Council abdicates - or capitulates? Administration conforms.

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ABDICATION or CAPITULATION, that is the question.

In the matter of the appointment of the city's department heads, the charter calls for the 'advice and consent' of the Council to the mayor's nominations.

Mayor Sharon Robinson-Briggs declined to make her nominees available for interviewing by the Council in executive session back last December, as has been the standard practice for dog's years.

There was a lot of buzz at the time about why they were not interviewed and word in the street was that they would be brought on in an 'acting' capacity once the new mayor took office. Word in the street got it right, though people were still perplexed about why.

The 90-day 'acting' period passed quickly ('time flies when you're having fun'), and the administration awoke to the smell of coffee days before the appointments were to expire -- so abruptly in fact that the mayor made an appearance at an agenda-setting session to ask verbally for full confirmation of her cabinet.

May we infer from Councilman Storch's remarks on the subject last night (reported elsewhere) that the Council never got to sit down in executive session with the proposed cabinet just to discuss the cabinet?

The Council bluster of last fall that we had a 'strong-council' form of government seems to have gone the way of the March winds before the gentle April showers.

I never held for that 'strong-council' stuff anyway. I come from the school that says 'barring their being outright crooks or incompetents, the mayor's nominees should be confirmed with celerity.'

Interviewing the candidates in executive session provides the opportunity for the Council to do its due diligence and minimize the risk that the city is going to be embarrassed by the appointments somewhere down the road.

But not to interview the candidates at all before confirming them? That means the Council either abdicated its responsibility or capitulated to the administration, either way giving the administration carto blanco.

Will we ever know which it was? Probably not. We will survive, but with a Council whose luster is somewhat tarnished.

On a more positive note, the agenda for last night's Council meeting indicated the Clerk's office had received written communications from the administration regarding the appointments. Conforming to statewide practice is a good thing, since the only form of communication the State of New Jersey recognizes in governmental matters is written.

-- Dan Damon

Keywords: Council, written communications