After crony appointment of Sivarajah she gets a crony salary, but Anoka County politicians see no evil, hear no evil, and speak no evil.

Although Strib (not the local paper) reports Matt Look CYA objection to the 5-1 decision, the deal got done. Those county politicians form quite a tight club. It's the peoples' fault for electing them, thereby getting the government they deserve. As a general rule, vote the incumbent out unless an exceptional job is done. That is how you end up having exceptional people. Reelecting mediocrity never improves any government. Yet the beat goes on.

UPDATE: Lakeland Broadcasting's online coverage is tightly well written:

(Anoka County, MN) -- Anoka County administrator and former Commissioner Rhonda Sivarajah is getting a ten-thousand dollar pay raise. The raise is double the pay hike rate for many employees and was awarded by the County Board she used to chair. Only one commissioner dissented in the vote this week on the six-percent raise for Sivarajah, saying the increase looks like cronyism. Sivarajah's raise follows three-percent raises for county officials that commissioners approved earlier this month.

It would be offensive if the council were to insist they must pay Sivirajah top dollar so that she does not move to some other job in some other county. That thought is absurd. That is no threat; her cronies are here. She's housed outside the county, but that does not mean she'd relocate jobs; and that is so with or without the most recent additional largess toward her (with public money) by former elected colleagues she used to cordially chair.