"Politics is Just Another Word for Relationships."

Portland Mercury:

I'm not supposed to be at work right now, but I didn't get a chance to post a short excerpt from a short interview I did with Ty Kovatch and the regret is unbearable. Ty has been Commissioner Randy Leonard's Chief of Staff/Platonic Life Partner since 2002 (and he also plays tunes). Since Leonard is not running for re-election, broken-hearted Kovatch will move over to manage the water bureau's Maintenance and Construction Group. We talked about what he'd learn in ten years of running a city commissioner's office (he was city hall's youngest chief of staff—at 24!—when he started the job). He said lots of things, but here's my favorite: Politics is just another word for relationships. Politics never really changes, but the mood of the people in the situation changes. I had to learn very early on not to get personally and emotionally invested in an issue. Because three days from now, there's going to be a new issue. The most important thing all the way along are the relationships you have. To sacrifice any of those for the moment, is shortsighted. Especially in the role I've had to play, is that's the key role of the chief of staff, to be able to work with everybody, over and over and over. [ Subscribe to the comments on this story ]

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