Not understanding leadership -- having never led a large, consumer-facing organization -- Matt Tuerk has decided to lay down the law to Allentown's net taxpayers over trash.
A quick look at the City of Allentown Facebook page shows a great many of Tuerk's net taxpayer employers aren't happy about that.
To anyone who has run a customer-centric organization and held responsibility for profit and loss, had to make payroll, pay dividends, and compete in an open market, the leadership response here is clear: tell the current trash hauling contractor to do as they're told or fire them and find one that will. Tuerk, alas, is bucking for Waste Management Employee of the Month rather than acting as Allentown's Mayor. We see here the burgeoning conversion to Detroit-style city management.
To a city like Allentown in dire fiscal condition and drowning in dependent class dysfunction and crime, placating garbage men would never be high on any capable senior leader's agenda.
It would seem the appropriate response is for Tuerk's net taxpayer employers to say to him, "No. We'll just keep doing it as we've been doing it. And don't even *think* of trying to fine us." This masked, tatooed little fellow is not to be taken seriously. As our patriot trucker friends to the North are so clearly demonstrating, non-compliance can be *very* effective.
