Immediately after Fred Messerle applied for the interim commissioner job my phone was ringing and my inbox was flooded with scathing and unflattering character assessments of tightfisted, scheming rancher.* Until that time I had never given him, or his brother, any thought but it fast became clear to me he was not well liked in the south county. No one at this end of the county expected Bob Main to appoint him and knowing how vehemently the rural community reacted to him I was surprised that he was chosen by the PAC(K) to be their shoe-in to win the race.

Messerle represented himself during the campaign as a lifelong resource manager, rancher and timber operator, all rural business activities. Yet, while he won the urban vote with the exception of Lakeside, Coquille and Myrtle Point, (if you can consider them urban) he lost the rural vote amongst the very people he has theoretically been doing business with ever since he went to work for the family out of college. Coos Bay and North Bend voted for Messerle but could it be these voters had no prior experience dealing with him all these years? If that is the case it supports my original impressions that Messerle has trod on a lot of toes in his day and burned a few bridges apparently forgetting that people are a not necessarily a renewable resource. It would seem he dug himself into a hole that not even anger at Bob Main for appointing him and Cam Parry in the first place and money could not fill.

Final Official Abstract of Votes for Automatic Recount

*Messerle has yet to keep his word about returning funds to the planning department, a promise he made last August.