Thirty eight planning department applicants from January through June of 2012 will receive a collective refund of up to $10,705 to be paid out of the county general fund contingency account. Last year, interim commissioner, Fred Messerle, acting as liaison to the department unilaterally ordered the planning director to cut research fees from $75 per hour to $60 causing the department to lose money. Last December, then planning director Patty Evernden raised the fees back to $75 after an email from County Treasurer Mary Barton warning, “…if the Board wants to maintain the current structure they’ll need to make your office whole by subsidizing your operations.”
Governments are not permitted to make a profit for providing services to the public and to protect the department from issuing refunds a policy was established to enable a fee reduction in the event budgeted fee structure was too high. On the planning department fee schedule is the following statement;
“The Board Liaison, in consultation with the Planning Department Director, has the authority to lower fees.”
Messerle evidently interpreted this to mean that he could simply lower fees without regard to whether the department was “making a profit” or not and believed that $15 per hour was being used for “savings” rather than fixed costs. In June, planning billed the county for $20,760 in lost fee revenue and now, because of a statute limiting fee changes within a one year period, to avoid potential liability board voted two to zero to refund those applicants paying the $75 instead of $60 out of the general fund. Main recused himself from the vote because he has two applications into the department and Messerle should also have recused himself leaving the board without a quorum.
Interim planning director, Jill Rolfe, prepared a cost analysis for the current fiscal year based upon last year’s actual costs and arrived at a fee figure of $75 per hour. So the department is right back where it started from and further, Messerle’s decision to lower fees cannot be justified on the basis of making a profit off the services provided. Rolfe did a comparison of ten other counties and even at the $75 rate Coos County was consistently lower. In short, Messerle made a $31,465 mistake and left the taxpayer to pick up the tab.
Today, the board agreed that planning fees will be reviewed and approved by the entire board twice a year.
Messerle’s own company and some of his campaign contributors benefited from the fee reduction but in an attempt to put the toothpaste back in the tube, Messerle acknowledged he had a conflict today by stating he would refund the department for his fee reduction in the form of a donation. For those who have filed ethics complaints this should add some fuel to the fire.
Still not addressed is the preferential treatment and $3,222.75 fee savings afforded to Michael and Linda Cole when Cam Parry, at the behest of Bill Grile, interceded on their behalf for a discrete parcel determination.
Yikes, Barton told us on the Bice show that we are uneducated – he probably meant stupid and Al tells us its a coutesy. How about we tell his dream team no way at the ballot box.
Knutsons’ – new head of SCDC – rag out today gives not one, but TWO cheers for Fred Messer lie for being such a great guy and paying more than anyone else into the department he gutted, planning. Freds’ fat fingers got caught in the cookie jar and he’s praised, not once, but twice today and tomorrow and Monday, until the next edition of “The World – where truth stops at the Coos County Border”.
Thanks boys.See what damage can be done when we don’t have anything resembling a free and open press folks? You get THIS, a single blogger having to report the truth to the people. How to fight battles with no truth being reported to the people is the very reason the press was so important during the founding of this nation. It’s important today, you see the damage being done to reality every day here in Coos County, where truly, The Truth Stops At The Coos County Border. You’ll never read about the bald faced lies the Port foists upon the people here, all to suck half a billion dollars of Other Peoples’ Money. Splain that Mark. Tell us where the jobs are, we’ve paid for that damned infrastructure at the port for four decades, where’s the return on our investment? Pie in the sky is becoming very expensive, and our unemployment continues to decline. Why continue funding these bottomless pits? So Sause and Knutson can continue to plunder this county? My humble opinion only of course.
An Administrator position can be added – and deleted – with or without voter approval at anytime. The position needs no more voter approval than hiring a new Deputy and it is only as a courtesy gesture to the voters that it is going to a vote at all.
The ordinance does not lock these kinds of decision. The charter does.
A little off the subject but; yesterday in its daily effort to discredit the proposed charter, The World paper printed with certainty information about the final draft of the proposed ordinance. Has any person seen the final draft of the ordinance, or the revised “part time” commissioner job description, If available to the public, will you give us a link to the documents. Thanks. And Mr. World publisher, we citizens can not “vote it out the same way we voted it in” if we decide an administrator was a mistake.
The paper also continues to ignore the horrible position Messerle’s lousy leadership placed Patty Evernden in. She is required to live within her budget but he wouldn’t listen to her and the paper paints her as the villain for trying to correct his ignorance and do the right thing.
The World ignored key components of the story, namely the $30k+ and the campaign contributors that benefited
The firefighter never served in the Marines but he lives with his big brother in Roseville and hears the occasional war story.
From the USMC to fighting fires? Is this guy a glutton for punishment or what?
It seldom happens; but, curiosity got the best of me. Michael and Linda or Lynda (probably the same person) (the only Michael and Linda / Lynda Cole property owners in Coos County) have some wonderful view and farm land and if they are in such need of a few dollars relief from the citizens who are stuggling to pay their taxes, indicate here and this prospective buyer will be contacting them.
The KCBY story made no sense to me – although I don’t know if I would blame the reporter for shoddy reporting when she and the farmers quoted in the story probably don’t even know the truth themselves because Mr. Messerle doesn’t like people aknowin’ his business. From the scuttlebutt that I have heard, the China Creek project is not associated with the Marsh expansion in any way, and is a project that has Fred playing nice with the Nature Conservancy, Bandon Biota and the gun club (strange bedfellows) to create a wetland area through those properties (not Messerle’s of course) and then replace the tidegates at the Coquille river. It is all very suspicious that Fred is suddenly enthusiastic about fish and allowing them access to that area, so he must be getting something from the taxpayers. The thought that so many adjacent “local” landowners have no idea of what is happening is telling indeed, and most likely this will all be done before we have the full story.
Bingo! Tide Gates…
Fred’s bread & butter sopping up taxpayer drippins. To give you an idea, he was paid $30,000 to do a meager adjustment to the one the airport has.
Perhaps a lead on the Coles. The only Michael and Linda or Michael and Lynda Cole listed at the county assessor site are possibly my Charleston neighbors and they are propoerty rich. Own many properties in Coos County. If Lynda and Linda are the same, she is a harpist playing around town occasionally. I believe that their primary residence is 63558 Seven Devils Road. Is that near the ORC mining operation? Their property near me is on Cape Arago Highway – and we are not far from Mr. Parry.
Here’s another one I’ve tried to ignore, KCBY website still carries news, and this comment was posted in response to an article from those impacted by the flooding near Coquille. My humble guess, right out of the gate, is this whole episode is for Fred and his Fellow Messerlies to suck up some more tax breaks, a la Nature Concervancy, at the expense of his neighbors. Perhaps ol Fred will come on and ‘splain himself??
CoosBayNative 5 pts
“This is a horribly botched story – the China Creek project has nothing to do with the USFWS, it is a project being pushed by Fred Messerle and the Nature Company. There is no threat of eminent domain in any restoration project in the area, including the marsh which is not part of the China Creek project, and we do not know who the landowners are, so this story is made up fluff. Come on Jessica and KCBY, do a little research before you put out this tripe.”
Gotta watch Fred every minute, the old coot is pulling strings as we speak, all in his favor of course. Been doing it for decades, but now there is SOMEONE in this county actually reporting “news”. His crowd has been running things all these years, aidded and abetted by the local press, or what sadly, passes here for a newspaper, couldn’t be further from it.
The Cole caper has been raised during public comment but not addressed by the board. Based upon email correspondence I have seen Bill Grile is a friend of the Cole’s who used his relationship with Cam to intercede on their behalf. The Coles got what they wanted without having to produce the required documentation or discussion from their neighbors and saved themselves $3,223 bucks to boot.
So WHO are the Coles, and why are they demanding, and getting all this paid time for a secret endeavor??
What goes on this one? Anyone know? Fred Messerlie is getting a tad expensive for this county isn’t he?
You know, fellow readers, this has gone on since the inception of SCDC, Knutson, and most of all Sauce, who many believe is The Don of Coos County.
I’m still confused, in brief, what the hell just happened?
Did Cam address his part in the Coles’ Caper?
Thank you. The firefighter is working the Rush Fire near Susanville, CA and is definitely tired, has logged 75 hours of overtime at hazard pay and will receive his first day off in two weeks Friday.. Aside from that, he still loves what he is doing
Dear Publisher James Casey, I eagerly await this same fine reporting in the World paper today. At least you and Jim Bice are not afraid of the truth. Unrelated, how is your forest firefighter son doing?
I see why the Messerle supporters want an admin. The same results could have been accomplished and the two appointed commissioners would have clean hands in affairs like this. They could have just blamed it on the admin and his inexperience.
It would have been a win/win for SCDC, instead its a potential mini scandal for Fred and Cam and much to messy to have to explain to the public why their friends were the prime benefactors of Fred’s decision to reduce the rates.