Of course, most of us working stiffs understand — unless you’re some sort of magician able to pull a rabbit out of a hat — working two jobs at once is simply impossible.
Well, Benton is special, in a mystical sort of way.
You see, Magic Don can work hard — for four months — up in Olympia as a state senator. And at the very same time — the same time, I tell ya! — he’s able to professionally run the county’s environmental services department.
Sure, Don gets two government paychecks, but he tells me he’s worth every penny. And more! He’s Magic Don.
Abracadabra! Presto! Do you see the rabbit?
o o o
For those of you following along, this isn’t new. Benton concocted this scheme with County Councilors David Madore and Tom Mielke nearly two years ago. Back in the day, before voters took the M&M boys to the woodshed and pulled much of their power, the boys just said, “We like Magic Don” and hired him in his $100,000-a-year county job.
No interview, no posting, no nuttin’. Yes, it cost taxpayers $250,000 to settle a small legal issue with someone who was actually qualified for the director’s job but didn’t get a chance to apply for it.
All in a day’s work, I guess, for the M&M boys.
Today, because of the home rule charter vote, Benton no longer has the direct protection of the M&M boys. He now answers to the acting county manager, Mark McCauley.
So I thought I’d check in, now that McCauley has more control over county departments. Is the same arrangement still in place? Does Benton somehow get paid to do both jobs at the same time?
Why, yes.
Look, I don’t blame McCauley. Even though he theoretically has the power to right the ship and sink Benton’s county career, he still has bosses. And those bosses are primarily the same characters who hired Benton: The M&M boys.
Benton doesn’t talk much to me, but I did ship him an email asking how it was going.
To my surprise, he emailed back! Essentially, he said to relax. He can handle it. He’s doing great. The state Legislature is a part-time gig, and lots of folks these days work two jobs.
Well, OK, then.
Since Benton appeared to be in a talkative mood, I continued with a few more questions.
I said — sure — there are people with two jobs, but isn’t someone getting shortchanged if both jobs are being done at the same time? Am I correct, Magic Don?
Benton didn’t answer that question, but he did attribute my not appreciating how all this works to my “ignorance.”
Oh, my!
So I tried another question.
Since Benton is a hard-core conservative, always looking to save taxpayers’ money, why isn’t he behind a proposal to merge a couple of county departments and save taxpayers huge dollars? Sure, the department that would get merged happens to be his. And sure, that means he’d be out of his county job that he really isn’t qualified for to begin with.
But a true conservative would be all for this, right?
Hmmmm.
Look, I don’t know McCauley well, but I do know him. He seems like a good guy. He was saddled with this unfortunate arrangement. And if he had to do this over from scratch … no way does he hire Benton.
McCauley says he has a number of checks and balances in place to ensure that Benton is — in fact — working. He says Benton travels back and forth from Olympia to put time in at the county. And, McCauley said, Benton often works weekends here to get his time in.
Weekends, I wondered? How does a manager — a manager! — work weekends when there’s virtually no one to manage over at the county on weekends?
When I asked Benton this, he — ah — must have retreated deep down the rabbit hole. I got no answer.
In fact, after my questions got tougher, I got this Benton response:
“I consider any further e-mail communication from you to be harassment and wish you would please stop e-mailing me and harassing me.”
I guess I did hear that Benton was the sensitive type. Sorry.
McCauley did say there are other things for Benton to do on the weekend.
McCauley added that, even with Benton’s working both jobs at the same time, he still is getting docked some pay.
I did have one final question for McCauley. If the environmental services department can somehow manage to run well without its manager’s being around for four months, doesn’t it make the case that you don’t even need a manager, or the department? Remember, the department has only been around for a few years. And there’s a boatload of taxpayer savings if departments are merged.
But McCauley is simply not ready to say that.
So we’re all stuck with paying for this very strange arrangement.
I bet the public wishes it had some magic tricks. Wave a magic wand and poof! All gone.
