GOOKIN: Botching city admin search

Coeur d’Alene is a great community and our local government deserves to find an excellent city administrator to fill the current vacancy. 

The city of Cd’A, led by Mayor Gookin is completely botching the recruitment process and I fear that the best and brightest applicants will shy away from seeking the administrator job. 

I worked in local government leadership positions for over 43 years and served as the president of the International City/County Management Association. I know how local government works and I know what top candidates look for when applying for city administrator positions. 

The best applicants are excelling in their current positions. Before they consider leaving to take a similar job in the city of Coeur d’Alene, they will have some key questions: 

Can I hire my own leadership team? The answer is no. In Cd’A, the city jumped ahead and hired your department heads for you. 

Is the elected leadership stable and competent? Watching the recent council meeting where the mayor heard the city attorney’s appropriate advice and responded with profanity and a call for a respected city attorney to resign, it’s hard to reach the conclusion that Cd’A has stable leadership. Gookin’s true colors are showing and he’s probably not fixable. 

In the end, an administrator candidate isn’t going to leave a great job, move their family to Cd’A, and risk having the mayor lambast them publicly every time they make a professional recommendation that he doesn’t like. 

The best fix for this botched process is for Mayor Gookin to resign, for the council to do a leadership “reset” and to hope that the recruitment process isn’t poisoned beyond repair. 

DAVID CHILDS

Coeur d’Alene