Call it a setup, or predetermined outcome, or a dog and pony show the selection committee process for assessor, surveyor and both interim commissioners were carefully orchestrated to achieve a specific outcome. It is no accident Bob Main has gained his top choice for each position. Instead of just picking the people he wanted and taking responsibility for those picks the public and the applicants were woven into an elaborate time consuming process.
We all participated in our own manipulation. We all played our part. We all wrote letters and emails and made phone calls supporting this candidate or the other as if we really had any say in the matter. We took valuable time out of our busy schedules to prepare resumes and applications, gather references, etc… Some of us went home with packets of applications and spent an entire weekend carefully reading them and some of us prepared and displayed ourselves in front of the public for an interview by a panel of handpicked mostly right wing Republicans. Then some of us took time out to watch the interview process and the final vote.
All that time and effort could have been spared if the commissioners just had the backbone to just make the appointment they obviously wanted in the first place. Perhaps they hoped to avert the public outrage at appointing someone whose large county holdings are surely to run afoul of many conflicting commission decisions. Or someone whose spouse, Sandy, directs the highly divisive SCDC or whose brother, Ken, is paid to lobby state and local governments on behalf of public and private entities.
How could Main and Parry be so indiscriminate as to allow the appointment of Fred Messerle? The potential for conflicts of interest are staggering. If Messerle is ethical he will have to recuse himself from many decisions so what benefit is there to putting him on the commission? Shame on them both.
Shame on us for participating in our own manipulation.
Holy moly BatGirl – Parry, now Main, next Kitzhaber, then the world (no not the bird cage liner) reading and responding.
aghast! before the vote they cleared the room so the committee could discuss the applicants without being overheard. This is a violation of a subsection 192.660. Executive session exemptions do not apply when filling an elected position.
themguys – Bob has made some heroic and lonely decisions during his term for which we should all be grateful
Looks like ol Bob is a fast learner in that Executive Thingey.
He’ll work for the majority, huh? What about the rest of us shmucks? Not so much?
Well that’s good news I suppose if you are “the majority” of us.
Whoa, when did they hold an executive session?
Thank you, Bob, for responding. First, I will not ask any of your committee members to betray the contents of the executive session held in advance of the vote but I will say I questioned whether that session was allowed under the ORS.
Mary, I am very disappointed that you would imply that the choice for commissioner was somehow manipulated. Please feel free to contact my appointees and ask if I manipulated the choice for commissioner (Pat Reday, Pam Hitner, Bob Westerman, Julie Jones, Dave Herman). You, especially you, know that I always try to do the right thing for the majority of the Coos County citizens. Please post on your site.
What a nice little family dynasty Bob Main is helping to support.
I encourage everyone to contact the commissioners and find out who will be responsible for determining when Messerle should recuse himself. Find out who will take responsibility for ensuring every decision made by the county isn’t subject to a legal action because a board member had a conflict of interest.
Call, write or email the commission and county counsel for answers
I have to say I have deep concerns over this appointment. Reading the World article about the new appointee, I fear we could have an attempt at pushing the corporate agenda as it is being forced in Wisconsin, Ohio, and Michigan.
On the other hand, I’m relieved that we will have the full energies of Jody McAffree because LNG is still the main push for these local corporatists in spite of the lull at the moment.
This local mafia has been in charge in Coos County for so long, they treat it as their personal fiefdom. We will have a year to prepare to reject all of this group at the polls. I just hope they don’t do much damage to the public welfare in the meantime.
Perhaps Messerle’s first motion before the board will be to increase our tax money that is sent to SCDC or to rapidly site his desired slaughterhouse preferably upwind of those who argue he should not have been appointed, Why doesn’t Main just endorse the tax check collected from the people of the county and send the money to the Messerle’s? And, it’s not just Democrats, or registered Democrat Jim Bice, who find this situation smellly. If Messerle is as successful as he states, and if as he states his interest was serving the people not needing a job, why not agree to send your commissioners pay and PERS to the needy of the community Mr. Messerle?
I am dumb founded at this. I really am. It just goes to show who runs this county. I’ve given up any hope of this county being anything other than what it is.
It is still hard for those of us who CHOSE to come here, to invest our meager retirements here, thinking it was just this forgotten corner of a wonderful state, and hey, “how could it NOT get better?” mentality.
I feel ‘self manipulation’ can be quite comforting at times, what I resent is the piglets at the trough that is this county, won’t share a teat with the rest of us.
I, also am so disappointed to see the real colors of Cam and Bob, I was hopeful they would take this county in a new direction.
They fooled us all. And they have Clark in their pocket now too don’t they? Bob may really regret his decision on this one. I think the World has it in for him, justly deserved one has to say now.