Burke appointed as interim county treasurer
For the interim, Montgomery County Auditor Stephanie Burke will be pulling double duty as Montgomery County Treasurer. The appointment made by the Montgomery County Board of Supervisors on Thursday, Nov. 5, was due to the Iowa Code.
“Stephanie has contacted our former County Treasurer, Carol Strovers, as to her giving Stephanie some guidance and direction as to following procedures, and what needs to be done on certain timelines, and we are extremely pleased and grateful for that,” Supervisor Donna Robinson said.
She added the supervisors have done the best they can to get the process going by putting out the announcement about the vacancy being filled by appointment.
“Hopefully by this week, we can determine when we can set up our forum and our interviews for potential applicants to fill the vacancy. We know it’s an added workload for her, and we appreciate the efforts of Stephanie,” said Robinson.
Supervisors also heard from Montgomery County Engineer Karen Albert about her meeting with a representative from Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railroad. Albert said the two of them went on a tour of the county’s bridges, along with supervisors Bryant Amos and Mike Olson. Albert said the meeting, she felt, was productive.
“I feel they are going to work with us. One of the things we were told is that they would need to verify the ownership of the bridges. So far, there has been no official commitment; it was basically just getting them out there, letting them see what we have, and the representative is going to go back and speak with members of BNSF and discuss the situation before they move forward,” Albert said.
Olson said the representative took a lot of pictures, and while he’s not sure where things are going to go, he felt it was progress that BNSF representatives came and looked, which was a start. Further discussions on the bridges will take place at a later date.
Lastly, Burke provided an review on the Nov. 3 election on the local level. Burke reported there were record numbers of absentee votes and voter turnout.