Tuesday, April 13, 2010

County Convention Update

My new commitment to blogging has not yet moved me to post immediately after an event. This hast the advantage of giving me time to reflect and be a little more thoughtful.

That's my story!

The Davis County Convention was on Saturday, and I saw a couple of friends there. It was their first convention, and I took the bull by the horns and tried to convince as many people as I could speak to to see things my way. I went with my Dad, which has become something of a tradition for me, and he was very patient with me this time as I dragged him around trying to talk to more people that he didn't know.

A neighbor of mine attended as a delegate for the first time. He has started a blog called Davis County Republican. He couldn't believe that the name was available. See his blog here.

The key results were as follows.

Bret Milburn (I) -- Commission seat A
Louenda Downs (I) -- Commission seat B
Todd Richardson -- Sheriff
Dennis Yarrington -- Assessor

That last one was an upset as I thought Ivie had done a good job. Everything else went the way I expected and wished. I honestly wish that we'd had better candidates running against the incumbents so that it would have been a real challenge for them. As it was, the two losing Commissioner candidates has some untenable ideas about how to reform the government, although their rhetoric was more conservative, and you know how much I want conservative qualities in my officials. Some examples of some unrealistic goals follow. Dave Andreasen wants to run a fiscally conservative county, but wants to switch out the Commissioner form for the Council Mayor, which would have cost so much more than what we have now. Nine part-time councilmen, and one full-time mayor would require so much more money to keep things running than what we have now. Drew Chamberlain, who ran against Downs, claimed he could lower the commissioner pay by 60 percent. Not likely considering he'd have to convince the other two to take a pay cut. Likely, all he would end up doing is donating the remainder of his pay to charity, not of my choosing, and working as hard as someone who earns $40k may work. My feeling is that if the commissioners think they are actually worth less money, then I am fine with them earning less, but if they work for the full $109,000 they are paid each year, then I am all for that.

Finally, we were scheduled to finish at 2 PM, and we finished at 2 PM. Very strange!