As I mentioned in another post, the issue of lacking a quorum—and why the Josephine County Republican Party remains in an “unorganized” state—highlights the core problem with the Josephine County Republican Central Committee (JCRCC): their tendency to pick and choose which bylaws to follow.
The lack of a quorum also lies at the heart of the controversy surrounding the recall of the chair—a slippery slope filled with gray areas that have led to questionable and unethical decisions.
One could spend hours debating whether the bylaws were properly followed during the recall process. Under Article XII: Recall, Section 2, it states, “Once the Secretary issues the PCP list to the petitioner, they will have 30 days to submit the petition with the signatures.”
In this case, the signatures were never submitted to the Secretary for proper verification. There are several other issues involved, but let’s ignore that submission of signatures, for now.
→ The key question is whether the JCRCC is acting ethically.
The Executive Committee sent an email to all 174 PCPs stating that the petitioners failed to meet the requirements for the recall and that any meeting held to conduct the recall would not be an official meeting of the JCRCC.
Despite this, an unofficial meeting took place. Every PCP had been informed that it was not official by the executive committee.
So ask yourself:
- Who would attend a meeting that was declared unofficial by the Executive Committee?
- Why did only about 35% of all PCPs attend, leaving 65% who chose not to attend?
- By most accounts, those 35% were the ones supporting the recall, while the 65% who stayed away likely respected the Executive Committee’s notice.
This gets to the heart of the JCRCC’s problem—ethics.
How ethical is it to take such an important vote under those circumstances, when all members were informed it was not an official meeting?
This doesn’t even address the mischief that occurred. For example, one text message from a person who wasn’t even a petitioner (though a city council person) who inserted herself into this and who refused to hand over the signatures read: “it is our recall, we have made up the parameters of delivering the signatures.”
It also raises the question: why did Herman Baertschiger Jr. back out of overseeing this unofficial meeting? In the end, they had to find someone from Jackson County to step in and oversee it.
Why didn’t any members of the executive committee attend the unofficial meeting?
The Chair, who was the target of the recall was out of town. The Vice Chair, Treasurer, and Secretary also did not attend. Their absence should have raised serious concerns about the meeting’s legitimacy and ethics.
Some PCP’s reported they felt deceived into signing the petition and wanted their names removed from the petition – but were denied. Some PCP’s reported they were yelled at, cussed at for not signing the petition.
Why didn’t the petitioners allow proper signature verification?
– Most likely because it would have only took one signature to have been removed from the petition – to make the petition invalid. In other words the petitioners had the absolute minimum amount of signatures required.
Where is the calls for investigation behind this travesty?
If this happened with the county commissioners’ recall, none of the recall supporters would have accepted this kind of behavior. Once again, it shows the hypocrisy behind this entire recall and the people supporting it.
The ethics and optics of this entire recall effort are deeply troubling. Anyone using common sense can see it for what it is—a coup, an attempt to undermine the foundation of the JCRCC. Yet we’re expected to accept this while preaching honesty and integrity within our party.
At the very least, this meeting should have been declared void and redone properly. But instead, our party continues down a path marked by questionable ethics, honesty and integrity.
As a staunch conservative I expect honesty, ethical decisions and integrity with my fellow conservatives.
