Being a former Town Cllr and now a District Cllr,you are right that the Town Council have not got the powers to do a great deal,but are been forced to take on more because the District is looking to drop some of its commitments,e.g.sports fields,playareas and I am sure the Town Council will grasp the chance to do more.
As far as the Mayor is concerned,being the Mayor is not an easy job,they have to attend 300+ functions in a year and they do thier bit for promoting the Town.
The arguement about who will be Mayor is very simple,in Politics you get nothing for coming second,if Gordon Brown thought that one of the Tories was doing a good job would he give them a cabinet position, no,the same on the District who ever is in power will choose the cabinet from thier own group,so the Town Council largest group Labour will have a selection process.this will take in anyone who is nominated,the reason that we get a Mayor serving more than once is nothing unusal some Mayors have been in office for 10 or even 12 years,there are otherthings to take into consideration.Being Mayor is almost a fulltime Job,not everyone can do 2 fulltime Jobs,that is why you also get a Deputy Mayor to cover the Mayor when the Mayor is either unable to attend or is double booked,not everone wants to or feels able to be Mayor,but in general I think the Mayor does a good job for no real money yes they get an allowance to pay for tickets to dinners etc,can you imagine going to a function and the Mayor says give me a£1 worth of raffle tickets! of course not what they spend is recovered by the Town Council,but being a Town Councillor can cost lots of money,at a rough guess £1000 TO £2000 a year
