The Moniteau County Commission voted unanimously Friday to appoint Bill Figgins as interim county assessor.
Presiding Commissioner Mac Finley said Figgins is highly qualified for the role, having served in the office for the past year. Figgins has previously worked as an educator and as an employee of the state, and is a U.S. Air Force veteran.
Figgins enters the position vacated by the Jan. 1 resignation of former Assessor Amanda Trimble. State statute allows that an interim appointment may be made until the governor has made a permanent appointment out of his office, Finley said.
Figgins said in the immediate transition, the first goal is to staff the assessor's office. Along with Trimble's exit, the office's two other full-time staffers found positions elsewhere, leaving Figgins as the only remaining staff member.
Figgins said the office has already received some résumés to review and will also advertise the positions as soon as possible. In the meantime, Figgins said, he'll also get some temporary help from the county collector's office starting Monday.
Figgins said another important piece will be getting up to speed on what needs to be done in what is traditionally one of the busiest parts of the year for the office. Annual assessment forms were just mailed out, Figgins said, which will add a lot of work.
"We're talking thousands and thousands of those coming into the office," Figgins said. "We have to go through each one of those by hand, we have to check and see if there's changes or there's not changes, and we have to scan them all into the system. It's very time-consuming, but we want to make sure we get the accurate picture of the personal property in the county."
Figgins said Moniteau County is a bigger county than people may think and, as a result, people may not realize how much goes into the work coming out of the assessor's office. From assessment forms to the office's assessment of newly constructed real estate, there's a lot of area to cover, he said.