County Interviews Four Treasurer Candidates
By Karen Gould

Four candidates are being considered for the 35-week appointment to serve as interim county treasurer. The appointment committee will interview the applicants Thursday, March 20. All interviews will be open to the public.

To be interviewed are Nora Massey, Walter J. Murray Jr., and Robert Winkelman, all of St. Ignace, and LeRoy Pieri of Cedarville.

Sitting on the appointment committee are County Clerk Mary Kay Tamlyn, Probate Judge Clayton Graham, and Prosecutor Fred Feleppa.

At an appointment committee meeting Tuesday, March 11, Mr. Feleppa asked if the candidate names should be released to the public and if interviews could be open to the public. He also asked whether any candidates had requested confidentiality, and wondered if the candidates could attend the interviews of another applicant.

Mrs. Tamlyn said, under the Michigan Open Meetings Act, the public must be allowed to attend the interview process. Judge Graham, who participated in the meeting via speaker phone, added that candidates could attend the interviews of other applicants, just as any other member of the public could.

The Open Meetings Act will allow confidentiality during the initial application stage, but not during the interview selection process. None of the applicants requested confidentiality.

Mr. Feleppa suggested the committee could interview all four candidates at one time, although Judge Graham said he preferred to interview each candidate separately.

The committee set the order of interviews alphabetically by last name. Interviews will be held in the commission meeting room at the county annex beginning with Ms. Massey at 9 a.m., Mr. Murray at 9:45 a.m., Mr. Pieri at 11 a.m., and Mr. Winkelman at 1 p.m.

The committee is expected to make a decision in two weeks.

The interim treasurer will serve until January 1 to complete the term of Jane Hampton, who announced in February she will retire May 1.

The treasurer is a four-year elected position that has an annual salary of $43,254. The candidate elected in the November 4 general election will assume the office January 1. Candidates interested in running for the partisan office in November must file a petition with the county clerk by 4 p.m. May 13.