Correcting a misconception

One former City Council member has recently blogged to the effect that the recent external review of accusations against City Manager/Police Chief Yost Zakhary was arranged to benefit Mike O'Bric by his "friends on the Council". Wrong. Check the record: the Council was unanimous in their vote for the external review, and it certainly wasn't to benefit or appease Mike O'Bric. The Council realized that whether or not any of the allegations were true (a) a large segment of Woodway residents had apparently lost trust in their City government as evidenced by the May election results, in which every incumbent that ran was voted out; and (b) to those mistrustful of City governance, no internal review would suffice to restore confidence. The internal review had made it evident to the Council that the allegations were at least mostly unfounded, but the entire Council recognized that any self-investigation would be easily dismissed by a significant fraction of the public. Only an entirely independent review would be convincing to many. Yes, the cost was significant. But what price do you put on trust in your government? As I recall, in the end the entire Council seemed to agree that the money was well spent, given the circumstances.

Does Mike O'Bric have "friends on the Council"? Wrong again. I was elected to serve all of the citizens of Woodway, and I have tried hard to do so honestly and to the best of my ability. And I think the same applies to all of the new guys on the Council. It is true that Mike O'Bric contributed to some of the challenger's campaigns. In my case, he covered the cost of my mailings, which totaled somewhere around $400 or about 20% of the cost of my campaign (all public record). But even on a professor's salary, $400 isn't much, and my loyalty isn't for sale anyway. Since joining the Council, I have had virtually no contact with Mike O'Bric, and I think that's true of the other new guys too. Personally, I feel misled by his confident assertions of corruption that turned out to be false.

Do I support the "O'Bric agenda"? I don't know what that "agenda" is, but I doubt it. I did campaign partly on separating the positions of City Manager and Police Chief, a stance Mike agreed with, but that's where any "agenda" ends. I still think (as do others, Barney Knight for example) that it is poor policy to combine the positions, since such a concentration of authority "invites abuse" (to quote from my campaign website). Suspicions and allegations prosper more easily under those conditions, as I think the May elections attest. But I have come to realize that Yost Zakhary is doing a remarkably good job of City Manager/Police Chief. There appears to have been no abuse of the combined position. To make this arrangement work requires both skill and honesty, which I think Woodway has in Yost Zakhary.

To RH: Try not to find evil intentions where they don’t exist, to assume the worst about people when you don't really know them. Mike O’Bric fell into that trap. To some extent I did too during my campaign and for a while after. But don’t you and I both know better now?