At-large petition dead; LaFortune forms Citizens' Commission

An edited version of this column was published in the December 14, 2005, edition of Urban Tulsa Weekly. The published version is still online, courtesy of the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine. Here's my blog entry linking to the article. Posted October 28, 2017.

The at-large councilor petition appears to be dead, but supporters of representative democracy in Tulsa shouldn't rest easy just yet.

On Monday, December 4, the effort to dismember three City Council districts was put on hold. You'll recall that on October 20, a group with the misleading name of Tulsans for Better Government (TBG) began collecting signatures on an initiative petition for a City Charter amendment: Add to the Council three at-large "supercouncilors," elected citywide to four-year terms, and reduce the number of council districts from nine to six.

Just over halfway through the 90 days for gathering signatures, the petition wasn't catching fire with the general public. An opposition group, Tulsans Defending Democracy, quickly emerged, with support from Tulsans of all races, classes, and political views.

Also on Monday, December 4, Mayor Bill LaFortune announced the formation of a "Citizens' Commission on City Government," a group of 17-20 citizens, handpicked by him, to study the structure of Tulsa's government for six months and make recommendations next June.

Most of the petition's backers were residents of Tulsa's "Money Belt," and their motivation was to bring city government firmly and permanently back under the control of the old city establishment. The petition gained some ground thanks to sleight of hand: They hired the same petition circulators who were collecting signatures for the Taxpayers' Bill of Rights (TABOR) petition and another popular petition which would limit the use of eminent domain condemnation for economic development. Circulators, paid by the signature for all three petitions, would attract signers for the popular TABOR or eminent domain petitions, and then would quickly ask the signer if they'd also sign a petition "for better city government," hoping the voter would sign one more time without looking too closely.

Opinions are divided as to whether the supercouncilor petition was shelved because it wasn't on track to get the necessary signatures, or out of fear that, if it were on the ballot for next spring's city elections, it would create a backlash that would leave the petition's supporters with even less power than they now have.

So the petition is dead, or at least hibernating, and this "Citizens' Commission" has risen in its place, evidently to accomplish the same goal by means of a "blue ribbon" panel.

Here's how a blue ribbon panel usually works: Appoint to the panel prominent people who don't really have time to devote to the effort. These people are accomplished in their fields, but not engaged in the issue to be studied. They come into the process with an open mind, with no predetermined conclusions. To help guide them to the appropriate conclusion, lend the panel your own staff to gather and organize data, helpfully arranged to point in one clear direction. Add to the mix a couple of panel members who are passionately committed to the desired conclusion, but make sure no one passionately committed to another point of view has a seat at the table.

After the requisite number of meetings, the advocates for the desired conclusion and the staffers will make a convincing case for their position, and no one on the blue ribbon panel will be strongly committed enough to an opposing position to make a rebuttal. The panel will make the desired recommendation, which the daily paper's editorial board will hail as tablets from Mt. Sinai. The pressure will then be on the legislative body to adopt the recommendation, even if they disagree with it.

LaFortune seems to be following this recipe. He created this panel without any input from any other public official, and he alone controls who will sit on the panel. Two members, Howard Barnett and C. S. Lewis III, were members of the advisory board for Tulsans for Better Government, so you know they'll be pushing for at-large seats on the Council to be part of the commission's recommendation. So far, no women have been named to the panel. Neither has anyone involved with Tulsans Defending Democracy.

As a bonus (for him), some of LaFortune's choices seem desired to bolster his reelection campaign. One of the co-chairmen is Hans Helmerich. Hans's brother Jono Helmerich is the chairman of LaFortune's reelection committee, but it's rumored that he is shopping around for a better candidate to back. Michael Covey, spokesman for the South Tulsa Citizens' Coalition, represents a group that will wield a lot of influence over next March's Republican mayoral primary; Covey's inclusion may be an attempt by LaFortune to win his support or at least neutralize him.

If LaFortune were serious about creating a broad-based, diverse group of citizens to study this issue, he should have given each of his fellow elected officials the chance to name a committee member. If he were serious about keeping politics out of it, he would have consulted with his fellow elected officials before setting the rules, and he would have delayed doing anything until after the election. The Council asked LaFortune to speak on the issue at their December 8 meeting, but he claimed a prior engagement; he has promised to show up on the 15th. We'll see.

There are some good and thoughtful people on LaFortune's commission, but it will take a lot of determination and time and energy on their part to keep the process honest, if that's even possible.

As we bid good riddance to the at-large councilor petition, while training a wary eye on the Mayor's "Citizens' Commission," let's pause to note two oddities about Tulsans for Better Government:

Oddity 1: TBG insisted that Tulsa needs an elected city official who would advocate effectively for the needs of the entire city, not just a single district. Don't we already have such a position? Known as "Mayor"? Ah, but the key word is "effectively," isn't it? The obvious solution is to have an effective Mayor, but since many of the members of TBG are supporters of LaFortune's re-election effort - Chip McElroy, the chairman of TBG, hosted the Mayor's reelection launch - the obvious solution wouldn't have occurred to them.

Oddity 2: While many long-ago-former elected officials were members of TBG, the only currently-serving official on TBG's board was County Commissioner Randi Miller. This was surprising, since the at-large proposal would have rendered her home base of West Tulsa politically insignificant, too small to influence even a district council race. LaFortune's backers are talking about Miller as a tag-team substitute for the him in the Mayor's race, but her support for this proposal isn't going to endear her to grass-roots Republicans. (Her political future has already been damaged by her admission under oath that she didn't review any supporting information before voting to approve the IVI toll bridge contract.) There are rumors that she didn't intend to support the at-large proposal, but to date her name is still on the TBG website as a board member, and she has yet to issue a public statement withdrawing her support for the plan.