Mayors Say Building Coalitions Is Major Transition Hurdle

Newly elected mayors attending a five-day "crush course" on tradition at the Kennedy School of Government said yesterday that their chief hurdle assuming office would he to build coalitions among city council members with differing Philippians.

"It's important to keep partisan friction from stymying the city council at the beginning." said A very Upchurch, who will be sworn in as Raleigh, N.C.'s chief executive in a few weeks.

The 25 newly-elected mayors, who arrived at the K-School Thursday, have been attending seminars on transition management, media relations, and the difficulty of translating campaign pledges into actual city policy.

The seminar will also focus on current policy issues, including urban transportation and budget and finance questions, Charles Trucheart, director of the Institute of Politics Forum, said.

"It's always important to take time after the campaign to formally look at what you're about to do," said James A. Sharp, Jr., mayor of flint, Mich. "You have to learn to deal with truth, and take out the rhetoric," he added.

Many of the mayors said their cities operate on the council-manager system, under which the city manager makes all appointments. They added that this would greatly ease the pressure of the short transition period.

The mayors also said that the K-School conference provided an opportunity to most their colleagues in other cities. "I want to be able to call up the mayor of Denver and ask him how he settled a garbage strike," said Harvey Gantt of Charlotte, N.C.

In the wake of unprecedented minority participation in mayoral elections this year, several Black city leaders said they hoped race would not be a major problem in normalizing relations with incumbent-dominated city councils. "People generally want to work together," Sharp, who is Black said, adding that it was nevertheless helpful to "be able to morbillre the Black community to based my vote."

"I think there's a great said of pride and esprit do corps in the Cambridge's attack community," Gould who is also Black, said. "It's undeniality going to he a fastor in the administration, but not an issue," he added.

Mayor Anne Rudin of Sacramento, Calit., that city's first woman chief executive, said that she was confident her "colleagues wouldn't stand" for any opposition to her based solely on sex.

Cutting city operating budgets will be a major problem, most of the mayors said. "Our population has shrunk dramatically so tax revenues have dropped in the past years," Sharp said. "We're just going to have to spend a lot of time figuring where we can draw the line," he added.