Whole lotta meetings inside and outside the city, whole lotta reading, whole lotta stuff coming at you.

Auburn City Councilman Bob Baggett compares it to “drinking from a live fire hose.”

That is, the busy life and times of a freshman councilman.

Not only must one attend City Council meetings, chamber meetings and the like, one must be there for regional meetings, from time to time pay a visit to Olympia and get up to speed on arcane rules and regulations.

“You have to learn not only what the real issues are that are affecting our city,” Baggett said, “but those things with which we are in collaboration with other cities around us. And how we can all benefit from this collaboration.”

Hardly a part-time job, but Baggett’s making it happen.

And he’s chill about it.

“Thank God I’m retired because this part-time job, which it’s supposed to be, would not be something easily taken by people who have to work full time,” Baggett said. “But at the same time, I’m president of two homeowners’ associations and I have other duties around the city I’m involved in as well. It does take its fair share of time, and even then more so. It’s just trying to fit everything in.”

Baggett, a Boeing retiree, ran unopposed in 2015 for the council seat formerly held by Wayne Osborne, who did not run for reelection. He was sworn into office at the first meeting in January. Like Osborne, he, too, served on the Auburn Planning Commission. The big difference between commission and council, he said: the former makes recommendations to the council, whereas the council makes decisions.

In Baggett’s two months, he’s already dealt with some toughies.

At the top of the toughies, he said, is marijuana. Not only does the state take the lion’s share of sales tax revenue from retail marijuana sales within city boundaries but it also holds the cards, giving cities like Auburn little say about what actually happens inside of them.

Recently the state Liquor and Cannabis Control Board added one more throbbing vein to Auburn’s headache when it announced it would increase the number of marijuana businesses allowable in a city.

“We have two retail marijuana stores in the City right now, and we’ve already passed a moratorium on additional applications for marijuana retail businesses. This week we have a public hearing on that. But I guess the state can still override any moratorium we come up with as a city, not necessarily that it would,” Baggett said.

Recently, the Transportation Benefit District Board, a separate panel on which the entire Auburn City Council serves, tabled action on the imposition of a $20 car tab fee meant to fund local collector and arterial streets.

“I really don’t think folks in the city right now — and this is just my opinion — are ready for a $20 tax hike,” Baggett said. “I think the Community Development and Public Works department is looking for some additional revenue to fix some things. But we’re kind of being taxed out of existence here, and I think it’s time we take a little bit of time to evaluate those things rather than just bring them forward for approval. I think they might have jumped the gun a little bit on that, and in my mind they really didn’t fully justify the need for a $20 tax hike. I think it’s very important that we listen to what the people who we are elected to serve have to say.”

While Baggett is all for transparency, he would like the state to do something to curb frivolous public records requests. Like that of the man who recently filed a request for every city record from Auburn’s founding in 1891 to today, which, the councilman noted, would cost the City upwards of $500,000 and take years.

All in all, however, he’s enjoying himself.

“We’ve got a really good council, and even though we don’t agree on everything we do agree on what’s best for the City, and we can come to a consensus,” Baggett said.