I'll have more to say later about Dean Logan's career in King County and the future of King County Elections (elect the Auditor!). For now, some more thoughts on Deanron's parthian shot at his critics. Logan cited the "toxic" political environment surrounding the mail-only voting proposal as a factor in his decision to resign. But as he told Dave Ross this morning, he missed last week's Council meeting to go to L.A. to visit his prospective employer and also scout out schools for his teenaged son. As Sandeep Kaushik told the Times last week, the expectation had been that the Council was going to approve the mail-only proposal and that the meeting was merely a twice-postponed formality. The timing of all this is interesting. I'm left with the impression that Logan had been preparing for his departure for quite a while and was waiting for the mail-only proposal to be rammed through the Council so he could declare a victory before moving on. That would also imply that Logan knew that he would not be around to implement the move to mail-only. He must have anticipated that even the Democrats on the Council might balk at making such a significant move when the leadership of the office was also in transition. Yet it looks like he tried to time the news of his departure so as not to jeopardize the mail-only ordinance. And he would have succeeded if not for the exceptionally effective tri-partisan protest that scuttled last Monday's vote.
But Logan's imminent resignation was already becoming an open secret. I heard it through the grapevine last week, but thought it best to sit on it until I had stronger confirmation. As I see it, the combination of intensely hostile public reaction, newly raised concerns about unfilled positions in the elections office and the circulating rumors of Logan's departure must have sealed the deal. The mail-only move would be dead in the water and best for Logan to just get on with his life, and for Sims to use his resignation as the excuse to avoid an outright defeat in the Council next Monday.
I find it odd that both Logan and Sims used this opportunity to elevate their "unhinged partisan critics" (Sims' words) by attacking them. (If we critics of Dean/Ron were mere unhinged fringies, we wouldn't have enough traction with the broader public to have this much impact, would we. But the criticism resonates , because it's on target and fully hinged). The strong words are less about the critics than about Dean/Ron changing the subject from their own failures at running the elections office, capped by the total debacle of their attempt to force us all to vote by mail.
Posted by Stefan Sharkansky at June 13, 2006 11:19 AM | Email ThisToxic!!?? Hell! He has done more damage to the confidence in the democratic process that anyone since Mayor Daley.
Posted by: JCM on June 13, 2006 11:32 AMLogan was only giving a partisan shot. It had NOTHING to do with the last hearing on all-mail ballots. You don't go to "scout out schools" if you're not sure you're going to be living in the area.
I also doubt that Logan could have gotten that job without an endorsement from Sims. With the Sims crowd so good at masking the truth, I'm very surprised that all involved last week didn't have a better cover story.
The head of KCRE needs to be elected. We also need far stronger sunshine laws regarding elections for the whole state.
Posted by: SouthernRoots on June 13, 2006 11:33 AMIt's now time to call for making the position of Director of Elections and elected one, or barring that, to at least require Sims to work with a broad citizen group from all ends of the political spectrum in replacing Logan.
I want to see someone who is highly knowledgeable in the auditing and accounting procedures that assure checks and balances in registration, authentication and tabulation of ballots. The new candidate should also have an Information Technology background. A good candidate might be someone from a private auditing firm or brand name IT consulting firm that is willing to serve the public for a while. And above all I want someone who's not afraid to conduct all business in the open.
Elections are about as public, as public gets. It's only when there is a lot of sunlight and when we work together across partisan lines when conducting our elections, that we can avoid the collapse in public trust that asssured Dean Logan's demise.
Posted by: Jeff B. on June 13, 2006 11:41 AMBut one of the prime sponsors of the ordinance, Seattle Democrat Bob Ferguson, said he was troubled not only by Logan's absence ("a serious lapse in judgment") but also by information presented Monday about staff vacancies Logan has been unable to fill in his office.
"I have to have confidence that the Elections Department has the resources and staff and the ability to make that change. Right now I'm not sure if I believe that's the case," Ferguson said.
Could it be that Logan had lost the 'D''s too?
Posted by: Gary on June 13, 2006 12:07 PMSims needs to spend less time blaming his critics and more time taking responsibility for his own failures and lack of leadership.
Posted by: Gary on June 13, 2006 12:07 PMWhy wouldn't the Dems be supportive of a little guy taking on big government in the form of voting rights?
Why would the Dems not welcome a crusader for clean elections in their tent?
I always thought it was the rascally Republicans that had a small tent and represented the big corporations.
Banner day in the topsy-turvy world of stereotyped politics.
Posted by: swatter on June 13, 2006 12:14 PM
http://dhr.lacounty.info/Assistant%20RRCC.pdf
Posted by: NJERALD on June 13, 2006 12:27 PMWhat happened at the Council meeting on Monday was a case of the public telling the council members that the emperor does not have new clothes. The problems will not be fixed until the thinking of Sims and his council cronies change drastically. Hades will probably enter the ice age first.
Posted by: Burdabee on June 13, 2006 02:46 PMThere is no way the citizens of King County were going to allow "all mail voting" with the open sores of the 2004 election still bleeding. Sims had to think of plan B...I'm thinking that Logan's departure is plan B. Logan's whining about a "toxic" working environment just adds to the drama....
They must have his replacement already chosen.....
I'm getting sick of the lies and the drama tactics for something as important as our elections!
Posted by: Deborah on June 13, 2006 06:34 PMTo proceed with appointing a new director of their party's choice, would cause so many misgivings that this new individual would enter this arena with the same distrusted nature that caused Dean Logan to leave.
The 2004 governor election will not be forgotten in this state, until voters have the right to fill this important position. It is the least they can do at this point. Then and only then if a democrat is elected, they will have the ability to begin anew without the scourge of 2004 hanging over their heads.
Unfortunately I do not believe for one moment this will happen in Our King County.
Another missed opportunity, and a hopeless tragedy for the new appointed Director.
Posted by: GS on June 14, 2006 12:03 AMIncompetent Elections Official Praises Less Incompetent Elections Officials
Los Angeles County Registrar of Voters Conny McCormack thinks King County "displayed amazing accuracy" in the 2004 election
McCormack said she was impressed with King County's inaccuracy rate of only 0.2 percent. "We've never hit 0.2 of a percent (in Los Angeles County). I think that is excellent," she added. Los Angeles County's error rate in its voter-crediting process for the 2004 election was about 1 percent of its 3.1 million votes.
Yikes. And we all thought that 0.2% was bad. As I discovered the other day, if SeaTac airport had an error rate of 0.2%, it would mean 2 airplane crashes a day. But if LAX had an error rate of 1%, it would mean a crash every 80 minutes!