No need for wholesale changes

By The Gazette Editorial Board

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The Cedar Rapids Home Rule Charter, approved by voters in 2005, required the City Council to create a Charter Review Commission this year, and then every decade thereafter. That's good. When a community makes a big change in its form of local government, it makes sense to periodically pull back and see how it's working, and whether adjustments are in order.

That said, we don't see a need for big changes here, at least not yet. The citizens council-professional manager form that replaced the full-time commissioners-mayor system is still relatively new. The commissioner style was in place from 1908 through 2005 before it fell into voter disfavor.

And let's all remember that any government system's effectiveness and responsiveness is largely a product of who's in office and the extent of residents' engagement with their elected representatives.

Certainly, there have been growing pains with our change of local government. An epic flood presented enormous challenges just over two years into the change. Our first city manager, Jim Prosser, became the main target of both praise and criticism, in part because the first city council in the new form expected a lot from him. And when voters installed a new mayor after the incumbent decided not to run, and also changed the makeup of the City Council, Prosser left.

But given the circumstances, and the nature of democracy, bumps can be expected.

The flood crisis quickly turned the part-time City Council positions into high-stress, nearly full-time jobs. The crisis has eased somewhat but council duty will be especially demanding for some time as this community continues to recover from the disaster and its leaders make decisions on the direction that recovery should take.

Mayor Ron Corbett gets one vote like every other council member, but clearly he's become the face of this city and a driving force in decision-making. And very busy. After one year in office, the CRST project manager, a former Chamber of Commerce leader and Republican speaker of the Iowa House of Representatives, told a Gazette reporter: “This is the hardest job I've ever had in my life.”

We don't doubt that. And regardless of how you grade the mayor's performance, our community can be thankful that CRST has been supportive of Corbett as he dealt with the escalated demands of public office during this unusually difficult period.

Some even have called for the mayor's position to be full-time, with a commensurate pay hike from the base of $30,000.

While the salary may need some adjustment, we don't think it's time to change the office's status to full-time. Nor do we see a need to add or subtract city council seats or make other wholesale restructuring. This form of government is still evolving. Give it more time to prove itself.