by George Gramlich,
News and Commentary
You never know what new issue is going to raise its ugly head at a Custer County Board of County Commissioners (BOCC) meeting, and the thing that popped up at this meeting might get some citizen’s feathers flying. Read on, fellow peasants.
The August 3, 2022 BOCC meeting started at 9 a.m. All three royal musketeers were present: Chair Kevin Day and members Bill Canda and Tom Flower.
After a couple of quick Commissioner Items, it appears that the muskies must convene a somewhat rare Board of Equalization (BOE) meeting as there is a Lake DeWeese home owner disputing his property assessment done by the head of the Assessor’s Office, JD Henrich. The muskies weren’t quite sure how to adjourn or pause the regular BOCC meeting and start the BOE meeting. Finally County Attorney Smith told them how to do it, and shazam, we had a BOE meeting going. (The muskies are also the only Board members on the BOE.)
First up was JD who handed out a bunch of papers to the muskies. JD explained the somewhat complicated assessment process. He then explained the situation: a Mr. Carlisle owns a small home in Lake DeWeese. He is contesting the assessment that JD gave him of $204,000 and says Carlisle claims it should be $130,000. JD says Carlisle had the house recently listed for sale at $324,000. JD goes over several comparable houses (“comps”) that sold and says those prices justify the $204K assessment. The muskies ask JD a bunch of questions and then it is Mr. Carlisle’s turn before the exalted BOE judges.
Carlisle says he never had the house appraised and that the recently completed structure is on a very small lot and it has no well or septic (just a holding tank that has to get pumped out), He continues his tale of woe with his water storage is only 300 gallons and the electric company won’t run power to his house for some reason and he has to use a solar setup.
He then states that JD should have used comparable sales figures from the Lake DeWeese area. JD then somewhat convincingly defends his comps. Carlisle rests his case so now it is up to the Solomon level muskie judges to bloviate and then decide on poor Mr. Carlisle’s fate.
This, of course, is an open invitation for a Flower Power Hour from Flower and we are not disappointed. Flower, leaning back in his power chair, puts on his Judge Judy/Perry Mason
face and starts grilling poor Carlisle. Blah, blah, blah, blah. The Flower is “conflicted”. Again. Blah, blah, blah. Finally, he says let’s make the assessment $175K hoping to appease both sides but JD is not too happy. (Like Solomon saying let’s split the baby in two.) The other two learned judges mumble a bit and then it is up for a vote. All vote to make it $175K. No reaction from Carlisle.
The muskies then wave their fairy wands and shazam, again, we are back into the regular BOCC meeting.
The Airport honcho reports that the airport sold 802 gallons of fuel in July grossing $4,354. He says they still have 2,175 gallons in the tank and they are good to go for the AirFest coming up.
He then says the electrician who was going to hook up the big new fuel tank backed out and they are currently getting bids from two other contractors.
Recycling is next and the lady reports the new big can and cardboard baler is up and running and all is well.
Land Fill then reports they are working on digging the new trench for the garbage and that is going well.
IT’s Vernon Roth is next on the hot seat and says the new website is doing good and they are making fixes and changes as they pop up.
The head of the Office of Emergency Management, Adrian Washington (AW), is next. He talks about all the money we are getting and spending from grants, grants and more grants. This goes on for a long time.

Part of the issue is county bookkeeping. When a grant comes in, sometimes he is notified by the grant issuer but not by the county. Sometimes the money doesn’t show for OEM. In fact there is a large amount not showing in OEM. There was a discussion and Adrian said he’ll work with Braden when he gets back from vacation.

AW then talks about fire mitigation and insurance companies. . He then starts talking about people being responsible for mitigating their own property specifically the perimeter around their home  and says his grass is mowed and his is a good citizen because of that. He says that education is the key and reminds everyone that he’s giving a talk/workshop at the Library soon. AW  is working on some brochures for the peasants to explain to us what we should be doing with OUR property.
AW then, unexpectedly, veers into dangerous Happy Valley waters: He says property owners need to mitigate on an annual basis and Douglas County up north has a MANDATORY MITIGATION INSPECTION ORDINANCE that allows the building inspector to COME ONTO YOUR LAND EVERY YEAR TO MAKE SURE YOU HAVE OBEYED THE MITIGATION RULES. He then says we “must start with education” directly implying that if “education” doesn’t work, the county had better have some other means of forcing us serfs to obey. He then says, again subtly implying that this is good and that the reason other communities are passing mitigation/inspection ordinances is that “education” is not working. Next, AW GOES THERE and says, “That is where we need to begin. We need to begin with education and education does REQUIRE ON SITE VISITS”. (This is NOT GOING OVER WELL with the three muskies as they know this would literally be civil war here in Happy Valley but it doesn’t seem to bother AW. )
Canda then repeats the line that Douglas County has an ordinance that requires mitigation and that is like BIG Brother telling you what to do. Education is the key, he says. (Canda is NOT on board with this loony stuff.) County Attorney Clint Smith then chimes in and says this is Custer County and telling landowners what do with their property is a “tough sell”. (“Tough sell” is an understatement for us peasants here in the Land of the Free. You thought the rebellion against the proposed Dark Skies outdoor lightning criminalization was bad….)
AW, not giving up, says “honesty” is the key. (Whatever that means in this context.) Then, UNBELIEVABLY, AW says we had a mitigation ordinance BACK IN CALIFORNIA (where
he comes from.  AW was an employee of Cal Fire, after he worked for the forest service) and they didn’t use the enforcement/penalty feature of the ordinance MUCH except where there was a problem, like a fire. (Implying that if we do get a mitigation ordinance, and remember these have criminal penalties for non-compliance, it wouldn’t be used much. Yea, right.) He then tries to mitigate this tyrannical proposal saying no community can afford to inspect every property every year. (But I wonder who would be inspected? The inspector would be like judge and jury over every property owner in the county.) He finishes with “Custer County is changing”. (With tyrannical California ideas like this floating around, one must almost agree. Look at the ex-California lib running against muskie Bill Canda this fall. She is bad as it gets.)
So the good muskies kind of make no comments because anything they say about this will be interpreted as endorsing it and they are not going there. There was a brief silence in the royal chambers and AW makes his exit.
(Folks, that’s why elections matter. The California transplant running against Canda would probably LOVE this ordinance. Libs just LOVE to rule us peasants. It’s in their arrogant blood.)
Next the muskies announce that they are combining the BOCC administrative assistant position with the Public Information Office officer into one. (Duh, we never needed a PIO in the first place. Waste of money.) The muskies discuss the applicants and vote to give “Applicant A” an offer. The wages are $17.31 per hour.
In Public Comment, local businessman, Lucas Epp, Zooms in on the computer and asks the musketeers what are they going to do with all this new property tax money coming in from the recent assessment increase and are they gonna try to put some aside for future purchases, etc. Canda is the only muskie with the nerve to answer and says we will see when the budget process starts this fall and that the county is required to have a reserve in case of emergencies. Canda says the budget meetings are open and please come and participate.
And that was that. (Sing “California Dreaming” to finish the drama.)