Interim director picked for local Elections Board
By Steve Herring
Published in News on June 6, 2012 1:46 PM
A former employee of the state Board of Elections will serve as the interim director of the Wayne County Board of Elections.
The Wayne County Board of Elections voted 3-0 this morning following an hour-and-a-half closed session to hire Beverly York to fill the slot left open by the resignation last week of Vickie Reed.
Ms. Reed, who had served as director since Jan. 2, 2008, resigned late Friday, following criticism of her job by state Elections Director Gary Bartlett, who attended this morning's meeting.
Bartlett recommended Ms. York, county board Chairman Joe Lofton said.
Deputy Director Michael Barry submitted his resignation Friday as well.
"She (Ms. York) lives in Goldsboro and had worked for IBM," Lofton said. "She worked for the state Board of Elections. We were trying to bring in somebody with experience. We can't bring in a novice right now. She will help us until we can determine who we are going to put in that position.
"We had asked Mr. Bartlett to help us find somebody who has experience. We didn't want to bring in a novice. That would not help us. We needed somebody with enough experience to hold until such time that we could have the (July 17) election."
Lofton said he was leaving the meeting to contact Ms. York who would be brought in as soon as possible.
It was the third called closed session in less than a week to discuss personnel. Lofton has declined comment on whether Ms. Reed was the subject of the closed sessions.
Today's meeting came just days after a May 18 letter in which Bartlett called into question statements Ms. Reed made during a May 16 deposition for the Dickson v. Rucho civil court case in which voters challenged the General Assembly's statewide redistricting.
No decision has been made yet about filling Barry's position.