Easy fix for county's transparency fight

Mary Souza remains proud of introducing a “transparency bill” at the last legislative session.

The state senator from Coeur d’Alene made that clear at Tuesday night’s candidate forum.

So applause for Mary, since transparency in government always, always benefits those citizens being governed.

Ironically, though, we have an unsightly transparency problem much closer to home than Boise.

Besides being a hindrance to the day-to-day functions of Kootenai County, the issue in question soon could lead to a truly ugly lawsuit that would make the rest of the state look at us and say: “Are they nuts?”

Here’s the situation …

Once the new Board of County Commissioners takes office in January, we may see that commission filing suit against the county clerk.

There’s an “if” in that prediction, however.

Legal action is possible if incumbent Clerk Jim Brannon survives a challenge from independent Dan Gookin.

Brannon considers himself the guardian of the county budget, and he strongly opposes sharing any numbers with the public — at least not without some paperwork and a 72-hour delay.

BUT THE real problem is that Brannon is almost as secretive about the budget with county commissioners, who obviously need that financial information to do their jobs.

This whole battle has been simmering, and it exploded at a Pachyderm Club meeting a couple of weeks ago.

Although Brannon was present, the chosen defender of the “secrecy policy” was Dena Darrow, the county finance director.

Justifying the current policy, Darrow said, “We need to make sure the system doesn’t get hacked.”

Several potential combatants in any future scrap were present at that Pachyderm event — including Brannon, Gookin and Commissioner Chris Fillios (who will remain in office with the next commission).

In post-breakfast conversations with The Press, Brannon stood fast on his duty to hide the budget, and Fillios made the frustrations of various commissioners perfectly clear.

Gookin, meanwhile, dismissed Brannon’s stance as foolish.

“It’s the taxpayers’ money,” Gookin said. “Nowhere in the statutes does it say that any county employee is supposed to keep the budget away from anyone.”

AT ONE point, Darrow said of commissioners’ headaches, “It’s a tough call, (so) work it out.”

Fillios replied: “We’ve tried.”

If Brannon remains in office, which he’s favored to do, commissioners plan to try quite a bit harder.

The commission that’s soon to be sworn in will include Fillios, Bill Brooks (a Republican running unopposed in District 1), and either Republican Leslie Duncan or Democrat Ruben Miranda from District 3.

Fillios and Brooks already are on record as favoring a new county policy that would require the clerk to make the budget accessible on request.

Those two votes would clinch a challenge to the current policy.

Gookin has no objection to that, but Brannon could well refuse on the grounds he has stated repeatedly — setting up a very real possibility that the BOCC would have to sue the County Clerk’s Office.

“It’s all so needless,” Brooks said. “First of all, as county employees we should all be on the same side. The clerk can remain the chief budget officer, but commissioners clearly need access to do the work they’re elected to do.”

IN A touch of serendipity, Brooks’ daughter Melanie happens to be an IT security specialist for a company based in Switzerland — so the new commissioner knows plenty about the type of hacking that worries Brannon and Darrow.

“Solving all this would actually be very easy,” Brooks said. “A link to the entire budget could be posted on the county website and updated every week.

“Not just commissioners, but also county residents could see it any time — which they should, because it’s their money.

“The key to making this work is that the budget could be displayed as a read-only PDF file, which can’t be hacked.

“Meanwhile, the clerk would retain all the software to prevent any possibility of hacking, or malware being introduced. All that would leave the clerk’s office is the read-only PDF, which ought to satisfy everyone.”

This suggested resolution would suit commissioners, obviously, while also allowing the clerk to ensure that security remains tight.

So let’s do it soon, and …

For heaven’s sake, no lawsuit.

•••

Steve Cameron is a columnist for The Press.

A Brand New Day appears from Wednesday through Saturday each week.

Steve’s sports column runs on Tuesday.

Email: scameron@cdapress.com

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