Cribbins, Taylor share views at forum

Oct. 30—The two candidates running for Coos County commissioner recently faced off in a debate, with Rod Taylor and Melissa Cribbins making one last plea to voters.

In the forum hosted by the League of Women Voters of Coos County, the candidates agreed on many issues while having differing views on several.

The forum opened with the two candidates describing themselves before taking questions from the moderator and the audience.

"It's my honor to be your Coos County commissioner," Cribbins said. "I grew up in Coquille, right across the street from the courthouse. I never thought about working in the courthouse. But when I returned back with my husband and my children, I started to think about what the future of Coos County was. I wanted the future of Coos County to be better than what it was. When I became Coos County commissioner, I started implementing some of those ideas. One of the things I have worked on is building a stronger economy in our county. We don't ever want to be in the position again where if one industry goes down, Coos County goes down."

Taylor also took time to introduce himself, saying he was running because he wants to ensure his children and grandchildren can thrive in the county.

"I have lived in Bandon for 19 years," Taylor said. "When I moved to Coos County, it was not a particularly prosperous place. I'm really concerned for their futures. I'm concerned for what is ahead of them in terms of housing availability and income opportunity. I see some gaps, where we could make changes in Coos County. We have a number of things we can change to be one of the most prosperous counties in the state, which we should be by accident, but we're not. I hope what you hear from me are ideas that are fresh, that are innovative, that come from my problem-solver mind."

The two then took a series of questions.

What are the duties of a commissioner? What aspects are you most looking forward to?

"The major duty of a commissioner is to manage the county budget," Cribbins said. "We only have discretion over about $25 million, the rest is funds mandated by the state or federal government. More importantly than that, you have to be the liaison between our citizens and government. We are the local face of government."

"I believe they obviously have a significant role in being the representatives of the people," Taylor said. "I am one of us. That representation is critical to keep government at the county level working. This concerns our roads, our infrastructure, our business environment. I believe we can become that prosperous county I mentioned."

In what ways can the county commissioners collaborate with others to address issues of housing availability and affordability?

"I believe what we need to do in Coos County is establish a greater degree of local control," Taylor said. "The problems we have in Coos County in housing do not originate in Coos County. They originate in Salem and Washington D.C. What we need to do is interact with those agencies that are sending down mandates that are limiting our ability."

"I have a history of working closely with our neighboring jurisdictions on housing," Cribbins said. "One thing we realize is a lot of people have to work outside of the city they work in to afford housing. I have worked with Curry County to create a housing coordinator. That person works from Reedsport up to Brookings."

What steps would you take to ensure the public is kept informed about your activities as commissioner?

"I try to post a lot of the stuff I do on Facebook," Cribbins said. "It's not an ideal platform but it is a good way for people to see what we're doing. In the past, we've tried a lot of things like moving commissioner meeting around the county. Unfortunately, a lot of people are busy. Now we're streaming the meetings and we're putting it on YouTube."

"Regular updates and a website presence is a fundamental requirement in serving in an office like this," Taylor said. "That is something I would do to serve you. I do believe roving the commissioner meeting around the county and changing the time from 9:30 Tuesday morning to 6:30 Tuesday evening, it would lead to greater communication. I believe those evening meeting would be attended with much greater numbers."

What experiences do you have in resolving personnel disputes?

"When I worked as a general contractor, I had a number of opportunities to interface with other contractors," Taylor said. "That was a one-year project where I had multiple opportunities to mediate. I've dealt with those issues. It's really simple. If you use common sense, decency and understand people's problems, you can usually resolve everything that comes."

"As part of my job, I served as interim HR director when we were between directors," Cribbins said. "Mediating personnel disputes is always interesting Luckily I came as an attorney and I have experience dealing with issues. I've always taken a very collaborative approach with that. There have been time we've brought in a mediator."

I am noticing large campaign donations. Are you in favor of campaign finance reform?

"One thing I am very proud of is my campaign donations come from people in Coos County," Cribbins said. "95% of them come from our citizens. That comes from years of building relationships, saying what I'm going to do and doing it. I'm completely transparent when it comes to the money."

"Transparency is a requirement," Taylor said. "We all must report our donations, which we do. But my campaign does not have $1.3 million in it. Our campaign has $11,000 total."

One of your plans to deal with the homeless is to send them back to the communities they came from. What are the logistics of your plan?

"That's just one little part to deal with street people who are not here by their choice," Taylor said. "One of the options I've considered is sending them back to the place they came from because we do have cities all over the west coast sending them to our area. What's really going to solve the problem of people living on the street is reinstitutiing a community based solution."

"The homeless issue is not a simple problem," Cribbins responded. "We know many of the people that are homeless are from here. The Devereux Center runs a program called Homeward Bound, where they can be returned to their community if they have family or a support base."

If re-elected, what are the most pressing issues?

"The budget is always one, but we've managed to stabilize the budget," Cribbins said. "We have a problem with the public safety budget. We currently have a levy out there to allow us to fund 150 jail beds. I'm in favor of the public safety levy. I've also been working on housing, mental health and healthcare Those or the primary issues for our citizens."

"I think what we really need to do is form this collaborative effort between faith organizations, government and other civic groups to reach out to people that all need ministry to their hearts and a hand up we can provide," Taylor said.

You have proposed placing ballot measures before the county to reform the election process. What specific measures are you proposing?

"There are a number of reforms we need," Taylor said. "We need to overcome the problems that have come to the floor with mail-in voting. We have 10% phantom voters in every county in Oregon. Elections are impenetrable if they're conducted on one day, if they're conducted in person, on paper, counted by hands and with ID. Those are the reforms I propose."

'I hear a lot of comments about election reform, but I can tell you anyone who has ever gone to the clerk's office tells me how impressed they are with election security," Cribbins said.

What is your position on potential shipping facility at the Port of Coos Bay?

"My position is I'm in favor it and frankly we are missing an opportunity if we don't develop that port," Cribbins said. "We can talk about housing, we can talk about mental health, we can talk about healthcare, but none of it means anything if we don't have good jobs to go with it."

"The deep-water port is a piece of infrastructure that will facilitate a number of different opportunities for prosperity for the county," Taylor said. "I believe it is an asset and will be a benefit to the county and will provide us a mechanism to improve transport to the I-5 corridor. I believe it's one of the best things we can do here."

What is your position on county measure for a jail levy?

"I believe there are other ways to provide adequate funding for the jail," Taylor said. "The problem is these measures were not undertaken early, so we have come up with these problems. So an emergent measure is another tax that comes to the fore. I don't support the levy, but I do support law enforcement and the jail, and there are other ways to fund the jail."

"I am in favor of the jail levy," Cribbins said. "I can tell you our county commissioners over the last 10 years have pinched every penny until it screamed. Unfortunately, inflation has outpaced the property tax increases, so we have gotten behind in what we can pay our deputies. There is no additional money to pay deputies more. We would love to be able to staff 150 jail beds. We currently budget for 98 and we fund that."

What do you consider the highest priorities commissioners can address? What have commissioners failed to do in recent years?

"I think the biggest issue we have to address right now is public safety, homelessness and mental health," Cribbins said. "We always believed we could address these issues without asking the public for additional money. I think that's where we fell behind. At this point, we do need to solve the public safety issue. Unfortunately, we need more to have more beds."

"There are a lot of ways the county can generate additional revenue," Taylor responded. "One of to the things I think is incumbent on government employees is to be fiscally responsible. To me, $60,000 on a county credit card is not pinching pennies. Traveling to a global commission in Colorado is not keeping with that. I believe we can generate what we need locally with repurposing the management of our timber, reintroducing county held lands that are unnecessary back to private hands and the tax rolls."

A local estuary management plan is overdue for an update. What is your view on the plan?

"Estuary management is an important aspect of all of our marine ecosystem," Taylor said. "It is important. We all are interested in stewarding our resources, and preserving as much as we can, particularly the salmon run habitat and the steelhead run habitat."

"I'm the liaison to the planning department and I've always championed the updates to the Coos Bay estuary management plan," Cribbins said. "We really do need to find the funds to update the plan because it inhibits the economic development around the estuary. We need to do more, we need to get it finished and get it approved."

When addressing long-term land-use planning, how would concerns about climate change factor into your thinking?

"I think that's always a challenge," Cribbins said. "We try to think a lot like not locating critical infrastructure in areas we know there will be sea level rise. I think it's important that we are thinking hard about the work we do and the impacts climate change may have on it. We have to make sure we're not having to redo projects because we didn't think about the future impacts."

"The sea levels were suppose to rise and inundate communities all over the world by 2012, 2014, 2016, 2018," Taylor said. "The sea levels have not appreciably risen in any form."

What is your position on home rule? Are there other ways to reorganize county functions?

"I do believe that every law that comes from Salem or Washington D.C. needs to be evaluated as far its detriment or benefit to Coos County," Taylor said. "I do favor home rule. I do believe the time has come and the will of the people of Coos County is to assert our local control."

"I believe the citizens of Coos County have voted three times on home rule charters and voted them down three times," Cribbins said. "I think home rule charters are great when they are vetted."