Commissioners Craig Arthur and Kevin Helmick will soon be making their third appointment of a County official in 2023. On the heals of the resignations of Sheriff Warren Basnett and Prosecuting Attorney Nigel Jeffries, the Commission will now be appointing a replacement for their resigning Commissioner Matt Walker (Republican).
Politics being what it is, there is now a Republican and a Democrat in charge of determining who the next Commissioner will be. For clarity on how this process works, the WV State Code is listed below.
Commissioners Arthur and Helmick are now tasked with appointing the best Republican Candidate (having to be a Republican because the outgoing Walker was) for Calhoun County.
WV Code
Chapter 3, Article 10, Section 7
§3-10-7. Vacancies in offices of county commissioner and clerk of county commission.
(a) Any vacancy in the office of county commissioner or clerk of county commission shall be filled by appointment by the county commission. The appointee must be a person of the same political party with which the person holding the office immediately preceding the vacancy was affiliated at the time the vacancy occurred: Provided, that at the time of appointment, the appointee must have been a member of that political party for at least 60 days prior to the occurrence of the vacancy.
(b) If a quorum of the county commission fails to make an appointment within 30 days, the county executive committee of the same political party with which the person holding the office preceding the vacancy was affiliated at the time the vacancy occurred, shall submit a list of three legally qualified persons to fill the vacancy.
(c) Within 15 days from the date on which the list is received, the county commission shall appoint a candidate from the list to fill the vacancy.
(d) If the county commission fails to make the appointment within the specified time, then the county commissioner with the longest tenure shall eliminate one name from the submitted list, followed by the county commissioner with the second-longest tenure then eliminating one name from the submitted list. The name remaining after those two names have been eliminated shall be deemed to be appointed by the county commission to fill the vacancy.
