GATE CITY — The Scott County Board of Supervisors saw two surprise actions at Wednesday’s board meeting: a move to censure a board member over public comments on the 2024 budget process and the resignation of County Administrator Freda Starnes.
Starnes, who has served eight years in the position, announced her resignation after a 25-minute closed session by the board for personnel matters.
“I have given my resignation and will be leaving the county in 30 days,” Starnes said after taking the board’s roll call vote certifying a proper closed session.
“I have accepted another position locally,” Starnes said, “and I wish the citizens and the board the best going forward.”
In her resignation letter, Starnes said she was the county’s eighth administrator.
“During my time here, I have witnessed the dedication and resilience that defines Scott County,” Starnes wrote in her resignation letter. “Together we have overcome challenges, a global pandemic, celebrated successes and forged meaningful connections that I will always cherish.”
Starnes said the 30-day notice will give her time to prepare next fiscal year’s draft budget, and she asked the board to “be diligent and prayerful” in looking for her successor.
“Working in local government is a thankless job, no matter your position,” Starnes wrote.
“Thank you for your years of service and what you’ve done for the county,” Supervisor Chair Chris Manness said. “We have enumerated that several times during this meeting and want to say we really do appreciate you. We don’t know what we’re going to do without you.”
Starnes said after the meeting that her resignation for a private sector job was not related to two incidents earlier during the meeting. During the meeting’s public comment period, Duffield resident Bobbie Powers accused Starnes of creating an unauthorized assistant county administrator position for which Bill Dingus was being paid two salaries for the same job.
Manness and other supervisors told Powers that the assistant county administrator slot was created by a previous board before Starnes became county administrator.
Dingus — who also supervises the county’s public works department, animal control and maintenance services along with handling various committee and board appointments — is not receiving two full salaries for his duties, Manness and others added.
Later in the meeting, Starnes outlined a proposed calendar for the supervisors’ 2025-26 budget process. The board adopted unanimously the calendar of meetings and deadlines.
Maness then appointed himself and Supervisor-at-large Stefanie Addington to the budget committee for developing a budget recommendation to the full board.
That discussion led to Addington moving to censure District 3 Supervisor Eddie Skeen over a newspaper advertisement he took out in 2024 before the current budget was set and approved.
“Let’s go back to last year really quick as we know how the misinformation put in the paper and just request let’s work together as a group,” said Addington, “as Chris and I are on this budget committee, to not put out any false information just to get the public riled as last year could have been completely avoided.”
Skeen said the information he put out then referred to the county real estate tax rate and a possible 23% tax hike for then-preliminary budget issues.
“You can go back and do whatever your need to do to justify your actions,” Addington replied, “but in my opinion, and I think everybody here on this board agrees, that was misinformation and was conveyed to the public to create the atmosphere it created.”
“This year I hope that you’ll have more respect for this board and more integrity on this board that to do something like that to put us in that shape last year.”
“I think we had a good response from the public,” said Skeen, “and I think it’s our responsibility to inform the public.”
“I will grant you that we did have a response from the public,” Addington said, referring to a public outcry over any real estate tax increase, “but if you felt that was a good response, okay.”
Starnes said the committee worked through from all budget requests from various county departments, agencies and organizations to determine what the county could afford.
“If you were going to fund everything everybody asked for, it would have taken that much of an increase,” Starnes said. “I agree that should never have been advertised as a 23 percent increase. That was not realistic because this board had not looked at the whole budget and made its changes, and we’re still dealing with those repercussions nine or 10 months later.”
Addington then made her censure motion.
“Can we just agree to work together?” District 2 Supervisor Michele Glover asked. “Work together as a team and not even worry about the past. Worry about now and the future. Today’s meeting has just been unreal, and it’s not over.”
Manness asked the board to agree “we’re working together and no censure.”
The budget planning calendar calls for department heads and agencies to present budget requests and estimates by Feb. 14. The county administrator’s office will then work with the commissioner of revenue and treasurer to prepare revenue estimates between Feb. 17-28.
Budget committee meetings will be scheduled between March 3-28 to develop a draft budget for review during one or more board of supervisors’ budget workshops between April 2-16. The calendar sets a target date of April 23 to advertise the budget and tax rates for a May 7 public hearing and budget /tax rate adoption by June 4.