Cothren, Marsyla take aim at assessor

For the second week in a row, a majority of Wahkiakum County commissioners have refused to support Assessor Bill Coons's hiring of a temporary employee to help his office address pressing demands.

Coons and the board of commissioners will meet next week to go over the situation and find a way to resolve it.

Coons, who took office January 1, has said his office is far behind. Previous Assessor Sulema Zerr struggled to implement a new computer program for the office. Coons learned just as tax statements were sent out in February that many contained incorrect information. He told commissioners two weeks ago that he planned to hire a temporary clerk, using funds from the Professional Fees line in his budget, which was set at $22,000.

He estimated the cost of the clerk at $4,360.

Coons's plan has drawn stiff opposition from Commissioners Dan Cothren and Lisa Marsyla.

They say that the board adopted a no-hire policy when they laid off courthouse workers two years ago to deal with a severe revenue shortfall. Also, they say the Professional Fees line was intended to pay computer consultants, not clerical employees.

Allowing Coons to hire a part-time employee would set a bad precedent, Cothren said.

"It just opens the door to everyone else," he said Tuesday.

Last week, they asked Prosecuting Attorney Dan Bigelow for an opinion on whether or not Coons can use the Professional Fees budget line as he intends and whether or not the commission could "reabsorb" the money into the Current Expense Fund.

Yes, Bigelow said, Coons could either sign a personal services contract with the clerk, or the board could pass a resolution adding a line item for Extra Help in the assessor's budget and transfer the funds there from Professional Fees. The latter would be the easiest way, he said.

The board can't take the money away, he said.

"The budget is fixed when you adopt it," Bigelow said. Money can be transferred within the department's budget; there can be budget supplements, and money could be taken out for an emergency, and this doesn't qualify."

Marsyla and Cothren were unhappy with Bigelow's opinion.

"I can't believe we can't take it back or move it," Marsyla said. "Fourteen thousand dollars (of the $22,000 in the Professional Services line) belongs back in Current Expense. The $14,000 was specifically intended for maintenance of the computer program."

"We never had the intention for that money to go for extra help," Cothren said. "Is there a need? The past assessor wanted help. We told her no. Is this person covering the things he says? I don't know. Can he really justify this need?

"I would put the money back in Current Expense."

Commissioner Blair Brady suggested Coons deserved support.

"He didn't write the budget," Brady said. "He didn't create the problems."

However, Brady commented that the board had made suggestions to Zerr on how to operate the office with reduced staff, but she hadn't followed them. One possibility was closing the office to the public a couple days a week, Marsyla said.

"We said try these first," Brady said.

Bigelow also suggested Coons had sufficient grounds for hiring the employee. There have been over 200 requests or petitions for changes in assessments, and there were around 100 incorrect statements sent out that need to be corrected, he said.

"There's no question the assessor needs help," Bigelow said. "It would help the taxpayers of the county."

Marsyla suggested the board refuse to approve the change for the new extra help line. That would force Coons to use the personal services contract, and those must be approved by the board, she said.

"It goes through you," Bigelow said, "but he has the money in his budget. It puts you in a dicey situation if you refuse to approve that."

The board did pass a motion to lay off the temporary employee at the end of the day because there was no mechanism to pay her. Cothren and Marsyla voted for the motion; Brady opposed it.

"This is no reflection on the employee," Marsyla commented.

The board agreed they would meet with Coons and discuss the situation. They found that the soonest they could do that would be next Tuesday.

Coons missed the meeting because he was taking training from the Department of Revenue to change the county's assessment cycle from four years to one year so values better reflect market values.

"I'll meet with them next week and bring all my material," he said late Tuesday by telephone. "We need to find a solution."

He added that, at his request, the state Department of Revenue will conduct a performance audit of the assessor's office by the end of March, and the county would be bound to follow any recommendations.

"They have the power to come into my office and perform functions, and charge that back to the county," he said.

(Editor's note: Coons sent The Eagle a written statement about the situation; we've published that in this week's Letters to The Eagle on Page 2.)