[
Here’s an interesting story out of Jefferson County, Idaho.
And all this time I thought nepotism, bid-rigging, and conflict of interest in Idaho was unique to Coeur d’Alene and Kootenai County.
April 19, 2010
13 Comments
RSS feed for comments on this post.
Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.
What is going on with Wasden that he does not use his department for investigating such matters? Is this not one of the roles for our Attorney General? At the Mica Flats Grange Forum the question was asked of the state candidates what they thought of an Attorney General’s office that does not respond to citizen complaints or investigate issues brought forward by private individuals. Now I understand why this question was asked.
Comment by citizen — April 19, 2010 @ 7:54 am
This is kinda like CDA and ACI
Comment by WannaBe JD — April 19, 2010 @ 8:07 am
The State Police may do a more thorough investigation. But, it would be interesting to see how it might work out, if in the future, the State Police were petitioned first by citizens. They would probably refer it to the AG’s office.
Comment by Gary Ingram — April 19, 2010 @ 8:18 am
For the reason I posted over three years ago on my Whitecaps blog, I am very skeptical about any ISP investigation of public officials. At least in our region, nothing has occurred subsequently to change my mind.
Comment by Bill — April 19, 2010 @ 8:25 am
Nepotism is statewide. Does not surprize me.
It is so bad that our own education committee tried to make it legal this year and change our bribery and corruption laws and sneak through exceptions. I wrote a post about it here.
This is what I found off of our Bribery and Corruption Chapter.
I.C.18-1359
(1) No public servant shall:
They will get around it because they will claim, “I didn’t know they were married!”
This part is clear as far as I am concerned as well.
Then our dear AG won’t even take a look at the situation. Gee, I wonder who is he related to?
But, like the Open Meeting Laws and Idaho Records Act, I am sure down the road our legislators will continue to tweak the Bribery and Corruption laws to suit their own corrupt agenda so it is all legally corrupt and ethical.
Comment by Stebbijo — April 19, 2010 @ 8:39 am
What about the Judges wives who sit on Supreme Court councils. That has to change
Comment by WannaBe JD — April 19, 2010 @ 9:08 am
I attended a conference where the keynote speaker was Daniel Burrus. He’s a futurist who talks about technology and trends. One of the things he mentioned, which I remember well, is that you’re biggest problem today is not your biggest problem. The people with vision are those who see what the big problem is years down the road.
Often the best way to find the biggest problem is to look at the 3rd through 6th pages of the local paper. There you’ll find the rumblings of major issues to come. For the State of Idaho, fraud and corruption is and will be the big issue. But you’ll note carefully that it’s not on the radar of anyone currently running for the legislature.
A quick survey shows the issues pushed by candidates are the usual: taxes, jobs, and a smattering of social issues that are designed to raise emotions and get votes, not necessarily to solve the issues. I don’t see any candidate talking about the rampant cronyism and abuse of power being practiced by local officials throughout this state. I don’t see any candidate making urban renewal reform a key part of their plank.
Locally, the biggest issue facing the City of Coeur d’Alene is infrastructure. The sewer system is over capacity in the northwest quadrant. When construction resumes, there will be backups. The city will deal with this later, rather than now. If they dealt with it now, they could re-zone the undeveloped properties back to a lower density. (But being in the back pocket of developers, the Mayor and City Council won’t go there.) So when they deal with the problem later, they will impose an LID on either the northwest quadrant or the entire city to pay for the infrastructure improvements.
In other words: Our “visionary” leaders will choose to raise taxes on a lot of people later rather than deal with the problem now and risk offending their big developer buddies.
There are other problems that will cripple this city in the future, problems that are easy to discover now but which are conveniently avoided by self-serving egos who inhabit elected city posts. For Idaho citizens to deal with such problems we need to take state-wide action now. Just as urban renewal was off the radar 5 years ago when I first started looking into it, corruption will be a major, major issue in the years to come.
Comment by Dan — April 19, 2010 @ 9:36 am
WannaBeJD,
Dan astutely, says it here, “For the State of Idaho, fraud and corruption is and will be the big issue. But you’ll note carefully that it’s not on the radar of anyone currently running for the legislature.”
I know it needs to change, you know it needs to change and most likely others – but will it?
I don’t expect much.
Senator Jorgenson is on the Senate Judicial Committee. He might be a good one to contact. Home (208) 762-5514 Bus (208) 762-5514
Phil Hart is on the House Senate Judicial Committee. Home (208) 683-0456 Bus (208) 772-2522
This subject will most likely be ingored and then it just goes away like so many other things. Also, just so you know another judge’s spouse was also selected, he was the husband – Doug Copsey to Judge Cheri Copsey. However, he does not have ‘medical ties; to the judges nor is he an expert witness for the courts or contributes to issues of law with his spouse (Judge Simpson’s activity with the Children Family Courts Committee alongside of his wife), so it’s not as controversial as far as I can tell. However, that judge could just as easily get in a mess down in Southern Idaho and the same conflicts could effect her. It’s not worth the risk. You never know, maybe an illegal voter will show up from his business address someday.
Another interesting fact about these committees and I have asked for information to see if the most current list of the Courts/Media Commitee has any relatives on it. There is a Linda Wright, James Wright, and Steve Wright on that committee. Could be just a coincidence, I don’t know – yet.
The public deserves more than just a name, we deserve bios and creditials – like where did they go to school? But that is probably private and priveleged information? We also should be allowed to object to an appointment if we know of an issue.
It’s a mess.
Betsy Russell of the S-R (Washington based newspaper) is also on Rule 32 Committee. She claims she only has had dealings with what she calls e-records or the technology aspect of the rule and she recieves no compensation.
Rule 32 is critical to judicial records and open records. This group can make changes to it without our input and they do. I mean really, WHO ARE THESE PEOPLE? We deserve to know.
She recently won the Max Dalton Award – open government award. She almost sits exclusively alone as a reporter on the Media/Courts Committee. I don’t recognize any others – if you do, enlighten me/us.
Comment by Stebbijo — April 19, 2010 @ 10:34 am
I just received a reply from Michael Henderson – legal council to the Supreme Court who is also on many of these committees. I encourage you to contact him if you have questions. He really been very receptive when asking for public information.
This is his response to my inquiry about the Wrights who are on the Media/Courts Committee.
Comment by Stebbijo — April 19, 2010 @ 11:04 am
I need an edit button. 🙂
council = counsel
Comment by Stebbijo — April 19, 2010 @ 11:09 am
Isn’t that a picture of Hal Perry….better known as The Great Gildersleeve?
Comment by rochereau — April 19, 2010 @ 12:45 pm
rochereau,
That’s who it looks like to me too. Yes, Harold Peary truly had a voice for radio. Was The Great Gildersleeve ever on TV? I only remember it from radidio.
Comment by Bill — April 19, 2010 @ 5:25 pm
There were several Gildersleeve comedy movies made. I can’t remember if it was also on TV. I know as a child, I loved the radio program. For those of you too young to know, a radio is a thing without a picture. : )
Comment by rochereau — April 20, 2010 @ 8:29 am