The Sussex County GOP guest speaker at their monthly meeting last night was Cindy Green, current Register of Wills. Mrs. Green is the incumbent Republican in the GOP primary for the office of Sussex County Register of Wills. Now it is unusual for there to be a primary for a row office, but Mrs. Green is being challenged by Bridgeville small businessman, Brian Butler.
Mr. Butler is a life long resident of the Bridgeville area and has stated that he is running to improve the efficiency of the office.
Mrs. Green took the opportunity to speak to the GOP crowd last night at their monthly meeting, and while she spoke for about ten to fifteen minutes, I am not sure that she actually said very much.
She spoke extensively about her family, her children and grandchildren, which is nice and cute, but not sure it is a qualification for the office. She also spent quite a bit of time informing the room that she has had a long and close political relationship with current Sussex County Councilman Sam Wilson.
Not sure that pointing that out is the best political strategy, since Mr. Wilson often finds himself in the middle of just a few political controversies, such as his controversial questioning of a citizen who had come to ask the County Council for grant and aid for a group affiliated with the NAACP. Accusations of racism were leveled at Mr. Wilson and co-council member Vance Phillips for their questions and attitudes towards the group and the NAACP. It may not have attracted as much attention if these two were not regular yes votes for other groups of a more, might we say, “paler shade”.
Mrs. green however had no hesitation in pointing out that she has been helping Mr. Wilson with his campaigns for twenty some years, and that he was the person who had encouraged her to become involved in GOP politics, and to also run for office.
Now when it came time for Mrs. green to actually talk about the office of Register of Wills and what is involved in running the office, her first statement was when she was elected, she realized she needed someone to help her run the office. So was this an admission that she ran for an office she knew she couldn’t run, simply because Sam Wilson asked her to?
Well this is where she spoke of hiring Deputy Bodenweiser to run the office, and since Mrs. Green has said in public statements that she doesn’t need to be in the office everyday, and that Deputy Bodenweiser speaks for her, does this mean that Deputy Bodenweiser is the one who actually runs the office? And since Deputy Bodenweiser has in recent time been understandably distracted by personal issues, how much day-to-day stuff is falling through the cracks?
Now she did take credit for the office turning away from manual filing to electronic filing and how the office was working backwards to electronically scan the archives. She did let slip that this process had been out sourced. So how much is that costing the tax payers, and why can’t the regular employees do this job? Also it is my understanding, that the Register of Wills going electronic has more to do with the fact all of the county offices and agencies were changing over, than it does with the election of Cindy Green. Mrs. Green also admitted that her office had simply used the template already being used in Kent and New Castle counties to make these same changes.
Now what Mrs. Green didn’t, understandably so, address was the concern that revenues seem to be down since she took office, possibly having to do with the fact that the office doesn’t seem to be using the proper assessment procedures in assessing estates that are being handled by her office, as was the case in the past, and may simply being taking the word of the people coming into the office on the value of the estates.
The lack of procedure and the possible loss of revenue may be directly connected to the amount of employee turnover in the office since Mrs. Green took office. There seems to be only one member of the staff who has remained in the four years since Mrs. Green’s election. Some may have simply moved on, but there is the possibility that some were forced out, or moved to other county jobs to make room for Mrs. Greens personal choices, such as the position for Deputy Bodenweiser. And while Mrs. Green has every right and authority to make such changes, losing that amount of experienced staff and the institutional knowledge that goes with it has to have a negative affect on how the office runs and the efficiency of the office.
Personally, Cindy Green is one of the nicest people I know, however this is not a guarantee of her also being the best person for the job. That decision will be up to the GOP primary voters. Mrs. Green is a member of a small group of citizens who hold similar views on politics, and one of those views is that everyone running for re-election should face a primary, so I know that Mrs. green and her supporters welcome this challenge, in their view, as well as my own, primaries serve an important role in our political process.
Not sure that pointing that out is the best political strategy, since Mr. Wilson often finds himself in the middle of just a few political controversies, such as his controversial questioning of a citizen who had come to ask the County Council for grant and aid for a group affiliated with the NAACP. Accusations of racism were leveled at Mr. Wilson and co-council member Vance Phillips for their questions and attitudes towards the group and the NAACP
A lot of Americans feel that the NAACP is an inherently racist organization.
Frank, Sam Wilson has actually won elections. Have you?
Rick, I know you have a problem when I, or anyone points out the facts, but what i stated did not charge anyone with racism, or defend any organization’s reputation.
And I thought that a person of your intelligence would be able to do better than the, “if you haven’t run for election, then you can’t criticize those who have”, argument.
Using that formula Rick, I can only assume that we will not be hearing any more criticism of the Democrats who have run or been elected to office, since unless I am wrong you have never run, or been elected. Correct me if I am wrong.
And even if I am, your formula would severely limit the people’s right of redress.
And I thought that a person of your intelligence would be able to do better than the, “if you haven’t run for election, then you can’t criticize those who have”, argument.
I didn’t say anything about your right to criticize; I said that Wilson has actually been elected to a real and that you haven’t. Is that not correct?
I am sorry Rick, then what was the point of pointing out that Mr. Wilson had won elections, and asking if I had?
I do not know who is better for the office. I think some of your criticism is valid, but outside of Sheriff and the Kent County Recorder of Deeds under Mel Warner when that office needed ground up fixing after the Democrats literally looted it. I don’t know of any row office not run by the Deputy. She is honest about it. It is the deputy who does the day to day management and that always changes with a new Recorder or whatever row office. Now if she never showed up, that would be valid for criticism., but the pay is the same as other jobs regarded as part time management in the county such as County Council, A more interesting question is why do we need a person to supervise the elected office in the first place? Can’t we give a 15k raise to the person we choose to actually run it and pocket the other 14k for the taxpayer? Why dump on her as if she is different from anyone else? That is what I don’t understand. The person who replaces her (whenever that is) is likely to do the exact same thing.
Honestly, the parties need some patronage office and the row office is where it happens. The deputies are some of the few patronage positions left besides the elections boards and legislative clerks.
The other criticism of electronic records being outsourced is not valid in my view. She could expand her office a couple of people with health, retirement, and many other benefits or she can outsource. Outsourcing is the smart way to do it. As for how much taxpayer money it cost, how much does it cost to store 200 years of stuff and how much more would it cost if you don’t do it? The office is revenue generating so it does not cost the taxpayer money to update it. It is just a cost of doing business. It has to be done. Whether it is being done with proper competitive bids or not is another question that I have not investigated. I am just saying the concept and her way to attack it is valid.
I think the revenue stream critique has some validity. I never heard that brought up. If she is reelected, I hope she takes that to heart. If she is not, I hope her replacement does.
Elections are good, they allow issues to brought up to improve the office that would not otherwise be brought up if they were appointed. That is the flipside to the issue brought up in the previous comment.
Frank
Found your article on Cindy Green interesting. As you mentioned her goal of having Patty Bodenwiser as her go to person but didn’t think Cindy had the responsibility to assign the Chief Deputy for the Register of Wills. She does not! But that is what her goal has been since she has taken office. She wants Patty Bodenwiser to be the Chief Deputy. Even if this means ruining another person’s life. You may want to follow-up on the happenings at the Register of Wills lately. The person hired by the Chancery for the position of Chief Deputy (by the way, they did not chose Patty) has been unbelieveably harrassed by Cindy Greene and some of the Register of Wills staff.
She may be as you say “one of the nicest people I know”, but from what I have learned about Cindy Green, she should be removed from Office. Cindy Green is definietly not fit for Office…infact, she is not fit or experienced to hold any position of authority. I have lived in Sussex County for 20+ years and have heard of the “good ole boy” attitude in politics here in Lower Delaware but now I know it
first hand. I have supported the Republican Party by votes and money, but you can be sure this will end until someone steps up in the Republican Party and makes things right. There are hard working individuals that deserve a job not just because they are friends of Cindy Green. If Chanery wanted Patty Bodenwiser for the Chief Deputy position, wouldn’t they have selected her?
Laws have been broken here and there is much more to learn!!
Frank,
Forgot to mention, you should ask Mr. Wilson why Cindy asked him to do something about the person who was chosen for Chief Deputy (by Chancery) before this indiviual had even started the job.
Remove Cindy Green!!
I’m not sure how anyone could still support and stand by any person that would have unlawful sexual contact with a child. That’s disgusting on many levels. But, that’s Cindy Green.
Children! Cindy Green only cares about the children of friends of hers. She has set up a hostile work environment at Register of Wills for employees that are not friends of hers. These employees have had to leave their positions or one way or another she will get them out!! What about the children, and families that have been affected by how she is handling this office?
It is no wonder the average voter is sick of government. Once elected they think their position is theirs to manipulate to their benefit. They should be concerned with making things run more efficiently to benefit the tax payers in Sussex County. Cindy Green is in no way concerned with the tax payers.
If she were, why is Sussex County the only county not set up for “E” filing???? That might take
work and the acknowledge. She had just the person to do this but, no! It is more important for
her to get her friend, Patty Bodenwiser into the Chief Deputy’s position. And then her other friend
who is a clerk in the office moved up to Deputy. By the way, this clerk was in one of the offices and when the Chief Deputy was hired this clerk refused, or not required by Cindy to vacate the office that should have been assigned to the Chief Deputy. Cindy Green should be removed from office!!