Interim Habersham County Manager Tim Sims has been appointed as the permanent Habersham County manager. Commissioners approved his full-time appointment during Monday’s county commission meeting.
Sims, who previously served as Habersham’s Chief Financial Officer, succeeds Alicia Vaughn who left in December. He was one of three finalists for the job following a months-long search which commissioners whittled down from among 60 candidates.
The two others who were up for the job were Demorest City Manager Mark Musselwhite and former Mt. Airy Town Manager Tim Jarrell.
Prior to the appointment, the commission excused themselves and went into executive session to discuss litigation, property disposal, and personnel. After about an hour and 20 minutes, the commission emerged from the executive session and returned to open the meeting.
Once the commission certified the closed session, Vice-Chairman Bruce Harkness made an announcement.
“There is one piece of business we need to take care of concerning interim county manager Mr. Tim Sims and we are not going to fire you,” Harkness laughed.
Commissioner Ty Akins made the motion. “I’ll make the motion that we make Tim Sims our permanent county manager. Commissioner Dustin Mealor seconded the motion. The vote to appoint Sims as the permanent county manager was unanimous.
After the announcement, Sims admitted that he was humbled by the commission’s decision. “I’m very humbled that they chose me, to entrust me to continue on with what I’ve been doing the past three and a half months,” he said.
Sims took over as the interim county manager on December 28, 2024 after former county manager Alicia Vaughn resigned with her last day being December 27.
After the meeting, Harkness outlined some of the next steps after appointing Sims permanently. “We will be voting on his employment contract next month, so we will be working on that between now and then,” he said.
A source of contention during Vaughn’s tenure was her salary. Harkness addressed that as part of the employment contract. “His salary is not going to be increasing very much. That was part of all the discussions,” he said. “We have to keep costs down.”
Harkness continued, ”He’s very capable. He’s worked for many, many years for county government but we do have to keep costs down and he was willing to work with us.”
