Yesterday morning in his office, Commissioner John Sweet defended the “concept” of the community enhancement plan put forth by David Koch and argued that the public was only excluded from coming up with the concept but were now being given the opportunity to weigh in and make comments. Meanwhile, BS Oregon is broadcasting emails saying, “Our community has submitted a proposal to Veresen … that would have the company pay a community service fee totaling nearly $500 million dollars to our region over 19 years.” The Our community evidently being the ill advised members of BS Oregon.
When I asked him why not place the public money in a public trust rather than a private fund Sweet, an elected official, implied there would be no competitive edge as the public would just get in the way.
“Politics being what they are in Coos County, there would be no advantage to a public trust,” he said. “Someone would always come forward to disagree.”
Sweet punctuated the statement with examples of public participation in the Tioga Sports Club grant application and the Bandon Marsh issue before I cut him off and argued that it is the public’s money and when dealing with public assets it can get messy and very possibly tedious but it is nonetheless the right way, in fact the only way to do it. Sweet simply may not be suited to public office and may be better placed starting a small business and creating a few jobs so he can dictate his beliefs without objection.
I am thoroughly convinced at this point that this proposal is nothing short of another one of Jordan Cove’s scams. It is coming from Jordan Cove’s BS Oregon Lobby firm out of Portland and is basically Jordan Cove making a deal with themselves under the facade and scam that they are making a deal with the local community. Nothing could be further from the truth.
Their bought and paid for local administrators and elected officials DO NOT REPRESENT THE PUBLIC, obviously!
This just goes to show how easy it is to fool some of the local self-appointed rednecks in Coos Bay. Jordan Cove can dream on if they think they can fool everyone.
Both will be reelected because what Sweet and Cribbins are doing will never be exposed by their friends at the daily garbage can liner. As always, they will be reelected based on name recognition. PLEASE, progressive meaning candidates with names known to the people who agree to represent the people and who are knowledgeable of matters county, such as the forest.
Let’s see. Sweet is okay with a democratic process when it is used to elect him to office. But once in office, public discourse only gets in the way? Voters of Coos County should be outraged by this attitude from a public official.
Last I looked we live in a democracy (or what is left of it). Public disclosure and public discourse are part of the bargain. “Someone coming forward to disagree” is part of the democratic process, that used to lead to compromise or views that the electorate could make an informed decision. But that’s the rub, isn’t it; Sweet doesn’t want an informed electorate, he wants a county of sheep.
Baaaad Maaan!!!
Maybe we need to start a recall!
Sweet and Cribbins are up for reelection this year and though neither one has filed their candidacy yet, both have indicated they intend to run again. Rather than a recall, we need to find some progressive candidates to challenge Sweet.