On a Wednesday night in Grants Pass, residents Alan and Julie Hartford pass around soda and cookies and chat during a meetup for Citizens for Responsible Government (CRG). The nonpartisan group is behind a measure on the ballot to replace Josephine County’s charter this May. Only one neighbor has shown up to the meeting at the Hartfords', but he’s interested to learn more.
The proposed charter changes include increasing the board of commissioners from three to five people, electing them from newly-designed districts rather than county-wide and hiring a county manager, a position that doesn't currently exist.
"The two things we’re after is representation, and the other one is getting more effectiveness as well as efficiency out of the assets we have right now," said Larry West, the group's president.
Jane Slama, another group member, said the goal is to hire a county manager to make sure there’s an experienced leader taking over administrative duties, which she believes is better than electing them.
"We don’t have doctors elected, we don’t have dentists elected. You don’t want your surgeon to be elected. Because these are highly technical," Slama said.
The new Josephine County charter would also impose term limits for commissioners, pay them a smaller stipend instead of a salary and benefits and make elections for all county offices nonpartisan. The stipend would be 15 percent of a circuit court judge's salary, which is currently about $174,000.
This effort to alter the charter stemmed from a two-year commission that was formed to review Josephine County's charter, which concluded its work last spring. The nine-member group made a variety of recommendations of ways to update the county charter, which were submitted to the commissioners.
But Josephine County has a home-rule charter, so voters, not commissioners, have the power to change it.
Citizens for Responsible Government took some of the recommendations from the commission to form its new charter.
But the proposed charter has received pushback, mainly from Republicans in the county. That includes current commissioners Herman Baertschiger and John West, as well as a political action committee called We’re For a Constitutional Government.
Jonathan Knapp, with the Josephine County Republican Party, dislikes that the proposed charter would add three new positions in local government.
"We would double the size of our administration," he said. "And those officials would more than likely have to have additional administrative staff. So that again is going to cost additional dollars."
Right now, residents can vote for all commissioners. Under the new system, they would only vote for commissioners within their district as well as one county-wide seat. Knapp believes that would hurt rural candidates trying to get elected.
"So if you have a top candidate under this proposed thing from Wolf Creek, and I like them, I can't vote for them because I don't live in that district," he said.
Another argument from opponents is that each of the proposed districts would include a part of Grants Pass, so commissioners could all be from the city, although that’s true of the current system as well.
Supporters of the ballot measure see this issue differently. CRG member Rick Flora argues that changing the charter would improve representation in rural areas.
"That’s what we’re looking for. People get good representation. Not whether it’s progressive or conservative, but whether it’s people that will actually serve their constituents," he said.
Jackson County faces three ballot measures
Meanwhile, in neighboring Jackson County, there are three similar measures on the May primary ballot. They would increase the number of county commissioners from three to five, make the positions nonpartisan and reduce their salaries to $75,000.
In April, the county’s Budget Committee approved a salary increase for the commissioners: over $150,000 for two of them and about $136,000 for the third. Those are all more than Oregon Governor Tina Kotek makes, which is about $98,000. According to the Association of Oregon Counties, in 2019 Jackson County had the second highest paid commissioners in the state. The association has not released a more recent list.
Laura Ahearn, a volunteer with Jackson County For All of Us, the nonpartisan group behind the measures, said when the group first started, they thought it would take a long time to gather enough signatures to get on the ballot.
"Instead, poof! In less than five months, the momentum was so strong, the reception so positive for these ideas, that we had more than 1,000 extra signatures," she said.
One of the goals of these measures is to allow nonaffiliated voters to participate in the primary election. They’re the biggest voting group in the county, but they currently can’t vote for major party candidates in the primary.
One of the leaders of Jackson County For All Of Us, Denise Krause, is currently running for the Board of Commissioners as a Democrat. She previously ran for the board and lost.
These measures have also received pushback from local Republicans. That includes current commissioners Rick Dyer and Colleen Roberts and a political action committee called Stop Bigger Government, which has raised more than $20,000 to oppose the measures.
Randell Embertson, chairman of the Jackson County Republican Party, said he doesn’t see a reason to make these changes.
"Right now, I would say, let's keep Jackson County great. If it's not broke, don't fix it," he said.
Embertson would rather see the commissioners stay partisan because, he said, there’s important philosophical viewpoints that come with being a Democrat or a Republican.
"The idea to make it nonpartisan is kind of like, 'Vote me in and then find out how I'm going to vote,'" he said.
Jackson County is currently represented by three Republican commissioners.
Another concern the opposition has is the potential cost. County Administrator Danny Jordan made a presentation to commissioners in February where he said the measures would cost the county a minimum of about $200,000 and potentially up to $700,000. He showed a predicted budget of how some costs would increase, including health insurance and office materials. Jackson County For All of Us claims that presentation was inaccurate.
They say the county violated elections law by opposing their ballot measures. But the Secretary of State’s office said “staff didn’t hear or see any possible violations presented in the complaint.”
The group has also been criticized for putting these measures on the primary ballot in May, when fewer people tend to vote, rather than on the general ballot in November.
But Ahearn said it was a natural progression of the group’s work once they got enough signatures.
"Then what? We weren't going to just take off six months and come back in November to go around again." she said. "We were on a roll. We are on a roll. It's obviously out there on everyone's mind. It's fresh."
