Staff Reports
JEDCO has a secretary, and an administrative assistant after Monday night’s special meeting.
The Board position of Secretary has been an ongoing discussion for almost a month as members could not initially find any member willing to take on the duties of the board position.
Raymond Sanders was elected to be the Board Secretary. Sanders is also the Board’s Vice President.
Elaine Altman was contracted to work for JEDCO
“Tonight, I’d like to go ahead and propose we hire, or whatever the word may be, Elaine Altman as an independent contractor,” said Board President Bubba Haggard.
Sanders made the motion to employ Altman and to appoint her as the administrative assistant. Board member Lyn Daughrity requested the Board use Altman’s July 29 email to Haggard as constituting the written agreement of contract and the duties she is to perform. The email had her resume attached and reads in part “I can attend all meetings, prepare and post the Agenda, generate and distribute Minutes, and whatever else you need me to do. My hourly rate as a contractor is $25/hour; and, I would invoice JEDCO on a monthly basis.”
The Jimplecute asked if the Board was required to post the job opening anywhere since they are a government entity. Haggard replied “No.”
The Board started discussion on the administrative position on July 22 and approved the position on August 2.
Altman has four years experience as City Secretary/Finance Director for the City of Marshall; experience with city government, open records requests/Public Information Act, was an ex-officio member of the board of Marshall Downtown Development Corporation, and coordinated Finance Committee meetings for numerous organizations according to her email and resume.
JEDCO is projected to finish off the year with $290,000 in revenue. This would be $26,000 more than was budgeted.
Lee Mack Jordan joined JEDCO this month after being appointed by Ward 2 Alderman Jamey Parsons. Jordan is a 1991 graduate, funeral home director for Lewis & Walker Funeral Home in Jefferson.
“I had no idea what JEDCO was all about specificially, but someone thought enough of me to say ‘This guy might have something to contribute’,” said Jordan. “I want to learn and find ways to help our community.”
JEDCO also tabled the Strategic Planning project with Texas A&M University until next year.
“This has been on the JEDCO agenda for one and a half years now,” said Haggard. “After talking with Dr. Cooper, I’d recommend we put this off until the spring.”
“The delay of JEDCO not meeting for two months set us back,” said Ward 2 Alderman Robin Moore. “I just agree we don’t need to rush this. We need to do the planning and education for the task force. This is really important and if we rush and get a contract signed we’re going to miss that step. So Dr. Cooper suggested doing several sessions with the task force to get them ready for A&M to be ready to actually work with them. We don’t want to rush it. We want the task force to be ready to do the job.”
JEDCO’s next meeting will be at 5:30p August 30 and will contain a budget workshop so they can meet the City deadline of September 8.