Mayor-elect seeking candidates to fill positions

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Seymour Mayor-Elect Matt Nicholson is looking for citizens who want to get engaged and take an active role in the city.

He is looking to fill more than 40 positions, including full-time department heads and seats on various boards and committees. Some will be chosen next month, while others will be named in January after he takes office.

But Nicholson doesn’t want people to think he is cleaning house.

"That’s not the goal," he said.

He isn’t looking to replace all existing employees with new ones but is making anyone wanting to keep their position reapply.

"There’s got to be a process," he said. "All department heads were notified last month that this is how the process would work. Several have already turned in their résumés."

He plans to evaluate all candidates in order to choose the best one for the job, not basing the decisions on personal beliefs, politics or hearsay, he said.

"Ronald Reagan said that you need to go find the best people and put them in the right position, and as long as you agree on policy, let them do their job," Nicholson said. "And he’s right. I want to surround myself with the best choices, and the best way to do that is for everybody to be on an equal playing field."

If he doesn’t open up the positions to everyone, Nicholson said he won’t know who might be interested.

"This is a chance for everybody to step up, raise their hand and go, ‘You know, Matt, I might want to be involved,’" he said. "And it’s a chance for me also to look and go, ‘Wow! I never thought of that person.’"

Nicholson will be choosing police and fire chiefs, a city attorney, directors of the department of public works, water pollution control facility and parks and recreation department and a building commissioner.

Those positions require certain skills sets, and not everybody is qualified, he said. He already has received around 80 résumés.

He also will be making appointments to the airport authority, board of public works and safety, board of zoning appeals, economic development commission, housing authority, county visitor promotion commission, park and recreation board, plan commission, redevelopment commission, redevelopment authority, downtown review board, Seymour Community Development Corp. and Crossroads Community Trails committee.  

As a city councilman for the past four years, Nicholson said he has had interactions with all of the departments. He also has spent time with each of the departments during his campaign, whether it was helping pick up trash and recycling to observing the sewer plant.

Now, he is working on attending meetings of all the boards, commissions, authority groups and committees that play a role in making the city successful.

He attended the airport authority meeting Monday night.

"I wanted to go see them interact with one another, shake some hands and get to know people a little more than I already do," he said. "You can really see the overlap and how we are one big, functioning unit with all these boards and commission that work together, and it’s really kind of cool to see. I’m glad I went."

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Anyone interested in applying for a position in Seymour Mayor-Elect Matt Nicholson’s administration can send résumés to 330 S. Chestnut St., Seymour, IN 47274 or email them to [email protected]. Board appointments do not require a résumé.

For information, call 812-528-6319.

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