Curmudgeon's Corner

County Exec for Washington County?

Posted by Al Campbell on Nov. 9, 2010

Village Buzz, County Board, Germantown, Political, Taxes

A new group called Citizens for Elected Executive (click here) has been formed in Washington County.  Its goal is to educate and agitate for the creation of an elected County Executive position in Washington County.

The County Executive position would focus the operation of the county on one person who would have the ability to create budgets for Board consideration, would hire and fire department heads, and who would have the ability to veto Board actions.  That person would be subject to citizen accountability since this would be an elective position much like that of now Governor-Elect Scott Walker in Milwaukee County.

This move has been brought forward but has met with little enthusiasm by current political powers since those powers would take a back seat to this new structure and position.  The group believes that an elected County Executive would be the solution to open government that currently can be obscured behind numerous committees and closed door meetings where decisions can be made without benefit of open debate.

With sufficient citizen involvement, this question could be on the ballot as soon as April 5^th, 2011.  That is the goal of this activist group.

It makes a lot of sense to me.  I can easily see where the ‘good old boy’ network wouldn’t be wild about the idea of losing its power, but that is the beauty of this change in governance form.  The old networks don’t wield the power they did prior to such systematic change, and the citizens have a very direct manner of expressing their pleasure or displeasure in a single county-wide vote.

It is time for this question to find its way onto the ballots for the coming election and that can be done by petitions and a resulting referendum question.