By Pat Jenkins The Dispatch The duties of Eatonville's elected town treasurer and appointed town clerk will be combined into a single, non-elected position. Under a plan approved March 14 by the Town Council, a clerk-treasurer appointed by the mayor will deal with the dual administrative tasks of being the town's chief recordkeeper and helping monitor the finances. Kathy Linnemeyer, who has been the clerk, is the choice of Mayor Mike Schaub for the appointment that will take effect June 14. State law requires at least a three-month wait before the consolidated position becomes official. With the change, there will be no more elected treasurers in small towns and cities in Washington. They once were common, but Eatonville was the last GÇô and actually hasn't had one since the resignation last November of Lori Smith. Last week's action by the council completes an on-again, off-again discussion in recent years about whether Eatonville should have a separate treasurer. The position was part-time and had a salary of $11,000 a year. A proposal to eliminate the job and give its duties to the clerk was rejected in 2011 by council members who wanted to keep the treasurer as a separately elected official. Schaub, who was the treasurer then, was among advpcates for keeping the position as part of a checks-and-balances system for confirming expenditures and monitoring fund transfers and accounts. He now favors a clerk-treasurer. Schaub, who was elected mayor in 2013, has said the duties of a treasurer under state law have become "minimal.GÇ¥ He said Linnemeyer will do "a great jobGÇ¥ as clerk-treasurer. The council's Finance Committee recommended combining the positions.
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