{"id":180225,"date":"2023-01-17T17:08:47","date_gmt":"2023-01-18T01:08:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/eugeneweekly.com\/?p=188781"},"modified":"2023-01-17T17:08:47","modified_gmt":"2023-01-18T01:08:47","slug":"the-farr-side-of-lane-county-leadership","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/extra.eugeneweekly.com\/index.php\/2023\/01\/17\/the-farr-side-of-lane-county-leadership\/","title":{"rendered":"The Farr Side of Lane County Leadership"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Lane County Board of County Commissioners showed a glimpse into its new dynamics as it argued over whom to elect as chair of the body at the Jan. 10 board meeting. The board ultimately unanimously voted to re-elect Pat Farr as chair and Laurie Trieger as vice chair for the second consecutive year.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThis is unusual,\u201d Trieger said when Commissioner Ryan Ceniga first motioned to have Farr as board chair again. \u201cThere\u2019s only been once in the past seven years that we\u2019ve had the same chair in the same two years in a row and that was because the person who had been in the vice chair seat wasn\u2019t in office any longer.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Newly sworn-in Commissioner Ryan Ceniga motioned to have Farr as the board\u2019s chair. According to the <\/span>Lane County Home Rule Charter<\/span><\/a>, the chair presides over and enforces rules at board meetings and determines the order of board business.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Traditionally, the election of vice chair and chair rotates through the board and the past vice chair becomes the chair. In 2019, Heather Buch was elected vice chair and in 2020, she was elected chair, for example.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

During Trieger\u2019s discussion of the chair appointment, she referenced a split vote for her election to vice chair in 2022, which Farr had defended. \u201c\u2018The protocol of the selection of officers and the rotation of selection of officers that most bodies select moves through a particular order to maintain continuity of leadership but also diversity,\u2019\u201d she said, quoting Farr\u2019s statement from last year. \u201cI echo that statement.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Buch also questioned the decision to elect Farr for a consecutive term, saying that Trieger and the two newly elected commissioners haven\u2019t served as chair yet. \u201cIt\u2019s important that we take turns,\u201d Buch said, adding that Trieger is qualified to take on the chair position. \u201cIt\u2019s important to create equity and diversity on this board as we replicate that for staff and the community at large.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Buch said that she wanted to see Trieger as chair and Ceniga as vice chair. \u201cIt\u2019s important to have that rotation and different people with different opportunities to have leadership opportunities,\u201d she said.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

David Loveall defended Ceniga’s motion to have Farr as chair. He said that the board is no longer partisan as it was in the past and that Farr brings a balanced approach to governing.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI think we have the A Team here,\u201d Loveall said. \u201cI would like to see the A Team continue for another year to train that next rotation to continue this momentum.\u201d Presumably, Loveall was not referring to the classic 1980s TV show where four wrongfully convicted military men who worked as soldiers of fortune out of a GMC van.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Ceniga said that the board is in a unique position where the second most senior board member has four years of experience. \u201cThe cohesion that the board had between Chair Farr and Vice Chair Trieger was impressive,\u201d he said. \u201cIt was a team I wanted to join.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

The chair debate prompted a letter to the editor (forthcoming in the Jan. 19 print issue of Eugene Weekly<\/em>), which says the Lane County commission started 2023 with a discriminatory slap to gender equality, “We can expect more of the same from this male dominated agency.”<\/p>\n

Before voting, Farr reassured the board that as chair he works with every single commissioner. \u201cI\u2019ve sided with commissioners at times and I\u2019ve opposed every single commissioner at times,\u201d he said. \u201cMy role has always been to look at the size of the issue and vote on the side that I believe is the right side.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

To watch Lane County Board of County Commissioner meetings, go to the county\u2019s YouTube channel. <\/span><\/i>Visit here to stream the Jan. 10 meeting<\/span><\/i><\/a>. <\/span><\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Lane County Board of County Commissioners showed a glimpse into its new dynamics as it argued over whom to elect as chair of the \u2026 Continue reading\u00a0\u2192<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[101,106,2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-180225","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ew-extra","category-lane-county-board-of-county-commissioners","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/extra.eugeneweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/180225","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/extra.eugeneweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/extra.eugeneweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/extra.eugeneweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/extra.eugeneweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=180225"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/extra.eugeneweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/180225\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/extra.eugeneweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=180225"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/extra.eugeneweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=180225"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/extra.eugeneweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=180225"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}