Calhouns Can(n)ons

Calhoun’s Can(n)ons for May 21, 2009

Aw, Gawd, Pullleeezzze Don’t Tell Mother Calhoun That She Has To Explain It All To You . . . Again

The terrible thing about the quest for truth is that you find it.
Remy de Gourmont

Actually, the epigram above is only partially correct. Sometimes you will find the truth, if you actually look. And sometimes you can work very, very hard to cover up the truth, burying it under a high load of Happy Horsepucky, only to discover it has its own path to the light and shows up anyway. Like a day later in a local newspaper headline.

About 10 days ago, the Board put the county’s top two administrators, CAO Dave Edge and his second in command, Gail Wilcox, on paid leave while they went into 10 hours worth of closed session huddling while discussing “anticipated litigation” and “significant exposure to litigation” – government speak for: “We’d better dump these people/problem or our behinds will get sued off.”

Meanwhile, the CalCoastNews.com blogsite posted a story claiming that “anonymous sources” claimed the issue was some sort of “sexual harassment” issue. This, of course, set off a barrage of speculation, bouncing from CalCoast to SLOTown’s Tribune to The New Times’ “Shredder,” and outraged replies that this was all baseless, un-sourced, scurrilous, sleazy rumor-mongering! Of course, “sexual harassment” speculation would pop up easily, given County government’s past history of hanky-panky at the civic center – County Auditor Paul Floyd, County Environmental Health Director, Jerry LeMoine, County Clerk/Recorder Mitch Cooney -- there was a time there in the late ‘90s when the place was one huge, embarrassing Animal House frat-fest.

Then Dave Edge was hired and suddenly heads were knocked together, departments reshuffled, sexual harassment training classes arrived, and for over 10 years, nary a peep about panties appeared in the headlines. There were other grumblings, but no threats of panties. Until now.

Then on May 19, the BOS met and the shoveling started. First, Dave Edge was allowed to speak. After the usual blandishments about his pride in his fellow employees, the honor of government service, and [now telling in hindsight] his efforts to act “. . . with compassion and concern for employees struggling with huge personal stress,” he noted that he welcomed a full investigation into whatever allegations were behind his dismissal, saying, “I have absolutely nothing to fear or hide,” while also acknowledging that that would be a waste of time since the deal had been done behind closed doors days ago and this “public” hearing was simply the Board “executing its discretion.”

Interestingly, Assessor Tom Bordonaro, during the public comment portion of the agenda item, spoke in favor of offering Edge a chance to have a full public hearing while Board Member Katcho Achadjian initially supported that notion. (Lacking the courage of his own convictions, and wishing to please the Board and join the majority, Katcho later said he wanted to vote “no” to the dismissal so Edge could have his hearing, but swiftly changed it to a “yes” so the Board could have a unanimous vote.) So, no hearings, no full disclosures, no investigation, no explanations.

Meanwhile, Boardmember Patterson confused anonymous blog comments on various blogsites with actual non-anonymous, sourced, signed blogs themselves and scolded the public not to pay any attention to anything found on any “blogs,” like nobody should return to CalCoastNews.com to see what they will continue to report? With a real news blackout and various officials clamming up, reporters and blog reporters alike will be busy over the next few weeks, digging. And since Edge was an at-will employee, his MOU grants him 8 months salary plus any accumulated holidays & etc. so he’ll walk away with about $237,000 worth of tax payer money. And the citizens will be correct if they feel they’re entitled to know just why they’re coughing up that amount of dough for their former CAO.

And shovel-wielding Chairman Gibson blandly assured the public that this is nothing more than the fact that the relationship between a CAO and the Board is a delicate and complex matter and when a Board seeks a different style or vision or different path, then it’s natural to chose a different CAO -- as if this were simply an abstract philosophical issue. Gibson made no mention of 10 hours of closed door sessions or “anticipated litigation” or “significant exposure to litigation,” or that this was a “sensitive situation” and that the “best interests” of the county demand this termination. “Significant exposure to litigation” is not simply a vision thing.

Thus endeth the hearing with nothing having been said that would begin to address just why the Board had put their two top executive officers on leave and now had just fired one of them. Instead, the only thing to be heard in the BOS chambers was the sound of shovels – digging and hurling, digging and hurling -- and in the background, the whicker of a horse.

The next morning the pony began emerging from the pile of pucky. Fired Edge declared to the Tribune that he had mentored Wilcox for the 10 years they had served together, he had counseled her through her struggles [“with huge personal stress,” perhaps?] and had bought her a self-help book by clinical psychologist Judith Sills, “Getting Naked Again: Dating, Romance, Sex, and Love When You’ve Been Divorced, Widowed, Dumped or Distracted.”

Apparently Ms. Wilcox filed an informal complaint of some kind, and, as Mr. Edge told the Tribune, he now believes he may have crossed some sort of line, he feels Wilcox has betrayed their mentor/protégé relationship and concludes that “he does not believe it wise and perhaps not possible for people of opposite sexes to develop personal friendships in the workplace.” Ms. Wilcox has not been heard from yet.

But Mother Calhoun is beyond annoyed. Back when the county government was awash with sexual harassment hearings, i.e. the pre-Dave Edge era, she wrote several columns outlining what county employees needed to do to protect their behinds. Clearly, nobody listened to Mother Calhoun’s Sage Advice For The Clueless, so here we go again:

1. Being a CAO is God’s way of saying that playtime with the children is over. It’s not your job to personally help your employees with huge personal stress. That’s what the Human Resources Dept. is for.

2. If you want a friend, get a dog. CAOs are a government’s version of the Medieval “Sin Eaters.” That’s why we pay them the big bucks and why their careers are nasty, brutish and very, very short.

3. Be aware that when you mentor someone, you nurse a viper at your vest. That’s not being mean, that’s simply the structure of the arrangement since mentorees are intended to replace their mentors. Sometimes it goes smoothly, often it doesn’t. You have been warned.

4. If your involvement with another employee crosses past professional cool and moves into murkier, very human waters, understand that that at any moment you will be on Carthaginian ground zero and the killing will commence. There will be no quarter given. Everything once benign will turn malignant. There will be no one left standing. Not even your accuser. Go look up the words “Pyrrhic Victory,” in the dictionary. Contemplate it well. You time in hell is about to commence. Mother Calhoun sends her deepest sympathy to all involved parties.

5. Every morning before leaving for work, look into the mirror and read yourself the Miranda Rights. Pay particular attention to the part about “. . . can and will be used against you in a court of law.” Now, go to work. Have a nice day.

6. And for the elected officials who shovel horse pucky and think the watching public is stupid enough to believe that “significant exposure to litigation” is another word for “philosophical, vision-thing differences of opinion,” let’s hope the voters remember that come election time.

Meantime, the taxpayers of a busted-budget county in a flat-broke state have just purchased a pony and a book worth $237,000, not to mention whatever other expensive shoes will soon drop as collateral damage fallout on this matter.

Luckily, the horse pucky that came along with all of this was free, as it usually is.