Off Beat: City councilor careful to make sure the many hats he wears don’t clash

Jack Burkman was just a tick-tock away from achieving a distinctive triple play of governmental leadership.

In November, Burkman was elected to a spot on Vancouver city council.

While waiting to be sworn in as the city’s new Position 1 council member, Burkman was already on the governing bodies of two other public entities: He was chairman of the Fort Vancouver Regional Library District’s board of directors and was vice chairman of the Clark College board of trustees.

While those two spots aren’t elected positions — college trustees are appointed by the governor, and library board members are appointed by the commissioners of Clark, Skamania and Klickitat counties — they do oversee tax-supported public agencies. That makes them part of the local government structure.

The various paths of Burkman’s public service roles hit a crossroads in the closing second of Dec. 31, 2009; his seven-year term on the regional library board concluded at the end of the day, and Burkman’s four-year stint as a Vancouver City councilor started as the calendar flipped to Jan. 1, 2010.

His appointment as a Clark College trustee, which started in October 2008, runs through Sept. 30, 2013.

There isn’t much likelihood of conflict of interest in any of those roles, Burkman said. Still, Burkman said he tries to make sure there isn’t a hint of crossing the line — even if it might be perfectly legal.

Clark College and the city have been partnering on a Japanese garden, and Burkman said he has abstained from any involvement on the joint project.

Monday, Monday

Burkman’s election did produce one conflict actually, but it was a matter of timetable, not policy. The city council has had a long-standing Monday meeting schedule. Clark also had scheduled its monthly meetings on Monday. To accommodate Burkman’s new position, Clark College trustees in January moved monthly meetings to Tuesdays.

Off Beat lets members of The Columbian news team step back from our newspaper beats to write the story behind the story, fill in the story or just tell a story.