KGWN –Cheyenne, WY– Scottsbluff, NE News,Weather, SportsChamber Holds Discussion on Impact of a City Manager

Chamber Holds Discussion on Impact of a City Manager

Cheyenne has been in existence since 1867, but in it's 145 years it's never hired a city manager.

At Friday's monthly chamber luncheon experts discussed and took questions on the possibility of adopting a council-manager form of government.

While Cheyenne has never had a city manager, cities like Casper, Laramie and Rawlins all have a council-manager form of government.

Some members of the community have raised the question of looking into it and the chamber decided it's an idea worth becoming informed about.

The council-manager government system has been growing in popularity throughout the country with approximately 50% of towns larger than 2,500 that have now adopted this form of government.

The chamber invited three local experts on the subject to give their first hand experience.

"When you have a city manager you free up the elected officials to focus on policy. That's a big advantage to them, then they're not burdened with the administrative duties," said George Parks, Executive Director of the Wyoming Association of Municipalities.

Parks is an expert on Wyoming's cities and towns and works to help them thrive. He says with so many cities across the country that have hired city managers he believes they see an advantage to having a professional run a city's day-to-day management.

"People recognize all of the expertise that it takes. The city's a very complex organization and the fact that it makes the elected officials job much more straight forward," Parks said.

Mark Collins works in administration at the University of Wyoming and has 25 years experience in public management. His research claims increased efficiency and revenue for towns with a city manager.

As a former city manager in Casper for more than 20 years, Tom Forslund believes it's healthy for a community to constantly evaluate itself.

"A community periodically needs to look at how it does things and has to question if there's better ways of doing it," Forslund said.

Forslund believes the people running the government and not the system is ultimately what's most important to success.

"I'm a believer that any form of government works well if you have good people in the responsible positions," Forslund said.

To change government formats it would take 15% of all voters in the last election to sign a petition calling for an election to approve a change in government.