Joe Daughtery elected commissioner chairman
By Steve Herring
Published in News on December 2, 2015 1:46 PM
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News-Argus/STEVE HERRING
Joe Daughtery, left, and Bill Pate are shown after being elected to be the chairman and vice chairman, respectively, of the Wayne County Board of Commissioners on Tuesday.
Joe Daughtery was elected as the new chairman of the Wayne County Board of Commissioners and Bill Pate as vice chairman on Tuesday.
Both are Republicans, but Daughtery was nominated for the office by Democrat John Bell.
Pate was nominated by fellow Republican Joe Gurley.
In the only other nomination for chairman, Ray Mayo nominated Wayne Aycock, who has served as chairman for the past two years. Both are Republicans.
Mayo and Aycock voted for Aycock.
Daughtery, Bell, Gurley, Pate and Ed Cromartie, a Democrat who served as vice chairman for the past two years, voted for Daughtery.
Pate was the only nominee for vice chairman and was unanimously elected.
Daughtery lives at Walnut Creek and represents District 6.
The owner of Modern Housing, a manufactured housing business, Daughtery is completing his first term on the board.
Pate, who lives in Pikeville, retired from the Employment Security Commission. He, too, is serving his first term on the board. He represents District 5.
Election of a chairman and vice chairman was the first order of business on the board's Tuesday agenda.
Aycock opened the meeting and then turned it over to County Attorney Borden Parker to ask for nominations.
After his election as chairman Daughtery accepted nominations for vice chairman.
Aycock passed over the gavel to Daughtery, who presided over the remainder of the session.
But Daughtery declined Aycock's invitation to switch seats.
He also focused his comments on Aycock's leadership.
"I want to pause before we go on any further in our agenda package," Daughtery said. "Before we continue I want to take a few moments on behalf of the board to express our thanks to outgoing chairman Wayne Aycock. Wayne did not ask for the position of chair. But he stepped forth and did assume that, and we do owe Commissioner Aycock a huge thank you.
"He was there when this county needed him. After his election, only a few hours later our county faced some trying moments. Within hours of his acceptance we faced this major issue and it shook our very governance."
Aycock handled the issue (the resignation of Lee Smith as county manager) devoting many hours to it over the following months, Daughtery said.
"Under his leadership, he guided us through the storm," he said.
Under that leadership a new county manager was hired and the position of assistant county manager created, Daughtery said.
Daughtery also praised Aycock for improving working relationships with municipalities and with the Wayne County Board of Education and for the board's numerous accomplishments over the past two years.