What is especially unsettling about Workman's current problems and the misuses of county vehicles, credit cards and gasoline earlier this year is that by changing the form of government from the commission to the council-mayor several years ago, it was hoped that this kind of thing would be averted.

The commission form of government is, by nature, subject to abuse.

I covered Salt Lake City Hall during a late 1970s scandal that led city residents to junk the old commission in favor of a council-mayor form in the city. And it was hoped that in county government a similar changing of the guard would lead to better county management.

In some cases, it probably has.

Workman points with pride to her administration's avoidance of property tax increases, steamlining of government and so on.

Under the commission form of government, the elected commissioners acted as the government's executive and legislative branches. They set budgets for departments they themselves ran. They built little kingdoms. And when tax dollars didn't match what they wanted to spend, they didn't have the fiscal discipline to cut their own budgets. They just raised taxes instead.

Worse, you routinely saw commissioners look the other way when fellow commissioners and/or the departments they ran were sloppy with personnel procedures, expenditures or with taking-care-of-my-buddies actions.

I don't know what's going to happen to Workman.

Political history tells me she will either get out of her race, resign her office or lose the election. It's unlikely she can survive this and still be mayor come next January.

As this column is written, Yocom has not yet decided how to proceed. And there's a chance, even if slim, that he won't charge her. But after reading the panel's report, I don't see how he can avoid charging her.

Yocom is, after all, an elected politician as well as a prosecutor.

And he remembers what happened in 1998. Then-GOP county attorney Neal Gunnarson had declined to charge then-Salt Lake City Mayor Deedee Corradini, a Democrat, after it was revealed that the mayor had asked big-shot city dwellers, some who had business with the city, for personal $10,000 contributions so she could avoid selling her Avenues house to satisfy a business bankruptcy ruling against her.

That June, GOP primary voters kicked Gunnarson out of office when he ran for re-election. All the while, Gunnarson said he legally couldn't have charged the mayor. His fellow Republicans didn't agree.

Yocom, a Democrat, now faces the same situation with Workman, a Republican.

Despite a record she's proud of, despite a $500,000 campaign war chest, despite Republicans outnumbering Democrats in the county, Mayor Nancy Workman now has to answer serious questions about her judgment and honesty.

Even with a change in the form of county government, it seems to be back to business as usual at county headquarters.

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Deseret Morning News political editor Bob Bernick Jr. may be reached by e-mail at bbjr@desnews.com