It’s really fascinating to me, when people don’t understand that there’s at least two sides, if not three sides, to every story. There’s your side, there’s my side, and probably the truth in the middle somewhere…
— Former County Development Director Pamela Flowers, July 20, 2025.
Yesterday, in Part Five, we considered one detail of a statement included in County Development Director Pamela Flowers’ resignation letter, addressed to the three current County commissioners — Warren Brown, Veronica Medina, and John Ranson.
This sentence:
The fact that you have made no effort to make rule changes and instead choose to actively work against and pressure my staff to behave unethically in favor of your pals, shows the depth of your ignorance, laziness, and corruption…
We discussed “ignorance” yesterday in Part Five. Here are a few more comments on that subject from Ms. Flowers, from our interview on Monday:
“So that’s what I mean by ignorance. You don’t know what the rules are, you don’t understand why they exist, you don’t understand the impact or the potential risk accepted by the person who’s breaking the rule, or the risks accepted by the County on behalf of that person. Or risks to the neighbors, who might be impacted by something, if we don’t follow the rules.
“So if you don’t understand that, you should ask the people who do understand it, so they can explain to you the rationale behind the decision, and the reasoning — before you make a decision about how you’re going to communicate with that citizen.”
Apparently, this type of ignorance has been common among our current commissioners — one Commissioner in particular.
But what did she mean by “corruption”? That was one of my questions to Ms. Flowers when we did our interview.
“Ignoring the rules, or pressuring your staff to ignore rules, on behalf of a particular person.
“I referred to ‘friends’ and ‘pals’ in my resignation letter. But sometimes it’s just whatever person has called the Commissioner. They may not have had a previous relationship, but boy! He’s going to go fight for that person, because it’s whoever calls. And the Commissioner assumes that everything that person tells him, must be true. But that’s not the case. One particular gentleman said to one of our commissioners, ‘I’ve finished building my house and they won’t let me move in!’
“Does that even make sense on the face of it? Why would we not let him move in, if he was really finished with his house?
“But instead, the Commissioner comes after us and attacks our common sense… through [County Manager Jack Harper]. The Commissioner sends an email to Jack and Jack sends it to me, so I can answer it.
“It’s really fascinating to me, when people don’t understand that there’s always two sides, if not three sides, to every story. There’s my side, there’s your side, and probably the truth in the middle somewhere.
“But you should at least get all the information before you go making a decision…”
I have occasionally used the word “corruption” here in the Daily Post, to describe the actions of certain local government officials, and my readers have sometimes objected to that use. To some people, an accusation of “corruption” immediately connotes criminal actions — embezzlement or bribery or extortion or maybe hired killers. But we have experienced, here in Archuleta County — occasionally, or regularly — much more subtle forms of corruption in local government.
One subtle form of corruption might be a County commissioner allowing a person to move into their new house, when the house has not yet met the required building code requirements. This type of corruption can put the homeowner at risk… can put the neighborhood at risk… can put a future purchaser of that house at risk… and can put the County at risk of future lawsuits, over failure to enforce its written regulations.
Ms. Flowers:
“You should at least get all the information before you go making a decision and determining that your staff… who has never once gotten the County into trouble through a decision… Not once have we been challenged, that we did not prevail. Because we did it right.
“So there’s no track record with my department that would make you think you need to really watch out for what we’re doing. But you should at least ask before you go making bold decisions, making promises to some constituent who skipped three levels. This gentleman [who moved into his house illegally] never talked to our Building Official, he didn’t talk to me, he didn’t talk to Jack. He just called his ‘friend’… as he referred to the Commissioner.
“Well, there are three steps along the way, that if you’d made any one of those three steps, you probably could have gotten some kind of compromise worked out.
“Instead, he’s moved in, and the County has taken on risk, because the County directed him to move in.
“So that’s frustrating. And it’s continuing to happen, because people… ‘You mean, all we have to do is call the commissioners? And we get what we want?’
“The way you reduce those calls is not by eliminating the staff.”
So that was the next subject that Ms. Flowers and I took up. Does the Development Services staff need to be cut?
This idea was brought up by none other than Commissioner John Ranson, at the Tuesday, July 22 BOCC work session.
We know that the Development Services staff has grown over the past five years. We also know that the County has taken on at least three large projects that the department was not handling five years ago, and have handed those big new jobs to Development Services.
1. Approval and monitoring of individual Short-Term Rentals — 600 of them? — which were previously unregulated.
2. Water quality — septic system inspections and and approvals. previously handled by San Juan Basin Public Health before it was dissolved.
3. Grant writing and document development for County-supported affordable housing projects.
Might one expect… that the department would have added staff, as approved by the BOCC?