One would think that Jon Barton would be old enough to know there is no Santa Claus and superman only exists in comic books but in a letter to the editor he continues to place faith in mythical beings while fabricating mythical arguments. Barton blames Coos County Treasurer Mary Barton of frittering away millions of dollars and presiding over “poor financial systems” that enabled disasters like solid waste while doing it all out of the goodness of her heart. Barton insists that a financial officer, another superhuman who can part seas and walk on water, oversee maintenance schedules and balance a checkbook will cure the county’s ills.
Many of the financial disasters, such as solid waste, parks, IT and others would be avoided. Millions of dollars have been frittered away just in the last few years because of poor financial systems, lack of financial analysis and neglect by just a few of our public officials.
Who knew that Mary Barton was responsible for all the county’s failings, real and imagined or that a budget director could have saved solid waste. Not only does Barton accuse treasurer of doing a terrible job but he successfully derides county staff and other elected officials, past and present.
Incompetent staff and public officials with a special agenda would be the losers. In fact, the only reason for opposing the hiring of a competent professional is fear of either having one’s authority usurped or the public finding out just how poorly managed our county is and has been for years.
There is no question that Mary Barton requires some mechanism to take over some of the extra duties she has taken upon herself over the years. Why these charges haven’t been delegated in the past is not clear but whether other departments can take some of the load or whether one or two more people should be added to meet these challenges one thing is clear, many are suspicious that the finance director will ultimately morph into an administrator. The fact that Barton who is a founding member of the rat PAC(K) is pushing for a finance director only adds fuel to the flame.
Aside from the fact that this egregiously incompetent man and his little dittohead buddy, Al, keep inserting themselves into county business to the detriment of all of us, letters like this are clearly a poor attempt at deflecting his own culpability in the damage he and his ilk have wrought upon the residents of Coos County, and it wreaks of the “last throes” of a soon-to-be-irrelevant cadre of selfish, greedy individuals…so please tell again me why we give a sh*t about anything he (or the owner of a motorcycle shop) has to say?
Salmon/Mary – apparently you DO care about what I say or you wouldn’t have an anuerysm every time I post something here.
Nobody cares what you think bikeboy. Your just entertainment.
Speaking of entertainment, Al will be strutting his gravitas like a banty rooster at Wednesday’s chamber luncheon where I believe four or five people will genuinely genuflect as he walks by…
Your welcome, Al, for the free publicity
Thanks, Mary! I’ll see you there. 🙂
Al, a blind man can see that your pal the Walrus is a walking example of the “Peter Principle”. An educated person can read the letter no different than read by Ms. Geddry. The man does say that Ms. Barton is wonderful and then goes on to say imcompetent, wasted time and money, and commissioners violated fiduciary responsibility to citizens. Them there are the kind of words that get you sued Walrus. If I were a member of the CCAP I would run far and fast from the Walrus as Sause did when the walrus violated his confidence regarding how to donate $5K to the Portland politician.
Sorry, Susan, you lost all credibility when you gave up intelligent discussion in lieu of name-calling.
Barton may not have meant what he said but he criticizes the work done by Mary Barton “out of the goodness of her heart”
Read Jon’s letter, Jaye. You’re assuming Mary correctly represented the content, and that’s a mistake.
And while there, they can sit back and have that smoke blown up their kazoos, just like little al enjoys.
(Pssst…..al)
Perhaps this Mary learned how to fritter from Mary Barton. Perhaps that is what is going on, just all these women named Mary, just a fritterin away, frittering all day long, think they fritter under their desks when no one is watching little al? In the shower? My gawd al, think they fritter in the vegetable department at Safeway too?
Where do you boys think all this frittering takes place?
Come on little al, use your imagination. Must be a whole herd of them females just a frittering and a frittering.
Any more brilliant ideas fellas?
Wow. I didn’t think it was humanly possible to take a couple of paragraphs and twist them into such a piece of distorted dribble.
Barton also says: “A finance director would assume, in addition to other things, many of the functions that Treasurer Mary Barton now performs out of the goodness of her heart.”
Hardly a damning comdemnation of one of the County’s hardest-working and valuable employees.
Readers can get the whole story – sans the distortions and lies – at The World editorial page.
Barton and Bennetti have done so well leading the Airport Board, right?
THEY know how to get things done around here.
Salute them, they’re wiping the floors with the working folks of this county, one job at a time. And it’s working.
Barton’s assertions sound exactly like those he made for an administrator and Barton, at least, believes the proposed financial officer has powers above and beyond those expressed by the commissioners in public meetings. Perhaps Barton knows something the rest of don’t considering he has lunch with John Sweet.
What does Jon regret about the contrived financial disaster at the solid waste that his SCDC buddys closed so that those financial resources could go to another SCDC member? We all saw how fast Cam and Fred closed it down by claiming it was done to protect the county employees from immediate danger. Is that the disaster he’s referring to? Will the IT dept. remain a financial disaster until he can have a “Financial Director” fix the problem by outsourcing those financial resources to another SCDC member? Does he want all the county parks to be outsourced to another SCDC member to fix that supposed financial disaster? Is that what Fred Messerle has his eye on getting?
We all know that he was laying all those financial disasters in Bob Mains lap.
We all know that they played Bob like a fiddle and now Jon’s going in for the kill by pushing for his “Director” with Sweet’s help..
Was “frittering” another aspect of Mary’s Job Description?
Was she paid overtime for all that frittering she has been doing on County time?