Andrews – Town Administrator Sandy Dobson has resigned after more than two years in her role.
Dobson, who also served as Andrews’ certified public accountant, resigned from her positions on Aug. 3, one day after expressing frustrations over the town recreation department’s spending and lack of documentation during a town work session on Aug. 2.
“I have decided that I want to have more time for my family, my CPA practice and maybe even add a hobby or two to my life!!” Dobson wrote in a post on her Facebook page. “It has been a honor to work at Andrews.
“I am grateful for the opportunity and proud of what all was accomplished during my time there. I wish the Town of Andrews the best in the future.”
Andrews Mayor James Reid said Dobson’s son and grandchildren recently moved back to the area from Florida. He does not believe the conversations about the recreation department played a role in her decision.
“That’s kind of a normal conversation with Sandy,” Reid said. “She gets pretty stern when it comes to finances, but no, I don’t think that played into it at all. I think it’s just something she decided would be best for her, and I totally understand and respect it and accept her resignation, and the town will move forward like we always do.”
Dobson raised concerns about recreation department spending after activities director Brian Wilson and recreation director James “Jaybird” Ellis discussed expenditures for signage.
Wilson said the department likely had spent between $3,000-4,000 on reusable banners this year in front of the community center – and proposed spending $25,000 on a digital sign for the main entrance to the rec park. Wilson and Ellis said they believed the sign would eventually pay for itself through advertising and sponsorships.
Dobson said she never approved spending $3,000-4,000 on banners.
“The rec park at this point has a lot of expenditures going out that we need to get control of, we just do,” Dobson said. “It does bother me. ... We just really need to get together and talk about all the expenditures.”
Dobson said she thought Wilson and Ellis have “done a really good job,” but added that her concerns extended to a lack of purchase orders from the department, which she said she had expressed “several times.”
“You have to get purchase orders on everything and I’ve tried to tell ya’ll that,” Dobson said. “It doesn’t seem to be clear that you have to do that.”
Wilson said it was his understanding that a purchase order was not required unless an individual expenditure was $1,000 or more.
Reid and Dobson acknowledged to Ellis that the recreation department management was new for town leaders as well. Andrews received managing control of the 32-acre Heritage Park from Cherokee County in October 2021 for the first time in more than a decade. Ellis and Wilson were hired as part of that acquisition.
During the work session, Reid suggested a Thursday morning meeting in Dobson’s office in order to iron out the town’s processes and procedures.
“The sooner we get the logistics figured out (the better), that way nobody gets mad,” Reid said. “Let’s just sit down and say, ‘This is what we can do, and this is how we go about it.’ I promise you there’s been more spent on the rec park this year than probably the previous 10 years combined.”
Reid said on Friday that Dobson indicated she would like to remain with the town in some capacity until Aug. 31 to wrap up some finance work, but on Monday he said her roles with the town have likely concluded. The mayor added that he expected to install an interim town administrator during Andrews’ regular scheduled town meeting Tuesday night, after the Cherokee Scout’s press time for this edition.
The Andrews Board of Aldermen appointed Dobson to be the town’s administrator on May 12, 2020. She had been under contract as the town’s CPA since February 2020 to review financial records and train staff on proper governmental accounting procedures. She previously served as a temporary financial assistant for the town.
“We were broke coming into this, and she got us out of that,” Reid said. “So, I always have the utmost respect for her bringing the town out of the huge hole we were in back in 2017 and ’18.
“Andrews is like an ongoing thing, you get one thing fixed and then there’s something else that pops up. I respect her decision 100 percent.”
In June, the Board of Aldermen approved a $5,216,297 budget for the 2022-23 fiscal year that will see the town’s property tax rate remain at 52 cents per $100 of valuation. Reid praised Dobson at that time as well for carefully managing the town’s finances.
“I think the biggest thing is, after Sandy Dobson came aboard, and having Scott Stalcup and Mike Sheidy and all those aldermen, really straighten out our finances,” Reid said. “We did what we needed to do those first two years, and didn’t overreact or under-react, but made it to where we could run the town efficiently.”