You might have heard by now that the Board of Supervisors voted unanimously today to reject a proposal to provide severance pay when elected Polk County officials retire from office or are defeated. That alone was good news, but I thought you might be interested in reading what I had to say. Here’s an excerpt of my remarks:
“I’ve been at this local government thing for quite a while. I’ve been on the city council, been a mayor and now I’m on the board. … I remember my first meeting as a city council member in Clive. The meeting started at seven o’clock – it was the first meeting about the Flying J Travel Center – and it lasted until 2:15 a.m. a council meeting. The whole time, residents were teeing off on the council. There was a lot of emotion and a lot of energy.
“Since I’ve been on the board, there was the Iowa Events Center and then (the salary scandal involving the Central Iowa Employment Training Center). There was a lot of controversy, a lot of emotion around them. The common thread between those … was that they reflect what we call ‘reality’ in the real world. There was a lot of controversy and a lot of emotion but it was part of something that really existed. I have to say this was the first time since I’ve been doing this that we had a controversy over something that never existed, that was something that was theoretical only and lived in a pretend world only.
“The severance pay issue never had a chance of passing with the Board of Supervisors. It was not on the agenda. It was not scheduled to be on the agenda. … This was a citizens’ proposal. All five (supervisors) get proposals multiple times per week that cross our desks. …
“You could say this is a committee we appointed, but I’ve for a list of proposals as long as my arm from the Conservation Commission, which is another commission we appoint. They’re good proposals. There’s nothing wrong with any of them but many of them we can’t afford. Yet, none of those is on the front page of the Register.
“The point of it is, some of these things are just proposals and they don’t actually exist until the Board of Supervisors takes them up and this was never going to be taken up. I don’t want to put words in anybody’s mouth but I know at least two of us were surprised to even get the call from (Register reporter Jason Pulliam) that this was even being considered.
“I ‘get’ the anger. I really do. People feel government is too big, it’s too expensive, it’s not responsive and all that. Now we have the specter that these well-paid officials are going to take more and it’s unconscionable. I would agree, if only it were true. I can tell you it’s not true. We’re not about to do it.
“We will continue to serve you the best we can. We’ll continue to work hard and get the best value out of the public dollar we can. We’re not perfect but we’re not crazy either. And this proposal was crazy from day one.”
