County community development deserves better from bosses

Dear Kootenai County Commissioners,

I’ve never written such a letter before but felt compelled to do so after watching you systematically destroy the Community Development Department. The role of a county commissioner is to administer county government. You are to be the executive of the local government and administer services such as courts, public safety, property registration and building code enforcement. I’m not sure what you believed your role to be when you took office, but what is being done is not administering, but destroying the county from the inside out. You don’t appear to want to be leaders, but instead fulfill some sort of personal ideology.

As a former employee of Community Development working alongside some of the finest people I have ever known, I have insight into the department. As I worked with these people for several years, I was always amazed at the caliber of people that serve our community. They all had extensive experience and/or high education credentials, and every one of them are fine people I was proud to work with. I know that with the credentials and experience the employees have, they could go across the border to Washington or even seven blocks down the street and earn significantly more money per year. Why they stay always amazes me. Some have been with the county their entire working career. They have seen many commissioners come and go and many boom and bust building cycles. I was at the hearing at the Kroc Center last week. The insults to the building inspectors made me angry. The inspectors work hard and have several certifications that are not easy to obtain.

I’m sure the commissioners only hear the complaints about the department, and in my experience the ones that are angry are the ones who got caught breaking the rules and are unhappy they got caught. Inside the department we were able to help many people, and we heard story after story of people being taken advantage of by less than honest builders or buying a home only to find major issues from the previous owner who didn’t use good building practices. Opportunists will see the lack of a building permit requirement as a way to take advantage of homeowners who don’t know any better. Reputable builders will have to try and compete with those that don’t carry the proper insurances or registration because no one is checking.

We have three commissioners who can’t seem to agree on anything and instead of administering and leading the county departments they oversee, want to dismantle the department. You have created chaos and unfairly put the people who work there in a terrible position. They have gotten no direction as to the status of your indecision and no real answers as they try to deal on the “front lines” to assist the public. It makes me so sad and angry seeing the people I admire and care about being treated this way. Whether you succeed in destroying the department or not, life will go on. Someone else will occupy your chair and some people will be made happy and some will be unhappy. There are people with opinions on both sides. My hope is that as you serve out the rest of your time as commissioners, you will remember to put the good of all the people you serve in front of your personal agendas, and treat the staff with respect and professionalism.

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Paula Roukema was a Kootenai County Community Development employee from 2009-2010 and 2012-2018.