Last week, the Sedona City Council voted 6-1 to approve Mayor Sandy Moriarty to join the Mayors Climate Network.
This came after an identical vote earlier in the month after it had been pulled off that consent agenda by request for council and the public to discuss it.
During the second discussion, Sedona City Councilman Jon Thompson made the point that the mayor didn’t require council’s permission to join such an organization.
That’s good to know, so that if future mayors want to join the Sierra Club, the Industrial Workers of the World, the Ku Klux Klan, the Disney Vacation Club or the Aryan Brotherhood that council need not discuss the matter that is legally permissible, though perhaps not politically wise.
However, the issue is this item was specifically added to the agenda for approval as a consent item, meaning the mayor or a council member who added the item to the agenda, wanted council’s explicit approval and blessing to join this supposedly private club.
A fork is one of a basic chess tactic that consists of a single piece attacking two or more pieces at the same time. The attacking piece is known as the forking piece, while the attacked troops are known as the forked pieces. The deadliest forks are the ones that are forcing. Usually, those forks involve an attack on the enemy king and create an inescapable threat. Although every piece can deliver a fork, the most striking forks come from a knight. Because of the unique way it moves, a forking knight cannot be captured by the pieces it is threatening. Because it is also a minor piece, it can be traded off almost with no restrictions.
Graphic courtesy of Chess.com
Ergo, Thompson’s claim is moot. By claiming the opposite, then voting in favor, Thompson placed himself in a fork, to use a chess term, with both moves losing their argument:
If approval isn’t required, as Thompson claims, then council members should have abstained or declined to make a motion regarding the matter.
They did not, and Thompson voted in favor. Thus, he says by voting “aye,” Thompson and council absolutely must approve the mayor’s participation, completely invalidating his argument that the mayor can do whatever she wants.
Hypocrisy aside, because the item was agendized for approval, council then had the obligation and duty to discuss joining this network as though it did require council’s explicit OK.
Falsely maintaining that the mayor did not need because it was no longer political expedient is disingenuous, but this council isn’t known for understanding formal logic.
We hope that for the sake of consistency, every time a future mayor — be it Scott Jablow or Samaire Armstrong — wants to join mayors-only club or a council member wants to join something officially, they are bound by this precedent to bring the matter before council and the public for discussion and a public vote.
If not, then this council just wasted hours of staff time in the public’s time discussing a matter that it had no right whatsoever to debate.
Certainly with the $105 million budget, Sedona City Council has no problem wasting our taxpayer dollars on meaninglessness items, but the public does mind. The money wasted here on this meeting and on staff time researching it could have benefited a nonprofit. It could have gone to rental assistance. But instead it was wasted on the private desires of a lame-duck official to join a club for one final grasp of publicity and clout before being cast out of Sedona City Hall.
Some ex-Sedona mayors have a hard time surrendering that “mayor” title once they leave office and become private citizens again so after November, we might have three “Sedona mayors” running around.
Lovely.
We hope that Jablow or Armstrong do a better job safeguarding the public’s financial security rather than bowing to the private whims of its council members.
Will Moriarty’s successor waste council and the public’s time discussing rejoining the Mayors Climate Network or take it upon himself or herself to do the right thing and join or not join this organization privately?
That said, deciding to vote for or against an issue of deference to a council member or out of respect for their person disrespects the public. Autocrats maintain power in failed democratic states because of personal allegiances — like that on display here — rather than elected officials doing what is right in the public interest for constituents regardless of political friendships or “deference.” That sycophantic subservience undermines the public duty to serve voters and is the kind of bare minimum political courage that six members of this council demonstrated they lack.
Would this council reject a qualified member who wanted to join a group because he or she was a meanie in the break room?
Or didn’t sign a birthday card with enough smiley faces?
Good grief, people, this is civil governance, not grade school.
We commend Councilwoman Holly Ploog for being the sole vote of logic and adulthood against this colossal waste of time, public money and staff effort.
Christopher Fox Graham
Managing Editor
