05/23/2007: "County Council Shuns Voters- AGAIN"

On Monday our elected officials had an opportunity to ask the Governor to allow the voters of San Juan County to select our first Superior Court Judge. Our State Constitution allows the Governor to appoint someone for this position, and also allows the Governor to defer and allow the voters to decide.

I am amazed, though I should not be anymore, that our County Council (save two) did not request the Governor to defer this decision to the voters. This will be San Juan County’s first Superior Court Judge and the decision should be made by the voters. Using the excuse that there will be an election in 2008 is really lame. At the very least we could have continued as we are now until that election could be held in 2008.

Our County Council needs to stop going around the voters. The Stormwater Fee/Tax that was recently added to our property tax statements is another example of excluding the voting community. By calling it a fee they were able to do an end run around the voters. If it was a tax they would have needed to ask the voters if they wanted to levy an additional tax upon themselves. And there was the 73.5% vote for Guest Houses the County ignored as “uninformed”.

The exclusion of the voting public must stop. The Council needs to remember, the voters elected them, but they will not be able to deny them the right to reverse that decision at the next election cycle.

Frustrated but still hopeful,

Ray Bigler
San Juan Island.