Jay, what makes you the ideal candidate?
My adult life has been spent in management. I am not a career politician. The Coroner’s office has been in the hands of a narrowly-focused career politician for 17 years now, and his mismanagement and self-dealing are now at intolerable levels. It is long past time for a change
I began work in the private sector working as a laborer in the oil fields at age 15. I worked my way into better and better jobs, and have run small and even large businesses (some on an international scale). I know that every dollar that is in a government agency budget is a dollar that someone else had to sweat to earn. I have learned that you must have excellence to survive in the business world. I know that the external motivation of businesses is that you must provide a service or product better, cheaper, faster, etc. or people will go elsewhere to buy. Government has no motivation for excellence or fiscal responsibility at all because it is a monopoly and there is no where else to go for services. The only way government can change is though an inner motivation – being driven from the top down.
As Coroner, I will apply an inner motivation to the Coroner’s office to achieve excellence in service, at a reduced cost, all the while cheerfully interacting with the people that need our help. The employees of the office will provide service with a smile that rivals the best-run companies in the private sector. If not, they will be looking for a job in that private sector very soon.
I am a military veteran. I put on the uniform first in 1969, and have Honorable Discharges from the Air Force (1972) and from the Army (2001). I have had to make the hard decisions regarding grave situations as an officer in Infantry, Special Forces, Logistics, and Special Operations assignments. My several overseas deployments include Desert Storm. In the military, leadership is not an option. I will supply something now missing in the Coroner’s office – leadership.
I’ll apply real-world business management techniques and old fashioned leadership to government. No longer will a bloated budget be acceptable. No longer will I allow “double dipping” by multiple government jobs for those in the office. No longer will I allow use of the County facilities to line the pockets of a privileged few. I will expand office hours to better serve the public. I will be sure that a live person answers the phone, 24-7-365. The needs of the public take no holidays.
I bring 35+ years of business management, investigation and legal expertise. I have real-world experience that my opponent can only dream of. I’ve conducted or supervised thousands of legal and medical investigations. I understand the legal side of the job more than any other Coroner in the state. I have Coroner-specific training in death scene investigations.
I’ll restore ethics, transparency, public accountability and fiscal responsibility. I will run the office like a business, restoring focus on the bottom line of cheerful service to the public, at a reduced cost. I will save the County nearly $135,000 in salaries on the first day, as my first official act will be to reduce the Coroner’s obscene pay to what the law allows. Then I will take a sharp scalpel to the budget, and will see where we can better honor the trust given us by the taxpayers. I believe there is plenty of room in the $1.5 million budget for some “bottom line management” techniques.
