Edmonds has No Police Chief Really !

No Acting Police Chief the position has been vacant for 21 days according to the City Code. My Oh My, this is shocking behavior of our Mayor, Human Resources Director, City Attorney and City Clerk to allow the acting police chief’s appointment to lapse and the police chief position to be automatically vacant. This isn’t about the City’s ability to retroactively compensate our former Acting Police Chief Jim Lawless for back pay. It is about who is steering the government ship. Our Mayor needs a period of introspection of his duty to ensure all laws of the city are enforced. Not to continue to only react, when a mistake has been discovered. Who is making all the mistakes? How can we stop the expiring of contracts and agreements and not renewing them on time? How do we get the Mayor and City Staff to follow city and state law? There seems to be continuing problem that needs to be addressed. There needs to be accountability.
Another example, the Hearing Examiner contract expired in December 2019. The City scheduled a Hearing Examiner hearing in January 2020. It wasn’t until a citizen pointed this issue was there any city reaction. It is a repeat of what took place with the last Hearing Examiner contract. The previous Hearing Examiner contract expired on December 2014 and wasn’t renewed until January 1, 2016.

Back on February 14, I emailed the Mayor (with no response) asking him two questions:

1.) Whose responsibility is it to ensure all city contracts and agreements are followed and current?

2.) Does the City Clerk, the City Attorney or is it the Mayor that tracks the expiration dates of city appointments, contracts and agreements.

The City Council needs to recognize there is management problem and changing good city policy isn’t going to fix it!


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