John Lovick did a good job in his work with the Washington State Patrol and as Snohomish County Sheriff. I actually voted for him in the last election (a decision I regret more and more each day.) But now as an elected politician his true colors are shining through. Unfortunately he appears to be another tax-and-spend liberal in the shadow of President Obama, Gov. Inslee, et al. This is revealed in his recent support of the new courthouse fiasco and his proposed budget (which includes large pay raises for upper level county managers), both of which are going to hit Snohomish County taxpayers hard.
Now we have the John Koster situation. As far as I can tell, John Koster has been an honest, hard-working person who deeply cares about the people of Snohomish County. But as usual, freedom of speech and thought stops when someone from the right says something that politicians on the left, like Lovick, don’t like. Then we have a county council that doesn’t have the courage to do the right thing and keep Koster on in his position as Snohomish County ombudsman, even though they all admit that John Koster has been doing a good job. One council person bravely abstained from voting (which in effect was a “no” vote) and another didn’t bother to show up to vote. I’m sorry, but this feels like deja vu all over again (remember Aaron Reardon?)
Koster made his comments as a concerned citizen on his own time and in no way as part of his job as ombudsman. Frankly, I agree with Koster’s concern over the disproportionate power the labor and teacher unions have in this state and the undue influence they have on local politicians and our left wing state Supreme Court. The Seattle tunnel and 520 bridge boondoggles, the corruption and cost overruns in our state ferry system, the damage to large and small businesses in Washington, the chaos in our educational system, etc., are due largely in part to union pressures and cozy relationships with local politicians.
The “smaller classroom” initiative recently passed because of misinformation and millions of dollars spent by the teachers unions to pass it. Of course, what they didn’t mention was that the only way to pay for this will be huge tax increases for all of us. Actually I don’t remember being in any classroom smaller than 40-plus students and I did just fine. So, the beat goes on!
Mike Shouse
Edmonds
Talk to us
> Give us your news tips.
> Send us a letter to the editor.
> More Herald contact information.
