Mecklenburg County Commission Wants More Active Role In Governing

Mecklenburg County commissioners are now looking for a new county manager after they fired Harry Jones Tuesday night. One thing is clear in the shake-up: the new manager won’t have as much autonomy. County government has had its problems of late. For starters, there was the botched 2011 property revaluation. “This is a special situation and so every part of it, in my view, we must do carefully,” said Commissioner Trevor Fuller at a meeting in December. Commissioners were discussing a contract with a company to improve customer service in the tax assessor’s office. He wanted the manager to hold off on the deal until the board met with the firm’s CEO. That did not go over well with Jones. “It feels exactly like micromanagement to me,” replied Jones. “We have an existing contract with this company and I have the delegated authority to approve that contract without this board’s approval. This item was placed on the agenda to be transparent with you.” It was not a good start and relations