Commissioners meet with youth leadership class
COSHOCTON – The Coshocton County Commissioners have many duties and responsibilities, which they did their best to explain to members of the Coshocton County Youth Leadership class.
The class included the commissioners Sept. 19 meeting in their challenge day, which focused on local government, law and justice.
Commissioners Dane Shryock, Curtis Lee and Gary Fischer and their clerk Mary Beck introduced themselves and explained their duties to the students.
They are the taxing authority for the county, deal with benefits for county employees, deal with the budgets of various county organizations and also handle bids for county projects. A lot of their time is spent doing paperwork, communicating with people by e-mail and attending meetings.
“We are a political entity, but are fortunately able to keep politics out of our work,” Shryock said. “We try to run our office like a business.”
Fischer also pointed out that the commissioners have to work together to run their “business.”
“Individually we have no power,” he said. “We have to operate collectively as a board.”
After explaining their jobs, the commissioners took questions from the students in regards to job creation and the oil and gas industry.
“We see our role with job creation as making sure we have the proper infrastructures to create jobs,” Fischer said.
As for the oil and gas industry, they are working with companies to make sure road maintenance agreements are in place. Bringing the companies here is more the role of the Port Authority.
“We would like to see them in town,” Lee said.
Coshocton County Youth Leadership is a program of the Coshocton Foundation for juniors at the county high schools.
josie@coshoctoncountybeacon.com
Category: Clubs & Organizations, Education, Government
