A majority of Alamance County’s commissioners have approved two applicants endorsed by the local chamber of commerce to serve as industry representatives on the county’s tourism development authority.
During their latest meeting on Monday, the commissioners voted 4-to-1 to install Graham’s former mayor Jennifer Talley to a seat on the authority that’s reserved for the owner of a hotel or motel.
They also chose Tracy Schmidt by the same margin for another position that’s set aside for a delegate of the tourism trade.
With these nods from the county’s governing board, Talley and Schmidt will assume their places on the five-member authority, which oversees the distribution of a special sales tax on hotel and motels that the county has implemented to bankroll tourism-related endeavors.
Both of these candidates came to the commissioners with endorsements from the local chamber of commerce. The chamber had reportedly recommended Talley over fellow hotelier Scott Comer and selected Schmidt in lieu of rival industry reps Crystal Lawson, Eric Kerchner, and Renee Russell.
The only vote of dissent against these two appointments came from commissioner Pam Thompson, who offered a somewhat obscure analogy to explain her decision.
“It’s kind of like when your pastor has been in your church for 40-some years,” Thompson told the rest of the commissioners, “and you get a new pastor, the former pastor doesn’t sit on the front, they walk away.”
