County group favors coordinator

After multiple meetings and hours of discussion, the special county committee for administration on Friday voted to recommend adding responsibilities and authority to the existing administrative coordinator/ human resources position rather than creating a new administrative position to lead county operations on a day-to-day basis.

“I don’t want to keep adding and adding to keep building empires,” said committee member Mike Bub in making the decision to enhance the current position.

The recommendation will go to the full county board for discussion and action. It passed on a vote of six in favor and one abstention. The abstention came from committee member Bud Suckow who expressed concern that it would just be continuing the status quo. “You are riding a dead horse,” he said, noting that he believes the county needs someone to run the whole thing rather than look at it piecemeal.

Suckow had been an advocate for having a stronger standalone administrative position with the goal of streamlining county government and eliminating or merging many of the county’s committees and reducing the overall number of meetings.

In the discussion leading up to the decision to make the recommendation, there was some disagreement over how the position should be viewed. The Wis- See COUNTY on page 4 consin County’s Association has been assisting the county through the meeting process and in connecting with other counties that have gone through the process of implementing a full-time administrative position.

However there was some pushback against the WCA by committee members concerned that the organization was pushing for a full-time administrative coordinator.

Sarah Diedrick-Kasdorf, Director of Outreach & Member Engagement for WCA, who has been working with the county through the process, described the position suggested by the committee saying it should be a full time administrative coordinator with human resources duties. “That is not what we want to do,” said committee member Scott Mildbrand. He said their intent was to have it remain a shared position as both the administrative coordinator and the human resources director. He also noted the county was already set to bring additional help in the human resources office and that more help could be provided to allow duties to be delegated.

“That is a lot for one person to do,” said committee member Lorie Floyd expressing concern about there being enough time in the day to get everything done.

Prior to the recommendation, commit-tee members heard from Price County administrator Nick Trimner who had been Price County’s finance director as the county went through the transition to having an administrator. Trimner was joined by Cassandra Hanan who is the full-time administrative coordinator for Vernon County.

The major difference between the two full-time positions is that state law spells out the job duties, responsibilities and authorities of a county administrator including financial and appointment powers for boards and commissions. Administrative Coordinator job descriptions, duties and responsibilities are set by the county board and can be changed by the county board. In practice, there was little practical difference in the authority and responsibilities between the Vernon and Price county administrative positions who spoke to the committee.

“It looks very much like a county administrator,” Hanan said of her position, noting the Vernon County board created an administrator position in 2020 and in the end of 2022 decided to step back from that title and created the position she currently holds.

Trimner noted that one of his first duties in being hired as administrator was for the directive to eliminate positions in order for the new position to fit in the budget. He said at the time he was hired for the position 10 years ago, they made the choice to eliminate the human resources director position. Trimner said he initially focused on finances but that the human resources side of the job currently takes a significant amount of his time with recruitment, retention and discipline. He said Price County currently has both a finance director and a human resources director in addition to his administrator position.

While both county leaders cautioned