Lincoln County Commission hold special meeting to begin process to fill Otten vacancy

The Lincoln County Board of Commissioners met for a special meeting on Monday, June 22.Commissioners discussed the resignation of Commissioner Betty Otten and considered the appointment procedures for the vacancy. 

Chief Civil Deputy State’s Attorney, Drew DeGroot requested board action to acknowledge the resignation of Commissioner Betty Otten and consider the appointment procedures for the District #2 Commissioner vacancy pursuant to SDCL 3-4-4. 

“As I’m sure you are all aware, Commissioner Otten’s resignation became effective June 18 and now we will have 35 days to fill that appointment. The deadline for that will be July 23 and this special meeting was called to discuss that process and find out what the commission would like to do,” DeGroot said. 

DeGroot’s recommendation to the board is to have interested parties submit letters of interest to the commission office for consideration. 

“This would allow this commission to see background, what their interest is, and how they believe they are a qualified candidate for the position,” he said. 

Commissioner Doug Putnam asked why Otten’s opponent during the election, Mr. Carlson, wouldn’t be chosen as the candidate for the job. 

“That would be up to the board if that’s the route you want to go, but keep in mind Jim Jibben ran too,” DeGroot responded. 

Two methods of appointment process are possible, one includes an appointment process with a motion and a second utilized in all meetings, the other is the nomination and ballot process where each commissioner nominates a person of their choosing, without a second, to be placed on a ballot. 

“I like the idea of publishing it on the website, and I think we should capture letters of interest from the public to create transparency and as the letters roll in, they should be made available to commissioners as well,” Commissioner Joel Arends said. 

DeGroot agreed stating all phone calls should be directed to the commission office to not lose track of those that are interested in the position. 

“My only concern is the night vote, me generally, I think that it’s a good idea, but if we do have 30 people apply, I can see us taking a much longer time for us to get through having folks come up. It might take a whole day, so I think it should happen during the day due to time constraints,” Chairwoman Tiffani Landeen said. 

“To quote you Commissioner Arends, this is one of those rare times that we agree on something,” Commissioner Jim Schmidt said. 

“I would support setting July 7, so they have to submit their interest, it has to be in writing, and it should be posted. I fully agree with the interview process, I went through that myself and I think it’s a great opportunity for the public to see the individuals that come forward and their qualifications and how well they address the issues that are in front of the commission,” Schmidt continued. 

A motion was made to have letters of interest made by June 30 with interviews starting July 7 by Landeen. Motion was suspended by Landeen for further comment. Commissioner Arends asked for the process to move to applications and interviews starting on June 30 to give commissioners more time to think over candidate applications and have an overflow date of July 7 if there were a large number of candidates. Landeen modified her motion to have letters of interest submitted by June 29 at 5 p.m. with interviews beginning at the June 30 meeting at 6:30 p.m. and continue as needed depending on the number of applicants with all interviews happening at night meetings, seconded by Arends, motion carried unanimously. Landeen also made the motion to adopt the procedures put forth by the Chief Civil Deputy State’s Attorney, seconded by Arends. 

Commissioner Schmidt asked for public comment on the matter and Chad Skiles was the first to speak. 

“I agree with every single point that has been discussed this morning on the process, except for one and I was glad to hear about it more than once on the openness and transparency of this process. I agreed right up until the point of the commissioners, our elected officials, casting the vote to appoint a name. I am opposed to the ballot process and I think you need to be just as open and transparent as the rest of us and your votes for each person that applied is public record,” he said. 

DeGroot said the votes would be made public and would be filed in the auditors office. 

Motion carried unanimously.