Voters may want to think twice on May 9 before choosing a busy person when it comes to the important work of city governance.

A Denton Record-Chronicle  analysis of elected officials’ attendance showed 17 council members of the 92 serving in 16 cities missed 20 percent or more of both the regular and special meetings in 2008. Two council members, Alan Fletcher in Lake Dallas and Wayne Hoyt in Bartonville, missed half of all the meetings in 2008.

Hoyt said he approached Bartonville’s mayor, Ron Robertson, when he learned that his job would take him out of town a lot last year. Hoyt works on information technology projects for airlines.

“You know how jobs are these days,” Hoyt said. “I told the mayor when the projects came up and I asked him if I should resign, but he just said, ‘We’d have to appoint a replacement, so let’s see how it goes.’”

Hoyt is in the middle of his fourth term on the council for the town of 1,350. He was able to keep up, in part, by checking in with the town administrator, he said.

At one point, Hoyt asked whether the council could change its meetings to Monday nights, but the discussion didn’t go very far because some complained that it would conflict with Monday night football.

This year has been better on the job front, Hoyt said, and he expects to miss few meetings.

Although Lake Dallas council member Alan Fletcher could not be reached for comment Friday, he had approached fellow council members in late May about changing the meeting day when work demands took him out of town most weekends. He asked the council to change the meeting time from Thursday nights to Tuesdays but was voted down. He announced that he would resign after that meeting but later withdrew his resignation.

Fletcher’s term expires next year.

No city council had a 100 percent attendance rate, but Shady Shores, which meets monthly, had the best attendance rate overall. Two council members missed just one meeting apiece. Neither Mayor Olive Stephens nor any of the other three council members missed any meetings at all.

Most cities had at least one member who missed at least two, or about 10 percent, of the meetings. Two mayors, Ponder’s Jeff Vardell and Oak Point’s Duane Olson, both missed four, or about 20 percent, of their meetings. Denton Mayor Mark Burroughs missed three consecutive meetings in December. Bartonville, Copper Canyon and Northlake each had three council members who missed 20 percent or more of the meetings.

University of North Texas professor Bob Bland, who heads up the university’s public administration department, agrees that, colloquially speaking, busy people are sometimes the best ones to get a job done because they have good time-management skills.

“As you move up in community responsibility and leadership roles, you can accomplish more,” Bland said. “But that can also work the other way. Good time-management also means being able to say no to some tasks.”

When a council member misses a meeting, an important voice from the community isn’t being heard, he said.

“Public policy suffers — from the most mundane to those life-sustaining matters — when you don’t have the benefit of that voice,” Bland said.

Moreover, if too many members miss a meeting, the governing body cannot make a quorum, which can be demoralizing, Bland said.

Sometimes people run for public office and don’t realize the commitment involved, he said.

The Denton City Council held 40 meetings last year; Corinth, 36; and Pilot Point, 30. Those do not include committee meetings and responsibilities council members have.

“A culture develops in a community or school district where attendance is expected,” Bland said. “The mayor has a responsibility to call to task those who aren’t at a meeting.”

Long meetings can burn out council members, Bland said, especially in the smaller towns that still depend on volunteer council members to get a lot of the work done.

“When the meetings drag on and on, that really gets draining,” Bland said. “You don’t need to go into the wee hours of the morning.”

PEGGY HEINKEL-WOLFE can be reached at 940-566-6881. Her e-mail address is pheinkel-wolfe@dentonrc.com.

Attendance By the Numbers

Here is a look at the 2008 attendance records for area mayors and city council members.

Member            Missed            Percentage

ARGYLE

Greg Landrum            1 of 19            5.2

Joey Hasty            3 of 10            6.0

Jay Pellicone            2 of 19            10.5

Dona Schroetke            1 of 19            5.2

Bonny Haynes            1 of 19            5.2

Joe Phelps            1 of 19            5.2

AUBREY

Gary Hammet            2 of 20            10.0

Jim Brown            3 of 20            15.0

Deborah Goin            2 of 20            10.0

Bill Coffey            2 of 20            10.0

Brandon Stinchcomb            6 of 20            30.0

Frances Carter            0 of 20            0.0

BARTONVILLE

Ron Robertson            3 of 16            18.8

Carla Anderson            1 of 16            6.3

James Ashburn            4 of 16            25.0

Bill Reaves            2 of 16            12.5

Wayne Hoyt            8 of 16            50.0

Ryan Litherland            4 of 16            25.0

COPPER CANYON

Sue Tejml            0 of 14            0.0

Jeff Mangum            0 of 14            0.0

Steven Hill            4 of 14            28.6

Chris Franks            4 of 14            28.6

John Brothers            1 of 14            7.1

Dan Christy            3 of 14            21.4

CORINTH

Vic Burgess            4 of 36            11.1

Paul Ruggiere            0 of 36            0.0

Jim Mayfield            2 of 36            5.5

John Booher            1 of 23            4.3

Joe Harrison            0 of 36            0.0

Shannon Bryan            2 of 36            5.5

DENTON

Mark Burroughs            3 of 19            15.8

Jack Thomson            1 of 40            2.5

Charlye Heggins            3 of 40            7.5

Pete Kamp            6 of 40            15.0

Chris Watts            0 of 40            0.0

Rudy Moreno            2 of 23            8.7

Joe Mulroy            0 of 40            0.0

DISH

Calvin Tillman            2 of 19            10.5

Bill Sciscoe            4 of 19            21.1

Charles Smith            3 of 19            15.8

HICKORY CREEK

John Smith            0 of 20            0.0

Lynn Clark            0 of 20            0.0

Chris Gordon            5 of 20            25.0

Richard Baker            1 of 20            5.0

Paul Kenney            2 of 14            14.3

Eric Wiser            0 of 20            0.0

KRUM

Terri Wilson            1 of 28            3.6

Matt Kilgore            1 of 16            6.25

Judi Kindiger            0 of 16            0.0

Doyle Fletcher            4 of 28            14.3

Joe Beall            3 of 28            10.7

Stephanie Thompson            0 of 16            0.0

LAKE DALLAS *

Tony Marino            3 of 20            15.0

Carol Ann Connors            2 of 20            10.0

Alan Fletcher            10 of 20            50.0

Richard Martin            6 of 20            30.0

NORTHLAKE

Pete Dewing            0 of 17            0.0

Jean Young            2 of 17            11.8

Earl Roberts            3 of 17            17.6

Daryl Kern            3 of 7            42.9

Kenn Smith            4 of 17            23.5

Danny Simpson            5 of 17            29.4

OAK POINT

Duane Olson            4 of 14            28.6

Colleen Cameron            0 of 6            0.0

James Almond            3 of 22            13.6

Judith Camp            1 of 22            4.5

Mark Rakestraw            8 of 22            36.4

Jim Wohletz            2 of 22            9.1

PILOT POINT

Janet Groff            1 of 30            3.3

Michael Walker            6 of 30            20.0

Robert Heuman            2 of 30            6.7

Mark Roth            0 of 15            0.0

Pete Hollar            1 of 18            5.6

David Doughty            2 of 30            6.7

PONDER

Jeff Vardell            4 of 18            22.2

Alan Gorman            1 of 18            5.6

Randy Crider            0 of 10            0.0

Ryan Rouse            1 of 10            10.0

Bruce Ashman            1 of 18            5.6

Shawn Wilkinson            1 of 10            10.0

SANGER

Joseph Higgs            3 of 25            12.0

Thomas Muir            1 of 25            4.0

Glenn Ervin            3 of 25            12.0

Mike Walker            4 of 25            16.0

Andy Garza            0 of 25            0.0

Rusty Patton            0 of 25            0.0

SHADY SHORES

Olive Stephens            0 of 13            0.0

Jerry Williams            0 of 13            0.0

Nita Watkins            0 of 13            0.0

Sherry Starr            0 of 13            0.0

Polly Carter            1 of 13            7.7

Charles Grimes            1 of 13            7.7

* Current council members Jim Harper and B.W. Brooks did not join until January 2009, after the attendance audit period.