Retirement, Part II

Jerry will glide into retirement after his last BOA meeting in April.  Actually he started preparing for life after WL in December when he headed off to Florida, missing the BOA meetings in January and February.  What will York/Botbyl inherit as he takes over the reins of the City?

The City's financial condition is ok, Jerry and the City have had the good fortune of windfalls from phone and ddt settlements to prop up the budget.  Those windfalls are over and the City's revenues versus expenditures will get tighter as the revenue opportunities are limited for WL.  The Community Center continues to bleed red, to the tune of six figures over Jerry's tenure.  Take a drive down Kerns, you'll see the result of a patch and fill approach to streets gone bad...if you are an EastSider pay particular attention as you navigate East Side Drive, yikes, huh?  Jerry's Road Guru, Vic, estimated the road life in the city to be about 20 years.  Interesting.  While we have around $600,000 at Platte County for roads, doing the math, we are a bit short on addressing our streets.  And of course the management of the water and sewer increases from KC has long ago gone awry.  Lots of issues simmering for the new mayor to address.
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Try as Jerry might he was never able to mobilize citizens to participate in city government, I think it might have been an unrealistic expectation on his part.  He started his first term with a flurry of new Committees, the Audit Committee, the so called Airport Noise Committee and the Entrance Advisory Group Committee (EAG).  The Audit Committee was a flop, established on the premise there may have been problems with the City's finances.  They reviewed an independent audit (last one conducted) and found the financial management of the City to be excellent (which was when Alan York was Mayor).  The committee met a few times after that and died.  Same thing with the Airport Committee, an initial flurry and then it too pooped out and died as well.

I'm sure Jerry felt the EAG would he his legacy for the City.  Almost six years in the making, it is half done or as a neighbor commented recently, half-a##ed.  The West Side still has the retro look of the old and of course East Side @ Barry and City Hall have the rusty/rustic look of the new.  Unless I have missed it, fund raising stalled long ago.  Vic, one of Jerry's chief lieutenants on the project, has left the City, and Jim Miller, the initial leader of the EAG no longer heads up the project...leaving Jerry with the mantle of leadership for the unfinished business.  The whole monument project never generated an outpouring of community support, thus what you see is what you get.

Speaking of leaving, I think it is well known by now that Jerry at some point will be leaving WL for points North and South.  I certainly don't fault him for moving on and enjoying retirement, I think that is something we all aspire to do.