AURORA | Aurora City Council members, and police and fire unions, say they will speak out Monday against a proposal to give the mayor unilateral powers as the city’s top executive.
Councilmember Curtis Gardner said the news conference will take place on the west steps of the Aurora Municipal Center at 3 p.m., just a few hours before the council’s regular meeting.
“This is a gross power grab designed to consolidate power behind one person, which will lead to cronyism and worse,” Gardner wrote Tuesday in a social media post about the proposal.
“Our system works because accountability is built into the process, requiring six votes to get anything done. Giving absolute power for contracts, appointments and more to one person is a sure-fire way to ensure voices are excluded from the process.”
Most of the council will be present to denounce the proposed charter amendment. Gardner said Mayor Mike Coffman and conservative council members Steven Sundberg and Dustin Zvonek were the only ones who have not said whether they will attend.
Sundberg and Zvonek did not immediately reply to messages asking whether they would be a part of the event Monday.
Multiple sources have told the Sentinel Coffman was involved in the creation of the proposal. He, also, did not immediately respond to a request for comment. It is unclear so far who authored the legislation.
In a release Sunday, Wendy Aiello, a spokesperson for the coalition, blasted the proposal.
“One-person leadership dangerously narrows the ability for voters’ voices to be heard,” Aiello said. “It dangerously allows the opportunity for corruption, graft and cronyism.”
The group further criticized the creators of the effort for their lack of transparency.
“There is little clarity in the 13-page document being presented to voters,” Aiello said. “Most importantly, we do not know who is funding this initiative or even who authored it.”
City clerk officials by Friday weren’t able to clarify the composition of the committee behind the effort, other than providing names provided to begin circulating petitions.
The proposed ballot item would restructure Aurora’s city government, giving the mayor the power to veto legislation and directly control the hiring and firing of city staffers.
Other parts of the proposed ballot item would add an at-large council member to the group, reduce term limits for mayors and council members from three four-year terms to two, among other changes.
The proposal has drawn bipartisan criticism, with opponents saying it concentrates too much power into the hands of a single person.
Supporters of so-called “strong-mayor” governments generally argue that folding the responsibilities of a city manager and mayor into a single position cuts down on bureaucracy and creates a more focused local government.
Earlier this month, Suzanne Taheri, an attorney and former Republican candidate for the Colorado Senate, submitted the proposed charter amendment to Aurora’s city clerk on behalf of Garrett Walls, a member of the Aurora Planning and Zoning Commission.
Proponents of the amendment must gather at least 12,017 signatures from registered Aurora voters, equivalent to 5% of the number of voters registered as of the 2022 regular election, before the item can be placed on the Nov. 7 ballot.
Walls recently told the Denver Gazette that the idea emerged from conversations with Coffman.
Councilmember Juan Marcano also previously told the Sentinel about a conversation in which Coffman said he wanted to place a strong-mayor item on the 2023 ballot.
Marcano, Danielle Jurinsky and other city council members said Aurora residents have contacted them saying the people tasked with collecting signatures to put the proposal on the ballot are mostly promoting the item as a way of reforming term limits, failing to mention or downplaying the significance of empowering the mayor.
One constituent wrote in an email to Jurinsky, Coffman and Sundberg that they encountered signature collectors outside of a local Walmart and were told the amendment would limit council members to two terms rather than three.
But when the man read through the text of the amendment, he was surprised to find it included other major changes that the signature collectors failed to mention.
“It wasn’t a one item cause, it was mainly about changing Aurora from a Weak Mayor to a Strong Mayor,” the man wrote. “Also adding MORE at large council members. The people who had just signed the clipboard had never read that, this is very deceiving.”
A constituent of Gardner’s said she spoke with a signature collector outside of a post office in south Aurora, and he initially presented the item to her as a proposal to change term limits.
When she asked for more information, he again said it was a proposal to lower term limits, and then mentioned that it would give more executive power to the mayor, although she said this was brought up as an “afterthought.”
Gardner also sponsored a resolution that the council was scheduled to discuss Monday night that would declare the group’s support for the existing council-manager form of government, which it says combines “the strong political leadership of elected officials with the strong managerial experience of an appointed manager or administrator.”
This is a developing story and will be updated.
Are the signature gatherers a grass roots community group promoting this, or are they paid signature gatherers, and if so, paid by whom?
It seems clear that Garrett Walls is merely a front. He seems to know little about this.
If the Sentinel follows the money it seems likely to lead back to Mike Coffman.
My question is whether Mr. Coffman used city resources to draft this proposed amendment. The Sentinel should be submitting open records requests to find out. Were staff from the Mayor’s Office or the City Attorney’s Office involved in drafting any part of this proposal now being presented insincerely as arising from the mind of Mr. Walls.
Aurora continues to pay the heavy price for one man’s ego and scrambling search for relevance after being voted out of congress.
And if Juan Marcano, who is running for mayor (and absolutely will never get my vote), were to win election? While this may or may not be favorable to Mike Coffman, the issue is do we want ANYONE to have this power in a strong mayor government?
Meanwhile the only thing happening here, even if signature gatherers are orally misrepresenting something people should read before signing, the only result would be putting this on the ballot for voters to decide. Are voters too stupid to decide? I’m encouraged that in Aurora ballot measures do fail nearly as much as they succeed.
Let voters decide.
It should be obvious who is behind this blatant power grab: the book banning, anti-history crowd. Aurora has no history of electing progressive mayors anyway, so passage of something like this will only make right-wing ideology even more firmly entrenched in the office.
This is a horrible idea to concentrate more power in the hands of the mayor. I am horrified to read that the petition gatherers are “summarizing” the petition’s content and misleading people by omitting this important component of the petition.
King Coffman would not be a good thing now or ever! Do not allow this to happen in our beautiful city. Too much power for one person is never a good thing especially when our current Mayor wants the power grab. Our charter was well written and has always worked well. Leave our city as is with the City Manager who manages the city and follows what the City Council votes on.
I was contacted (King Soopers at Quincy and Buckley) by someone asking for me to sign the petition to limit the mayor’s term to two four-year terms, instead of three. Thanks for this article. Nothing was said about changing to a strong mayor form of government.
Uh, in order for that (Strong Mayor) to happen, the mayor must be elected by a greater than 50% margin. Had that been in place during the last mayoral election. Mr. Coffman most likely, most likely would not be mayor.
This conservative council is just like all the others in this country. They “constitution thump” and “bible thump” and get into office to do what? Not govern! They prefer anarchy, like Bush said, so long as they are in charge. So, no to Coffman’s idea(s)