Wicomico County Council Press Release

On Tuesday of this week the Wicomico County Council received four nominations from the Republican Central Committee to fill the District 4 seat vacated by the passing of Councilman Bob Caldwell, who was a registered Republican. As is required by the Charter, The Nominees must live in the District of the vacated seat and must be of the same political affiliation. All nominees are residents of District 4 and all are registered Republicans. The nominees are Bill Carey, John Hall, Robert Huntington and Catherine Keim.

The County Council will interview each of the nominees on November 15, 2011, during a recess of its regular Legislative Session. Interviews begin at 12:30 in a closed work session, which being a personnel matter, will not be open to the public.

The County Council will reconvene the Legislative Session at 2:00 pm, or as close thereto as the interview process is concluded. At that time the County Council intends to introduce and approve Resolution 134- 2011, appointing one of the nominees to the Wicomico County Council to serve the remaining term of the District 4 seat.


Section 205 of the county Charter defines the procedure for filling vacancies which may occur on the County Council. One of the provisions is that a vacancy be filled within 30 days. When the Council passes Resolution 134- 2011 it will have been 35 days since Mr. Caldwell passed away. Fortunately, this section of the Charter has not been used many times, but this instance has revealed that 30 days may be too short a period to give the degree of care and consideration to such an important decision. Section 407 of the Charter has identical language in the event that the Office of County Executive should become vacant. The County Council will ask the Charter Review Committee to consider whether these sections of the Charter should be amended to afford more time for nominations and appointments to these important positions in our county government to occur.