"There was a tremendous amount of resistance," Ladenburg said. "None of the county board members played golf, and they had the stereotype that it's an elitist game." He had to sell golf, then a relatively high green fee and $20 million price tag. "I'd been in government 25 years," said Ladenburg, re-elected in 2004 [as Executive] amid the Chambers Bay fight and now Democratic candidate for state attorney general. "I did a little arm twisting; I called in some political IOUs." - snipped from Golf Digest (2/15/08)

John Ladenburg announced he has formed an exploratory committee to decide if he should run, yet again, for Washington State Attorney general. is forming a campaign for Supreme Court.

This is terrible news, but not surprising.

For years he claimed that nothing is broken in Pierce County, when in fact MANY things are broken in Pierce County, and most are associated with the departments he was responsible for during his many terms in local office.

Here's a brief list of reasons John Ladenburg should be consider not suitable to hold public office ever again:

1. While serving as a Tacoma City Councilmember, and continuing as he served as Pierce County Prosecutor, and still, as he served as Pierce County Executive, Ladenburg failed to notice the disproportionate number of violent felons being exported to Pierce County. This issue did not however go unnoticed by his successor, Prosecutor Gerald Horne, who coined this travesty the Pierce County Crime Warp; a suitable name for a county that was ranked #1 most violent crime county in the state, and, at the same time, was ranked 2nd lowest in the state for officer-to-citizen ratio.

2. Per the County Charter, the County Executive is the top overseer of the Pierce County Sheriff's Department. During Ladenburg's Executive swearing-in speech on January 3rd, 2001 he announced the immediate appointment of Paul Pastor to the post of Pierce County Sheriff, saying "Paul is extremely well qualified for the job and has my complete confidence." In September 2002, Sheriff Pastor had to request an administrative waiver from the Washington State Criminal Justice Training Commission due to the fact he did not meet RCW requirements to serve as a county sheriff because he did not graduate from the law enforcement academy, therefore could not be certified as a law enforcement officer. The administrative waiver was granted with conditions, and Pierce County become the only county in the state with an appointed sheriff, and one of only thirteen counties in the entire United States.

3. While serving as County Executive, Ladenburg had the responsibility to ensure proper operations of Puget Sound Behavioral Health--and its employees, yet State inspectors shut the hospital down after finding poor-quality food and not enough staffers to care for the sometimes-violent patients. “There clearly has been a meltdown in the way services are provided,” said then-Councilmember Shawn Bunney in a TNT article.

4. Ladenburg, as Executive, and his wife while serving as a Tacoma City Councilmember, allowed the Northwest Detention Center, a private, for-profit prison, to be built in downtown Tacoma, directly atop a known EPA Superfund Site; the Tacoma Tar Pits. And later during their watch, without-permits, and without the knowledge or oversight of EPA or DOE, contractors drilled and augured through the contamination cap in preparation of a 545-bed expansion project, allegedly releasing known cancer-causing carcinogens (visible to the naked eye via bio swells). Of additional concern is the apparent lack of an appropriate evacuation plan for this 1,500+ bed prison which, according to the DNR and NOAA, is at risk of tsunami flooding which will allow little time to evacuate - anywhere from 20 minutes at the most, to as little as five minutes.

5. Ladenburg, as he was terming-out as Pierce County Executive, crafted a 28-year, near two-billion dollar solid-waste contract with the private, for-profit LRI landfill owners—a landfill which is situated atop a sole-source aquifer that provides drinking water to over 60% of the 400,000 people who live within the aquifer system boundaries--and approximately 84% during peak demands. As reported by the Seattle P.I., Mr. Ladenburg, while running as an AG candidate in 2008, “took money in [the] landfill deal”. In addition to this, Ladenburg overstepped his authority by drafting and sending an eminent domain threat letter to members of a community adjacent to the landfill as he unfairly masterminded this bad contract. This is not the first time Ladenburg has participated in questionable eminent domain deals.

6. Ladenburg not only failed to disclose his stock ownership in Prometa, but at the same time, authorized funding for AND lobbied for even more public funding to support Prometa, earning his second slap on the wrist from the Public Disclosure Commission. According to MSNBC, Mr. Ladenburg "did not respond to calls seeking comment". As for the first slap from the PDC - it was a result of him committing one of the two “biggest violations in the commission’s 30-year history” (PDC quote from a TNT article) when he used public money to pay for, to create, and to distribute biased campaign material on Proposition 1 (More Cops Now campaign). He claims that he was “not found guilty”, rather than admitting the truth; which was that he was indeed guilty, though got off on a technicality.

7. Ladenburg failed to ensure that Planning & Land Services (PALS) identified ALL critical/sensitive land, therefore failed to remove them from the buildable lands map (as per GMA). This is part and parcel to Ladenburg failing to ensure his departments protect Pierce County’s wetlands which are being destroyed. Instead, the violators have not/are not made to undo the damage they cause, nor are they fined. They get a free pass and finish their developments.

8. Ladenburg failed to ensure responsible departments complied with NPDES requirements, leaving Pierce County vulnerable to lawsuits, and taxpayers at risk of paying the $10,000 (per day) fines which the state can rightfully impose. Speaking of Ladenburg's interest in the health of our drinking water - Robert McClure of the Seattle PI, wrote in an article on Ladenburg's quest to be appointed as the Region 10 EPA Administrator after his failed run for AG in 2008, "A number of Pierce County citizens have written to Sens. Maria Cantwell and Patty Murray and the Obama transition team to weigh in against Ladenburg. Here is one example of an anti-Ladenburg letter."

9. Ladenburg failed to ensure that PALS and Public Works imposed allowable fines for violations of sign code, leaving communities blanketed with illegal, off-premise signs by the thousands–the majority of which belong to the development and real-estate industries. The Council did their part, he never did his.

10. Ladenburg failed to recognize the need for Charter changes, demonstrated by the fact that he wrote or co-wrote the voter's pamphlet statements against seven of the nine 2006 Charter Amendments, in which he repeatedly said “The current system has served us well for 25 years”. Saying otherwise were the 21 elected commissions who concluded the amendments should be put on the ballot, and agreeing with them was the majority of the voting public who passed all but two of the amendments--one of them being Charter Amendment 1, which converted the Sheriff position back to elected, making him/her answerable to The People instead of the County Executive.

11. The Washington State Native Plant Society, who fought hard to protect ecologically-sensitive lands and habitat from Ladenburg’s proposed development, said in their Fall 2007 newsletter (The Acorn, page 7): "Pierce County Executive John Ladenburg, unwilling to accept our success, threatened to resign from his position of Sound Transit board chair, and veto the entire roads and transit package if cross-base was not included. Executive Ladenburg is a skilled, tenacious, and stubborn politician. By the time it came to a final vote at the RTID Planning Committee meeting on June 8th, it was apparent that the political will was gone, and potentially our victory."

The above is a sampling of reasons why John Ladenburg SHOULD NOT be voted into or appointed to public office.

Ladenburg has, on several occasions, accused me of lying about how poorly he “managed” Pierce County. That’s par for Ladenburg, though – instead of ever admitting a mistake, he tries to discredit people who disagree with him or his supporters, even when it's all verifiable information.

Stacy Emerson
Pierce County, WA