Life Of Jason

Nothing gives you a good discussion like talking budget issues over a strawberry banana smoothie at The Coffee Ethic in downtown Springfield. It helps when you have a discussion partner like Springfield City Councilwoman Cindy Rushefsky.

LifeOfJason: Let me ask the question I’ve asked everyone else. Are you planning to run for Mayor?

Councilwoman Rushefsky: No. (laughter) That’s short and sweet!

LOJ: Yes it is! Being on the police/fire pension board you’ve been in the thick of the debate on the pension crisis. You wrote an article in the News-Leader recently with various ideas that could be used to solve the pension problem. In that you mentioned the need for a tax increase. Of the proposals you mentioned, which is the one you think is the best course of action?

CR: Well, I would like to see us go to a closed plan which is we would get out of the pension business eventually and move our police and fire in LAGERS. That way we would have all our employees on one system and I think ultimately that would be our best plan. I think the city needs to get out of the pension business.

LOJ: What would you say to citizens who would read your plan in the newspaper and see the tax increase and say that taxes are too high already?

CR: Well, I’m not unsympathetic with that because I pay city taxes too. Unfortunately I think that is the last resort because I don’t see any other alternative. There is nothing else that is going to get that pension system back to where it needs to be.

LOJ: Would you be in favor of repealing another tax like the parks tax and replace it with the police/fire pension tax?

CR: That’s one I hadn’t thought about…I’d have to think about that.

LOJ: Given that there has been some success with the Pit Bull ordinance, are you still as heavily against it as you were when elected?

CR: Yes. I think we need a comprehensive animal control ordinance that is not breed specific. I think focusing on a single breed is ridiculous.

LOJ: Do you think that can be accomplished in your term of office?

CR: I hope so.

LOJ: In 2007, you told David Catanese of KY3 in response to a question about a united front from Council “It’s all well and good to e-mail one and other, but City Council meetings should not be situations where it is a done deal, especially when they are inviting the public to make comments to participate and they really aren’t listening because it is a done deal. Municipal government, city government is supposed to be accessible to the people and if they are all working behind the scenes and doing city government in private, it is not accessible.” In that sense, it hasn’t changed much as most votes in the time I’ve been covering Council are unanimous. What has changed now that you’re on Council in your view on this?

CR: I think to a large extent that’s true and what I’ve discovered is it’s really more systemic than I thought from being on the outside. What you have is a volunteer Council that depends very heavily on a professional staff. Especially since how the charter is set up and the way it’s been translated it is almost impossible for Council members to talk to department heads and employees about what is actually going on without going through the City Manager.

So everything we get is filtered through the professional staff…through the City Manager’s office…and by the time we get it, it is so structured that there aren’t any options or that’s the way it appears. I’m not saying they’re doing it deliberately to stymie us but that’s the nature of the system and it’s very frustrating and I know it’s not just me. Several of us have talked about it individually the frustration we have with not being able to talk things out amongst ourselves or with the public and just throw out ideas.

The lack of opportunity we have to get our own sources of information to test to see if what we’re getting from the City Manager’s office is actually the same way the department managers feel…the department heads. That’s very very frustrating.

LOJ: Let me ask this couching that it’s not a question on City Manager Bob Cumley. Would you be in favor of changing the city charter to allow Council members to have more direct access to department heads?

CR: Yes. The way the charter is actually written it says that “for purposes of inquiry” Council can have individual contact with the employees. The way it’s been translated by the City Manager’s office and City Council too…that is, the city attorney…is that any kind of inquiry we make has to be funneled through the City Manager in order to avoid the appearance that we’re trying to control the individual departments.

When we first came on Council…that is Doug Burlison, myself and Dan Chiles…a memorandum was sent to all staff saying they could not talk to us without going through the City Manager. They could not write us any responses without it being cleared by the City Manager’s office. I think that is not a good plan because there is no way for Council members who have ultimate responsibility to test the information they’re getting from the City Manager’s office.

LOJ: Since it says in the charter you can do this, why don’t you just go do it?

CR: I think some of us have but then what happens is that department heads are then put on the spot. Then we can be put on the spot as well because we have to justify what we are saying as an inquiry and not as a way of trying to direct departments. But they in particular are very uncomfortable and the few times I have been able to speak directly with department heads they were very uncomfortable being put in that position.

LOJ: You said at the special Council Budget meeting “that people advocating cuts should have been asked to provide alternative funding for the cuts. “If that had happened we would have had a lot less speakers tonight.” Some of those in attendance took umbrage with that statement as if you were saying people can’t talk to council about their issues unless they bring solutions. How do you respond to someone who took your comments in that manner?

CR: Well, you know, it’s very easy to say “don’t cut me.” But the hard part is figuring out “OK, if we don’t cut you, who do we cut? Who is less important than you?” And I think there is something to be said for that…I’m sorry that they were offended by that…but I think the reality is if you’re going to throw a roadblock then you better have a constructive solution. The Council is not the end of the road necessarily. We’re supposed to be representing the people and ultimately it’s the people who have that burden of decision making whether it’s done in the form of throwing Council members out or whatever it is. But to just complain or say “no, no, no, no” is not very constructive.

LOJ: You were a board member for the Rape Crisis Center. There was a report in the News Leader yesterday that the state is out of funding to cover the cost of rape kits. Obviously this is something that would not be a priority with the budget cuts now happening but is this something that in the future you feel if the state cannot fund it that if someone is a rape victim in the City of Springfield that the city should cover the cost of that examination for the victim?

CR: I think that’s something that ultimately government has to take responsibility for when the victims can’t because it is the state of Missouri that brings the criminal charges. Ultimately, it’s the state of Missouri’s job to make sure that it gets prosecuted effectively. The state, as I recall, voluntarily acquired that responsibility for the rape kits because the victims were having problems paying for it but then they didn’t allocate enough money. But I think it’s a state burden. If the state doesn’t do it, other jurisdictions would have to do but I think putting it on a local level is too burdensome.

LOJ: Do you think the system the way it is now is flawed where a rape victim has to pay for their own rape kit?

CR: Absolutely. We keep telling victims “you’re not the case, you’re a witness in the case” but it’s the state that decides if it gets charged or not. If that’s the case then we need to take responsibility all down the line.

LOJ: In the past I’ve been very critical of you on this blog…going as far as to say you seemed to have obstructionist tendencies…regarding annexation of lands into the city. You seem to have softened a little on that stance recently but I want to just ask you flat out why you seemed to be so against annexation of land into the city and if your mind has changed what changed it?

CR: I still am and I’m glad you raised that because I intend to raise it again at the next meeting when we try to annex some land. We take little bits and pieces here…seven acres here, a few acres there that doesn’t sound like much…but we are straining all our city resources to the limit. Public grounds in their last report on annexation said we’ve taken on hundreds of acres of property and not increased the budget for maintaining those public areas at all. Same thing is happening with streets, same thing is happening with fire personnel, same thing is happening with police personnel.

I’m going to continue to oppose annexations…all of them…because I want to make a point. I want people to start asking “is this annexation really in the best interest of the city?” Can we truly afford it when we’re in a position where we’re barely able to cover the existing city? So I’m not opposed to even the specific annexations but what I want us to do is to start looking at it and stop making it automatic.

I want us to know when we annex a particular piece of property it is for a particular reason and not simply because we can or because someone has asked us to do it. We don’t have the resources to do it. So creating little city islands in the middle the county makes no sense to me. Having boundaries that jig-jag all over the area makes no sense to me. Straining city resources to cover areas that are not of direct benefit to the city makes no sense to me. I want us to start asking the questions we need to be asking and getting meaningful answers.

LOJ: Well, now I understand a little better where you’re coming from because sitting in the back (of the Council meetings) all I ever see is “no, no, no, no” and it sort of came off to me having not spoken to you leaving me wonder why you were against the city growing but when you put it that way…

CR: I want us to grow reasonably.

LOJ: This is from another blog that I frequent and whom I’ve worked. During a vote regarding the city’s position on the homeless shelter proposed by Rev. Larry Rice, you stood up and walked out of the meeting before the vote. Local blogger Jim Lee posted the following: “NOW: somebody in all honesty tell me this wasn’t discussed prior to the meeting and a course of action was laid out and followed. Council knew what they were going to do before they did it. This was discussed and City Attorney Dan Wichmer.gave them a strategy. Our little moment of ‘high drama’ appears to have been scripted. So much for openness and transparency in our city government.” Was it scripted and how does it make you feel that someone would have that conclusion upon hearing about the incident?

CR: Well, I don’t think they paid attention! I’m sorry, Jim, but that’s how I feel about it. It was not scripted at all and it was something that I had worried about and thought about…especially that day. All day long I tried to decide what to do with that. Whether it was worth taking on the steamroller because I knew I was going to get aggravation over it. Finally I decided I was going to try and explain how I felt about it. Because it had that qualification in it that it had to be unanimous I thought I would abstain. When I said that at the meeting Dan Wichmer said “no, you can’t abstain unless you have a conflict of interest.”

Then I was stuck with “well, do I completely block this essentially pointless resolution and take on the entire city or do I let them do it and say what I have to say and move on?” Finally I said to myself the only way I’m going to get out of this is to not be here so I just got up and walked out.

LOJ: Let me ask the tough question. Why didn’t you just cast the no vote that you wanted to cast? Why not take it on say “this is just not worth it?”

CR: I thought about that but then what would happen is that it would be all about me instead of the resolution. I wanted people to really ask themselves what they were doing. To question the wisdom of what they were doing. Again, it was a question of do I discuss the principle and try to make my point and yet not be so obstructionist that everyone jumps down my throat and focuses completely on me. It was a tough one but that is how I handled it right or wrong.

LOJ: We’re sitting here just off the square whose redevelopment is now in question because of the involvement of the National Trust for Historic Preservation. What is your opinion regarding their inserting themselves into the process at the 11th hour and do you think this will impact the redevelopment and possibly the city having to repurchase the Heer’s tower?

CR: Well, to be really blunt about it, I’m aggravated.  I wasn’t totally thrilled with the way the whole Heer’s negotiations went but that really happened before I came on and we were stuck with what we had.  But I am aggravated now because the last thing the city needs right now is to have the Heer’s project dumped back in our lap.  We just can’t afford to take on that kind of debt again and that kind of aggravation.

So I don’t know what prompted it…why they inserted themselves at this point…I suspect it has something to do with Dan Chiles’ position on this but I’m aggravated because it could be way too expensive.

LOJ: What would you say is the item that the city most needs to focus on and what item in the city are we most focused on that we shouldn’t have as much focus on?

CR: I think the focus on the pension fund and that’s a real problem.  I don’t think that’s an illusory thing.  We’ve got to get that straightened out and off our plate so that we can move on to other issues.  I think the city is very focused on development which is fine and I think that’s an important part of what the city needs to do…but I’m concerned we’re not doing it in a balanced and reasonable kind of way.

For one thing, I think development needs to be focused a little more on major retail than on bars and restaurants.  I think we’re taking a real limited perspective on what is development.  I think we’re tending to do development for the sake of development.  We’re not spreading it across the city.

I think there are a lot of questions we have to start asking about what we need to do, where and how.  I feel like there are a lot of voices on the Council that speak for developers that are interested in development and are kind of “full speed ahead and full throttle” on everything.  What I want to do is add one little voice in there for neighborhoods.

I don’t see any point of development at the cost of neighborhoods.  You start taking away people’s most valuable assets…their homes, their neighborhoods…and they’re going to leave.  It doesn’t matter how much retail or restaurants or whatever downtown…they’re gonna leave because you’ve taken away that thing that is most valuable to them next to their family.

So I get really aggravated at times when I see the developer getting all kinds of benefits and assistance and the neighborhoods just kind of being blown off.  I want to make sure there’s at least one voice on the Council..and it’s not only one voice…but I want to make sure there’s at least one voice that says “hey, what about the neighbors here” and “what about property values” and “maybe we don’t need to have that new strip mall at the busiest intersection in town and adding to the aggravation in that neighborhood.”  That’s what I’m trying to do…be the one small voice of reason in the flood.

LOJ: One more question…on this blog in the past I’ve taken issue with people who have come to City Council meetings and used props or insulted City Council members or in their public comments have taken shots at Council members or city staff saying that’s not the best way to communicate your opinion to City Council…

CR: Clearly.

LOJ: As a Council member, when a member of the public comes to you during public comment time, what do you look to hear from them and what when thrown at you turns you off to what they have to say?

CR: When I get somebody who starts getting personal or snide or has that nasty little undertone to what they have to say, I’m done.  I’m finished with them.  I believe very strongly in civil discourse.  Whatever your feelings are you deal with people with respect and I expect that back.  You give it out and you expect it back.  So when someone starts getting nasty with me I stop listening.

I don’t listen to show that deal with that kind of attitude, I don’t read blogs that deal with that kind of attitude because I expect people to treat each other with dignity and respect.

What I’m looking for is someone who is reasoned who can present their concerns in a straightforward, civil  and rational way.  When someone does that, I’m going to listen.  I might not be able to help them but I’m going to listen and try to give them the courtesy of some response.

You know, some people seem to think that just because you’re an elected official they can speak to you any way they want to speak to you and that’s not the way I was ever brought up.  I don’t expect people to deal with me that way.

LOJ: Any final thoughts you would like to share?

CR: It’s been a real learning experience for me on a number of levels.  First, what we expect from our City Council is enormous.  I don’t think the average citizen has any idea how much time Council takes.  It’s not just the lunches, it’s not just the meetings every other Monday.  It’s hours and hours of personal time.

I used to kind of smile at Ralph Manley until I realized that Ralph dedicates hundreds of hours of his personal life to the city.  I think people need to understand that and how much is really involved it.   For people to donate the amount of time that they do is pretty impressive.

The other thing that has been very frustrating is how very little people participate.  You get a handful of people who appear all the time and the vast majority of people do not participate and this is the level of government where we should have the greatest interaction.

I used to blame Council for that…and I do to some extent…but I see Council really struggling trying to make processes as open as possible.  In the past year, I’ve been really impressed at how much individual Council members have tried to do that but the public is not willing to take on their share of the responsibility.

They need to step up.