The reactions were surprise and disappointment when the Commissioners Court announced this week it would not appoint a new County Judge until the last week of March at the earliest. The four Commissioners met for almost an hour in a closed door executive session with Assistant County Attorney Denise Gremillion and Human Resources Director Lori Ardoin at the close of the Commissioners Court meeting.
Commissioner for Precinct 3 and County Judge Pro Temp John Gothia explained the first steps were discussed in the executive session of selecting a replacement for the county judge. This included getting all the information about the process and learning the legal way to do it. Gothia added, “Everybody wanted to do their own research after that.”
The next Commissioners Court meeting has been moved to Wednesday of next week. The change will allow at least two of the Commissioners to attend a meeting in Galveston on Tuesday concerning the coastal spine project being planned by the Corps of Engineers. A quorum could not be present on Tuesday so the meeting has been moved to Wednesday at 1:30 PM in the Administration Building at the Courthouse.
In addition to working to name a new County Judge, the Commissioners must now fill the position of another elected county official at the end of March. Chris Humble the Constable for Precinct 1 announced Tuesday he will be retiring from his constable position to take a job with the Stark Foundation on April 1.
Gothia indicated replacing Humble was not a topic during this week’s closed-door session of the Commissioners Court since it was not on the agenda. Finding a replacement probably will be discussed at next week’s meeting in another executive session.
The County Judge Pro Temp confirmed the Commissioners will select the next Constable in Precinct 1, and believes they are already reaching out for candidates to fill the position. “Him announcing that lets that process start taking place kind of on its own,” Gothia concluded.
He anticipates the process going similar to finding the replacement for Constable David Cagle in Precinct 2 last year when Cagle died in late September. Several candidates emailed the Commissioners about being interested in filling that position including Sheriff’s Deputy Mark Jones who was appointed to be the Constable for Precinct 2 in October.
-Dan Perrine, KOGT-
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