Good Government Advocate Joe Lynn Rises From the Dead -- Almost
Joe Lynn -- a former commissioner and staffer with the Ethics Commission and a self-admitted good government kvetch who was a fixture at the commission's meetings -- is now able to do something many people dream about, but few experience. He can read his own obituaries.
Lynn told SF Weekly he's leaving California Pacific Medical Center on Thursday, roughly 50 days after he checked in. After undergoing treatment for acute leukemia, Lynn, at one point, was so close to death's door that a group of his closest friends actually converged to make decisions about pulling the plug. One of them told me at the time "it will take a miracle" to stave off that decision. As Lynn put it to me yesterday with a laugh, "I'm told I pulled quite an act there." (He was, however, still suggesting story ideas to reporters from what turned out to not quite be his deathbed).
As Lynn's health bottomed out, I sent out e-mails to his friends and colleagues in preparation for an obit. Here's some of what I got back:
Former Ethics Commissioner Paul Melbostad recently called Joe "the living embodiment of San Francisco Campaign Finance reform."
Joe's efforts include:
- providing a sounding board and well of sagacity for the development of good government policy and campaign finance etiquette; exposing good government scandals;
- facilitating the dawn of SF's electronic campaign finance database in 1998 (once considered the best in the nation);
- enhancing local press access to campaign finance data during key elections such as Nov. 2000;
- providing a great example of making the best of a hostile, retaliatory work environment by resigning from Ethics Commission staff in 2003 and then promptly getting appointed as a Commissioner;
- facilitating unprecedented amendments to the SF Campaign Finance Reform Ordinance in 2006; & tirelessly working on improving the routinely inept and corrupt operations and direction of the SF's good government watchdog, the Ethics Commission; not to mention motivating and encouraging the good works and creative endeavors of his friends and colleagues, be they political, artistic, culinary, or academic.
Lynn told us he'll be spending some time in a hospice/rehabilitation home to get up some strength before going back home. It may be a little time in coming, but we've yet to see the last of Joe Lynn grilling the hell out of the powers-that-be at Ethics Commission meetings.
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