Election Season Heats Up And Spills Over

The Iron County Reporter of February 22, 2012 has several
paid advertisements for and against the recall of Wayne
Wales, the Chairman of the Iron County Board. The ads
against the recall explain themselves well enough, but the
pro-Rosalie King and friends ad bears some scrutiny.

Anyone with a depth of interest sufficient to delve into the
actual records can get at most of the information by reading
the meeting minutes that cover some of the topics. It is
unfortunate that the Reporter and WIKB don’t do a better
dissemination of underlying facts. Rumor has it (admittedly
your humble correspondent has not verified this) the record
and the ad do not agree. But check for yourself. We state this
as rumor because we have not made the effort to verify the
facts, though memory tends to lend credence to the rumors.

I think the final lines in the pro-Rosalie ad on page 12 of the
Reporter are the most telling. It reads in part, “These
statements are not made by a ‘Special Interest Group,’
only by your fellow citizens who have been involved in these
and other groups for many years to promote Iron County.”

We have in Iron County a collection of municipalities that
mostly cannot afford so much as a 2 wheel drive pickup
truck or a police car without a grant from somewhere. How
many roads have been waiting for decades to be repaved. I
would love to be able to use Smoky Lake Road, but that is a
formerly paved road that’s been graveled over much as the
alleyway behind my house on Plum Street in Iron River
was recently. Obviously there has been little to no success
with the promotion of Iron County by the Rosalie club and
some of the predecessors, otherwise we could afford the
important essentials without outside money in the form of
grants. The EDC, another enterprise of the County Board,
hasn’t brought in any new businesses or new jobs capable
of supporting a family in the time I’ve been here full time
(since 2003).

Further analysis of the sentence written on Rosalie’s behalf
shows it is inconsistent in the very words used. The claim is
that the people involved promoting Wayne Wales’ recall are
not a special interest group, but then goes on to say their
special interest has been Iron County. And the sad part is
that the interest they tout so boldly has only resulted in such
a depressed local economy that a regional salesman I speak
to several times a year told me that he hates to come here
and only visits here when he must.

As pretty as this countryside is, isn't that a shame? And
Hovey Company folks, who have the contract for revamping
Central School, stated they used to drive through Iron
County on their way elsewhere, not thinking to stop here
because nothing attracted their interest.

On this basis alone, isn’t it time for those who have failed
for so long, for 36 years and counting, to move over and
give someone else a shot at improving our outlook?

Wayne Wales and the recently formed alliances on the
county board have been doing those necessary things
that King and her little troupe have avoided out of
self-interest.

But the analysis is hard to stop there. The dogcatcher
position has been eliminated. “In fact it will cost the
taxpayers more money for less service,” says the pro-
Rosalie ad. The ad admits that isn’t true so far. What
is going to change that? Sorry folks, I ask these rhetorical
questions now and again. Nothing anyone can lay their
finger on will actually make the service cost more while
providing less. The position Tom King was in, and his
father before him, was created as a personal interest
matter so that Rosalie’s son would have a cushy job at
the public expense. And in a grant application for a new
vehicle, he was listed as a “first responder” when in fact
he never has had any training along those lines. And the
reason for the grant request was that the old vehicle he
was using burned too much oil. What was wrong with an
engine overhaul? It certainly would have cost a lot less
than a new vehicle!

The fact is that a fully qualified peace officer is now serving
as animal control officer. When not involved in animal
control activities, this individual is providing police
services that Tom King was not qualified to do. When
Tom King asked if he could carry a gun on the job, that
request was denied. Given that animal control does not
keep an individual busy at all times, what did Tom do
with the rest of his time? We know what the sheriff’s
deputy is doing, and those patrol duties are important
to the citizens, so where does this “costs more for less”
idea come from?

The creme de la crème in Rosalie’s ad says, “We have
always gotten public input and it should remain that way.”
Then why, under the Rosalie King chairmanship of the
Board, was the “Airport Committee” continuing to meet
and work? From all reports the people spoke loudly
against a new airport around the turn of the century. So
the sentiment that the King group is in favor of public input
and heeds appears on the surface to be false.

To begin wrapping up the discussion about this debacle, we
point out that DICSA failed to pay rent that was due under
the previous administration. Now called to task and required
to pay some back rent, complaints about it come from the
King camp followers alone. Iron County Doings and this
humble correspondent have always spoken in favor of
government and agencies running very thin on money. The
fact that DICSA had over $60 thousand dollars at its disposal
addresses that issue directly. The ideal situation, in our
opinion, is that government and its agencies should have
next to no discretionary funds in any account. If they they
have more, then we’ve been paying too much in taxes.

And that brings us near the end of this analysis (although
there’s enough material to fill a large college textbook) the
ad accuses Wayne Wales of operating the road commission
when “payroll could barely be made.”

Hurray!

That’s an ideal circumstance, so long as the payroll could
actually be made. I applaud that sort of diligence.

We point out here that along with the escalation of
antagonism in the King camp is a similar escalation in
at least one other municipality in the county. We offer
the reader, and all government officials, the simple
premise that you serve the public, so get your personal
initiatives and keep your emotions out of the equation
and do your jobs serving the public. Everything else is
self-serving. Such process that has no place in governance.
If you want to take on something that personally bothers
you, quit your government job, go get another one, and
then take on personal issues when you no longer have
political prestige and power distracting you from your
official duties and expending public funds.

While we have used facts to arrive at the content of
this article. It contains a bit of well founded opinion,
so read it with that in mind. And voters, please
understand that it is time to get the “Boss Hawg”

http://tinyurl.com/6rkcnv5

mentality displayed a while back in a TV show called “The
Dukes Of Hazard” out of Iron County politics. That
attitude is what has held Iron County back and forced so
many of your children to leave the region in order to earn
a living.

Retain Wayne Wales, and let’s have some real progress in
Iron County.

Bill Vajk