NorCo Council Questions Brown's Transparency

Bob Werner and Hayden Phillips

When Executive John Brown proposed a pay hike for clerical staff, NorCo Council went along unanimously. But it has been troubled by Deputy Director of Administration Cathy Allen's claim that the money for it was included in this year's budget. Hayden Phillips asked that it be made an agenda item at the May 7 meeting.

John Brown insisted that the payhike had been under consideration in February and was "contemplated in the 2015 budget."

Ken Kraft refused to accept that explanation. "All I heard was doom and gloom," he remembered. "It sounds like you're covering for someone," obviously referring to Cathy Allen.

Scott Parsons echoed Kraft's sentiments."Somewhere along the way, as Roger Clemens would say, you misspoke."

Lamont McClure stated that, if this payhike was being planned for as long as brown had claimed, it should have been specifically included in the budget. "You should have presented that to the public," he charged. "Shouldn't that have been in the budget?"

Brown claimed it was a question of timing.

Bob Werner was incensed that the Executive and Cathy Allen had refused to provide staff from Public Works who could explain what is going on with the bridge bundling program, a state program under which specific types of bridges are bundled together for repair at less cost to the County.Brown responded that they would just be "repeating the same information over and over," and that a request like that should have come from Hayden Phillips, who chairs the capital improvements committee. But Phillips agreed with Werner.

"To me, it's kind of insulting that we couldn't have these people come in and address us," stated Phillips.