The Aberdeen City Council currently has the opportunity to make an investment in the city that will pay off for a long time to come. The council is considering whether to approve funds in next year’s budget to hire a city administrator.

The need has existed for a long time and as Aberdeen’s list of problems grows – horrible downtown blight, crime and drugs, flooding, homelessness, lack of adequate low-income housing, irresponsible absentee property owners – the need just becomes greater and greater.

For decades, the backbone of the city’s management has been a collection of department heads who carry out the collective will of the part-time mayor and council. A city this size needs a municipal professional who has the authority to make day to day decisions on issues that cross jurisdictional lines between city departments and other government entities – local, state and federal.

Not on the aforementioned list of problems was the crippling lack of private investment that might grow the economy here so that we can make progress on the other problems, most of them rooted in high unemployment. A competent city administrator greatly enhances our chances when opportunities arise, either in the form of private investment or government funding. When we’re dealing with decision makers that have the power to help, it’s the difference between putting a professional foot forward as opposed to that of well-meaning amateurs.

We need to show that we’re willing to invest in ourselves. The position is in the mayor’s budget at a base salary of about $130,000. During his campaign, Mayor Erik Larson said he would try to find money in the budget and he has.

Not everyone on the council favors adding the position and it’s one of the things that delayed a budget vote last week. The council has a budget workshop scheduled for Monday to hash out questions about the administrator position and any other budget items, then expects to pass the final budget Dec. 28. Some council members will be tempted to cut corners by agreeing to the administrator on the condition that the duties of a human resources director be added to the administrator’s job instead of hiring someone for that open position. That would not be a good idea.

There will be some who will say that Aberdeen has gotten along without a city administrator in the past and will link the need now to the notion that Larson’s full-time job limits his availability at City Hall. The truth is, we’ve needed someone in that spot for years. If you think everything is going smoothly, you’ll probably disagree. We refer you to that earlier list of problems and note that it’s a partial list.

The mayor and the city council will continue to play a critical role in setting policy and conceiving strategy for dealing with those problems, but the fact is, dealing with them will require a disciplined, coordinated effort and someone to carry out their plan.