Around Des Moines

(Des Moines, IA, May 5, 2008) The Polk County Board of Supervisors and George Davey deserve praise. The supervisors saw the public was not going to accept their original $186 million proposal for a new court facility. Consequently, they sent their staff and hired consultants back to the drawing board and Polk County residents were given a $132 million proposal on which to vote. For his part, Davey took his objection to more taxes and made attempts to provide alternative solutions for the supervisors to consider.

As many residents made clear in opinions expressed to the local print and broadcast media, the vote was about far more than a courthouse, though. The low voter turnout showed the vote also was about the needs of a court system few people understand or use. Pre- and post-election commentary reveal there is no answer, yet, for how to move past the growing deadlock. That barrier is a lack of public trust in the decisions of the county supervisors combined with the lack of people willing to serve on the board, or at least to run for a seat on the board.

Despite comparisons people have made, the courthouse vote was not the same as the vote against Project Destiny. Project Destiny was about a sales tax, something almost everybody understands. Moreover, Project Destiny was a reaction against the massive corporate tax breaks the measure would have created combined with large corporate donations to the Yes to Destiny campaign. However, there was also a significant feeling among voters in both last summer’s Project Destiny vote and last month’s courthouse vote that elected officials have regularly acted in favor of a few non-elected power brokers over the greater interests of the general public.

M.R. Field was editor of Leading Voices: Iowa.