Last Friday, August 11th, after work, in the first interview ever in the Perkowski’s Tower Press Building, Suite 105, George, Gloria, TimF, and Yellow Dog Sammy met Barbara Sykes, candidate for Ohio State Auditor in the next election in November. Having talked to her, we already feel better, knowing that there is some hope to get us out of the tangled mess we’re in now with the unauditable audits conducted by private CPA firms prior to the Coingate blowup. But I’m getting ahead of myself. You need to listen to the podcast to see why we feel the way we do. These unauditable audits have not yet become part of the public dialogue, to my knowledge.

The conversation kicked off with a restatement of the primary function of the Office of the Auditor of the State of Ohio, which is to write the checks and to pay the bills. The office comprises abut 800 state employees, 90% of whom are trained auditors. The state auditor also sits on the Apportionment Board. At this point we got into the distinction between a CPA and a person with auditor’s experience and a background in public administration. We quickly covered more ground: her 31 years in Ohio; Holly Row, Arkansas; sharecropping; the Delta area of Mississippi and Arkansas; Clinton’s 1992 campaign; the University of Akron; the role of television in shaping our images of ourselves; the fine art of listening to calls as they come into the government offices, and how constituents will tell you the problems and what to do, if you listen; the importance of all auditors at all levels being on the same page; transparency and accountability; the role of the Investigative Division of the Auditor’s Office; the open records law, work product of CPA firms, and the subversion of the process by Ohio legislators.

Barbara speaks simply and directly about peoples’ having lost trust in their government, all the while knowing the basic question that needs to be answered and re-answered by all who hold the public trust: “What did you do with the money I already gave you?â€? She speaks about thoroughness, fairness, and professionalism, regardless of party affiliation, about how our processes have been hijacked, about how the money is in the wrong hands. In getting into the telecommunications issue and network neutrality, we got back to all utilities and access to such things for all people, especially those most challenged by poverty, and you’ll hear Barbara get choked up for a minute as her mind goes back to one of her defining moments, about the little old man. She tells us, like Hubert Humphrey, that you can gauge the health of a society by looking at how it’s treating the least fortunate of its citizens. She is at heart a social worker, and her concerns for all of us haven’t changed over the years. Sammy brings up her two “electrifyingâ€? appearances with Ted Strickland just recently, and we find she can very well hold her own in any crowd. We wrap with talking about her moral compass and her role models—not politicians, incidentally–and how she keeps her heart in the right place.

This lady helps round out a strong Democratic ticket in this state, this year. Listen closely; she lays out compelling reasons we need to change what’s come to be “business as usual� in this state, and all eyes are upon us for setting the record straight. After seeing us, she was on her way, with her husband Vernon and her daughter Emilia, to a fundraiser at the Stadium, and we hope she did well, and we wish her well in her campaign.

Our conversation with candidate for State Auditor Barbara Sykes.

Part 1. Time: 10.28
Part 2. Time: 13.18
Part 3. Time: 14.53
Part 4. Time: 13.38
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