Though an official vote to select the county's new Recreation and Maintenance Director will be held next Tuesday, two of Rockdale County's three commissioners announced they will be supporting deputy director Jackie Lunsford for the position during a heated work session today.

Commissioners JaNice Van Ness and Oz Nesbitt vehemently supported hiring Lunsford over two other candidates, who received negative support from the community due to both being involved in separate litigious situations in their former positions. 

The first, Corliss Randall Davenport, was one of the 13 principals who resigned before the release of the state's report investigating cheating in the Atlanta Public School system that came out naming her and 178 other employees. However, she was not one of the 35 APS employees recently indicted in the scandal.

The second, Marilyn Boyd Drew, was past director and deputy director for DeKalb County Parks and Recreation and was convicted of discrimination against two white county employees in Parks and Recreation.

Jackie Lunsford has been the deputy director of Recreation and Maintenance department in Rockdale since 2009. Prior to that she was director of Senior Services in the county and director of the Olivia Haydel Senior Services Center. A three-member panel of Parks and Maintenance Directors from three neighboring counties selected the top three candidates from a pool of 72 applicants.

During the Board of Commissioners' work session Tuesday, Commissioner Nesbitt said he felt the county needs to change the policy by which candidate information is released. County ordinance requires the names of top candidates for director positions be announced 14 days prior to the commission's vote on the final selection. 

"I learned about these questionable deficiencies or concerns coming from our citizens and I learned of the information as I too read the paper," Commissioner Nesbitt said Tuesday. "One step that may be considered to change is to make sure that, prior to these announcements to our media and general public, let's do all we can internally to make sure we know who these candidates are before we release it to the general public. It could save the county not only money but embarrassment."

The Rockdale County Board of Commissioners is expected to take action on this appointment at their regular voting session scheduled Tuesday, April 23, at 10 a.m.