ICFJ/Knight International - Knight Foundation News

<h3 align="left">By Travis Fain - <a href="mailto:tfain@macon.com">tfain@macon.com</a></h3> Macon Mayor Robert Reichert can spend private foundation grants and conduct a survey of city employees without the City Council's approval, according to the city attorney. The controversy surfaced in late May, when some council members were upset to learn of the ongoing survey. The survey and other projects are paid for by two local foundation grants funneled through a third foundation, the Community Foundation of Central Georgia. That means the grants are not city money, City Attorney Pope Langstaff wrote in a memorandum to the mayor and council. The mayor can spend the money as he likes, provided the foundation boards that gave the $1.25 million in funding agree, Langstaff wrote. A large chunk of that money, about $420,000, eventually will fund a &quot;total organizational review&quot; of the city by the University of Georgia's Carl Vinson Institute of Government, mayoral spokesman Andrew Blascovich said. That study will look at installing a new pay scale for employees, which has been on Macon's wish list for years, as well as the ongoing &quot;climate survey,&quot; Blascovich said. The climate survey, in which employees are asked which needs the city should address, concerned some council members who complained they were left out of the loop when they heard about it last month. Poor communication between the mayor and council short circuited many initiatives during former Mayor Jack Ellis' administration, and some complaints of a similar problem have carried over into Reichert's term. But the city charter allows the mayor to authorize such a survey without council approval, Langstaff said in his memo. It also allows the council to do essentially the same thing without the mayor's approval, he said. Councilman James Timley, perhaps the most vocal critic of the mayor's move, said he understands Langstaff's opinion but doesn't share it. It may not be city money the mayor is spending, but it's being spent on city business. &quot;And anytime you're spending money for city business, it has to be done by the Appropriations Committee,&quot; Timley said. But since Timley's push to have the council ask for a separate opinion from the state Attorney General's Office failed, this appears to be a moot point for the council at large, Timley said. The $1.25 million comes from two grants: a $1 million award from the Peyton Anderson to revitalize city government and $250,000 from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation to improve communication between city government and residents. The money runs through the Community Foundation of Central Georgia and not through city accounts, Langstaff said in his memo. Some of the money is being used to help Reichert find a new chief administrative officer for the city - a position still held more than six months into Reichert's term by Ellis' interim choice. A consultant paid through the grant will hopefully have a &quot;short list&quot; of job candidates to Reichert by July 4, Blascovich said. Background checks and interviews would follow, he said. A recent mayor-council retreat, a retreat for department heads and an administration trip to Baltimore to study a computer program used to manage city resources there also have been financed by the grant money, Blascovich said. Councilwoman Elaine Lucas said she never expected the council to have approval power over grant expenditures. But the implementation of programs will have to come through the council, she said. And Reichert should have talked to the council before starting an employee survey, she said. <div align="left">&quot;Since we approve most things that come through that involve all employees, we certainly should be asked to approve (the survey),&quot; she said.</div>

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