|
A community embarrassment |
|
|
To the Editor:
The Caledonia City Council speaks of embarrassment caused by Police
Chief Shefelbine for his attempted promotion of one of his officers to
sergeant (Argus, Jan. 9), but then proceeds to embarrass us with a
letter of reprimand that is published but not “registered”. The letter
appears to be little more than a cheap shot that the Council knows will
“register” with Mr. Shefelbine.
That embarrassment is heightened by the Council, in collaboration with
the City Attorney, acting as if the language in Chief Shefelbine’s job
description in unclear. While the language is clumsy, it is not
unclear. The police chief “undertakes or effectively recommends the
full compliment [sic] of personnel actions”. He may “undertake”, or he
may “recommend”. Take this out of the context of city politics
and it becomes quite clear: At lunch my child “drinks or generously
shares his juice with friends.” Who believes that this means my
child should not drink all his juice, and must be disciplined if he
does?
I am sure the City Council would rather that Mr. Shefelbine’s job
description said “the chief does not undertake--but instead effectively
recommends--the full complement of personnel actions”. So why didn’t
councilmembers acknowledge that the job description does not accurately
reflect their intent? They could correct the offending language,
negate Mr. Stemper’s promotion, and forthrightly deal with what they
apparently see as Mr. Shefelbine’s disregard of their wishes.
Did Chief Shefelbine over-zealously interpret his rights as defined by
his job description? Perhaps he did. Did he discuss his intent with the
Council as would have been prudent? Perhaps he did not. But by
pretending that he misrepresented a job description that reasonably can
be seen to give him the authority he exercised, and by publicly airing
a letter of reprimand that they then “retract”, the City Council and
City Attorney have only increased our community’s embarrassment over
this unfortunate affair.
Joel Lidstrom
Caledonia, Minn.
 |
