Position could be eliminated, but that will require state legislation
Gilmer is still without any candidates for its next county surveyor.
Nobody qualified as a candidate for surveyor during the recent primary election qualifying period, which ran March 4-8. The registrar’s office then left qualifying open only for the surveyor position Monday and Tuesday, March 11-12, but again, no one qualified.
Commission chairman Charlie Paris said he’s in favor of eliminating the position, and a legal opinion obtained after nobody qualified confirmed that is an option.
However, it would require a bill to be passed at the state level, and the county needs to have someone in the surveyor position until that can happen, Paris said. Before any of this can be done, the commissioners have to vote on whether or not to do away with the position.
“Eliminating it would be the permanent solution. In the meantime, we still have to find somebody,” Paris said. “It would require local legislation, which doesn’t happen real quick, and we’re not in a situation where we can leave it vacant while we’re trying to do that.”
Jeff Vick has been elected county surveyor for the last two terms. His current term expires at the end of this year. Vick, who’s also vice president of local surveying company Chastain and Associates, said he believes in term limits and didn’t seek re-election on that principle.
Nowadays, the county surveyor is called on an as-needed basis, usually to offer guidance or consultation, Vick said. What were once official duties of the office are now obsolete.
“There’s no official obligations. The state legislature more or less abolished any official duties of the county surveyor several years ago,” Vick said. “It used to be the purpose was for processioning to help landowners settle land disputes. To my understanding, they took that code section out several years ago.”
Georgia code says county surveyors “shall be elected, commissioned, qualified and removed as are clerks of the superior courts and shall hold their offices for four years.” The code also says anyone holding the post must also be a qualified surveyor certified and licensed by the state.
Paris said although county surveyor is an elected position, it’s also an unpaid one unless the surveyor is hired to work on a project.
“It really isn’t necessary (anymore). Whoever has it doesn’t get any kind of salary. The only thing they do get is kind of a nod when we need to hire a surveyor, but even that’s not necessary,” said Paris. “Every now and then, we may need to get something surveyed for the county. But if we call and he can’t get to it for two or three months, we may say nevermind, we’ll find somebody else. It doesn’t automatically get you the job.”
Tammy Watkins, chief registrar, confirmed it’s unusual for not even one candidate to qualify to run for an elected position.
“As far as I know, it’s never happened before,” she said.
If the board of commissioners decides to do away with the county surveyor post, the earliest it can be brought up by the state will probably be next year’s legislative session, Paris noted.