‘One of the hardest jobs I’ve ever had’
Karen Bowerman and Gary Medvigy
reflect on their years as Clark County Council members,
the reasons they’re leaving and the work still to be
done
Columbian, June 10, 2024
Excerpt:
"County charter cited Both Bowerman
and Medvigy said they chose not to run for reelection
because of the way the county charter is written: It
separates the powers of the legislative branch (the
elected county council) from the executive (the
appointed county manager).
“If you look at the way
the charter was constructed … the separation of the
legislative and executive branches was key,” Bowerman
said, adding that the charter places strict limits on
what the council can do.
“All the capacity is with the
executive,” Medvigy said.
“It means that for us,
as individual councilors, when we come upon an issue
that needs resolution through the county bureaucracy, we
have one path.
That is through the
county manager. Otherwise, we are ‘interfering,’”
Bowerman said.
While Bowerman said she
is completely supportive of County Manager Kathleen
Otto, she said the charter language creates a
bottleneck.
Medvigy did have
suggestions for whomever wins his seat.
“In order for us to
fulfill our role as county councilors, we need to sit
down with the manager at the beginning of the year and
say, ‘Here are our priorities. Here’s what’s going well.
Here’s where we would like to see improvement, and we
would like to measure that improvement in a few months.’
Then, at the end of the year, do an evaluation,” he
said.
That kind of
end-of-year evaluation is common practice elsewhere but
isn’t in the charter or the county manager’s contract,
Medvigy noted."
