Columbia County updates: resignations, hires, budget

COLUMBIA COUNTY­-Virginia Schmidt is the ever-capable Clerk of the Board for the Board of Columbia County Commissioners (BOCC), in that position for a year and a half. Here is what this reporter learned by picking her brain last week and by following up with various department heads.

Chris Mills, Columbia County's Assessor, has announced her last day with the County on Sept. 30. She has been with the County for over thirty years, first as the Chief Deputy Clerk in the Assessor's Office and the last nineteen years as County Assessor.

"I had the privilege to get to know many wonderful people," Mills said.

She said she strove to treat all people fairly and equally and feels she was successful in doing so.

Mills and her husband have sold their home here and purchased a home in Ferry County where they will enjoy being retired.

The remainder of Mills' term, which ends on Dec. 31, 2022, will be filled by the BOCC, who must appoint someone from a list compiled by the local Republican party. Tammy Ketterman is the sole candidate for the position in the November General Election for the next four-year term, which begins on Jan. 1, 2023.

Schmidt said County Auditor Anne Higgins has resigned from her position, effective August 30, 2022. The BOCC appointed Cathy Abel, who works in the Auditor's Office, as the Interim Auditor. Higgins' name is on the ballot for the next four-year term, which begins on Jan. 1. If elected, Higgins will resign. It is up to the local Republican party and the BOCC to find a replacement for her.

County Engineer Grant Morgan is switching his allegiance from Garfield County to Columbia County as a full-time employee, beginning on Nov. 1. Schmidt applauded his hiring.

"We're super happy to have him."

The commissioners are taking steps to bring a human resources manager on board. The BOCC has approved a job description, and the position is now being advertised. This person must have experience handling public records requests.

The County has been swamped with "lots" of records requests for some time, particularly in the Auditor's Office, the Sheriff's Office, and the Prosecuting Attorney's Office. The BOCC is looking for temporary help with that.

Columbia County Prosecuting Attorney Dale Slack said his office is struggling with a few of them.

"I have lost count, but Virginia is doing an incredible job of keeping track of them; it's just the footwork of gathering, examining, redacting, and sending out the completed packages that we are struggling with."

The HVAC installation project at the county courthouse is finally coming to fruition. Schmidt said Engineering Tech Dave Finney has been working on that project for the past several years and deserves recognition for his hard work.

That project was authorized by the BOCC in Dec. of 2021. The idea was to use funds the county received from the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) to help manage the Covid-19 situation.

Finney said the U.S. Dept. of the Treasury had not yet released its final rule (guidelines on how the money could be spent) at that time. Under the interim rule, the guidelines regarding how the County's ARPA dollars could be allocated were rather strict.

"In order to use those dollars for HVAC, we were looking at having to increase the scope of the project's ventilation component significantly, to be in compliance with the rule."

The County began exploring different possibilities and came up with the idea to use a Dry Hydrogen Peroxide (DHP) cleaning system to make the design acceptable under the rule.

At the beginning of 2022, many public entities were finding it difficult to spend their ARPA dollars under the interim restrictions, Finney said. Then, in April of this year, the U.S. Treasury Department published a final rule regarding how ARPA funds could be spent, and that rule relaxed many of the restrictions in place.

"This allowed us the flexibility to move forward with the project as originally designed without the additional Covid mitigating DHP system. We then proceeded into the final design phase while waiting to receive the balance of the ARPA funds."

Finney said the County received the balance from ARPA about two weeks ago. Those funds and a three-year-old grant from the state Dept. of Archaeology and Historic Preservation are being used to finance the $763,673.82 project.

The call for bids will be published in the paper on record. Finney said the project has been uploaded and advertised in local and regional plan rooms. A pre-bid conference for all qualified and interested contractors is set for Monday, Sept. 19. Bids are due on Friday, Sept. 30, and will be opened at the regular BOCC meeting on Oct. 3.

The scope of the project is to replace the existing water source heat pump system, including the cooling tower, boilers, and water source heat pumps inside the courthouse. Ductwork and piping modifications will be made to accommodate connection to the new water source heat pumps, but most of the existing ductwork and piping will be reused.

That's all for now. Look for more news from the county in future editions of the Times.