ATHABASCA – Athabasca County will not start its search for a new chief administrative officer until after the October 18 municipal elections.
Councillors were presented with several options on how and when to proceed with the search at their Aug. 10 regular meeting, and passed a motion, 5-1, after a short discussion where most agreed the current council should have no part in choosing the new administrator. Coun. Doris Splane and Coun Travais Johnson were absent from the meeting.
Interim CAO Dawn Phillips, who has been in the position since the resignation of former CAO Ryan Maier in June, recommended the hiring of a consultant to assist with recruitment as the county has done traditionally, at a cost of no more than $17,500 from operation reserves to get the process underway by Sept. 13. Other options to have the county’s human resources department start the recruitment process, or to table until after the election were also presented.
Phillips said the consultant option would allow for candidates to be selected by the new council after they were shortlisted by the consulting firm, whereas waiting until after the election would mean it may take until 2022 to have a new administrator in place. A hybrid option of having HR do the initial legwork and then handing it off to a consultant was also available, she said.
Coun. Dwayne Rawson noted there could potentially be up to three current directors applying for the position so any in-house decisions on even choosing a consultant could be seen as a conflict of interest.
Coun. Dennis Willcott agreed, saying he didn’t want the current council choosing shortlisted candidates either and that the selection of a new CAO should be newly-elected councillors first task.
“Let the new council come in in October and that will be on the table, No. 1, and start picking them,” he said. “We might like somebody and the new council may not like the people we pick.”
Coun. Kevin Haines expressed some concern the timeline was just too long and it may be prudent to get the process underway sooner than later.
Coun. Christi Bilsky was initially of the same mind, but eventually decided it would be best to put it off until after the election.
“I don't want this council, picking or choosing anything with the way things have gone, but I think we can certainly get the process started with a closing date of Oct. 18, election day,” she said. “I would be very opposed to us having our nose in it at all.”
Reeve Larry Armfelt pointed out that would require the current council to choose a consulting firm, so Bilsky relented, and the motion to delay until after the election was approved.
