Local government doesn't get the credit it actually deserves

If you limited your local government exposure in these parts to online forums and social media channels, you would find yourself subjected, in large measure, to a torrent of highly charged and sharply negative invective.

It would be easy to conclude the hallmarks of local government around here were waste and fraud, incompetence and malfeasance, over taxation and over regulation, graft and corruption — all a byproduct of an unfeeling bureaucracy.

A perusal of the pages of your local newspaper would, however, dispel much of that notion. It would expose you to a long list of hard-fought accomplishments and well-meaning initiatives.

And that’s not only true in McMinnville and Newberg — our county’s principal urban centers, where expectations typically run higher and positive results typically get greater play. It’s also true in the neighboring communities, where public appreciation may be harder to come by.

Large crowds turned out in Amity this summer to welcome completion first of a new high school gym and subsequently a new middle school, fruits of a hard-fought $29 million bond passed three years earlier.

It will soon be Sheridan’s turn, following May passage of a $6 million school bond qualifying for $6 million in matching funds from the state. The money will fund extensive renovations and upgrades at the community’s high school and grade school.

Out west in Willamina, the key recent focus has fallen on Huddleston Pond, a popular fishing and recreation asset threatened with failure of the embankment keeping at bay the adjacent South Yamhill River.

The former log pond was donated to the city by Hampton Lumber, which has stepped in to assist. The company was joined by the state Legislature, which allocated $1.6 million, and stabilization efforts began last month.

Last year, Carlton celebrated the opening of a much larger and more functional city hall/civic center — one designed to meet local needs for decades to come, and without having to fall back on bond issue funding. It wasn’t too many years ago that the city also won public support for a new pool house, an upgrade to the downtown centerpiece.

In Lafayette, plans are afoot for major upgrades at all three local parks — Veterans, Commons and Terry. The city is also embarking on an ambitious street improvement project, with new sidewalks and handicap access ramps to accompany.

The governmental roster of recent achievement should also be extended to the Newberg-Dundee School District, which was plunged into chaos with election of destructive forces to its governing board at the height of the pandemic. After managing eventually to purge its board and administration, the district embarked on a turnaround that has transformed a $1.3 million deficit into a $1.6 million surplus.

We might also extend our kudos to a pair of county agencies that don’t typically receive the level of attention the governing commissioners do.

The county’s public health unit has enlisted Linfield University, YCAP, MV Advancements and other public and private players in creation of a network of mental health safe zones around the region. The commitment is grounded in a belief in preventing suicide “one conversation at a time.”

Meanwhile, the county clerk’s office has unveiled an alert service allowing local owners to better monitor property records and ward off fraud attempts — a growing threat across the nation. And the new monitoring service is offered at no charge.

It might also be worth mentioning the Newberg-Dundee Bypass. It has taken 50 years, and still isn’t fully built out, but has already made a major difference in local economic, transportation and livability quotients.

The people doing the dirty work down in the trenches to make this kind of thing happen aren’t just faceless and aimless bureaucrats. They are focused, trained, dedicated professionals doing their best to make your life better.

They breathe the same air, drink the same water, drive the same roads and attend the same schools you do. They also pay the same taxes you do, and are mindful of that.

It’s easy to be an armchair critic, taking note of nothing more than the relatively slow pace of the public process and its occasional dead ends, false starts or wrong way pivots. But that doesn’t even begin to give an accurate picture of how well local government is doing at delivering the goods.

We actually have it pretty darn good. We could, most certainly, have it much, much worse.