Slim budgets and tough decisions are nothing new for local governments, and Denver for decades has navigated through boom and bust cycles. As former leaders respectively of two of Denver’s largest city agencies (the Department of Parks & Recreation and the Department of Transportation & Infrastructure), we know how challenging it was to lead city teams through hard times.
Denver’s government grew during the last decade of boom times. Mayor Mike Johnston and agency directors are now managing through this economic downturn, and they need to prioritize both caring for the city’s public servants who keep the city running and delivering great services for residents. It isn’t easy to do both with shrinking revenues, but our city’s leaders have to find the way.
Given the significant budget deficit facing the city, the city’s leaders sadly have to consider employee layoffs. For decades, city employees have operated under a complex layoff system that placed a heavy emphasis on seniority, using a “last in, first out” method of making layoff decisions. While well-intended to protect long-term employees with institutional knowledge, this legacy system can overlook other critical factors like performance and expertise of more junior employees. Employees are the heartbeat of this city, and we should be doing everything we can to attract and retain the best and brightest…