Stop whining and get involved
A year or so ago, the local blogosphere was all aflutter with post after post about publicly financed elections. We had the drama of Emily Boyles that created a whole t-shirt line. One thing that got a little overwhelming was the constant write-ups rehashing what was bad about publicly financed elections. Even after the elections, some blogs, even this one would not let the issue die a graceful death. It is one thing to report, but another to report the same story or angle post after post. (as you can tell, I got rather tired of the issue.)
I got an email from the Boise neighborhood association the other day telling us about the Citizen Campaign Commission. This is a volunteer position that provides assistance to the Auditor and City Council regarding publicly financed campaigns.
Portland City Council is seeking four volunteers to serve two-year (1) and four-year (3) terms on the Citizen Campaign Commission, beginning in the fall of 2007. The Citizen Campaign Commission provides assistance to the Auditor and City Council in the implementation of the Campaign Finance Fund, Portland’s system of publicly financed campaigns.
The principal duties include the following: attending monthly or semi-monthly evening meetings; advising on policies, procedures, guidelines, and training information related to Portland’s public campaign financing system; coordinating the work of a hearings officer to rule on appeals by candidates; and working with Auditor’s Office staff to review operations and prepare a biennial and interim reports to Council on recommendations to improve the system.
- Application information can be found on the Auditor’s Office web site.
- Application Deadline: 5:00 p.m., Monday, August 20, 2007
- Contact: Andrew Carlstrom, City Elections Officer, (503) 823-3546
So, all you bloggers out there (and you know who you are) who tirelessly documented the fallacies of the publicly financed campaign system, I ask you to go volunteer to help audit it and maybe, just maybe change it. This is your chance to make a difference.
Don’t mess around with this “maybe change it” hooey. It deserves to be killed. Stake-through-the-heart dead.
Why get involved? Nothing ever changes. Government and the people around it are corrupt and will always be corrupt, and the way to keep your sanity is to by-and-large ignore it and do your own thing. That doesn’t mean you give up the right to complain, and it doesn’t mean you buy into the system, but life is too short to fight city hall. City hall hasn’t changed in thousands of years.
Yeah, like anybody but a true believer in the Sten Genius would stand a chance of being appointed to that.