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62 °F Forecast | Road Cams Friday, March 18, 2005 Today's News | Classifieds | Autos | Homes | Jobs | Tempo | Health | Community | Home Delivery SECTIONS Home Page Local News Sports Business Obituaries Life Opinion Tempo AP News Weather Classified Archives Site Map SPECIAL SECTIONS Since We Asked Outdoor Journal Menu Guide How To Guide Health Readers' Choice Real Estate Showcase Real Estate Guide Joy Magazine Homelife Magazine Wedding Guide Passport to the Rogue Valley SHOP OUR VALLEY AutoFinder HomeFinder JobFinder Classified Place an ad TOP JOBS EXTRA Ashland News NIE Personals Movie Times TV Times E The People Volunteer Moving here? eSouthernOregon CUSTOMER SERVICE FAQ's Advertise with us Home Delivery Employment Contact Us Media Kit Oregon Road Conditions & Cams Email Story to a Friend January 27, 2005 Sadler’s appointment to Marine Board held up By MARK FREEMAN Mail Tribune It’s the kind of petty politics that pundit Russell Sadler would have ridiculed in his newspaper column, radio show or television commentary over the past 30 years. But this time, he’s living it. Gov. Ted Kulongoski last summer appointed Sadler, acerbic-witted former political commentator, to an unpaid seat on the Oregon State Marine Board. But his confirmation to this relatively obscure agency has been held up in the Oregon Senate by some conservatives apparently exercising their chance to tweak the nose of someone who’s made a career of tweaking theirs. Sen. Jason Atkinson says members of the Republican caucus pulled Sadler’s name from the confirmation rolls last November to upstage the former Ashland resident, who regularly chided legislators — particularly conservatives — for their politics and public policy. "There was some heartburn with him," says Atkinson, R-Central Point. "A handful of Republicans were sensitive to him getting an appointment on the Marine Board. I wasn’t one of them. Advertisement "I think that pettiness is why the Oregon Legislature has a bad reputation." Jim Myron, Kulongoski’s natural-resource adviser overseeing the Marine Board, says Sadler’s name likely will be sent back to the Senate for confirmation late this month or early in February. Atkinson expects Sadler to gain confirmation. "He won’t have any trouble this time," Atkinson says. Sadler says he never expected trouble in getting confirmed to an agency as innocuous as the Marine Board. After all, this is a tiny agency that sees precious little controversy and no general-fund money, allowing it and its members generally to fly far beneath the political radar. "We didn’t know this was going to take so long," says Sadler, 62. "It’s not me. It’s not the Marine Board. It’s the games being played in the Senate." Just as chinook and elk sometimes bring out the worst behavior in sportsmen, politics occasionally do the same to politicians. "Some of the best people in Oregon I’ve met over the years are in the Legislature," Sadler says. "The truth of the matter is, some of the smallest people I’ve met are there, too. "In that respect, it’s pretty much representative of Oregon." Sadler has made a big name for himself as a left-of-center commentator for decades, creating a persona as big as his opinions in newspapers such as the Mail Tribune. Whether they loved him or loathed him, Oregonians religiously read him and listened to him until he hung up the typewriter full-time in 2001 while living in Ashland. Now retired, Sadler lives the boating life aboard his 30-foot Sundowner, splitting time between Friday Harbor, Wash., and the Port of Portland. Retirement also sheds his professional detachment from what he calls "the lords and commission" he has covered. With the new freedom, Sadler has decided to stop being part of the solution as a journalist and become part of the problem that sometimes is government. "Life in Oregon has been very good to me," Sadler says in a telephone interview from his boat in Friday Harbor. "I decided to see what I can give back." A lifelong boater who dropped in on the Marine Board from time to time, he says he was drawn to the agency when a seat opened in July. "My own prejudice is it’s one of the best-run agencies in the state and I want to keep it that way," Sadler says. Marine Board Director Paul Donheffner ran Sadler’s name up the flagpole, eventually earning Sadler the nomination. "We’ve known Russell for years, many years, on a friendly basis," Donheffner says. "He seemed like a good fit." But he was one of just two Kulongoski appointments in natural-resources agencies to be pulled during Senate confirmation hearings in November. "There was some politics last fall," Donheffner says. "I’d rather not go there." But Atkinson will go there, pointing his finger at some fellow conservatives he won’t name. Some conservatives, he says, just don’t like Sadler. And Sadler has given many conservatives, including Atkinson, plenty of reasons not to over the years. In fact, Sadler took conservative former legislator and GOP party chairman Perry Atkinson, Jason’s father, to task enough that a little bad blood could be understandable. Jason Atkinson acknowledges Sadler’s criticisms of his family, but he says he would never consider holding up Sadler’s confirmation over them. "I don’t hold grudges like that," Atkinson says. "And it’s the Marine Board, for crying out loud." Sadler, for now, remains on the outside, his seat-to-be still vacant. If confirmed, he’ll join the helm of the agency that manages and sets policy for the state's almost 200,000 registered boats, oversees education programs and funds facilities — with an annual budget of less than $14 million. "There’s no hurry here," Sadler says. "The Marine Board, generally speaking, doesn’t have contentious issues." And the man who made his living and reputation by nose-tweaking from the outside says he won’t bend any noses as the Marine Board’s newest insider. "I’m a ‘newbie,’" he says. "The important thing from a newbie is to keep his mouth shut and learn the ropes." Reach reporter Mark Freeman at 776-4470, or e-mail [email protected] Mail Tribune Home | Local News | Sports | Business | Obituaries | Life | Opinion AP News | Archives | Site Map | Community | Classified Copyright © 1997-2005 Mail Tribune, Inc. All rights reserved. Privacy Policy | Terms & Conditions | Website Feedback Student Loan Consolidation Conference Calls - $50/Month Home Security Systems Trunks, Footlocker, Trunk, Footlockers home equity loans helzberg Slippers Student Loans afsa teleconferencing Memory Foam Mattress w2 forms Tatoo Advertisement s