SEQUIM — With unusual speed, Sequim has landed an interim public works director.
Jim Pemberton, former public works chief in anacortes, will start work in Sequim on Tuesday, less than a week after Ben Rankin left his position.
Rankin, the former city engineer in Clemson, S.C., became Sequim’s public works director in late June after the city paid Waldron & Co. $18,000 to recruit a pool of applicants. The city had been without a permanent director for more than a year since James Bay retired in April 2008.
Rankin resigned in November and left his office last Wednesday to return to Clemson.
He told City Manager Steve Burkett that the Sequim job wasn’t a good fit.
Almost immediately, Burkett, who had just started in his position Oct. 19 after Sequim’s 17-month search — began looking for an interim public works boss.
He called his own contacts, he said, checked in with recruiters such as Waldron and Prothman, another Seattle-area search firm, and conducted a few interviews.
City to pay firm
Burkett found Pemberton through Prothman, so the city will be paying that firm, which will in turn pay Pemberton.
The interim director will make about what Rankin did, Burkett said: about $45 an hour.
Reached at his home in Anacortes on Friday, Pemberton, 60, said he’s enjoyed stints as interim public works director in various Washington cities.
After retiring from the city of Anacortes in 2001, he did some consulting and then served as interim director of the Public Works departments in Mukilteo and Kenmore.
“He knows the issues,” Burkett said, adding that over his 30-plus years in Washington, Pemberton developed strong relationships with the state departments of Transportation and Ecology and with tribal leaders in the Skagit Valley.
“This interim stuff is fun,” Pemberton said, as it allows him to make a contribution without making a long-term commitment.
“It’s not like getting married or anything,” he joked.
Burkett estimated that Pemberton will work in Sequim for three or four months while the city manager looks for a permanent director.
Burkett added that he and the City Council will soon decide whether to hire a permanent public works chief or overhaul the Planning and public works departments and create a different position, that of a community development director who would head both.
Pemberton, for his part, said it’s very unlikely he would seek a permanent position as director.
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Sequim-Dungeness Valley Reporter Diane Urbani de la Paz can be reached at 360-681-2391 or at diane.urbani@peninsuladaily news.com.
