PORT ANGELES — Clallam County officials today will launch a seven-week search for the next hearing examiner.
Mark Nichols will be sworn in at 1 p.m. today as Clallam County prosecuting attorney, leaving the half-time hearing examiner’s position vacant.
Also today, the three commissioners will consider sending a request for proposals to applicants who are interested in the job.
Commissioners Mike Doherty and Jim McEntire fine-tuned a draft request for proposals, or RFP, in a Monday work session.
They tabled the vote to allow Commissioner Mike Chapman, who was absent, to weigh in.
A selection committee likely to include Nichols, former Hearing Examiner Chris Melly, Human Resources Director Rich Sill, one county commissioner and possibly the president of the Clallam County Bar Association will recommend three finalists for commissioners to interview in the first week of January.
“It’s kind of a fast timeline,” County Administrator Jim Jones told the board.
“On the other hand, based on the people I’ve heard from so far, I do believe we will get some highly qualified applicants, and it will cost us somewhere around 50 to 60 percent of what we had otherwise budgeted to go with either an hourly or a per-hearing system. And as you see, the RFP calls for either one or both.”
Jones said four attorneys have expressed an interest in the position.
The proposed 2015 county budget includes $91,439 for the hearing examiner.
The hearing examiner conducts administrative and quasi-judicial hearings and makes decisions on a variety of land-use permits and appeals of decisions made by county departments.
Nichols, a former chief civil deputy in the Prosecuting Attorney’s Office, was appointed as hearing examiner by two commissioners in February.
Nichols defeated Prosecuting Attorney William Payne in the Nov. 4 election.
Commissioners have the authority to make the next hearing examiner a county employee or an outside contractor.
As a half-time employee of the county, the hearing examiner would be eligible for benefits and pro-rated vacation time.
Chapman last week said he favored an in-house hearing examiner, saying he or she should be invested in the community.
Doherty and McEntire directed Jones on Monday to maintain flexibility in the request for proposals to hire an outside person or an in-house worker.
Clallam County has had an in-house hearing examiner since Melly, now a Superior Court judge, was appointed to the post in 2005.
Commissioners will decide in the coming weeks whether to invite Bar Association President Cathy Marshall to serve on the selection committee.
“It’s just a traditional way to let the bar feel that they had some role,” said Doherty, who objected to Nichols’ appointment as hearing examiner because it took place without the county advertising for the job.
“When you don’t do that, then it becomes kind of the rumor mill: ‘Why didn’t the board ask us to participate?’”
Three local attorneys, none of whom intend to apply, told Jones “in the very strongest terms that we not allow a practicing attorney other than an employee of the county on your selection committee, feeling that there was just too much chance for conflict and for games to be played,” Jones said.
Said Doherty: “Well, I see that both ways.”
“When you only have the government’s attorneys, you have an issue, too,” Doherty said.
Hearing Examiner pro-tem Lauren Erickson will handle the six remaining hearings on the docket this year.
Counting those six, there will have been 29 hearings, the most in recent memory.
There were 20 hearings in 2013, 11 in 2012, nine in 2011, 16 in 2010 and 2009 and 19 in 2008.
Officials attributed the spike in the number of hearings to conditional-use permits for recreational marijuana businesses under state Initiative 502.
Later Monday, county commissioners and the Sequim City Council were expected to approve an interlocal agreement for the Carlsborg sewer project in a joint meeting in Sequim.
Officials from both jurisdictions have expressed support for the pact that secures long-term wastewater treatment for Carlsborg homes and businesses.
Clallam County intends to build a pump system in Carlsborg and pipe effluent to the city’s water reclamation facility by 2016.
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Reporter Rob Ollikainen can be reached at 360-452-2345, ext. 5072, or at rollikainen@peninsuladailynews.com.