They tell me timing is everything. In journalism it is important to be timely otherwise it’s all yesterday’s news. Yesterday’s news is fine for lining the bird cage or training a puppy, but it isn’t worth beans in the context of current events.
I am not making excuses when I say it isn’t always easy to be timely in a weekly newspaper. Furthermore, having been laid back by current economic malaise, I have even less control over when my maunderings might be published. So timely is relative; I try to write as if it doesn’t matter.
While it may already be yesterday’s news, I write here to congratulate newly elected members of the Crested Butte Town Council. As cub reporter for the Crested Butte Pilot, I covered town council news for many years and five different mayors. I know sitting behind that council table is no easy job. While it might seem like a popularity contest during the election, trust me: it’s not.
Unfortunately, neither is a town council election an exercise in pure democracy. This sad circumstance confronted me during the candidates’ forum prior to the recent election. Members of the voting public were frustrated because candidates were advised not to answer questions about important issues facing Crested Butte.
There are at least three issues council members and candidates can’t discuss publically outside formal council meetings. These include the proposed Foothills Annexation, proposed Sixth Street Station development, and the proposed Mt. Emmons molybdenum mine. All these proposals are important to town residents who wanted to know where prospective candidates stood on the issues.
Questions: How the hell can voters decide who to vote for if candidates can’t answer any and all questions? Why are council members enjoined from discussing important issues in any forum other than regular and scheduled Town Council meetings? What happened to council members sitting down with constituents over a beer and discussing town business?
I know the answers: First and foremost, the Town wants to avoid future litigation from proponents of proposed projects. The Town must act in either a quasi- or direct regulatory capacity concerning proposed developments. Should council members or prospective council members demonstrate they have already made up their minds about a project, the proponent could appeal a final decision. He could say the decision was made before all evidence was on the table and could ultimately have grounds for a lawsuit.
My gripe is not about erudite, prudent and well-meaning advice to elected representatives. My gripe, and the angst expressed by the voting public, is that the enjoinder subverts democratic process. One question remains extant: How the hell can voters decide who to vote for if candidates can’t talk?
Having posed these difficult questions, a responsible pundit would set about proposing answers. Try as I might, though, I can’t think of any.
Gone are the days when an elected official can say: Elect me because I believe Foothills annexation is more trouble than it is worth, a waste of time and money in an economically difficult business climate. Deep in the past is the time a council person could say, we don’t need to develop Sixth Street Station until all other commercial property in town is built out and rented.
Thirty years have passed since council members and town staff could say flat out, “I am opposed to a molybdenum mine on Mt. Emmons and I will fight to prevent one from being developed.” Back in the day, that was the mantra by which candidates aspired to Town Council. Town staff was unabashedly tasked with working to prevent a mine.
Furthermore, I remember sitting with mayors, council members and town staff in numerous watering holes, strategizing how to beat the mine. Our cards were on the table; mine operators knew they would have to overcome not only public opinion but also town government at every level.
Perhaps one strategy that came from those confabs was the town’s watershed ordinance, conceived back then to keep the mine out of Crested Butte’s drinking water. Adopted by town government and upheld by the courts, the ordinance established the town firmly in a regulatory capacity. From this position we are today unable to let any cats out of the bag as to whether or not we want a mine.
I wonder if this is some kind of irony, or something altogether more sinister.
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