Unsettled

The thing is, Fort Smith City Director Kevin Settle is a likable guy. Or, to the point of this essay, he has a likable side; amiable, also.

More to the point, he has many sides. Too many. Politically speaking, that is.

Speaking politically, Settle has become a hologram.

“If you look at these holograms from different angles, you see objects from different perspectives, just like you would if you were looking at a real object,” notes an explainer at How Stuff Works. “Some holograms even appear to move as you walk past them and look at them from different angles. Others change colors or include views of completely different objects, depending on how you look at them.”

If you look at Settle’s board positions from different angles, you see his actions and words from different perspectives, just like you would if you were looking at real leadership and decisions. Some Settle positions even appear to move as time marches past them and we see them from angles that include more hindsight. Settle’s political colors shift or take on completely different appearances, depending on how he wants you to look at them.

He’s been all over the map on taxation.

In January 2010, Settle and then City Director Bill Maddox rejected a board consensus to move the 1% prepared food tax for support of the Fort Smith Convention Center to a public vote. Settle, possibly petulantly upset that a more aggressive and costly ($38 million) quality-of-place plan he proposed just a few months earlier was rejected, said the city should instead ask voters for access to the 1% street tax money to fund the convention center.

In February 2011, Settle voted against direct enactment of the 1% prepared food tax because he said it should go before voters. With little changed in the way of circumstances, Settle had within 13 months opposed and supported sending the 1% prepared food tax before voters.

Prior to February 2011, Settle and Maddox refused to accept the recommendation of an ad hoc committee that researched, at the behest of the city board, convention center funding options. That committee recommended a 1% prepared food tax. Obfuscation and successful delaying moves by Settle and Maddox continued to spoil any hope of immediate board action on the convention center issue.

Settle is all over the map on leadership.

Following the November 2010 election, Settle aggressively and successfully lobbied the other six city directors to be voted the city’s vice mayor. As part of that effort, he promised to do more to bring the board together and make unified decisions on the big issues. Settle somewhat chastised City Director George Catsavis for missing an April board retreat during which Settle frequently noted the importance of the better board interaction and coming together to solve the big problems.

“As a team building exercise, I wish that all board members would have participated. It gives us a better idea of how we can all better interact together,” Settle said of the retreat and pre-retreat work.

Settle, who sought the vice mayoral position to be a board leader and who recently spoke of the need for board unity, now refuses to directly answer if he will stand with five city directors who unequivocally say they will campaign for voter approval of a 1% prepared food tax. When asked repeatedly if he would campaign for or against the tax, Settle noted: “I want to educate the citizens to better understand the cost and benefits of the convention center, so they can make an informed vote. I will also educate the citizens of Fort Smith on what services will be cut if the tax fails.”

Settle’s equivocation makes it difficult to assess if he means what he says now compared to what he did yesterday. To wit: In April 2010, Settle and Maddox opposed selling a relatively paltry 70,000 gallons of water a day increase to Charleston, Lavaca and the River South Water Users Association. If Settle and Maddox would have carried the day, a more than $7.5 million water development bringing new water supplies to growing communities east of Fort Smith would have been jeopardized. Water is THE fundamental component of economic development in this and any region. Yet Settle, who worried the 70,000 gallons from our more than 35-billion gallon holdings would threaten city spigots, didn’t want to share the basic resource with neighbors in desperate need of more water.

Yet during Settle’s 2010 campaign and in recent interviews he professes to being “committed to working with regional partners to make good things happen for Fort Smith and surrounding communities.” He said the Fort Smith Board of Directors “needs to take a leadership role and facilitate regular meetings between City, Chamber, County, UAFS and state leaders so we can work cooperatively for the benefit of the entire region.”

One is justified in questioning Settle’s leadership on future regional economic development issues.

On internal budget matters, Settle has proven equally squishy.

The board voted in December on a $269 million city budget that included revenue from a 5% water rate increase. The rate increase was an important part of the city budget, because it maintained bond covenants necessary to protect the city’s overall credit rating. Settle opposed the rate increase, but approved the overall budget that included the 5% increase. He said at the time the overall budget was good but he opposed the 5%. Which is to say he opposed the 5% hike that made the overall budget look good. That’s a lot like ordering apple pie ala mode but not wanting to pay for the ice cream.

Even more troubling was Settle’s involvement in a dust up for which then City Administrator Dennis Kelly took the heat. With the city facing serious budget cutting pressures in mid 2010, Settle privately demanded that Kelly cuts costs without raising fees or taxes; suggesting that in recessionary times, the city cut personnel just like the private sector had cut jobs.

When Kelly responded with deep personnel and service cuts and wage freezes, Settle took quick note of the immediate backlash to Kelly’s plan and pushed the charge against the plan and, eventually, Kelly.

As noted earlier, Settle’s political colors shift or take on completely different appearances, depending on how he wants you to look at them.

This is not to be naive about the process. Politics is certainly not the best soil in which to produce consistency, leadership and consistent leadership.

Those who notice Settle’s vagaries wonder aloud if he is attempting to please as many constituencies as possible so as to better position for higher elective office. Those more conspiratorial suggest Settle is positioning himself for a mayoral bid — especially if we change our form of municipal government.

Folks less kind say Settle is simply in over his head. Politically speaking, that is.

That’s a call I’m not yet willing to make. What I do know is that Settle is the vice mayor, a position he sought and a position that carries — or should carry — a higher expectation of selfless and transparent leadership.