"City Council Tactics". That's the title of the presentation made by City staff to the Richardson City Council. But they aren't tactics for the City Council. They are tactics for City staff, who developed them themselves. There are a lot of them, 73 by my count. Much of the list reads like things that were probably on the City staff's to-do list for months or years, just like the goals and strategies they are based on are mostly recycled from previous years. I suspect City staff was careful to avoid making them too ambitious, risky, or binding (or, for that matter, specific, measurable, attainable, relevant and time-based — you know S.M.A.R.T.). It's entirely understandable for employees to not want to promise their bosses too much. So words like "Explore," "Review," "Evaluate" are commonly used. One tactic starts with "Develop a strategy to...", not "Just Do It." I thought the Council had delegated the tactics to staff, not the job of developing more strategies.
Let's look at what's still missing, and then assess the City Council's own participation in the process of developing and shaping these tactics, maybe awarding some medals in the process.
