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Time to hold Aspen city manager accountable

Must Aspen City Council be reminded that the assistant city managers report to and are supposed to be supervised by the city manager? Not by City Council.

Aspen’s city charter entrusts management of the city to one person: the city manager. He is supposed to be accountable to City Council. There is no mention in the charter of assistant city managers. They are like any other city employee. They are supposed to be supervised by the city manager. If the assistants are to run the city and be held accountable instead of the city manager, why is a city manager needed at all?

One assistant to the city manager appears to have gone way off the rails with regard to two major and expensive city projects: one for employee housing and one for the mobility lab (“Assistant city manager Barry Crook resigns,” Dec. 16, The Aspen Times). This didn’t happen overnight. Where was the city manager? Didn’t he know what was going on? Why didn’t he set things straight before it was too late? Why isn’t he ever held accountable?



Maurice Emmer

Aspen