Will Danny get voted

off the island?

The three-person Board of County Commissioners is ruled by majority with a 2-1 vote deciding the outcome on any issue of county business before that Board.

Previously, Commissioners Mike Helm and Dan DeLozier at times seemed to sit on opposite ends of the teeter-totter of power that went up or down with Commissioner Kirt Thacker as the fulcrum or center point in that balance.

During his year as chairman of the Board, Thacker’s voting record indicated bipartisan concern for the county.

The balance of power shifted and equalized as the three-headed entity seemed to pull together in a healthy balance.

Now, with Thacker vulnerable due to money management problems in his District, he is looking for any alliance he can get. Thacker may feel lost in a sea of Democrats at the County Courthouse. A drowning man will grab a life preserver.

And, a man who wants more control will form alliances.

“Politics makes strange bedfellows” has proven itself over and over again in human circles. Watch a few episodes of the popular television show, “Survivor,” if you don’t believe that fact of human nature.

Commissioners can’t vote each other off the island, but a 2-1 voting block can be a powerful tool in the County decision-making process.

Monday, an apparent alignment between Helm and Thacker reared its head as the Board voted on two important agenda items concerning the budgeting and use of county dollars.

If there is indeed an alliance forming between the Republican commissioners over county money management, that union is a shift away from earlier trends that left Helm on the outs and looking like the big spender of county dollars.

Now, Thacker’s overuse of one-cent funds and the need for more money before fiscal year’s end has left him out-on-the limb as a big spender. Helm appears to be ready to come to the rescue — not with his own one-cent money as he has little or none to spare — but by reaching into the pockets of future County budgets.

This shift is a move away from DeLozier’s conservative money management principals to a more spend-it-if-you’ve-got-it strategy.