I darn near spit my coffee onto the computer keyboard with the ironic sign over his shoulder in the picture: "WES Works!"

I don't know if this is some sort of sick projection or what, but I was certain you had written that the board of directors should be "incinerated."

Their salaries are obscene. I have no doubt that they've convinced themselves that these salaries "just keep them competitive" but none of those people could earn anywhere near that in the private sector.

Trimet has to be the best racket in the State.

I'd love to believe there will be some sort of repercussions from this story, but I don't.

These yo-yos are public employees, several of them appointed by political hacks. There ought to be a recall process, right? For some of them, at least?

I hope enough people have noticed this so that when TriMet administrators start whining again about the labor contract, folks will just ignore it.

Yes, the WES works sign in the background is an instant classic!

Unfortunately, the Try Met board is appointed by the Governor. If the Governor did the right thing, he would ask for across the board (pardon the pun) resignations and start fresh with appointing credible hard-nosed people and Jack Bogdanski to the board. The first order of business for the new board would be to publicly fire McFarlane, seize his office and computer(s) and conduct a forensic audit of Try Met's top management.

I don't believe the governor has the authority (or balls) to do much of anything anymore. Portland agencies and bureaus appear to run the state.

Snards, not only will there be no repercussions, but I've seen the same exact thing happen in the private sector, too. (My favorite was when Belo, the owner of the "Dallas Morning News," announced a 5 percent pay cut applied to all employees. What was left out was that all of the upper management was given a 15 percent pay raise the day before the announcement, so they were still coming out ahead as they were driving the company into the ground.) Something tells me that the Tri-Met board knows that this is going to crash and soon, and they're all trying to get everything they can before the piggy bank is taken away from them. And, of course, if Tri-Met declares bankruptcy, expect the rank and file to be screwed out of their last paychecks to pay for the executive retention bonuses for these otherwise unemployable scum.

And is it just me, or does this character remind you of that guy in high school who was so humorless and dorky that he regularly had his butt beaten every day by the anime club?

I want to see how the Trimet board looks in orange jumpsuits...
Any graphic artists want to photoshop that ?

Unfortunately, Tri-Met's leadership hasn't failed - at least by their way of thinking. They are doing exactly what they and their construction/developer overlords want to do, and they are getting away with it. This kind of stuff will continue until the public puts enough pressure on the governor to stop it. I'm not optimistic this will happen anytime soon.

The suits are always first at the taxpayer funded feeding trough – even if it means cutting service and leftover scraps for everybody else.

Silence from the wife of the willyweek publisher and silence from the county DA.
This needs to be a new segment on Portlandia...they won't run out of material anytime soon!

Yes, there is never a good time to give yourself a raise. What humility.

Jack, you're doing a good job here. I think you should give yourself a raise. You deserve it.

Unless I'm missing something (as I often do), the news article is telling us that Tri-Met lied to the public about a pay freeze. How much longer do we have to put up with this kind of fraud?

Lying to the public is TriMet's and Metro's standard operating procedure.
Among others.

FYI

Everything happening today with TriMet hiring big dogs Ater Wynne to sue the citizens, PMLR and the CRC is an expansion of this.

http://www.billparish.com/20040314pgereferences.html

Careful now this stuff is a rather sickening read covering corruption and incompetence in Oregon.

Why offer raises to keep government executives? Pass the trash and lose them. Paying them off to shut up and avoid a grievance has been the norm in Portland for years. The public shouldn't have to pay $$$ because government supervisors are racist, homophobic, and misogynists. I need a coach too.

Whadda' you got against Wally Cox?

"Q: Are we not men? A: We are Tri-Met!"

Uncontrollable Urge ~ Devo
http://youtu.be/M4Q35e0-fPQ

But they have to retain the best talent, you see -- any other grandees would be totally crappy. Only *these particular* window-seaters can make the big decisions, so they have us (i.e. we have ourselves) over their knees. No amount is too high.