The council-manager form of government takes away three fundamental rights that are now exercised by the citizens of Bainbridge Island: The right to have direct representation, election and recall. These are precious rights, and should not be lightly abandoned.

By design, the council-manager form of government insulates a city’s executive administrator from the will of the people whose public life she/he administers. By putting the actual inhabitants of a community at a distance, the council-manager form of government presumes a unified public will, and thus more easily carries out the aims of a business community that agrees on long-term strategies.

Accordingly, the most successful council-manager governments have had a close interface with or direct involvement by active and unified Chambers of Commerce whose purposes and vision are permitted to speak for the entire population.

Proponents have pointed to the popularity and effectiveness of the council-manager form among cities of comparable size to Bainbridge Island.

Size, however, is not what has determined the success or effectiveness of the council-manager governmental form. Instead, it is an actual or imposed agreement on community goals, a stable source of revenue and an electorate that is largely of one mind or is subordinate to a dominant industry such as manufacturing or tourism.

The polity on Bainbridge is fundamentally divided on issues related to development. Until the issue of development is fully addressed and a stable source of income that does not depend on building permits is provided, nothing will change.

In the words of the present city administrator, Mark Dombroski, “The city would still be divided on Winslow Way, divided on watershed development, and we would still be a city that depends on development for revenue. None of that changes.”

This division of public purpose manifests itself in a divided city council, and it will be a divided council that will seek to instruct and otherwise direct the activities of a city manager. Historically, when the political public is so divided that decision-making is impeded, active centrists encourage the community to vest their civil prerogatives in a strong individual: A “Solomon” who will arbitrarily decide, or a “Bonaparte” who will seek to balance competing interests.

The movement for a council-manager form of government seems to reflect such a frustrated center seeking a bonapartist solution to the island’s unresolved problems.

The proponents tout the value of open meetings, but in some closed meeting the present city manager was pre-approved to be the administrator of the proposed new government.

So in fact, the vote is not only about giving up our rights, but whether we want Dombroski to be our Bonaparte.

Sterne McMullen

Bainbridge Island