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12/21/2005: "The End Of An Era"

(Lil Hamel, Clerk of the BOCC, joins the Commissioners for the last photo of the BOCC. Lil will be retiring at the first of the year)

The Board of County Commissioners have held their last meeting, and now the sitting members will start-up in January as the first members of the new Charter form of Government.

Commissioner Myhr stated that he believed he was speaking for the full Board when he said that "We want this to be as smooth a process as possible, and that while it is revolutionary event, it is going to be an evolutionary process; and it is not going to happen overnight. We will not be able to make all the changes all at once. As we develop new rules for the Council, we will have to use existing Board rules until we put new rules in place".

Commissioner Ranker said that "My primary goal is to appoint a high level Pro Tem, but we may have to appoint someone as a temporary Pro Tem until we can find the right person", at which point Myhr said the primary "goal is to find a full-time County Administrator" to which Lichter added that a "key person is essential".

County Prosecutor Gaylord reminded the Commissioners that the Charter has taken away their administrative authority, so if they do not act quickly to appoint a Pro Tem, and then a County Administrator, as required by the Charter, some areas of County government will grind to a halt.

The new form of government starts January 9th when the current Board will be sworn in as Council members. Once that is completed SJC will have a new government.

Their first order of business is to secure a bond, and then to elect a new Chair and Vice Chair. Under the Charter they are then required to appoint an Administrator Pro Tem and start a "professional search" for a County Administrator "qualified to carry out duties. Search should be complete within 120 days".