Thomas Breen photo
Grotheer pitches alders.
Lawmakers didn’t press “like” as they questioned a proposal to spend $50,000 a year on a new mayoral Facebook/Twitter/Snapchat specialist while raising taxes 11 percent.
Mayoral officials responded that in a social media-saturated era of vanishing news reporters, City Hall must become more of its own news outlet.
Those exchanges took place during a workshop in the Aldermanic Chambers on the second floor of City Hall about the mayor’s proposed $547 million operating budget for Fiscal Year 2019.
Three representatives from the mayor’s office made their pitch to the alders on the Finance Committee for hiring a new mayoral staffer who will specialize in digital communications via the city’s website and other social media platforms.
Alders on the committee pointed to the 11 percent increase in the mayor’s proposed budget for the fiscal year starting July 1, as well as to the three assistants, two secretaries and one communications director who already work for the mayor, as reasons not to create a new $50,000 per year salaried position. The alders suggested that existing staff absorb that work.
Acting Budget Director Michael Gormany, Chief of Staff Tomas Reyes and Director of Communications Laurence Grotheer argued that changes in the news industry have resulted in fewer City Hall reporters and a greater public reliance on digital, multimedia news platforms.
“All of this suggests a need for the city to provide more content and to become a news source on it own,” Grotheer said. “With additional platforms and multiple options on each of these platforms, there simply isn’t enough time to meet the demand for written content, for photographs, and for video. So this position would provide that opportunity to meet that demand.”
Gormany told the alders that the new position is one of four new to be created from savings achieved through the proposed elimination of two high-level positions in the Department of Public Works (DPW). The other three new positions will go to DPW, while this fourth new position will be allocated to the mayor’s office.
East Rock Alder Anna Festa asked why Grotheer could not do this work as part of his current job. Grotheer currently serves as the mayor’s spokesperson and press secretary, and as the public information officer for all city departments.
“How complicated is it to copy and paste for a Twitter account?” she asked.
“It’s not so complicated,” Grotheer replied. “It’s just time consuming.”
Grotheer, Acting Budget Director Gormany, Chief of Staff Tomas Reyes.
He said that he simply does not have the capacity to keep several Facebook accounts current, to tweet, to provide content for the city’s website, and to upload video from CTN on top of his current workload of writing and delivering press releases, doing interviews with reporters, and coordinating responses between the press and every department at City Hall.
Festa and Hill Alder Dave Reyes pointed out that, in addition to Grotheer, the mayor’s office already includes an executive administrative assistant to the mayor, a receptionist/citizens specialist, an executive assistant to the mayor, an assistant to the mayor, and a receptionist for the mayor’s office.
“That’s a lot of assistants to the mayor,” Reyes said. “Have we thought about being creative” instead of adding this position?
Reyes said that the mayor’s office conducted a review of each assistant’s job responsibilities as they formulated this new position, and decided that everyone in the office is already fully occupied with unique workloads. He stressed that this position would build capacity in a public information team that currently consists of just Grotheer.
“To have stability in an assistant role,” Grotheer said, “to complete administrative functions and to provide content across these new and more and more popular platforms would benefit the city in terms of its obligation to keep residents informed.”
East Rock Alder, and lone Finance Committee millennial, Charles Decker.
East Rock Alder Charles Decker said that, as the lone millennial on the committee, he is sympathetic to the idea that people increasingly rely on Facebook, Twitter and Snapchat for their news. He asked what specific outcomes the mayor’s office expects to produce with this new position.
“Well, referrals to all these additional platforms,” Grotheer said. “I completely forgot about Snapchat.” He said that press releases could link to specific areas of the city website that would then allow interested residents to learn more about the workings of city government.
“With all due respect,” Reyes replied, “wanting and needing are two different things.”
He and Festa said that this position looks a lot more like a “want” than a “need,” and that the mayor should find some way to get existing staff to assist in these digital endeavors.
“It just seems like people are trying to squeeze a nickel out of a dime,” Festa said, “and this city is spending the dime plus the nickel that we don’t have. “
She said that the mayor blames the state for not giving the city enough money, but really the city has a spending problem.
The mayor’s team promised to provide the committee with a detailed description of each mayoral assistant’s current job responsibilities and workloads.
The Board of Alders must approve a final version of the budget by the first week of June.
The next budget workshop, during which the Finance Committee will interview more department heads about their respective allocations in the mayor’s proposed budget, is on Tuesday, March 27, at 6 p.m. in the Aldermanic Chambers on the second floor of City Hall.