lotzothoughtzpages - City Government

Roanoke City’s governmental structure truly needs fundamental reforms, alterations to its long established structure. Currently Roanoke resides under a Council-Manager structure of government. In this construct the City Council is an elected body that appoints a City Manager who really oversees the day-to-day happenings of the city. This does two things, 1) Puts primary control of the city and it’s resources in the hands of an unelected official is not accountant able to the people and 2) Gives a select few in the City Council an inordinate amount of power. This accompanied with the five appointed positions in the city government in addition to the appointed seven-member school board, the voice of the people in Roanoke is largely ignored and only paid lip service to. Government has ceased to work for the people, now it simply works for itself and the rich who control it while wearing a veil of foggy public service.

To correct this the government of Roanoke City needs meaningful and fundamental changes. Below you will find the changes I think would better benefit the City and its people. Note that these reforms would require altering the City Charter, which means a process of working with the State to do so.

The City Council

Currently the City Council of Roanoke City is elected at large, meaning they all are elected by the whole city and there are no districts. I suggest that we make 7 districts within Roanoke City and each district would elect two representatives to the City Council. However, each set of representatives would only have one vote between the two of them. This would increase the size of the City Council from its current 7 members to 15 (the 21st member being the Vice-Mayor).

Additionally the Mayor would be taken off of the City Council and instead the Vice-Mayor would sit in his stead, being able to vote only as a tiebreaker in a 7/7 split in the City Council. In this the Vice-Mayor would assume the role of President of the City Council, calling in the session and such. The City Council would also pick from its ranks of 14 a Leader of the Council who would be the collective mouthpiece for announcements and other duties not regulated to the President of the City Council.

The City Manager

At this time the City Manager does everything you would equate with a traditional Mayor, he/she oversees the executive branch of local government. The City Manager has no real checks on their power, sure the City Council has oversight but they really don’t exercise it. In Roanoke City the city manager has near free reign to do as she wishes and is not accountable through elections to the people. This must change; honestly half of the point of representative government is so that the two big branches, the executive (City Manager) and the legislative (City Council), are held accountable to the people by elections.

I offer the idea to do away entirely with the City Manager position. Instead giving all the powers of the position to the Mayor, which will become a fulltime, year-round job. Currently in Roanoke the Mayor sits on the City Council and is mostly a figurehead rarely seen or heard from after election night. In my new construct the Mayor would become a driving force behind the city’s government. He would not only enforce legislative decisions enacted by the City Council but through his Vice-Mayor in the City Council would propose legislative actions and policy initiative. He would also submit a yearly “State of the City” address and agenda for him and the City Council to follow for the next year. Also it should be noted that the Vice-Mayor and Mayor would be elected at the same time and on the same ticket.

The School Board

The School Board would be elected by the public and would consist of 7 members, 1 from each district.

Everything Else

All of the following positions are currently elected positions in Roanoke City and would remain such:

The Clerk of Circuit Court

Commonwealth's Attorney

The Commissioner of Revenue

The Office of the Sheriff

City Treasurer

The following positions are NOT currently elected positions but under the new construct would become so:

The Director of Finance

The City Attorney

The City Clerk

Municipal Auditing

These are all simply ideas, not deluded rants that I think will become reality soon. But what is the point of a democracy if we can't put forth ideas such as these.