How The Campaign Commissars Would Be Selected
Posted by: Jubal | 01/07/2008 11:58 PM
The proposed TINCUP2 and its attendant County Fair Campaign Practices Commission are bad ideas in so many ways it'll be impossible to detail them in a single post. But for starters, let's look at the proposed structure of the County Fair Campaign Practices Commission.
There will be five commissioners, appointed by a panel consisting of the "three most recent past Presiding Judges of the Orange County Superior Court who reside in Orange County." They'll pick the commissioners from a list provided by the Selection Panel of the Grand Jurors Association of Orange County, who in turn draw up that list from a pool of people who want to be commissioners.
In other words, the Commissioners charged with enforcing county campaign laws will be chosen by three people who don't know much about campaigns from a list developed by a larger group of people who probably know even less about campaigns.
But there's more.
Here are the qualifications any would-be campaign ordinance commissar must meet:
I think "qualifications" is the wrong term here, since these criteria are stringent enough to screen out people who are familiar with political campaigns (even without the felony and misdemeanor provision). At the same time, they do little to prevent someone with one or more political axes to grind from being appointed to the CFCPC.
These five individuals, who will have made it through an application process designed to screen out politicos, will be empowered to (per Section 1-6A-4:
There will be five commissioners, appointed by a panel consisting of the "three most recent past Presiding Judges of the Orange County Superior Court who reside in Orange County." They'll pick the commissioners from a list provided by the Selection Panel of the Grand Jurors Association of Orange County, who in turn draw up that list from a pool of people who want to be commissioners.
In other words, the Commissioners charged with enforcing county campaign laws will be chosen by three people who don't know much about campaigns from a list developed by a larger group of people who probably know even less about campaigns.
But there's more.
Here are the qualifications any would-be campaign ordinance commissar must meet:
1. Each member of the Commission shall be a registered voter of the County.
2. During his or her tenure, neither a member of the Commission nor its Executive Director shall hold any other public office.
3. No member of the Commission shall during their term of office, participate in or contribute to, or publicly support or oppose, a candidate for local County office or an incumbent local County elected official.
4. No member of the Commission shall employ or be employed as a person who is acting as a Lobbyist, as that term is defined in County Ordinance 3892, Section 1-3-22(f).
5. No more than three members of the Commission shall be registered with the same political party.
6. No member of the Commission shall have been a former County Elected Official, a current Agency/Department Head or Executive Manager.
7. No member of the Commission shall have been a former or a current elected or appointed official of a national, state or local partisan political committee.
8. No person who has been convicted of a felony, or a misdemeanor involving dishonesty or untruthfulness, shall be a member of the Commission.
I think "qualifications" is the wrong term here, since these criteria are stringent enough to screen out people who are familiar with political campaigns (even without the felony and misdemeanor provision). At the same time, they do little to prevent someone with one or more political axes to grind from being appointed to the CFCPC.
These five individuals, who will have made it through an application process designed to screen out politicos, will be empowered to (per Section 1-6A-4:
...adopt, amend and rescind rules and regulations to carry out the purposes and provisions of the County ordinances relating to campaign financing and to govern procedures of the Commission. In any conflict between the rules and regulations and this ordinance, this ordinance shall prevail. Violation of the rule or regulation shall be subject to those penalties and remedies as may be provided.According to Section 1-6A-7(a), these same five political naifs, assisted by staff may:
The Commission may subpoena witnesses, compel their attendance and testimony, administer oaths and affirmations, take evidence and require by administrative subpoena the production of any books, papers, records or other items material to the performance of the Commission's duties or exercise of its powers.What is this? Campaign Law and Order? What grave emergency demands subjecting how we elect our representatives to this sort of treatment? I can't imagine I'm the only one who gets the heebie-jeebies at the prospect of putting an unelected, quasi-legislative county agency in charge of how we elect our county representatives?
Mr. Ayer registered as a Republican to be electable in an interim election with no incumbents. He did...
Huh? Can someone give us the lay of the land, politically, on which of our conservative Supervisors actually support this new bureaucracy in our county?
This is a terrible idea.
With our conservative majority, Orange County is supposed to be a model in the nation in reducing government regulation, not increasing it.
I am willing to call Supervisors, and I hope others will do the same.
I would sure like to understand:
a) the alleged problem that currently exists.
b) how this commission is going to solve those problems.
Right now, I just see us going in the wrong direction. We should be trimming and streamlining county government, not creating new entities and bureaucracies.
Jon, those "conservatives" on the Board may not be nearly as conservative as you give them credit for being.
But this idea is such a lame, non-starter that you don't have to worry. It's going nowhere.
Political naifs? I beg to differ. Nearly any former city council, water board, or school board member could serve on the board as proposed. So could most of the people who comment on this blog, lots of current and former campaign staffers, folks who had held office in other counties, YDs and YRs, and many others who are hardly "political naifs."
Jon:
This supposedly conservative Board has done more to grow County government in the past year than previous boards over many years. To wit:
- Yesterday they appointed a new Performance Auditor, someone they picked from within the bureaucracy. The new Auditor now gets to pick a staff to perform his duties. This, by the way, is in addition to the existing Internal Auditor, the Auditor-Controller and last, but not least, the CEO. I seem to recall the justification for the CEO following bankruptcy was so that performance could be directed and managed by one person who reports to the Board. But two is always better than one, right?
- The Office of Independent Review of law enforcement, also known as the ACLU full employment office. We do not yet know how large this bureaucracy will grow. But you can bet that now that it's established, it won't be going away any time soon.
- The 1st District Service Center. Now Supervisors who represent challenging districts will get district offices and staff paid by County departments. This is one growth business Chriss Street should invest in.
- The Strategic Focus Manager. Don't get me started.
I could go back through the budget documents and rack up the number of positions added to the bureaucracy, but won't bore you here. Those at least go to existing programs to provide services to a growing population and are done mostly with the benefit of state or federal money. The new bureaucracy outlined above comes out of pure local property tax, or in County-speak, Net County Cost.
So I guess we need to rethink our notion of conservative supervisors, which will provide a pretty unique political opportunity for Joe Dunn should he wish to exploit it.