Sharon McDonald needs to go

Sharon McDonald, Norfolk's commissioner of revenue, has apparently decided that she doesn't want another term in office.

It's hard to think of another explanation for her decision to hire her daughter again to work in her department, this time over the Christmas break.

The money is neither enormous nor particularly important. What is bewildering - and telling - is why McDonald, after a year in which her judgment was almost continually and rightfully criticized, has apparently learned nothing about how a public official should conduct herself.

Going back through 2010 - with its lingering feuds with City Hall and the city treasurer, her irresponsible use of a city credit card, her lobbying at cross purposes with Norfolk's interest, her use of a city-paid employee to do so, her attempts to conceal information - taxpayers might've reasonably thought McDonald would use the holidays to reflect on a difficult year.

"I've already admitted to mistakes in judgment," a chastened McDonald said back in September. "Obviously, I must do better. And I will."

So much for September resolutions.

Through her spokesman, McDonald defended hiring her daughter last month for a job that wasn't advertised and for which no other candidates were considered.

"This is the busiest time of the year for my office and hiring Marlee, because of her experience, eliminates the costly process of trying to train a part-time employee," said McDonald, in a story by The Pilot's Harry Minium.

That's a perfectly reasonable explanation, and it doesn't matter one bit.

No matter how good an employee her daughter may be, it does not provide a reason to violate what are common-sense prohibitions against nepotism. It is a universal rule, outside of family businesses, that close relatives shouldn't hire or supervise each other. The office of the commissioner of revenue is not a family business. It is an arm of the government, which is to say the taxpayer, which is to say us.

Even if McDonald can legally skirt such prohibitions because her position is a constitutional office, an entity unto itself, taxpayers have made it abundantly clear that they don't approve. So has almost every elected official at every level. And yet, for whatever reason, McDonald has done it again.

McDonald, elected in 2009 to a fourth four-year term, is either defiant or oblivious to the wishes of her constituents to a degree unprecedented in recent memory. Or she just doesn't care enough to do the right thing. Or she thought nobody would notice.

Regardless, the only conclusion that reasonably follows is that McDonald doesn't want any more time in office. Voters should oblige her at the first opportunity.