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CITY HALL

An axiom of folk knowledge is that "you can't beat city hall." By this, one may mean either that it has the resources to squelch efforts at social change, or sanction opposition.

I have learned that in rural communities "roads" rank next to schools in importance. Good roads allow a farmer to get his products to market, or a worker to get to his job. A good, hard-surfaced road can greatly increase the value of a piece of property. Consequently, road maintenance and improvement are resources that can be used to reward and punish citizens of a community. Supporters get service. The opposition gets none. This is called "road-grader diplomacy." It happens.

Local governments seem to have much less power than in times past for three reasons--limited income, court decisions, and the increased power of state and national governments. Further, it seems that usually city halls in very small towns have less resources for community leadership than do governments in small cities. For example, in Green Ridge the council has essentially a maintenance function. But in Sedalia, with nearly 30,000 persons, a greater variety of services are offered, professional management is employed and city hall is aggressively seeking to develop the community by securing or expanding industry and enterprises, and also by improving and expanding governmental services.

There is one significant area where the importance of local government has grown in this half of the century; that is, planning and zoning. In towns that are growing or have a potential for growth, this function is crucial. The theory behind it is good. Planned growth can make for a beautiful and functional community. One of the reasons that I got involved in county government by running for office was that some of the developers were doing some sleazy things that increased their profit, but which the taxpayers would ultimately have to pay--undersized water lines, roads without adequate underbase, subdividing land that could not support a septic system.

We had some real battles. But ultimately we got planning and zoning. Battles continue. Where money is to be made the "good ole' boy" network really functions, and the temptations to abuse power are very great.

To this point in this essay we have been looking, in terms of our POET model, at organizations for the most part with some attention to environment. If you identify and understand the role of the five organizations--clubs, churches, schools, businesses and city hall--in your community, you will have a good start on locating power.

Remember that leadership in small communities has three functions--social control, maintenance and social change. All three are needed. While they are subject to abuse, this is not often the case. In our system abuse can be corrected. In stable rural communities the maintenance function is most common. This is expressed through the annual events and projects of the community as well as by the ongoing activities of its institutions. So most leadership is rather mundane and traditional.

Environmental factors, typically introduced by pressures from population or technological change which can impact the organizational dimension of a community, may call for a shift from primary attention being given to maintenance to a focus on control or change. (The next unit will be devoted to a discussion of social change.)

So, let's move to a population topic--the qualification and the motivation of persons to assume leadership roles in the rural community. Then we will look at the resources that equip for leadership.