A couple things in Candidate Ross\u2019s recently published campaign statements raise concerns.\u00a0 He said, \u201cElbert county government should not be in the business of facilitating the export of this precious water.\u201d\u00a0 Fair enough as a political sentiment, but Elbert County really only has a legitimate authority over water properties underneath land it holds in the name of Elbert County.\u00a0 In Colorado, water is not the community’s property.\u00a0 It doesn\u2019t sound like a Commissioner Ross would limit the scope of his water reach to county owned properties.\u00a0 This raises a concern of government overreach from aggressive water zoning and other county approvals and licensing that could become politicized.\u00a0 That\u2019s just not a conservative, rule of law orientation.<\/p>\n
Candidate Ross goes on to say, \u201cDecisions regarding any development project must make economic sense and be of true benefit to Elbert County.\u201d\u00a0 Hold on there.\u00a0 Since when is it government\u2019s role to decide winners and losers in the market?\u00a0 In a free country private citizens take economic risks with their property and capital.\u00a0 What\u2019s the constitutional basis for county government deciding beforehand what the prospective economics of a private project will be \u2013 and predicating licensing on that decision?\u00a0 Oh that\u2019s right, there isn\u2019t one.\u00a0 So, this is another big problem.<\/p>\n
Turning to Candidate Rowland\u2019s recent statements \u2013 which requires the turn of a page in this weeks\u2019 Prairie Times, thank you to the Bishops \u2013 more effluvia from the tea-drinking upholder of \u201cconservative values and principles\u201d rises to the surface.<\/p>\n
Skimming off the top layer, Candidate Rowland\u2019s position appears to be that commissioners Schwab and Shipper intended to bankrupt the county, sell vast amounts of Elbert County water, pollute the pristine water they didn\u2019t sell with dirty Arkansas River water, deny citizens a place to dump their garbage locally, and wrongly direct business to a struggling local employer.\u00a0 Then they succeeded in shutting out a clamoring mob from a non-policy making commissioner business meeting, and wrongly supported county employees in a harassment case.<\/p>\n
I don\u2019t see it that way at all.\u00a0 The commissioners I know have no such malice, short sightedness, or incompetence in their direction of Elbert County government.<\/p>\n
On the contrary, people who exacerbate circumstances in favor of their personal political ambitions are a big problem in this Elbert County political season.\u00a0 These meeting occupants grab the limelight every other week to sling innuendo and mudballs at decent public servants doing a fine job for the county.<\/p>\n
Someone asked me yesterday what I thought the biggest problem in the county was.\u00a0 I said jobs, but a close second would be political self-aggrandizement<\/em> because it clouds everything and makes reality based decision making much more difficult.<\/p>\n The circus sideshow of public sharing at BOCC meetings does nothing to elevate discussions or add information that could be used to solve a real problem — which was the commissioner’s intent in giving them a microphone.\u00a0 Instead, they self-aggrandize with impunity and permit their lust for power to overcome all shame.\u00a0 As difficult as it is to witness these occupant monkey shines, I\u2019m glad the commissioners put them on the web so we can see what our government is up against.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" A couple things in Candidate Ross\u2019s recently published campaign statements raise concerns.\u00a0 He said, \u201cElbert county government should not be in the business of facilitating the export of this precious water.\u201d\u00a0 Fair enough as a political sentiment, but Elbert County really only has a legitimate authority over water properties underneath land it holds in the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-2869","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-politics","7":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/elbertcounty.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2869","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/elbertcounty.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/elbertcounty.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elbertcounty.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elbertcounty.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2869"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/elbertcounty.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2869\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/elbertcounty.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2869"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elbertcounty.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2869"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elbertcounty.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2869"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}