The city of Durango plans to combine and dissolve a number of volunteer boards and commissions that advise City Council on a number of topics.
Volunteers were caught off guard by the plan this week. City staff members presented a proposal to reconfigure the city’s 23 boards and commissions in an effort to reduce redundancy and return the function of boards to their roots of financial oversight.
Staff members identified 10 boards that would be consolidated with other boards or done away with entirely, to the chagrin of some board members who have volunteered for years on the boards.
Boards being targeted for disbandment or absorption include:
- The Local Licensing Authority, with the city manager and city clerk assuming oversight of responsibilities.
- The Parks and Recreation, Natural Lands and Multimodal advisory boards, with financial duties being regrouped under a new Financial Advisory Board.
- The Infrastructure Advisory Board, Planning Commission, Design Review Board and Board of Adjustment, to be combined under a new Planning and Design Commission.
- The Community Relations Commission, which was vacated by all but one member in November after disagreements between City Council and commission members, would be dissolved in favor of a regionwide group that the city would have one seat on.
- The Strategy & Long-Term Finance Advisory Board could be disbanded. Staff members said the board has served its initial purpose.
The boards could be combined or dissolved as soon as midway through this year, said Scott Shine, community development director.
Seth Furtney, a member of the Durango Parks and Recreation Advisory Board, said it makes sense to combine planning and design boards into one group. But he is “disappointed” and “offended” that some boards and their members might get the boot without the city engaging volunteers directly and at least exploring alternatives.
“What has apparently been a yearslong effort on the part of staff took place with zero – and I think that’s an accurate statement – zero coordination with many of the boards that are being impacted,” he said.
Parks and Recreation Advisory Board members expressed disappointment during a meeting Wednesday evening after Ture Nycum, Durango Parks and Recreation director, broke the news. They questioned how effective community engagement will be under the proposed structure and said the restructuring is “sad” and “a slap in the face” to volunteers who have committed years to the board.
Furtney has served on the Parks and Recreation Advisory Board for seven years. With the board’s dissolution, the task of financial advisement will be taken up by a new proposed Financial Advisory Board. But Furtney said financial discussions take up just 20% of the board’s time. The remaining 80% is spent on discussions centered on policy, practice, priorities and recommendations – advocacy for recreational projects.
He said financial advisement is just one of nine explicitly stated purposes of the Parks and Recreation Advisory Board.
Shine said the original intent of having boards such as the Parks and Recreation Advisory Board – and the intent of creating a new singular Financial Advisory Board – is to have guiding bodies to recommend how to spend revenues approved by voters in ballot measures.
Furtney said he doubts community support for ballot measures such as the 2015 sales tax, of which 0.5% is dedicated to parks and multimodal use, would exist without volunteer board members advocating for them.
Board and commission volunteers, who are appointed by City Council, are passionate about their fields and reflect the community’s desires, he said. Dismissing some boards entirely is “forfeiting” that energy and advocacy in favor of a strict focus on “dollars and cents,” he said.
“Which is not insignificant but is by no means everything,” he said.
Erin Hyder, assistant city manager, said the proposed reorganization of boards and commissions would bring down the number of boards from 23 to 15. In turn, the reorganization would reduce City Council and staff hours from 429 council hours and 5,500 staff hours to 83 council hours and 1,500 staff hours per year. Monetarily, staff dollars spent on boards and commissions would be reduced by 27% from $313,000 to $85,000.
Furtney said he spends about 40 hoursreading and reviewing Parks and Recreation plans, and the city is dismissing the efforts of volunteers in its pursuit to whittle down its collection of boards and commissions. And he isn’t sure the city’s vision for reorganized boards matches the community’s expectations.
City councilors expressed support for the proposed reorganization, with the exception of Councilor Olivier Bosmans, who said he does not support the dissolution of the Parks and Recreation, Multimodal , Natural Lands or Infrastructure advisory boards, and the Community Relations Commission should remain active with new appointments. He said he wants more information about the proposed reorganization.
Councilor Kim Baxter said she wants more details about how the Financial Advisory Board would work.
cburney@durangoherald.com
A previous version of this story gave the impression Durango City Councilor Olivier Bosmans was in alignment with other councilors in supporting the reorganization of boards and commissions. Bosmans said he is against the dissolution of several boards.
