Tallahassee City Commission: How to End the Dysfunction

Gary York
| Your turn

To say that some Tallahassee city commissioners are having a hard time getting along is an understatement, and it’s not exactly a news flash for them. They know it.

They know it’s gotten ugly, on the stage and on the public stage. Mayor John Dailey and his fellow commissioners have openly called for public speakers to be more polite. But that’s like boxers telling their kids that hitting is wrong.

The audience watches and sees the common dysfunction, which stems from a simple truth: When you punch a coworker in the face, it’s hard to convince them that you just wanted to share your hand lotion.

I was Leon County Commissioner from 1986 to 1998. It was the pre-retribution era of local government. A time when Capital Circle had two lanes, cats and dogs could dance in the moonlight, and we knew the difference between fighting and pleading.

To be sure, we’ve had our fights, and some big ones. Our time in government was when the comprehensive plan was being written, a skirmish-filled process. We’ve widened roads like Capital Circle, built a courthouse, libraries, a landfill, a jail, and none of that happened without heated debate. We’ve talked about big things at a time when big things were needed. And 4-3 votes were not uncommon.

Our commissioners had very different philosophies on growth, development, spending and human services, but we also had one sacred unwritten policy: we stayed out of each other’s campaigns.

We didn’t recruit people to get each other. We didn’t donate to each other’s opponents, and we didn’t campaign for each other’s opponents. And the reason for that was clear: the community’s agenda was bigger than our petty tinkering. We knew that when the dust settled, we would have to work with whoever the voters had put in the seat next to us. A task that was hard enough without a suitcase full of bitter baggage.

We understood that we were different. We went into every discussion knowing that we had work to do to build consensus. We expected disagreement and we embraced it because it wasn’t personal. We built trust by not letting our differences define our relationships.

And despite our differences, we liked each other, and we’re still friends. I know that sounds unbelievable. People who had different ideas about big things, who like each other. What a concept.

I don’t want five commissioners with the same point of view. Good policy is born from different opinions. We don’t have to fear 3-2, no matter which philosophy is on the high side. We have built a nice place to live with close votes and often painful disagreements.

Look, I get it. Our city commissioners may be elected officials, but they’re still people. Some have stoked the fires of infighting by using social media, public endorsements of opponents, and even direct campaign donations.

So, it’s fair to give them some leeway in terms of decorum. But at some point you can dysfunction each other. Is it too much to believe that the existing culture is an opportunity for real statesmanship?

This group of city commissioners is made up of smart and talented people who are uniquely attuned to the pulse of our community, so it’s hard to understand why they can’t get on the same page.

They should embrace the mature recognition that moving our city forward is more important than being right, and far more important than punishment. It is a formula that allows for lively debate without making it personal.

It’s easy for elected officials to forget that the only reason they have amplified voices is because voters gave them megaphones. Voters did this so commissioners could use their amplified voices to move our city forward. What voters didn’t do was give them amplified voices to shape future commissions in their own image.

So how does this group begin to try to reset their relationships and work together for the greater good? I mean, who cares at this point how it all started?

If I were serious about lowering the temperature, I would start with voter confidence, without trying to tip the scales. Apparently voters were smart enough to put every one of our sitting commissioners in their seats.

And I didn’t just fall off a turnip wagon. I know that it’s common in state and national party elections for elected officials to take sides and go after their colleagues. And that seems to work out just fine. No.

Can we agree that the “dethrone a colleague” model just leaves the next group of commissioners fighting, and the group after them, and so on. Or can we in our little corner of the world decide to get off that merry-go-round and find ourselves.

Otherwise, when all the hand lotion runs out, we’ll still be left with the same problems that were never solved because we just haven’t figured out how to stop hitting each other.

Gary Yordon is the host of WCTV’s political program “The Usual Suspects” and president of The Zachary Group. You can find his podcast, “Banana Peel Boulevard” at thepeelpodcast.com or on Apple, Amazon Music and Spotify.

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