The subplots surrounding the imminent departure of Hillsborough County Administrator Pat Bean continue to play out. These include an ongoing, de facto endorsement of the county-mayor concept.
Bean has been the wrong person at the wrong time for too long a time. Even a dysfunctional body such as the county commission deserves better than a reactive leader without vision and sans creativity. Too bad being ineffective and incompetent are not sufficient cause for firing.
But whatever the final timing — and severance details — this much seems obvious. Regardless of what the FDLE finds or doesn’t find, Bean will not leave “with dignity” — as some editorialists have framed it. That scenario is foreclosed.
Once Bean declined to step down and opted to accept humiliation in the public dock as a tradeoff for that six-figure severance package, departing with dignity was no longer an operative option.
She obviously has her price — with the cost of dignity factored in.