Citizens must hold officials accountable

Editor:

More and more we see how the trust we put into people of authority and power becomes abused and the public ends up paying the price. That concept has now reared its ugly head in Madison County.

Time and again we hear county officials tell citizens one thing, only to find that the facts do not support the statements. This could not have been more apparent than during the recent hearings regarding the biannual tax collections.

County Administrator Lisa Robertson justified the county’s change with a broad statement of “most counties do it this way.” However, further probing showed Ms. Robertson had no real basis for her statement.

Now we hear her describe how the sheriff’s office has asked for $300,000 to replace older vehicles, yet a look at the facts shows that no such request for funds was ever made. What was submitted was a statement of fact by the sheriff’s office showing that one half of its vehicle fleet is now at or over the 100,000 mile mark, an apparent trigger point for vehicle replacement. Ms. Robertson’s mischaracterization of information in turn caused the sheriff’s office to issue a public written statement to clarify the situation.

We have also heard Ms. Robertson state that in an effort to cut expenses in county offices the cleaning crew had been replaced by another group. However, Ms. Robertson did not disclose what amount of money the county saved by the change, nor did she make public the fact that members of the new cleaning group were related to a county employee directly under Ms. Robertson’s supervisory capacity.

Further, I have found no evidence the cleaning vacancies were ever put out to bid. Have we traded a few bucks in county expenditures for the high ethical price of surrounding nepotism?

What are we to think of current Supervisor Bob Miller mired in a situation possibly related to questionable dealings with a county resident? This brings into question his judgment in conducting county business.

If the appearance of impropriety is supported by fact, Miller should step down, rather then continue on and further erode the credibility of the administration as a whole.

There is a lot going on at the government level in Madison County. Residents need to become more involved, ask more questions and hold our county officials accountable.

M. Christopher Martino
Madison County