PORT ANGELES — First, you have your partisan political offices — public posts won by party nominees.
Next come nonpartisan jobs for which candidates profess no party affiliation, at least not in their campaigns.
Now, Clallam County Charter Review Commission members have managed to divide themselves along non-nonpartisan lines.
Although the commission is officially nonpartisan, the split divided Republicans from Democrats at their initial meeting Wednesday.
Democrats echoed their recent federal and state victories, beating Republicans 10 votes to five as they chose John Miller of Port Angeles as their chairman over David Cummins.
Miller, former chief of the Clallam County Democratic Party, also will become the elected director of the county Department of Community Development on Jan. 2, leaving his current job as executive director of the Lower Elwha Klallam tribe.
The Charter Review Commission consists of 15 members, known as freeholders, who will examine Clallam County’s home rule charter over the next year and recommend changes to voters next November.
County constitution
The charter is the county’s constitution that lets it decide many policies for itself rather than following state statutes.
Freeholders next chose Sue Erzen — also over Cummins — as first vice chairwoman, Patti Adler over Randy Simmons as second vice chairwoman, and Rod Fleck unanimously as parliamentarian.
Erzen, of Sequim, is active in the Clallam County League of Women Voters.
Adler is a property manager and community activist in Clallam Bay, and Fleck is Forks’ city attorney/planner.