On Sunday, we’ll run a story on the latest developments in the debate over Port Orchard Mayor Lary Coppola’s salary. At issue has been whether and how to compensate him on his performance of the job. Here’s a brief review of our coverage and preview of the story.

Coverage so far:
The council in 2008 agreed to what they believed was a six-month trial increase for Coppola, who welcomed the idea of a pay-for-performance model. But the council learned in June that what they thought was a temporary measure could not be undone.
Under state law, councils can raise a mayor’s salary part-way through his term of office, City Attorney Greg Jacoby told them, but unless there were a financial crisis, they could not decrease it until the position came open again. Coppola’s term is up at the end of 2011.
Finance Committee Chairman John Clauson said the council did not ask Jacoby to research the implications of their action back in December, which led to the unintended consequence of a permanent raise.

Recent developments:
Coppola has volunteered to give up 50 percent of his salary if he doesn’t meet a set of quantifiable standards to be set by the city council. Under a proposal from Finance Committee Chairman John Clauson, the committee will draft the list of measurable criteria, to be finalized by the city council. A new set of criteria would be developed and Coppola would be evaluated every six months. If he doesn’t meet the standard, he would accept a 50 percent decrease in his current rate ($62,150 annually).

At least one other Washington city has an incentive-pay arrangement with its mayor. Leavenworth Mayor Rob Eaton receives a base compensation of $12,000, but under an ordinance passed by the city council in July, 2008, the council may periodically, at its discretion grant him what amounts to bonus compensation. Over the past year, Eaton has received a total of $60,000.
Like Coppola, Eaton spends more than 40 hours a week promoting his city. His forte is lobbying state and federal legislators. Often, when his work day is done, Eaton attends festivities in the quaint, Bavarian-themed town in Eastern Washington.
Leavenworth, with a population of 2,200 receives more than 2 million visitors a year. They have both a mayor and a city administrator.

Not everyone on Port Orchard’s council is on board with the idea of incentive pay for the mayor. Although Councilman Fred Chang calls Coppola’s offer “admirable,” he finds Clauson’s proposal “disturbing.”

“I think it’s unnecessarily politicizing the position,” said Chang, who with Councilman Fred Olin unsuccessfully sought an advisory vote on the issue early in the discussion. “I’m very disturbed by the performance-based model. I like it in principal, but I think they’re forgetting we’re a government, not a private company.”

Both Chang and Olin have had good things to say about Coppola, and they agree Port Orchard needs a full-time mayor. But they disagree with the methods pursued by the council.

On a separate note, Port Orchard — which has long had a bad case of Leavenworth envy — has not gone unnoticed by that town.
“I’m very familiar with your community,” said Eaton. I think it’s a beautiful community. I think it has lots of opportunities. I find it charming.”

Although Leavenworth’s unifying theme has played to its advantage, it’s not a deal breaker, Eaton said. His town’s events are a surprisingly “mixed bag,” just like Port Orchard which touts seagulls one week, pirates another, and recently pulled out all the stops to turn itself into the fictional town of Cedar Cove. “The ultimate thing is your customers,” said Eaton. “If you treat your guests well, they’ll come back.”

Monday
7 p.m. – The City of Port Orchard Planning Commission will meet at City Hall, 216 Prospect St.; www.cityofportorchard.us.

Tuesday
7 p.m. – The Port Orchard City Council will meet at City Hall, 216 Prospect St.; www.cityofportorchard.us. Among the topics before the council: chain parking and water efficiency goals.

Thursday
10 a.m. – The City of Port Orchard Hearing Examiner will meet at City Hall, 216 Prospect St.; www.cityofportorchard.us. The topic is a request the subdivision of 8.8 acres into 9 lots of property located south of Bay Street and west of Caseco Lane. The name of the project is Turtle Ridge.

The South Kitsap Helpline Food Bank will hold a movie fundraiser at 6 p.m. Sunday at the Historic Orchard Theater, 822 Bay Street in Port Orchard; (360) 850-1082.

The film, “Shirley Valentine,” is about a wisecracking, unpredictable English housewife, bored with her suburban life who takes a wild trip to Greece. Pauline Collins reprises the role of Shirley in the film which won her Broadway’s acclaimed Tony award.

The suggested donation is $20 per ticket, which includes two tickets for a door prize drawing.

Helpline is raising funds to purchase the Port Orchard Nursery property in order to grow produce for the food bank, hold classes on cooking and canning, and sells products to support food bank operations.

I also heard this week from Sally Santana, advocate for the homeless, who sent me an updated resource list.

The format is such that I cannot upload the file, so I will herewith paste the whole thing and hope I don’t crash the system.

Continue reading →

By Chris Henry
chenry@kitsapsun.com
PORT ORCHARD
The Port of Bremerton’s Port Orchard Marina manager has suggested a swap of parking spaces with the City of Port Orchard that would net the port one additional space in the city’s waterfront parking lot. In exchange, the port would maintain a strip of landscaping for the city.
Under the proposal, Marina Operations Manager Brain Sauer told the city council Tuesday, 31 spaces on the east side of the lot that are now controlled by the port would be switched for a total of 32 spaces on the west side of the lot, near the marina office.
The logic, Sauer said, is that port customers now must drive through the area on the east side of the lot occupied on Saturdays by the Port Orchard Farmer’s Market to get to port spaces proposed for the swap. The farmer’s market runs May through October, directly overlapping the port’s peak season.
Moving port parking nearer the marina office would make more sense, Sauer said. And, he added, if the farmer’s market were able to shift closer to the park, it would open up more city parking for market-goers.
Other parking problems arise during the city’s five major festivals each year. The port gives its customers heads up that their cars are likely to be moved to accommodate festival activities. Typically customers leave an extra set of keys with the port so they can be moved to city parking spaces at no additional charge. The city forfeits those spaces during festivals.
Alternately, cars in port spaces are towed. The festival committees pick up the tab for the tow, and the cars are not impounded, just moved.
The new configuration would do away with the need to play musical cars, Sauer said.
In the past, some vehicles that can’t be moved for one reason or another have been left to sit smack in the middle of the action. That problem also would be solved by the swap, Sauer said.
In his observation, marina customers who arrive by car are apt to have lunch or shop downtown. Allowing these folks to park closer to the action, would make it easier for them to support the downtown economy, Sauer said. People using the paid city parking, however, are more likely to be Seattle-bound, so having them park on the east side of the lot would not detract from downtown business, he said.
Council members seemed receptive to the idea, although there was some discussion of reevaluating the arrangement after one year. Councilwoman Carolyn Powers of the city’s Public Property Committee said she had tried to contact the farmer’s market about the idea, but their representative to the city was out of town. Powers said the proposal would have to be approved by the market before she would give it her endorsement. she approves of the proposal, but she suggested the farmer’s market should have the chance to weigh in on it.
“I like it because its safer,” said Councilman Fred Olin.
Councilman Jerry Childs of the Tourism Committee said the idea was “fantastic,” and he praised the port for being”great partners” with the city during festivals.
The council will discuss the issue and likely act on the proposal at an upcoming meeting to be determined.

And since a picture is worth …. well you know the rest, here are maps showing the present and proposed configurations, courtesy of the Port of Bremerton.

parkingnow

parkingproposed