Elections recapped for Mineral County

Mineral County 2018 candidates met with the public during an open forum at the school in the beginning of Octobe


CREEDE— The City of Creede held a special meeting on Thursday, Oct. 25 to announce the three finalists for the city manager position.
On Oct. 23, the board interview six applicants via phone and spent the next 48 hours narrowing down their search for the final three. The board collected questions and concerns from the public and took public opinion into account while making their decision.
Mayor Jeffery Larson opened the Thursday meeting by stating that he was very thankful to the public who submitted comments to the board. “I am very thankful to the people who submitted comments, they were well thought out and helped significantly. Some people even did some of the board’s due diligence and checked out some of the applicants on their own,” stated Larson.
“We were very fortunate through the help of our staff and our advertising to receive over 20 resumes sent in, to which the board was able to narrow down to six that were interviewed during the last meeting. Now, we will cut the six applicants down to three and conduct final interviews,” explained Larson.
The trustees took turns naming off the three applicants they personally felt that would be good candidates for the position and by the end, all trustees had agreed on the same three people. Adam Olen who comes with experience as a planning director out of Utah, Dan Rivera who served as an interim bank president in Creede for several years, and Louis Fineburg has 15 years’ experience as a planning director out of Silverton, Colo.
Due to the fact that Trustee Dana Brink was not in attendance, leaving the board with only five members, there was no tied vote on the three finalists. One of the main things the board took into consideration, that was included in some of the suggestions proposed by the public, was the length of time it would take for each applicant to transfer to Creede.
The board used this as a means to narrow down the search but also took into consideration that the holidays were quickly approaching and felt that it was more important to get someone who was qualified for the position and would fit into the community rather than how long it would take for the potential applicants to relocate to Creede.
“There are all kinds of variations on how we can work this out. If applicants have to move, we can ask them to come for two weeks to train or handle correspondence by email. Everything is negotiable,” stated Trustee Lori Dooley.
Larson asked current City Manager Clyde Dooley for his opinion on the three finalists to which Dooley responded that he agreed with the board’s decision. “I have not read the applications as thoroughly as you, but I agree with the board’s decision,” said Dooley.
Dooley also stated that he would call the three finalists and set up in-person interviews if possible or at the very least through skyping, for Friday, Nov. 2, beginning at 2 p.m. Larson also told Dooley that if there is conflict with any of the applicants coming to Creede for the final interview, the board would reschedule to fit their needs.
Trustee Dooley asked if each board member would be able to submit questions to City Attorney Karen Lintott prior to the interview stating that she had specific questions for each applicant that wouldn’t be the same, like the initial interview questions.
The board decided to have Lintott narrow down the final interview questions, like she did in the initial interview and weed out any that may be answered by the resumes in order to make the final interviews as efficient as possible.
The board did decide to have the final interviews open to the public but did state that the same rules that were presented during the initial interviews would be applied. The public will not be able to ask questions during the interviews and will be asked to remain quiet and submit thoughts in writing prior.


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