These notes were taken by an Okanogan County Watch volunteer. Every attempt is made to be accurate. Notes are verbatim when possible, and otherwise summarized or paraphrased.
Note takers comments or clarifications are in italics. These notes are not the official county record of the meeting. For officially approved minutes, which are normally published at a later time, CLICK HERE.
The time stamps refer to the times on the AV Capture archive of the meeting on this date at the County livestream archive. To locate items in real time, the clock on the wall in the AV Capture screen can be helpful.
05.04.2026 Mon AM BOCC
Meeting Highlights:
Lanie Johns, Clerk of the Board, has resigned. She will negotiate an hourly contract with the county to work remotely, administering several grants she currently administers. Stacy McClennan, Deputy Clerk of the Board will continue in that capacity until the Board hires a new Clerk.
The commissioners, Nick Bates (Fairgrounds Manager) and Laura Sorensen (Fair Advisory Committee) discuss the possibility of a beer garden at the fair. They will wait until the hear the formal proposal to make a decision.
Susan Speiker, Clerk of the Courts, delivers her quarterly update to the commissioners.
The commissioners open six sealed bids for installing the new irrigation waterlines at the fairgrounds. The bid specification asked for the contractor’s hourly rates, and so they include a list of equipment that will be used (mini-excavator, dump trucks, labor, etc.) and the hourly rate for each item. The commissioners realize that the bids are useless because they can’t know the final cost of any bid. They reject all the bids and apologize to the contractors. They’ll rebid the job after they settle on a description of the exact work that will be required.
Meeting adjourned for lunch at 11:42.