things that were changed, and people get upset about the change, and they want to hold our elected officials personally responsible for that,” Gallaher said. “And whether I agree with these people or not, I have to believe that they’re doing what they think is best — even if I disagree with them, I have to believe that they're doing what they think is best. If in fact that is the case, then changing the people is not going to change the direction of the city.
“If we're going to affect change, then we have to do something that will support change. And changing the city charter to make it clearer will achieve that goal. We will be making it better and easier to understand exactly what council's role is in the city and what we expect out of them.”
