NLA - Oct 28, 2009 Mayor Cook, Carl Robinson

Mayor Hires:

1. City Attorney
2. Executive Assistant
3. Admin Assistant
4. Rates the City Manager along with the opinions of the council
5. National search for a trained City Manager

Compared city council to being like herding cats.  

1. Each has different needs, goals and desires. 
2. Some districts need more of something than other areas, eg the westside is park-poor. 
3. Keeping old infrastructure is different than new infrastructure.
4. Hires a moderator during the strategic planning session. 
5. Produces vision, mission and goals for city manager but also have to come up with the funds.
6. Sometimes there is no choice about the raising of taxes. 
7. Fema only paid 75% of the value (eg a 20 yr old road that has 30 yrs of life, they paid 75% of prorated 33%)
8. He has to try to extract the common elements from them and then convey that to the various other elected officials. 
9. Talking with the mayor of Juarez when the dam was about to break, and then sent pumpers and engineers to help.   Otherwise the downtown would flood.   Fires over there, our firefighters have to volunteer because workman comp would not have paid out-of-country but they are doing it because the very next warehouse was full of toxic materials that would have filled the air with poison.
10. County is an extension of the state.  Very different from the city.
11. 2500 emails a month to the mayor's office.

Carl Robinson, City Representative

 

1. Understanding that we, the council, are supposed to choose what's best for the city, not just our district.
2. Satellite office in NE, 9600 Dyer, NE command center Police 10-4 on Friday.
3. Running for office means sacrifice time, money, personal life, family time, and it is very hard. Walk, take criticism, icky people,involved in community causes name recognition.
4. NE will build some apartments for the soldiers
5. Ft Bliss has the largest land mass in all the world for training.