New Ad--Jeff Cogen for Multno Commish

I've taken another political ad, this one very local and thus gladly accepted. Jeff Cogen is running for Commisioner 2 in Multnomah, which will be an open seat now held by Serena Cruz. Cogen is Chief of Staff to Dan Saltzman--up for election himself against Amanda Fritz--and thus could find himself losing AND out of a job this fall. I'm not a major fan of Commissioner Saltzman, but I don't know him personally beyond an introduction--and I certainly have no problem with Cogen. I won't yet take an endorsement position (we'll do that likely over at Loaded Orygun; more on that name soon), but something immediately caught my attention:

Multnomah County has almost 4,500 employees, nearly all of whom work on computers that run Microsoft Windows. The County throws away 2 to 3 million dollars a year on licensing payments to Microsoft. As Jeff’s 7-year-old son Alex pointed out, “Bill Gates already has enough money, Dad.” Alex, we couldn’t agree more.

A few million dollars may not mean much to Microsoft, but it’s a very significant sum for the county. Fortunately, there’s an easy way to keep that money here and nurture our local economy in the process: transition the county’s computers to open-source operating systems. The Portland area has already emerged as a leader in open-source computing. It’s time for the county to take advantage of that native expertise and reap the savings that open source can provide.

Switching the county’s computers to open source won’t be free, but it will be far cheaper than what we’re paying now. And the best part is that the money we spend will stay here in the community, supporting an important sector of our local economy and providing jobs for local programmers, developers, and technicians. The governments of Munich, Vienna, and the whole state of Massachusetts have switched to open source. Let’s join them.

Brilliant. Seriously--outstanding idea. How can you lose with Linus Pauling a MAX ride away to help you through it? I do have trepidation about any involvement by the City Tech Services Bureau, however--BTS is still struggling mightily as a central services bureau for the City, and has earned a reputation in some departments as a place where you overpay for shoddy service that is often late and took too much slowdown nonsense. Short term, the transition needed to make  open source work for "ordinary" users would be a logistical nightmare made worse by BTS bureaucracy.

But in the long run, switching to open source would do the City wonders for reducing the throttlelock on IT by the current tech bureau. Centralized IT power in an organization always sounds good, and companies and governments cycle back and forth between the tech shop/home agency IT dichotomy hoping it will prevent redundancy and waste. Putting it all in one shop, to put it bluntly, empowers the geeks. And that's said as a fellow geek. The geeks get gadget-happy and power hungry if left to their own center code. All they do is chew up material and service budgets, and provide cost benefits that are very difficult to quantify. And because only they understand the language they speak to tell you what they think your IT needs are, you just have to nod and hope they know what they're doing.

Open source in the short term would increase reliance on IT services, but eventually its biggest strengths--customizability and extension--would by nature devalue the importance of central IT to an agency's Net profile. One of the things that makes Firefox such a clear winner over IE is all the extensions and high customizability you can achieve. IE by contrast is clunky and necessarily proprietary in function. Open source is that concept writ large--eventually office workers will custom fit their own mini-applets to their work environment.

So that's a very creative and smart idea. It's a tough thing to accomplish, but it's a good, high bar to set. Cogen also pimps wind power bought from Eastern Oregon, another winner:

• Healthy environment. Wind is a clean energy source. It doesn’t contribute to global warming or local air pollution.
• Boosting the local economy. By contracting with Portland-based wind energy developers, the city will support emerging local small businesses.
• Bridging the urban/rural divide. The construction of wind farms in eastern Oregon would create hundreds of much-needed jobs and bolster the tax base in that part of the state. This would improve our area’s relationship with our eastern neighbors and help bridge the urban/rural divide.
• Budgetary predictability. Rather than continue subjecting Portland to the fluctuations of the energy market, wind would give the City guaranteed utility rates for the next 20 years.
• Green leadership. Portland will be the first city in the world to get all of its electricity from wind—cementing its leadership in the emerging green economy and generating tremendous positive publicity.

My favorite benny is the bridging of the urban-rural divide. It's not hippie residue nonsense; there is a very real connection made when rural Oregonians see their products and services bought and sold in the NW corner of the state. The New York Times did a great piece on "local" being the new "organic," and featured Portland's New Seasons markets. The same dynamic Cogen talks about between power supplier and user comes between grocer and farmer:

The opportunity to sell locally has kept some area ranchers from going out of business in Oregon and nearby states. Doc and Connie Hatfield, who founded the Country Natural Beef cooperative in 1986, said the co-op now has 70 ranchers, who raise beef on a vegetarian diet free of hormones, antibiotics and genetically modified feed.

"Nineteen years ago we were going broke," Mr. Hatfield said. "Now we are paying income taxes."

Mr. Hatfield was just as pleased about an unexpected byproduct of selling locally: the bond forged between rural and urban residents.

"Most of the ranchers are rural, religious, conservative Republicans," Mr. Hatfield said. "And most of the customers are urban, secular, liberal Democrats. When it comes to healthy land, healthy food, healthy people and healthy diets, those tags mean nothing. Urbanites are just as concerned about open spaces and healthy rural communities as people who live there. When ranchers get to the city, they realize rural areas don't have a corner on values. I think that's what we are most excited about."

That kind of talk, in this political environment, gives me goosebumps.

So as I said, thanks to Cogen for Commish for supporting Also Also, and while he doesn't get the official nod he's off to a pretty good start. And of course, so far he's the only one who's filed, so he's got that going for him.

--TJ

Comments

[Kari Chisholm]

FYI - there are probably three or four other candidates in the race, though they may not have filed yet.

That said, I'm supporting Jeff Cogen. He's exactly the kind of guy we want in government. Smart, good, innovative. Experience starting his own business, crafting smart policy ideas (like the wind power thing), and advocating for the less fortunate. I was also had a ringside seat when he fashioned a deal to merge two nonprofits together - and saved them both.

(Merging nonprofits almost NEVER happens, since no one cashes out when that happens -- all the more impressive.)

Jeff's the right guy for the job.

[Kari Chisholm]

Oh, and the City tech folks won't likely have much involvement in tech over at the County. :)

[Jenni Simonis]

If I heard right, some of the other candidates who are running are working on getting signatures to put them on the ballot.

Lew Frederick is also running for the seat and is the candidate I'm supporting.

[torridjoe]

Kari--ha! My Portland-centric view of Multno shines through. How embarrassing. :) Perhaps the county guys will handle it better.

[Jasper]

You do mean Linus Torvalds, of course, not Linus Pauling.

[torridjoe]

it's correction day at Also Also! Torvalds, of course--you're right. Linus Pauling is this guy. Pauling was actually a native Portlander, so I was only a little afield.

At least we're better than the Washington Post--we correct immediately! LOL

[jeff cogen]

I'm glad you like those ideas Joe....and thanks Kari! If folks are interested in learning more about why I'm running for County Commissioner please visit my campaign website at www.jeffcogen.org or consider coming to a house party or neighborhood event.

[Amanda Fritz]

Adding to Correction Day, on the next - it's Amanda Fritz, not Frist. I've mused that Fritz isn't a particularly catchy last name for a candidate, so thanks for illustrating it could be so much more of a problem to overcome.

[torridjoe]

Being associated with the Senator from Tennessee may not help, either. I had it right many times before, so I hope you forgive the typo Amanda--but I would have written in to complain as well.

11:50 that night appears to have been a rotten time for me to try to write a well-proofread piece. Apologies to everyone, readers included.