- April 19, 2024
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When Flagler County first hired Jerry Cameron in February 2019, he was hired as an interim county administrator — someone to help keep the county running and deal with some ongoing thorny issues while the County Commission sought out a longterm replacement.
But within a couple of months, the commission, pleased with his performance, decided to keep him on, voting in April 2019 to halt the search for a replacement.
"It’s just taken much much longer than we anticipated," County Attorney Al Hadeed told the County Commission at its March 2 meeting. "We have some new issues; issues have gotten more complex. ... We're going to need him for a longer period of time to get us out of this hole that we’re in."
There's been one hitch: Cameron doesn't live in Flagler County — he lives in St. Johns — and state law requires that a regular county administrator reside in the county he or she serves.
There is, though, an exception under the law for an "acting administrator," who is not required to live in the county he serves.
Hadeed proposed updating Cameron's contract to clarify that that is the role in which he is now serving.
"I’m not saying today that it's going to be a longterm engagement, but it is beyond the interim that we originally conceived," he said.
"We’d be hard pressed to find anyone who can take on that job and do the job that Jerry’s done for us at this point," Commissioner Charlie Ericksen said.
The commission voted 3-0 to approve the contact amendment. Commissioners Joe Mullins and Greg Hansen were absent.
The County Commission opted at its March 2 meeting to delay its consideration of a final plat approval and acceptance of performance bonds for Plantation Bay Section 2A-F, Unit 8, which is 55 acres with 97 residential lots.
Commission Chairman Dave Sullivan noted that the county is in the midst of trying to settle water and wastewater issues at Planation Bay.
"With that still up in the air, I’m leery of doing anything to push forward with a lot of additional homes in that development," he said. "... I’d like to see us delay unit we have a full board of people here."
Two commissioners — Greg Hansen and Joe Mullins — were absent from the meeting.
A representative of the developer, ICI Homes, said that at this point the approval was a "check-the-box type of thing."
But Sullivan's proposal to table the matter passed 2-1, with Commissioner Donald O'Brien dissenting. O'Brien said he believed that, at this point, the approval is essentially ministerial, and that the water issues mentioned by Sullivan aren't relevant to the approval process.
