The World Around You

Secretary of State Nancy Worley is one of the more incompetent public officials I have seen in my time in Alabama. She makes more news for bonehead decisions than a Secretary of State ever should.

In an interview Wednesday, Worley pointed out a legal quirk mentioned in the attorney general’s opinion: State law does not specify who should call the advisory board together.

Attorney general’s opinions do not carry the force of law.

Legal precedent, according to the opinion, expects the chairman to call the meeting. But the panel, which is appointed by new officeholders every four years, has not met since Chapman, Sparks and Riley took office in 2003, so it has no chairman.

Further complicating the matter, said Worley, is that past meetings have been convened by the state’s director of voter registration.

Before Worley assumed office, the voter registration office answered to the governor, agriculture commissioner and auditor. But the office is now under Worley’s purview, and the director’s post has been vacant since its longtime occupant, Anita Tatum, resigned amid strained relations with Worley.

So, she also has zero walking around sense. Well, legally speaking, we can’t have a meeting, because there’s no chairman to call a meeting, because we haven’t met yet, because the person I forced out of her job was in charge of that. Sure, right, that makes sense…

**Crossposted at Polstate.com