Well, credit where credit is due. Apparently, King County Councilman and executive-wannabe David Irons Jr. is such a commanding leader, that he’s managed to cajole his council staff into performing two distinct jobs on a single county paycheck.
A quick look at Irons’ campaign website finds that over half the press releases on his press page were written by council staffers, with links going directly back to his official council web page. And he’s sure kept his staffers on their heels during this busy campaign season: since officially announcing his candidacy for county executive on March 14, 2005, his staff has written 28 press releases, compared to only 19 during the same period last year, and only 16 in 2003, when he was running for reelection to the council.
Of course, both the King County Ethics Code and Washington State laws expressly prohibit the the use of public resources to support political campaigns, but it is hard not to conclude that Irons is in effect using county staff to produce campaign website content on the taxpayers’ dime.
Hmm. I suppose if I were a litigious prick like some right-wing bloggers I know, I might be tempted to file an ethics complaint. (Oops… I just did.)