Charter Revision Q: Should Hamden Have A COO?

Does Hamden need a chief operating officer to serve as the mayor’s second in command in overseeing Town Hall?

That question could come before voters in November — if a skeptical Legislative Council signs off on such a ballot measure later this week.

The issue of whether or not Hamden needs a new chief operating officer (COO) position is at the center of the town’s latest effort at charter revision, a once-in-a-decade undertaking that Hamden has picked up two years in a row in an effort to boost professionalism and competence in the town’s top elected offices.

During Monday night’s meeting of the Legislative Council, members of Hamden’s Charter Revision Commission (CRC) made a final pitch in favor of including a new COO role in the town’s primary guiding document.

According to the latest proposed charter-revision draft, a Hamden COO’s job responsibilities ​“may include administrative responsibilities within the authority and under the supervision of the mayor in respect to any and all personnel and management functions provided for in the approved budget,” including ​“assist(ing) the mayor and the board of education in all aspects of labor negotiations, personnel issues, financial management, and any other field of public administration.”

The COO is meant to be a trained expert in local government management who would be appointed by the mayor as their second in command, according to the charter.

Hamden voters might be able to vote directly on whether or not they want town government to have a new COO position.

But that’s only if the Legislative Council takes up the CRC’s recommendation that such a position should be included as an independent question on November’s ballot.

Which is exactly what the CRC — a volunteer body tasked with reviewing and recommending edits to the town’s charter — called on the local legislature to do during Monday night’s meeting. The town council is scheduled to make a final decision on Wednesday as to whether or not the COO question, and other charter-revision-related questions, should appear directly before voters on November’s ballot. 

As originally reported in this New Haven Register article, both Mayor Lauren Garrett herself and a majority of council members oppose the new position on the basis of fiscal austerity, asserting that the town could not afford to pay for another government employee — especially one who leaders estimate would require a salary of somewhere between $100,000 to $200,000.

Click here to read the latest draft of the proposed revised charter.

COO = Mr. Spock, Mayor = Captain Kirk?

On Monday, the CRC asked the Legislative Council to approve the position of a COO — just ​“for the sole purpose of placing the issue on the ballot as a separate question in the election this November,” according a final charter report penned by the CRC and addressed to the council.

According to Council President Dominique Baez, that means that the council will have two potential pathways to go down Wednesday night: Either they move forward a final charter draft which includes all of the CRC’s suggestions and edits and create an independent ballot question aimed to discern public support for the role, or make a motion to take out the job of COO from the charter entirely.

The council could also choose to break down additional charter issues into specific ballot questions for voters to answer for themselves — such as whether or not the town’s mayor should stay in office for four years rather than two. However, no issue debated this charter season has turned out to be quite as controversial as the idea of hiring a COO. 

Council member and CRC Chairwoman Sarah Gallagher said the CRC’s reason for including a chief operating officer in the charter is to expand the capacity of the mayor’s office such that a ​“COO can facilitate the day to day operations for the town while the mayor could really do the leadership and visionary work.” 

Gallagher reported that six of the nine largest municipalities in Connecticut — including Bridgeport, Stamford, New Haven, Hartford, Norwalk and Greenwich all have either chief administrative officers, chief operating officers, or professional coordinators who assist the mayor in planning and administering daily government operations. 

The need for greater administrative accountability and capability, Gallagher said, was also a top request among residents who have participated in public hearings and workshops regarding the charter over the past three years.

“The CRC work over the last three years has really been grounded in public comment,” Gallagher said Monday, explaining why the CRC is still pushing for the COO role — even though the legislative council appears to be against it. 

“When we first started, the initial recommendations around public comment were to ensure strong town management for Hamden, improve coordination between our town departments, promote transparency to the public, ensure equity for all town residents, and then also retain our strong mayor form of government.”

The plan to integrate a chief operating officer into the charter, an idea that was also put forward by last year’s CRC, was one of the few proposals shot down by the Legislative Council upon their first look at the document last month.

But Gallagher has continued to contend that the establishment of a COO is a key part of a ​“three pronged approach” to addressing residents’ identified needs, including promote ​“robust financial review” through the creation of a finance commission and encouraging ​“legislative oversight and budget reform” through the mandating of a budget liaison. ​“The third tier and prong of that is technical expertise and operations support with the creation of the COO,” Gallagher asserted.

Patricia Vener-Saavedra, a member of the CRC, also tried to clarify the role of a COO to some confused council members: ​“I’ve come to start thinking of the COO as the Mr. Spock to the mayor’s Captain Kirk.”

However, at least one council member still refused to buy into the proposed position. 

Council person Justin Farmer maintained his aversion to the implementation of the potential government job.

“Adding a six figure salary that’s a mandate is concerning,” he said, citing the town’s 50-plus point mill rate.

Beyond the role’s budgetary implications, Farmer expressed fundamental doubt about the COO’s ability to better municipal operations.

“Allowing community members to think that hiring a position will hold the administration accountable is setting expectations for the community high only for them to fail,” he argued. ​“It took only one or two people to sink this ship.”

While the council will have the right on Wednesday to disappear a COO into the oceanic depths of discarded charter proposals from CRCs past, Gallagher spoke on behalf of the CRC when requesting that the council hand that decision over to the public.

Through tens of public input sessions and workshops, Gallagher said, ​“We did not have one person speak out to us against the COO and had many folks speak to us in favor of the COO.”

She continued: ​“We really feel because of that participation we have to be true to that and honor what folks wanted.”

4-Year Mayoral Terms, Finance Commission Also Proposed

The proposed new COO position is not the only major change to Hamden town government included within the charter revision proposal, and that the Legislative Council will have to weigh on Wednesday when deciding which matters to include as independent questions on November’s ballot.

When Gallagher first ran for council last summer, she had just completed service on the town’s then-CRC. She said part of the reason she decided to campaign for public office was to reverse the council’s total dismissal of the charter, asserting that the veto robbed residents of an important chance to weigh in on how their town works for them.

This year, the council did appoint a second CRC, with whom they have worked together to tweak that previously dropped draft, maintaining language that:

• Favors four-year over two-year mayoral terms;

• Establishes a finance commission of citizens with professional experience in business or finance to oversee budget preparation, pension funding, long-term capital planning, and collective bargaining agreements;

• Requires the hiring of a budget liaison, a position appointed by the president of the Legislative Council to assist both the council and finance commission in developing, overseeing and implementing town budgets;

• And separates the traffic authority from the police commission, among other changes.

The proposed revised charter would also add several new provisions to town government, including a new hybrid meeting requirement which should provide all residents an opportunity to participate in public meetings both in-person and virtually as well as another rule guaranteeing each town commission two non-voting ​“youth members” aged between 15 and 18. 

Read more about that latter idea concerning youth representation, initially proposed by Councilman Justin Farmer, in the New Haven Register here.

Nora Grace-Flood’s reporting is supported in part by a grant from Report for America.