Against my better judgment, I voted for a candidate for sheriff of Allen County and for the rest of the county offices on the ballot. TO BE SURE, the good sense of the voters in counties like Allen make the system work despite itself. Republican Allen County sometimes puts a Democrat in an elective county job and then keeps them there for term after term because they perform well. The voters, in effect, decide not to play politics and play good government instead.
The only wise vote in the batch was for county commissioner. County commissioners make policy. They should therefore be elected. None of the other officials up for election do. The others hold jobs that are best done by people trained in the knowledge and skills required by the position. They should be hired by the county commission from qualified applicants for the jobs. Or, better yet, picked by a trained county manager.
The model for staffing Allen County lies just across the street in Iola City Hall. Iola, like every other city in Kansas and most of America, doesn’t elect its law enforcement officers, its attorney, its clerks and other department heads. They are all hired by the city council, usually with the advice of the city administrator.
It is particularly important that law enforcement department heads, such as the chief of police, be hired rather than elected. Elected officials quite naturally seek to make themselves liked by the voters.
Hello, out there.
Popular sheriffs are not always good sheriffs. A chief of police who set out every morning to please the public might decide to have fewer parking violation tickets written, take a prominent businessman home rather than toss him in the clinker as a drunk and put people-pleasing over law enforcement in other ways.
Following the pattern set by municipalities would make for better county government for other reasons, as well. When selections are made in the election process, candidates with outgoing personalities have a natural advantage. The quiet, inward-looking guy or gal doesn’t even try to win those offices, even though they might do a whale of a job as register of deeds, treasurer or county clerk. Slapping backs and kissing babies doesn’t appeal to them.
Advantage number three is that competent, hard-working employees should be kept on the job as long as they can do the work and want to stay. That is all but automatic in municipal government. Thirty-year pin parties are commonplace events in city halls.
There would be more of them in county courthouses if the jobs were appointive rather than elective — and the taxpayers would benefit from the expertise those faithful servants develop and the loyalty they demonstrate.
To its good fortune, Allen County has had quite a few career county clerks, treasurers and registers of deeds.
But depending on the voters to act as though they were the county commission sometimes has painful results. If they turn out to be duds, elected officials can’t be fired until the next election. And that may be the very best reason to junk the system and adopt the city model.
Will it happen? When pigs fly and every hen lays two eggs a day.
— Emerson Lynn, jr.
