Weighing Randy

The Escambia County Commission will be publicly evaluating the performance of County Administrator Randy Oliver at its meeting this week. Afterwards, the board may vote to terminate the administrator.

Commissioner Grover Robinson hopes that’s not the case.

“As I’ve said before, I can’t think of a better administrator than Randy,” the commissioner said. “I just met with people today—‘hey, he’s doing a great job, he’s holding stuff together.”

Robinson recently joined with Commissioner Marie Young on the losing side of a 3-2 vote to reserve the right for a termination vote. Commissioner Kevin White, along with Chairman Wilson Robertson and Vice Chairman Gene Valentino, voted to reserve that right.

“I’m keeping my options open,” said Wilson, heading into tomorrow’s meeting.

In their respective evaluations, the commissioners issued a mixed field of perspectives on the administrator’s jobs performance. Robinson and Young were generally positive, while White and Robertson we’re more critical. Valentino ditched the established rating system, opting to write a letter that painted Oliver as unaccommodating to individual commissioners.

“First off, it’s a pitiful evaluation form,” said Robertson, who also ignored the numerical ranking system in favor of one and two sentence responses to each question.

The commission chairman sited several areas of concern regarding Oliver’s performance. He mentioned a lack of communication, as well as the recent budgetary controversies involving the Escambia County Sheriff’s Office and West Florida Public Library System.

Wilson also said he had been disappointed with Oliver’s handling of a controversy earlier this year which involved accusations that the chairman had unduly influenced the hiring of an employee at the county-owned equestrian center. That job candidate is presently suing Robinson and Young for effectively terminating him; White was dropped from the same suit a couple of months ago.

The chairman said he would have preferred that the county administrator have backed him up in the face of criticism from the public and the media. Instead, Oliver followed the directive of the commission and terminated the controversial equestrian employee.

“I feel like he could have supported my position, as an administrator, but he didn’t want to get in the middle of it,” Robertson said. “Well, he’s the one that hired the guy. He could’ve gone to the News Journal, but he didn’t want to.”

Robinson also cited the equestrian center incident, though he said that Oliver should have been “firmer” in his handling of the matter.

“So it wouldn’t have bubbled up and have happen what happened,” Robinson said.

If the commissioners vote to fire Oliver this week, the chairman feels the administrator should leave quickly.

“If we let him go, I think he needs to go immediately,” Robertson said.

The chairman pointed to Assistant Administrator Larry Newsome as the likely person to lead the county as it searches for a permanent candidate to fill the position. He did wonder if the assistant administrator would accept the interim position—which he’s held before, from Dec. 2009 to Oct. 2010—due to his past experiences with the county.

“I don’t even know if Larry would take it again,” Robertson said. “We kind of did him dirty last time.”

Another interim possibility that has been mentioned—by several commenters on this blog—is former county administrator George Touart, who served from 2002 to 2007.

“I read a lot of blogs where his name comes up,” Robertson said, adding that he didn’t know what the other commissioners were planning to suggest. “I don’t know if his name is going to come up.”

Commissioner Robinson said he wasn’t ready to think about who might take over for Oliver, should the board decided to let the administrator go.

Oh my God—I haven’t even started to think about that,” he said. “I don’t even want to deal with that thought, to think we’re even going to get to that point.”