At City Council last night, President Waldron once again responds to concerns about his soft-gavel style:
- I take this position seriously; I’m honored to serve for another term.
- I stand by my legacy in the work that I did in my role over the last two years and hope to build on that.
- I will continue to encourage as much public comment as possible as well as healthy debate among members of council.
- I have brought in the live-streaming in an effort to get more people engaged.
- I have made attempts to interact a bit more with the speakers in a way . . . to try to answer some questions whenever it is appropriate and try to have a small dialog.
- I haven’t been deaf to the criticisms of my style of allowing a very long leash and using a soft gavel, and I’ll continue to try to reflect on that in ways to help guide the conversation in a more positive and productive way.
- I’m serious in my commitment to listening to my members of Council and hearing their feedback on my management of the meetings.
- I would say that generally most of the criticisms directed at me for not managing a specific member of Council and not silencing them or gaveling them down.
- Which I think is a fair criticism; however, I have made attempts to guide that conversation to be a bit more productive, and those attempts have not been successful.
- Ultimately I think if there’s a single bad actor, that doesn’t reflect negatively upon Council.
- I think that reflects upon that individual, and those comments are representative of that certain person, not of the entire Council.
- I will, however, try to continue and maybe a bit more aggressively help try to push that conversation to a productive one.
- It’s my hope that everybody can continue to work together, we have a generally good working relationship among Council and the administration, and I hope that we can continue that over the next two years.
- I think the City is in great shape, and a lot of that has to do with these relationships.
- I thank members of Council and the public for their support.
- I am very open to having a dialog and a conversation about how we can continue to improve things here at City Council meetings as well as in the City as a whole.