I have served as the Grafton County register of deeds for 11½ years, receiving the vote of confidence last November from 47,467 of my fellow citizens to return me to my sixth term. I have served as vice president of the New Hampshire Register of Deeds Association and now serve as president. This service required me to spend a great deal of time in legislative committees in Concord.

It is from this experience that I write.

I can clearly see that a new day has dawned in Grafton County. I have been blessed to witness extraordinary leadership germinate and flourish, and her name is Wendy Piper.

Commissioner Piper’s intellect, common sense, determination, work ethic and ability to dissect a problem and seek solutions is responsible for this new era for our county. Piper also serves as president of the New Hampshire Association of Counties, which greatly contributes to her work load. Her friendship with and respect for Republican Commissioner Omer Ahern unlocked the former partisan gridlock and bickering. With Ahern’s vote, Piper became the new chair of the Grafton County Board of Commissioners.

I have had the pleasure of working with Commissioner Ahern over multiple terms. We fought Northern Pass together. I credit his innovative “Just Omer” show, available on Pemi-Baker Public Access Television, with helping keep the southeastern corner of the county informed.

As a real estate attorney, he understands the value of my office and I have always appreciated his input and ear.

He has also been a tireless advocate for the County Farm and has gone back to basics with his “FarmDoc Plan.”

Once these two minds met, there was no stopping the reset. These two dedicated public servants worked tirelessly to craft the excellent budget that was just adopted for fiscal year 2022 with little input from the County Legislative Delegation.

But with reset and rebirth, a death must first occur. Much like Rhett and Scarlett watching the Old South die, I feel very privileged to have been eyewitness to that death. The last gasp of the powerless and flailing ideologue was on full display during the June 28 meeting as feeble attempts were made to control what is uncontrollable.

Many busy people were held hostage for hours while a handful of Republicans indulgently strategized and then acted out their futile obstructionism.

In the past, the Ray Burton era, the Democrats and Republicans of the Delegation arrived an hour prior to the start of the meeting to caucus. Those days of respect and courtesy are truly gone with the wind.

Most notable was the behavior of the leadership of the Executive Committee, who failed to recognize the hard work and commitment of the Board of Commissioners or the brilliant and always dependable Grafton County finance director, Julie Libby, who has carried the burden of two full-time roles for far too long and is the rock that Grafton County is centered around.

Not a word to the eager and innovative new county administrator, Andrew Dorsett, who has hit the ground running, having just arrived in February as the department budgets were just about to be presented to the Board of Commissioners.

Nothing to the department heads, who work for half a year preparing their figures, specifically the Human Resource Department, which rose to the challenges of managing everything COVID-19 related throughout every other department.

I have rarely heard them praise any Grafton County elected official and expect nothing, but most important they ignored the essential workers. Instead, as we have so often seen from the stereotypical politician who lacks any self-awareness, they congratulated only themselves for showing up. The egos.

But I do not believe that the blame for this type of collective behavior can be placed on individuals, as they participate in a form of government, well-intentioned or not, that does not equate a reasonable value on their time and energy. This system attracts, almost exclusively, people who can afford to place no value on their own time but are then tasked with determining the value of the time of others.

And then there are the ideologues with nothing better to do with their time then advance their cause at the expense of everyone else. A great deal of time was wasted on June 28, and that is the biggest insult of all to those who have consistently showed up and toiled over the past year during a pandemic.

In closing, I would like to thank my team, the most dedicated and knowledgeable group of people I have ever had the pleasure to work alongside.

They showed up every single day, assisted the stressed and agitated public, and recorded thousands of documents to the official public record.

We will close fiscal 2021 by contributing $1.5 million back to General Fund, and we are just getting started.

Kelley Jean Monahan, of Orford, is register of deeds for Grafton County.