City hires new administrator

RANDOLPH – The City of Randolph has hired a native to come back home and lead as its newest administrator/clerk/treasurer.

At a five-minute special meeting Monday night, the city council voted in favor of hiring Sheila Korth, daughter of Rick and Sue Korth and a 2004 Randolph High graduate.

She most recently worked as a senior policy analyst for Taxpayers for Common Sense. Her anticipated start date at the City of Randolph is March 29 with a starting salary of $63,000 annually with full benefits.

Josh Rayford will continue to serve as interim until Korth starts in her new role.

The city council also met for its regular meeting March 13. During that meeting, a verbal agreement with a local resident for the abatement of weeds and grasses on city property has now been put into writing.

The Randolph City Council approved the renewal of a biannual plan from Rich Olson, who presented the plan and contract for the abatement of weeds and grasses on land located on the eastern edge of the Community Recycling Center, which is located in the southeast part of town.

Randolph City Administrator/Clerk Ben Benton said there has been a verbal agreement between the city and Olson “for years and years.”

“He has taken care of the land east of the recycling center and used it as pasture, and basically reduced costs for the city,” Benton said. “He grazes his cattle. He handles any sort of weeds that pop up. He provides his own fencing. It’s just been a mutually beneficial situation.”

Benton’s last day working for the city was March 15. After Benton submitted his resignation in February, Olson approached him and asked for the agreement to be written instead of verbal.

“I need something in my file to carry liability insurance on that,” Olson said. “If I’m over there with a tractor or one of the cows gets out or something like that, it’s tied to that piece of land on my insurance only,” The written agreement - just like the verbal agreement - is open-ended, “with the ability for both parties to terminate if they feel that it should end,” Benton said.

In other business, the council entered into an executive session at the request of Councilwoman Janelle Biernbaum to discuss the city employee personnel manual.

After exiting executive session, council members gave Rayford the goahead to sell the city’s old police vehicle, a Ford Explorer.

That item was not listed on the regular agenda.