CPO 6
CPO Program Coordinator Dan Schauer, left, and former CPO 6 chair Liles Garcia, explain officer duties at a past CPO 6 meeting in Aloha. Washington County currently is restructing the way it facilitates citizen participation.
(Anna Marum/Staff)
Washington County's one-of-a-kind means of fostering citizen participation, while sometimes rife with controversy, is undergoing its biggest change in four decades.
Yet while the transition still has a ways to go, it is drawing positive reviews from many of those involved.
"I'm feeling pretty optimistic," said Commissioner Greg Malinowski, who in the past has expressed concerns about county administration using the transition to assume too much control over the system. "This is an education process for all of us, but I'd say it's working out nicely so far."
Washington County is alone among Oregon's 36 counties in the way it complies with statewide land-use laws requiring some means of citizen involvement.
While other entities rely on commissioner-appointed planning commissions and other in-house advisory groups, Washington County has paid an outside administrator to run its program.
However, a change in the way the Citizen Participation Organization operates became necessary late last year, when Oregon State University's extension service - which had administered the CPO contract since the early-1970s - announced it was giving up that role.
Although university officials said only that running the program no longer fit with OSU's larger mission, county officials and others speculated that flare ups and personality conflicts at a few of the county's 10 geographically scattered CPOs figured into the decision.
Now, with a professional consulting team hired to help aid the transition process, the county has just appointed the first 11 members of what will be a 13-member citizens' advisory group.
The 11 members (along with their respective affiliations) are:
- CPO Representatives: Kathy Stallkamp (CPO 4K); Jim Long (CPO 4M); Bruce Bartlett (CPO 1).
- At-Large (Under-Represented Communities): Eduard Corona, vice president, Prisma Communications; Pablo Nieves-Valenzuela (Pacific University student).
- Practitioner: Sheri Wantland (Clean Water Services).
- City/Special District: Marty Wine/Liz Newton (City of Tigard); Corinne Weiss (City of Hillsboro); Bob Wayt (Tualatin Valley Park and Recreation District).
- County Staff: Victoria Saager (Land Use & Transportation); Bill Steele (Sheriff's Office).
That group, relying on research showing how jurisdictions elsewhere in the country are managing citizen participation, will appoint the final two members. They will then turn to the task of coming up with a slate of options for board consideration.
The county's five commissioners will make a final choice on the new direction as early as October.
Appointments to the committee were watched closely, with some wondering whether the three nominees put forward by existing CPOs would be approved by the county board. In the end, all three were confirmed with little discussion.
"From everything I've seen, the process has been open and fair," said one of those appointees, Bruce Bartlett, who has chaired one of the county's CPOs since 2000. "I don't have any concern that the commissioners are trying to hijack the public process."
Kathy Stallkamp, another CPO veteran who was appointed to the advisory group, agreed.
"It's really important that citizens provide a voice in what this will look like," she said. "Because, ultimately, that's who it's meant for."
-- Dana Tims
503-294-7647; @DanaTims