Less than a week after putting one of its top officials on administrative leave, Mercer County fires its assessment supervisor.
Don St. Germaine has been in charge of assigning property values and taxes since 2010.
Now, he will be looking for another full time job.
After spending 20 minutes in closed session, the Mercer County board voted nine to zero to terminate the county's employment with St. Germaine.
The board did not discuss any reasons for the termination when it came back into open session before taking the vote in front of a full county board room.
The county chairman also didn't offer any more detail as to why St. Germaine needed to be fired, other than St. Germaine violated portions of his contract that spell out misconduct, poor performance, or failure to complete required duties.
None of these however are criminal charges.
County Chairman Jeff McWhorter says, "he has a right to request a hearing, he has 21 days to request this from today and then we have to schedule a hearing within 30 days."
St. Germaine did not attend Tuesday's board meeting.
McWhorter says before St. Germaine was placed on administrative leave on Friday, he was given a chance to resign with pay.
He says St. Germaine refused that offer.
McWhorter confirmed that St. Germaine hadn't been brought before the county's personnel committee or given a performance review, but the board has been discussing this situation.
"We talked about it amongst the board at the last board meeting and I was instructed to talk to attorneys and I gave them my findings at finance committee and we acted upon those findings," says McWhorter.
St. Germaine could file a lawsuit against the county for wrongfully firing him..
McWhorter says he's confident Mercer county has a strong case against its former assessment supervisor.
The county has already appointed a staff member in the assessment office to fill the role of assessment supervisor.
