In county's battle of egos, only the taxpayers lose

THE OLYMPIAN | • Published November 05, 2009

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The battle of egos between Thurston County Sheriff Dan Kimball and the three county commissioners took another turn recently when Kimball won all of his court motions, including a move to force the county to pay his legal bills.

Now taxpayers will be paying for attorneys on both sides of this ridiculous dispute.

What should happen is that Kimball and Commissioners Cathy Wolfe, Sandra Romero and Karen Valenzuela should sit down like adults and work out their budget differences. They should check their egos at the door and remember that they are working for the public good. Maybe, just maybe, if the four officials could erase their lines in the sand and focus on public safety they would be able to move beyond their budget battle, resolve this dispute amicably and save taxpayers a ton of money.

If not, they will continue to drain the public treasury and endure additional public ridicule. We pay our elected officials to be good stewards of taxpayers’ dollars and to compromise, not engage in drawn out legal disputes.

Commissioners and Sheriff Kimball should take another stab at settlement.

At issue is the question of how much authority commissioners have in dictating how the sheriff spends his budget. Clearly, commissioners have the ability to set the budget for every county department – including the departments governed by independently elected county officials such as the clerk, auditor and assessor. But once those overall levels of spending are set, can commissioners dictate how the dollars are spent? Can they, in this instance, dictate to Sheriff Kimball that he cut his command staff in order to preserve the jobs of deputies on the road?

Commissioners say they have that authority.

Kimball says voters elected him to run the sheriff’s office and once commissioners set his budget, he gets to make the staffing decisions.

Unable to reach an accord, Kimball filed suit and a Grays Harbor Superior Court judge has been assigned to hear the case. The case isn’t scheduled for trial until March, but Kimball emerged victorious in a key ruling last week.

Grays Harbor County Superior Court Judge David Edwards ruled that the county commission must pay all of Kimball’s legal bills in the matter – both past and pending. County prosecutors, who would normally represent all county officials in court, agreed to represent the commissioners but did not take up Kimball’s case.

Kimball had been forced to pay his legal bills out of his own pocket. His attorney, Saxon Rodgers of Olympia, had argued in court papers that the prosecuting attorney is required to represent both parties to this action.”

The end result is taxpayers will pay for prosecutors to represent the county commissioners and also pay Rodgers’ legal bills to represent the sheriff.

No matter which side wins, taxpayers lose.

The best opportunity to settle this dispute came last month when Kimball offered to drop his lawsuit if commissioners agreed to cancel their April budget resolutions requiring Kimball to eliminate five positions in the Sheriff’s Office – a combination of supervisory positions and one command position.

Kimball had found a way to balance the budget in a way that would save deputy positions and command positions, but commissioners rejected the settlement offer. They insist that as the chief financial stewards for all of county government, they must have the authority to dictate how county dollars are spent. In their roles as commissioners, they say, they must set budget priorities for all of county government and that includes the deployment of staff resources.

The opportunity for settlement passed and now both sides appear to be going for broke with the expectation that next March the judge will decide whether state laws vest the authority to eliminate positions with the commission or the sheriff.

Unfortunately, members of the public may not have seen the last of the fireworks between Kimball and the three commissioners. Between now and March the two sides have to set a 2010 budget for the Sheriff’s Office. Given the acrimony still swirling around the 2009 budget, prospects for agreement on a 2010 spending plan seem slim.

It’s certainly in the best interests of taxpayers – who are now footing the entire legal bill – to resolve this dispute now, before another dime is spent on legal fees.