Two years. That was the estimate I heard last week for a new elected official to get up to speed in his or her governing capacity. Yikes, I thought. Another estimate I heard was six to eight months. Yikes again.

Two years seems like a long time. Then again, six months is, at most, 12 board, commission, or council meetings plus another handful of committee meetings. I’ve been going to 30 or more of these meetings every year and I learn something new, or need to ask questions of an expert after almost every one of them. So six months doesn’t sound like much time at all when you’re talking about governing a city of thousands, deciding on future development options, tax bills and utility rates for those thousands.

It made me wonder what is the breaking-in period for someone starting a new job, elected or selected? My experience at meetings makes me lean toward a longer time-frame for government officials. After all, government processes are slow, with lots of reporting and public notice requirements to gate each step.

It also made me wonder, if it’s six months to two years to be one of five or seven votes governing a Valley city, how much longer could it take to get up to speed for the commander in chief of the entire country?

For years, I’ve been saying, only half joking, that we should put all our Presidential candidates through a competitive internship process for the job, to test their claims of qualification. Give them all the same simulated crises — a military action, a natural disaster, a budget issue, maybe even a wildcard—and record their responses for later comparison. Then we can all vote for the people who acted the way we would have wanted.

Sadly, for me, that’s impossible. For the 2016 election, almost 500 people have announced their candidacy for President. Election day would be long gone before the candidate “testing” is done.

Instead, I and all the other voters out there, will have to judge each candidate by his or her words and actions, like we do in all the local races. I’ll just have to consider these local office-holders as the interns for future leadership positions, judging by their words and actions today, or starting soon, anyway.