From the Roundtable: Power Brokers should engage in constructive, not destructive, activity
One of the most intriguing mysteries within any community is figuring out who has the clout to get things done. Every community has a small contingent of Power Brokers, private citizens who have the ability to get things done because of one or more factors-their possessions, positions, experience in the community and just plain raw gravitas.
They operate best out of the limelight such as inside a private country club at a meeting that excludes the media.
That happened to be the setting for a recent luncheon arranged and hosted by Bob Pugh, CEO of MBS Textbook Exchange and a former mayor who would be on everyone’s list of Columbia Power Brokers.
The gathering of former mayors and city managers at Country Club of Missouri, an annual tradition it turns out, was a private party that violated not a single rule or regulation. The luncheon, nonetheless, piques the community’s curiosity about what transpired between a group of Power Brokers. The gathering took on the perception of a covert operation when information surfaced that the guest list included two public officials-the sitting mayor and city manager-and a speaker advocating an amendment to the city charter, along with the publisher of the Columbia Daily Tribune, and excluded other representatives of the Fourth Estate.
The details emerged because the bandwidth of communications has expanded dizzyingly into the Internet blogosphere, a daily stream of commentary and criticism that has increased exponentially.
The conversations are healthy, if not a little discomforting, and at times exaggerated. They reflect a genuine concern about a community poised to graduate from a small to a medium-sized city of a hundred grand in population when the next federal census is taken 15 months from now.
Pugh’s luncheon addressed the topic of amending the city charter to allow City Council members to be paid for their services. The subtext is that business community leaders want the City Council to have more members who are pro-business and fewer who are perceived to be anti-development.
Mike Martin, on his Columbia Heartbeat blog, revealed details of the private conversations. Power Brokers in attendance have denied allegations that they plotted to rid the council of “activist” members such as Karl Skala, who represents the Third Ward.
Unrelated to Pugh’s gathering, though coincidentally circulated, was a quartet of letters between Skala and Chamber of Commerce Chairman Larry Moore, who asked Skala to withdraw from the Chamber’s Governmental Affairs Committee.
If there ever was a time someone should have slept on a letter before putting it in the mail, this would have been it.
Moore wrote that he received numerous complaints that Skala’s participation on the committee was disruptive-basically because he talked too much. Skala refused to withdraw or become a listener only, with no voting or speaking privileges.
The complaints should have been resolved internally thus avoiding an ugly trail of communications that likely alienated Skala-and perhaps colleagues on the council-from the business community. The most embarrassing point was when Skala quoted to Moore the Chamber’s description of the role of the Government Affairs Committee: “to develop cooperative relationships with organizations and to establish and nurture positive relationships with local, state and national elected officials.”
Skala troubles the Power Brokers because he is “progressive” in a still undefined sense, perhaps a trifle odd, occasionally obstreperous and only rarely the patsy to their aims. Basking in retirement, he has the luxury of time to devote as many hours as he pleases to looking out for the interests of his ward as well as the city at large.
Maybe some of us in the business community don’t care for the policies or ideas of a particular elected official, but that hardly justifies engaging in destructive activity.
Business folk can get elected if they and their supporters stop stewing about the other side and focus on making themselves more attractive-thus electable-to the constituents of a given ward or district. They also can get things done through open communications rather than behind closed doors at a country club.
Al Germond
Al Germond is the host of the “Columbia Business Times Sunday Morning Roundtable” every Sunday at 8:15 a.m. on kfru. He can be reached at [email protected]