Coulee City dispatch. [volume] (Coulee City, Wash.) 19??-19??, 1917-07-05
GRANT COUNTY COMMISSIONERS?
GUILTY OR NOT GUILTY?

The taxpayers of Grant County
are hereby called upon to pass
righteous judgement upon two of
tilcir heretofore tr tstc,1 servants. A
give responsibility rests upon lie
shoulders OF eve,v rniz.' ;!aIl
Theimens and White be continued
ir the responsible position Of Cot
nty Commissions. )! The Ephrdta
court house matte is the test. Tie
facts are before Inc voters. What
81 all we do? Shall we encourage
thievery of puDiic funds funds
raised by the taxation If t,Ir prop
erty or not? 10 leave these 'nen
in office is to encourage crooked
ness among public servants. To re-
call them will be singing lesson
in righteousness. The story is
short and ugly. Messrs. Theimens
and White, the two Commissioners
framed a resolution authorizing the
building of a new court house at
Ephrata. They did this in an un-
demanded manner, not even hav-
ing formal meeting and leaving
| the third Commissioner, Mr.. Twin
ing, in total ignorance of any such
movement. These two above men,
toned took a trip to Spokane and
consulted with an architect in re-
gard to the matter still without
mentioning the matter to Mr.. Twin
! ing.
On their return after the thing
was thoroughly framed with the
aid of shyster legal talent Mr..
Thiemens gently and happily sprung
what he felicitously styled the
white Elephant" meaning the
Court House frame-up on Commits
sioner Twining.
Mr.. Twining Immediately and
very properly turned it down,
that let the cat out. Thei work
was too crude to be clever. One
is tempted to believe that the Com
missioners are more fools than
knaves. They were evidently tools
in the hands of higher ups who as
soon as they were through with
them gave them the Indian sign.
Straws they say show the way
the wind blows. Here's astraw.
The records show that Mr.. THE
mems owned some lots at Ephrata
which Sears and Roebuck would
perhaps retail at 81 each or ten
dollars a dozen.
The county assessor, however,
had them rated at $40 or there
about, each, but real estate in Eph-
rata had bad fall some time ago
from which it has never recovered,
therefore, Mr.. Thiemens plead with
the board that they reduce the as
sessed valuation to somewhere
near their real and actual value
which he said was about $4,000.
But, strange to say, and yet not so
str ange, we imagine TO those w'O
know this ThienunS after the faith
ering of the court house 81 heme by
i. iemens AMI his co.a,ljuster
White.
Thiemens' humble $4,000 lots
caught balloon and rose to the
dizzy heights of $4,000. No, gentle
reader this is not mistake by the
type setter-we did not mean to
say $3.50, which no doub would
better indicate the real value of
these lots.
That little transaction in itself
is enough to show how fit Mr. THE
mems is to fill a public>office. We
seriously doubt if there is resi-
dence lot in Ephrata that ever be-
fore sold for $4,000
Now let us look for a moment
into the legality of the intended
graft.
The law requires that unless a
distinct emergency exists all expen-
ditures for the coming year be
made up in budget form at the fall
meeting of the County Commission
ers. The Commissioners in this
case said nothing at all about a
court house at the fall meeting.
And no emergency exists, except
the emergency of an opportunity to
graft prevailed when this frame-up
was effected it is absolutely GER
tain.
A parallel case is contained in
the records of Okanogan County.
A few would-be grafters got to-
gether and decided to build $780,
900 bridge. They claimed an emer-
gency demanded the building of the
bridge at that time. 1t was shown
| in the evidence adduced that NO
emergency existed as was claimed,
and the Judge ruled that NO emer-
gency existed when it was brought
| into court. The result was that in
| - - x,.oo 1:ttlo ro1,o occ hosu n