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Council Policy 800-09 was written and adopted by Council
In my previous entry I discussed an incident in which a Council Member emailed the Police Chief at 1:00 AM instead of phoning 911, and then publicly complained about the Chief’s half-day response time, wrongly implying the lack of immediate response to the email was somehow intentional and that it put people in danger. (Any danger was actually due to not phoning 911.) This blog describes a council policy that was violated by this Council Member’s action. Running a city is serious business, with 110,000 Renton lives in the hands of the elected leaders and the people working for them. City employees including Council Members need to make an effort to follow the policies that are put in place to guide them.
The police chief is a department head that reports through the Mayor’s office, and by the City Council’s own policy (which Council wrote and adopted) has five business days to respond to Council requests. Furthermore, under the policy these council requests are required to go through the Mayor. Recent mayors as a courtesy have usually allowed council members to make these requests directly to staff over email as long as they copy the Mayor on the request.
This policy supports state law and federal systems of separation of powers, in which the legislative body -the Council- has the responsibility to make laws, and the executive branch -the Mayor- has the responsibility to enforce laws. Neither branch is supposed to unduly interfere in the operation of the other. (Together with the judicial branch, this supports our system of checks and balances)
“6.1 City Councilmembers shall refer substantial requests for assistance to the Mayor’s office for review, approval, and transmittal to the appropriate department(s) for response.
6.1.1 Upon receipt of a request from the Mayor’s Office, the department administrator shall estimate the time required to respond or comply with the request for assistance. Under normal circumstances, every effort shall be made to respond within five (5) working days. If it is anticipated that a response will not be forthcoming within five working days, the Mayor or Chief Administrative Officer will provide the Councilmember an estimate of the time required to respond to the request and the reason for the delay.
6.2 All responses to substantial requests from the Council shall be in writing. Responses should be sent to the Mayor’s Office to assure that the content fully addresses the intent of the request and that the information provided “
As an example, per the policy a typical Council email to the Police Chief might be to schedule a future meeting or ask for data; the email would either be sent to the Mayor and cc’d to the Chief, or be sent to the Chief and cc’d to the Mayor; the sender would expect a five day turnaround, or longer if it was complicated.
I asked Mayor Pavone if he was copied on the 1:00 AM email to the chief, as would be required under the council policy. He said he was not, and that if he had been, he could have acted on the email by 9:00 AM that morning, since unlike the chief he was not on vacation that day. Mayor Pavone explained that if he had been copied on the email, he would have sent it to the Chief’s stand-in for the day, and asked for expedited action.
I also asked Mayor Pavone what he would do in an emergency if he felt his personal safety was in imminent danger or the community’s safety was in imminent danger . He said he would phone 911, not call the Police Chief.
I’d like to see the email she sent. I suspect strongly that it was centered around her perceived needs and didn’t mention any ‘children.’ I also suspect that she added children to her Tweet so as to appear to be concerned about something more noble than herself.
I believe since it was between City employees that it should be available for under the public information requirements.
Carmen should remove the defamatory Twitter and TikTok videos and issue a public apology to Chief Schuldt for any harm or misunderstanding that may have resulted from them.
Greg
I sent a letter to the council say as much.
Please write letters to the council no matter what side you’re on. They need to know your opinion.
I felt it appropriate to let the council know that I support the police chief when he’s being unfairly defamed by politician.
To email the council, use this address:
jsubia@rentonwa.gov
Greg
Five business days = one weak of clock time
Derp.
So if I am reading your post correctly, when the Councilmember wrote the email to the Police Chief the person should have also sent the same email to the Mayor. If that is so was it the correction action taken (email sent also to the Mayor)?
Yes, the email was sent to the Chief but not to the Mayor. Under the policy the council member should have sent it to the Mayor also, and should have been prepared for a five-business-day response time when using email. All of this may have gone unnoticed, except the council member complained about a slow response on social media, and even questioned the Chief’s motives. It was the council member’s own communication choices and policy violations that created the communication failure and therefore any resultant danger.
Why is this person on the public safety committee?
I would like to know if this makes the city council member subject to recall. I am concerned about her consistent and seemingly deliberate attempts at defaming multiple members of our city who are simply doing their job to the best of their ability, when she does not do the most obvious effort to get assistance in an immediate way. I call 911, (for block watch and other situations) and get fantastic responses almost every time. This is common knowledge, and certainly should be for someone who serves on the public safety committee!!! Seriously?!