County does not have a healthy workplace

We have one elected official serving as a commissioner who asserts his self-perceived power through aggressive, negative actions intended to offend, degrade, intimidate and humiliate. He uses these tactics toward employees, department heads and his fellow elected officials. He does so with the blessing of a second commissioner who either rubber stamps his actions, or takes no opposing action to prevent it.

Currently, Treasurer Cheryl Piehl and I are his targets.

Normally, the bullying techniques being used would be classified as a private, not public, matter. However, his actions took these issues out of that realm when he engaged the services of the civil deputy prosecuting attorney in the Bonner County Prosecutor’s Office to assist him in carrying out his attacks. He is now interfering with our office operations. It is for that reason that we are seeking legal assistance.

The treasurer and the clerk have tried working with this same civil deputy prosecuting attorney to obtain opinions on those matters affecting our office operations and our ability to perform our jobs without interference from members of the commission. For almost a year we have requested assistance through that deputy prosecuting attorney and finally directly from Bonner County Prosecutor Louis Marshall, and have received none.

In frustration, we approached the board of commissioners for the ability to obtain legal representation on these matters. After Commissioner Lewis Rich made the motion to consider the request, it died for lack of a second thus preventing any discussion from even taking place. The end result was that we still had no legal representation and nowhere to get advice concerning our office operations.

In January of this year, we posed a series of questions on those items we feel are affecting our office. These questions were submitted in written form to Scott Bauer, civil deputy prosecuting attorney, with a copy provided to Louis Marshall, the prosecutor. We were seeking research and guidance from that office on how we should proceed. We are still waiting for any answers.

In February, Scott Bauer of the prosecutor’s office received word from the attorney for the Idaho State Bar Association that there is an ethical conflict, law licenses could be in jeopardy, and that no one from the prosecuting Attorney’s office should be providing advice to either the board of commissioners nor to the clerk and treasurer on these matters.

In another effort to gain the board’s cooperation in this matter, the clerk and treasurer again approached them for legal representation. Even after having been informed of the ethical conflict for the prosecutor’s office, the majority of the board of commissioners has still refused to provide the clerk and the treasurer with independent legal counsel of our choice. They offered to provide yet another deputy prosecutor who would again answer to the prosecutor. In our opinion, a conflict would still be evident. And even that “offer” was never actually approved or funded.

If you need your appendix removed, you don’t hire a dentist to do it. It’s the same with this situation. We need to have a lawyer well-versed in county governmental operations and who is knowledgeable of the separation of powers inherent in those operations in order to guide us. Too, it is imperative that we feel secure in the knowledge that the attorney we hire would be working in our best interests and who will value the confidentiality of an attorney client communication. So far, we have not had that type of representation.

Last week the treasurer and the clerk filed a request for inquiry with the State Bar Association and with the Idaho Attorney General.

We are saddened that it has come to this. We feel we have made every effort to work cooperatively with this board. We are fellow elected officials, peers to the board. If we, who have the ability to stand up to the board, are going through this, imagine what some of our employees and department heads who work directly for the board have been exposed to. Bonner County is not a healthy workplace these days.

n Marie Scott in Bonner County’s clerk, auditor and recorder.