Mayor Satish Hiremath scolded Oro Valley Planner David Williams at last week's Oro Valley council meeting because Williams put an item on the meeting agenda that, the Mayor's opinion, was not worthy of Council time.The item was to allow LaMesa RV to display RV's three times between now and December 3, 2014 at the Oro Valley Marketplace (See our posting yesterday).
Waiting until the end of the discussion on the matter, Hiremath stated his opinion: "Once again, we are way in the weeds....This [the display or more than 100 RV's ] is nothing more than the Art's Council with a massive amount of tents.... Our job is to bring people in the area. It is to help in a down time....This is nothing more than a private company trying to work with the Oro Valley Marketplace."
Hiremath then turned on Williams: "I'm lighly hitting you over the head with this because I don't think it should rise to this level of the council. We do have other pressing things that we need to be thinking about and I do think the buck should stop with you. You get paid the big bucks to make those decisions." Williams had to sit there. He had to listen to this public rebuke. The Mayor did not ask him to respond. Watch they Mayor's remarks.
Planner Williams had brought the matter to council because the law required him to do so. The Rancho Vistoso PAD required council to hear this matter, hold a public hearing on it, and make a decision. David Williams was doing his job.
Mayor Hiremath does not hold a town position that gives him the authority to "dress down" a town employee in private, let alone to do so publicly. The position of Mayor of Oro Valley is primarilly a ceremonial one. The Mayor has no direct reports. Two individuals, the town manager and the town's outside legal council, report to council. One department, the police department, reports to council. This is a department that the Mayor does not wish to oversee. Oro Valley Development and Infrastructure Department, the department in which Mr. Williams resides, reports to the town manager, not to the Mayor or council.
Regardless, no council member, including the Mayor, has the right to dress down a town employee in public (or private) at any time. It is not simply a matter of bad taste. It is a matter of decency. Perhaps Mayor Hiremath should undergo extensive sensitivity training to learn how to hold his remarks and be sensitive to others.
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Unlike Mayor Hiremath, we are pleased that council discussed this use. It was a worthy use of council time. There are rules. There are requirements. These rules and these requirements should be discussed and considered. Yes. perhaps, following the law can become a bit tiresome and boring. But it is the law and it Mayor's job to uphold it and to not rebuke others for doing so. And, if the Mayor doesn't want to do the job, the entire job, then, perhaps he should not be Mayor.
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