February 17, 2005
Lonnie Roberts' Process Switcheroo
Foolish Inconsistency Is A Hobgoblin, Too
There's an article in today's Oregonian on the Multnomah County Board of Commissioners and whether or not they followed their own rules in recent votes regarding a new courthouse.
It's not the subject itself to which we want to draw attention, but some of the comments coming out of the office of Commissioner Lonnie Roberts regarding the process itself.
Gary R. Walker, Roberts' chief of staff, acknowledged the board "may not be letter tight" to its policies on the Gresham project.
But Linn, Naito and Walker say the board has complied with county rules. Linn said the county can't get paralyzed by its own processes, and Walker said the board had to act when it had political support for the funding.
"We just don't want to get lost in a bunch of rules and lose this thing," Roberts said.
Don't you just love it when elected officials toss themselves headlong into a trap of their own devising? We sure do.
In case you don't know what we mean by that, it's time to take a trip in the Wayback Machine to those halcyon days a little less than one year ago, when the County was embroiled in the controversy over issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples.
Roberts, you might recall, was rather distractedly irked about the process issue at the time. Oddly, the process issue in this current situation is more direct than it was then.
Back in March of last year, Roberts' complaint was rooted less in policy than in feeling that he simply should have been included. This time around, however, the process issues reportedly are related to actual County policy. According to The Oregonian, referring to a vote related to the new courthouse project last November:
The board's decision repeats mistakes found in a 2002 audit and violates rules adopted to prevent waste that plagued previous construction projects, county auditor Suzanne Flynn said Wednesday.
In other words, when Roberts merely is feeling like the forgotten or disfavored child, process matters and he starts generating heat. But when actual rules adopted by the County itself are the issue, Roberts has no interest or concern at all over process. In fact (see above) he expresses outright disdain for it, essentially calling them an obstacle.
Of course, it's less surprising when you realize that the planned new courthouse will be built in Roberts' district. But at least now Roberts -- unknowingly, we're sure -- has shown us that his process stance during the same-sex marriage debate wasn't anything close to principle. It was politics, period.
Comments (4)
Dave Lister on 17 Feb 2005
Roberts protestations over the same-sex marriage debacle were probably more rooted in his embarassment over being totally clueless as to what was going on than any kind of process violation. It's time for him to retire.
todd birch on 17 Feb 2005
Agree that it's time for Roberts to retire. Better yet, maybe it's time for all of them to retire.
user on 18 Feb 2005
actually the one who comes out looking bad, in my opinion, is once again Diane Linn. Can't get hung up on process, eh? let's just ignore an auditor's report that said the County wasted 10's millions of dollars.
Diane has got to go.
anon on 19 Feb 2005
Until a viable candidate runs against her and makes it past the primaries... It's all fine and well to talk about kicking her out, but who (or what) will replace her? I guess NOW is the time to identify and start supporting that viable candidate.