BOC votes for a ‘county administrator'

When his supporters and others told the board they are opposed to the county-management form of government and reducing Yearwood’s responsibilities, Hendrix offered a compromise motion. Instead of acting to change the charter or to hire a “county manager,” he made a motion to have county attorney Angie Davis prepare a job description for a county administrator and to have it available for action at the May 11 board meeting.

That top administrative position – also called chief of operations – has been vacant since the February 2009 resignation of Keith Lee.

The motion was approved in a 4-2 vote, with Larry Joe Wilburn and Eva Elder voting no.

But the move was much weaker than the BOC voting to change the county county charter and move to a full county manger form of government.

YEARWOOD TAKES CONTROL
The dramatic fight was vintage Barrow County politics.

Taking control of the discussion before it began, Yearwood read from a prepared statement that pointed out alleged financial mistakes while the previous top administrators were in charge and together earning salaries totaling $230,000.

In the wake of their departures, he said he has used his best judgment in running the government and he said he would continue to perform the job he was elected to do.

He then put the BOC on notice: “I will neither continue to entertain or be subjected to such obvious abuses of power aimed at me, based on personal vendettas.”

Yearwood then turned the meeting over to Hendrix, who is chairman pro tem, and sat down at the back of the room.

With the rest of the audience, he watched as three citizens addressed the board during a public comment period – a comment period the chairman had moved from the start of the meeting to the end.

And he listened as the board’s discussion nearly dissolved into a shouting match, after two of his supporters suddenly rose from their seats and verbally took on a couple of the commissioners calling for a new top manager.

One of those attacked, commissioner Isaiah Berry, was attempting to explain his reasons for supporting the proposal, saying he has no personal vendetta, but believes Yearwood needs help running the government.

“Raise your hand if you think you can run the day-to-day operations of this county by yourself,” Berry said.

A woman’s voice rang out, “Why aren’t you running it?”

When he tried to continue his remarks, but was again interrupted, the retired high school coach said in a firm voice: “I am not going to get in an argument with you. I am not going to argue with anybody. I am going to say what I have to say, and that is it. I believe in my heart that Mr. Yearwood needs some help. I don’t care how much you stand and argue on that. You cannot, in your right mind, think anything differently.”

POWER STRUGGLE
The showdown was the culmination of a power struggle that has gone on largely behind the scenes for most of Yearwood’s 15-month administration.

Alarmed by the loss of many professional managers and directors during the first half of last year, the board in late July 2009 tried to get Yearwood to agree to hire a professional administrator.

Instead, he convinced them to promote purchasing director Bob Hohe to “operations development manager.”

While that has turned into a key administrative position in terms of project management and, more recently, supervision of a few small departments, Yearwood has retained ultimate control.

The chairman also has resisted implementing some board-approved directives – from not mothballing a defective ambulance last year until a second board vote, to refusing to take the anger management classes recommended by an attorney after a three-month investigation into allegations of employment discrimination.

Cartersville attorney David G. Archer recommended that Yearwood take both anger management and government management classes.

“Several interviewees told me of incidents when Chairman Yearwood lost his temper and yelled at them, but this has happened with both males and females,” Archer wrote in his Jan. 26 report. “And, it does appear that Chairman Yearwood speaks to employees (and some Commissioners) in loud, angry, harsh tones.”

However, the county chairman has blamed his elevated voice on his hearing problem rather than his temper. And the commissioners do not have the power to force him to take classes, since he is an elected official rather than an employee.

THE CITIZENS WEIGH IN
Public sentiment Tuesday night was in Yearwood’s favor.

Frank Clark, a member of the county’s Board of Assessors, said the county doesn’t need to waste money on a professional manager because “you’ve got a chairman that does the job and does it well.”

And he said any charter change should be put before the voters in a referendum, not left up to the board of commissioners and the county’s state delegation.

Clark said the BOC in the past few months has been spending money foolishly.

“How much money have you spent asking the county attorney to look into the re-chartering behind the back of the chairman?” he said. “This is ridiculous. Let the chairman run the county.”

Former commissioner Bill Healan said he is not a fan of the county-manager form of government because it “simply insulates what is done to another …person not accountable to the voters.”

A county manager often works under a contract, and as has happened in other jurisdictions, when the wrong manager is hired, buying out that contract can be expensive, Healan said.

“I urge we proceed with an awful lot of caution in this,” he said.

However, Healan said the chairman does not run the county.

“It only takes a cursory reading of the charter to see that the chairman carries out the policy set by the board,” he said. “He controls the day-to-day activities, but he cannot make unilateral decisions in opposition to what you propose.”

Healan said he has privately talked to Yearwood about delegating responsibility.

“A leader who cannot delegate cannot lead,” he said. “He cannot do it all himself, particularly with the amount of experience he has. He has two years of experience and suddenly we are asking him to cover every aspect of a $30-million organization? It’s ludicracy.”

The third speaker, a woman in real estate, said the commission should do the best job it can without spending any more money.

“We don’t need a county manager to further burden the county with money we don’t have to spend,” she said to applause from Yearwood’s backers.

CHAIRMAN NEEDS HELP
During the board’s discussion, commissioner Steve Worley said he has said from the beginning that Yearwood needs help with operations.

“He can’t do it by himself,” Worley said. “And this board needs help too. I’m not saying the chairman is doing everything wrong.”

Worley said many of the decisions the board made early last year concerning the reorganization of the county government have now been reversed.

Wednesday morning, Worley explained.

“I feel we need somebody in there that can help the chairman with personnel issues and stuff and help him with day-to-day operations. We’re not trying to take power away from him but to get him some help as well as to help us.

“To me, if we had had this type person in there when we were doing the reductions in force, I think all that stuff we reversed wouldn’t have been put that way to start.”