GREEN COVE SPRINGS – Clay County Fire Chief Lorin Mock will be interim county manager after Stephanie Kopelousos leaves the county manager post Jan. 7 to work for Gov. Ron DeSantis.

The Board of County Commissioners voted 5-0 in a special called meeting Dec. 18, just four days after the DeSantis Transition Team announced Kopelousos had been named Director of Legislative Affairs for the governor-elect. Kopelousos’ first day in Tallahassee will be Jan. 8.

“One of the things that is important to me is that we select somebody that will not be applying for the job and I’ve had discussions with Chief Mock and he’s not going to apply for the job,” said County Commissioner Diane Hutchings. “He’s a seasoned leader, somebody that converses with [Kopelousos] frequently so I don’t think there would be much of a learning curve in getting him caught up and...he’s a leader.”

Hutchings admitted that while Mock is a leader in public safety, a discussion with Mock would reveal that his leadership skills are transferable to any platform. Other suggestions for interim manager were Clay County Information Services Director Troy Nagle and Clay County Director of Economic Development Services Chereese Stewart. County Commissioner Wayne Bolla suggested Nagle and Commissioner Gayward Hendry suggested Stewart.

While everyone on the board agreed that Nagle, Stewart and Mock were all great suggestions, they all agreed that the interim manager should be somebody that won’t apply for the position after it is posted. The board encouraged Nagle and Stewart to apply and because of that, opted not to vote either of them in to be interim county manager.

After the vote, Human Resources Director Jennifer Bethelmy presented three options to the BCC. She said the BCC could put a bid out for the services of a recruitment firm, hire a recruitment firm previously used or utilize the Florida Association of County Managers to help find a potential hire.

The board opted to go with option one and search for a firm. The firm that wins the bid will handle the recruitment process and, according to Hutchings, bring the board “the cream of the crop.” From the top contenders, the board will advance to interviews by roughly March of next year with an official hiring by June.

Kopelousos and Mock make $180,540 and $100,672 respectively. Mock will receive pay as the interim county manager at either the entry level county manager base salary, which has not yet been decided by the BCC, or in the form of a 5 percent increase of his current salary, whichever form of pay turns out to be greater. The BCC will decide the future county manager salary at its upcoming meeting on Jan. 8.

To ease Mock into the position of interim county manager and allow him and Kopelousos to work together before she leaves, the board agreed that Mock’s work should begin Dec. 19.

The Dec. 18 special meeting marked the last public BCC meeting for Kopelousos and accordingly, she shared some thoughts on her time with Clay County in the position of county manager.

“First of all, I want to thank you and the previous boards that have given me an honor of a lifetime to work for the community that I was born and raised in,” Kopelousos said. “It’s personal to me when you can do something in your community and quite frankly, you never feel like you can do enough, but for the past almost eight years, it has been something that, no matter how difficult it was or what was going on, every day was a good day.”

“So thank you for that and you know, I’m one cog in the wheel,” Kopelousos continued. “You look at the team our here, you look at my colleagues...and certainly I couldn’t without them. They are an amazing group and you’re still well-represented when I leave and I’m sure you will find someone that’s going to take Clay County to the next level. Thank you. It’s been an honor.”

Hutchings, who has worked with Kopelousos longer than other commissioners, praised her tenure in Clay County.

“Probably the biggest strength that she has is her ability to think from a very high level and see the needs within our infrastructure to determine what she can bring in to help with what we already had,” Hutchings said, referencing to the $80 million hole a previous county manager’s survey determined the county was in following the recession. “[Kopelousos] came in, put a plan together and...took us back up to the top.”

“Clay County’s future, because of her time here...and she’ll never tell anybody because she’s the most humble person I’ve ever met...will forever have her mark,” Hutchings said.