DENVER — There is an effort in Aurora to become more like Denver.
A hush-hush effort to give the Aurora mayor more power, like Denver's mayor.
Hush-hush because it is not quite clear who is really behind the effort to ask voters to change Aurora from a form of government where the city manager has the power, to a form of government giving the mayor more power.
Denver, Colorado Springs and Pueblo have a strong mayor form of government. Everywhere else is a council-manager form of government, like Aurora.
When we asked an Aurora city spokesman if it was Aurora Mayor Mike Coffman, Coffman passed along the message, “I will comment if and when it makes the ballot.”
“The difference is who makes policy and who carries it out,” said retired Colorado Municipal League Executive Director Sam Mamet.
Mamet simplified the difference between having a city manager-run government, where the city manager hires and fires department heads, versus a mayor in control, which Aurora voters could be asked to change in November.
“I think one of the strong [mayor] arguments is you want to have one person, directly elected and accountable to the citizens of his or her community, to be able to control those appointments,” Mamet said. “The argument for a council-manager system is that you want a professionally trained individual.”
Aurora’s city manager recently retired, and now an effort is being made by three Aurora residents to try to put the mayor in charge of administrative decisions instead of continuing with a city manager.
However, when we tried to reach those three residents, we either did not hear from them or got directed to Tyler Sandberg, the spokesman for the group “Term Limits for a Better Aurora.”
“That city manager has the ability to hire and fire anyone at will and they never have to go in front of voters,” Sandberg said. “The person in charge of city departments should be in front of voters for a yea or nay, and right now the city manager never is on the ballot and voters never get to hold the actual, chief executive of the city accountable.”
Sandberg is a former campaign manager for Congressman Mike Coffman, and would not say if Mayor Mike Coffman is behind this effort.
“He’s supportive. I mean, he’s the mayor. And this is going to improve the running of the city, but there are lots of people that are involved and supportive of this,” Sandberg said. “Really, what amplified and, kind of, sped up the process was the sudden retirement of the city manager, and not wanting the city to spend $50,000 on a search firm and relocate someone from around the country if we are going to be moving towards this way of running the government.”
Next Question: Can I remove my name from the petition about the Aurora mayor?
The ballot issue would also reduce term limits for mayor and city council from three four-year terms to two terms.
Giving the mayor more power means the ability to hire and fire department heads, like police chief.
Aurora’s police department is working under a legal agreement with the Colorado Attorney General's Office to improve policies and training. But it's the city manager, and not the mayor, who ultimately fired former police chief Vanessa Wilson last year, and has since hired two interim police chiefs.
“He’s very clear there is a lot of public controversy around the police and it’s an unelected bureaucrat who gets to decide what happens with the police department,” Sandberg said about Coffman. “And with all the public debates about policing in this country, that doesn’t seem appropriate for a city as large as Aurora that’s had as many controversies as Aurora has had.”
“In Colorado, out of the 272 municipal governments in the state, the vast majority operate under a council-manager,” Mamet said. “There’s nothing that’s wrong with a mayor-council system, and there’s nothing wrong with a council-manager system.”
Proponents of changing to a strong mayor system make the argument that voters cannot hold a city manager accountable.
However, it is similar to a superintendent being hired by an elected school board. If you do not like the work of the superintendent, you can vote out school board members and replace them with others who would make a change.
“Well, that’s two steps removed. Diffusive accountability, I would argue, is no accountability at all,” Sandberg said. “Right now, it’s an indirect bank shot of accountability.”
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