Letter to the Editor / CRONYISM IN PARADISE

Reasonable people can agree to disagree about most issues, but there are some decisions that are rationally so one-sided, black & white, good & bad as to allow no excuse or justification for the wrong choice. Dramatic examples include slavery, women’s right to vote, and declaring war on Nazi Germany. President Kennedy wrote “Profiles in Courage” to honor public servants and politicians who did the right thing even though it was at great personal cost.

Key West is in the vortex of a simple but similar issue – how to find and select the best new City Manager. No one individual in KW has more power or impact on the city’s success or failure than the CM, who is chosen by the Mayor and 6 Commissioners. The question each of these public servants should ask themselves is: Do we want to use an open, competitive and professional process that screens qualified candidates (local, statewide and national) and assures us of superior vetted finalists from which to choose? If you want what’s best for KW, the answer is “YES”. Sadly, it looks like at least half of the commissioners want to avoid a national competitive search so they can simply appoint a friend, neighbor or local candidate without worrying about qualifications or merit. This might feel good within a local district, but it would be a long term tragedy for our city.

One irony is that avoiding a professional process and doing what looks like cronyism, renders that local candidate ineffective because more than half the KW population will always see him as illegitimate because he failed to compete.

Whatever the outcome in the next week, Mayor Teri and Commissioners Sam Kaufman and Greg Devila say they are for a national process to get the best candidates, locally and from wherever they are located. The other Commissioners should be wrestling with their consciences and asking themselves “why not the best?”.

One thing seems certain, each commissioner and the Mayor will be held accountable – for courage or for blame – depending on the results.

Roger Kostmeyer

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