While the departure yesterday was a bit suspicious, what made it even more suspicious was his interim replacement was hired almost simultaneously;
Elections Director Aaron Lorenzen resigned early Wednesday to pursue a job in the private sector, Gant said, but he did not offer further details. Gant hired Lorenzen in January 2011.
“He decided this morning to accept a new venture outside of state government,” Gant said.
Wasting no time, Gant hired former five-term retired Minnehaha County Auditor Sue Roust to serve as interim elections director through the November general election.
So let me get this straight, your election supervisor quits and you hire his replacement within a matter of hours? One can only wonder if his departure was in the making for awhile. I hardly doubt that Roust made the decision to fill in as interim supervisor from a single phone call from Gant. This decision had to have been in the making for awhile, but not according to Gant;
Gant told me today that he only found out about Lorenzen’s departure yesterday morning. By the end of the day he’d persuaded Roust — who’s on vacation — to agree to serve as interim through the election.
Makes you wonder if it stems from this comment left on a thread I posted about Lorenzen in July;
I know for a fact (aka direct knowledge) that Aaron does his job much better and with more integrity than that of Gant and PP. He takes his job seriously and loves what he does. The games that Gant and PP partake in Aaron disagrees with 99% of them.
To be honest, Aaron doesn’t have much of a say when he comes up with an idea. Gant and PP (especially PP) shoot down all recommendations that come into their office from fellow employees. Aaron and the rest of the staff wished none of the new electronic additions (Campaign Finance, Lobbyist, etc) would have gone live until 100% satisfied internally with the system. Gant and PP just wanted to push it and push it even if it’s a garbage system (which it is). Next be on the lookout for the new electronic filing system that business services is pushing. Trust me, it’s a great system once it works, but like the other systems, they will go live way too soon with too many defects.
I hate the fact his name got brought into something that he had no control over. Gant vetoes any and every idea that didn’t originate from PP. Maybe now that PP is gone, things will be for the better. One can hope.
Could this comment by one of Lorenzen’s ‘friends’ cost him his job? You know how these things work in government,
“You can either resign, or we will fire you and that could be very, very messy. Hey buddy, take one for the team like Pat did.”
This situation is getting stinkier by the day. If anyone has the real story, I would love to hear it.