And another one gone
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| Clockwise from top left: Lee, Snow, Jones, Trombino. |
This is of interest to Portland readers – or at least, it should be – because until quite recently, Jones used to work for Raymond Lee, who just became city manager in Portland with a compensation package valued at $535,000 this year. Lee left his job as city manager of Greeley abruptly and under mysterious circumstances, and in the month since he departed, two more of that city's managers also resigned or were asked to leave. They are Paul Trombino, who as the city's "managing director" was in charge of public works, and Blair Snow, who as "chief operating officer" supervised Trombino. The chain of command was Lee - Snow - Trombino - Jones. In a little over a month, all four of them are out. Jones had been there the longest.
What the heck happened in Greeley? Yes, there is a new mayor and a couple of new council members, but the outsider candidates lost in last month's election, and as far as city policy is concerned, it's reportedly business as usual. No, despite Lee's suggestion to the contrary, something else must have occurred that caused no fewer than four departures. But what? Nondisclosure agreements forbid anyone involved from talking, and so the rumors swirl.
This kind of purge doesn't usually happen unless serious mistakes were made. Let's hope something similar doesn't wind up happening here in Portlandia.
Some background to show there is a lot of money floating around, but also a lot of sides being drawn (sort of like the movie Chinatown). The city's farmer founder Nathaniel Meeker, was a journalist for Horace Greeley’s The New-York Tribune and named it “Greeley” after the Tribune’s owner. Greeley popularized the phrase, “Go West, young man.”
ReplyDeleteCut to today and things are getting a bit dicey. Agriculture is still big but cattle took over in the 20's and the biggest meat producer is now owned by a Brazilian firm. Oil and gas produces 3/4 of the state's energy- mostly from fracking and slant drilling. Weld County is currently among the fastest-growing counties in the state of Colorado. Population growth in Greeley and the surrounding area has resulted in a renegotiation of the relationship between agriculture, suburban development, energy extraction, and water resources. Real estate companies are purchasing agricultural lands for residential development. Cities are purchasing agricultural lands for the water rights tied to them, a process nicknamed “agricultural buy and dry.” And energy companies are purchasing agricultural lands in order to build concentrated hubs for oil and natural gas operations. Not only are these changes emblematic of shifting land use patterns in Northern Colorado, but they make Greeley and Weld County exemplary of many issues facing the twenty-first century American West.
Some of this dynamism has been expressed through political experimentation. During the 2013 elections, for example, Weld County joined ten neighboring northeastern Colorado counties in an attempt to secede from the state because of rural residents’ opposition to Colorado’s energy, agriculture, and gun regulations. It failed due to more rural voters- hey just like Portland.
The Oregonian and WillyWeek could care less--it's "All ICE, All the Time." No one in Portland has the stones to go up against a POC/Gay (God knows what else) dude who has robotic progressive catch-phrases deployed at the first instance of inquiry--which no one of the 25-percenters on council seemed to want to utter. No one has asked Mayor Wilson to pretty-please explain why this guy was the best after a national search, especially since there are four assistant administrators with better resumes. Keep slugging, Jack!
ReplyDeleteWhat were the "mysterious circumstances" of Lee's and others' subsequent departures. This casts doubt on the new City Administrator without providing any real reporting that makes this post worth paying attention to. Hope you will follow up with more substance.
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