Keeper of the Records and Much More
 
If you attend a Nicholasville City Commission meeting some Monday evening, among the elected and appointed officials, you’ll see Roberta Warren efficiently doing her job. She calls roll and records Board Members’ various actions, often saying little else, but sometimes answering a question or reading back a motion.  

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Roberta Warren

Warren is City Clerk. It’s a position most people may have heard of but few understand. According to those who work with Warren, her value to the community should not be underestimated.

“Since joining the Commission, and especially since becoming mayor, my understanding and admiration for the City Clerk’s role has grown tremendously,” Nicholasville Mayor Russ Meyer said. “The Clerk ensures we are following protocol and that our decisions are managed as required and recorded for all of history.”

More importantly, he adds, Nicholasville is a better community for the work she does day in and day out. City Commissioner & Vice Mayor Johnny Collier agrees.

“Most people don’t understand that, in addition to everything else she does, Roberta writes grants for many departments within the city, which helps us obtain important funding,” he said. “She does a tremendous job.”

The office of the municipal clerk is the oldest among public servants. Clerks provide a professional link between the citizens, the local governing bodies and agencies of government at other levels and pledge to be ever mindful of their neutrality.

So, in a political world, Roberta Warren offers citizens, fellow employees and elected officials a non-political person to turn to as a problem solver and resource.

“I especially enjoy my role as a liaison with the community,” Warren said. “People can call me if they have an issue that they can’t get resolved and I will try to sort out the problem.”

That was a talent that former City Clerk Bonnie Dean recognized right away as she worked with Warren, whose city service began as secretary to the police chief and continued as she moved into the utility office.

“Roberta always was willing to take on a challenge and would work at it until she got to the bottom of it,” Dean said. “I depended on her a lot and she did a good job.”

That’s why Dean and Sam Corman, who was mayor at the time, thought Warren would be a good person to fill Dean’s shoes when she decided to retire in 1999 after 33 years on the job.

“I was one of the youngest clerks in the state when I started,” Dean said. “And the job grew with me. In fact, I often felt like I had so many jobs that I wasn’t able to give them all the attention they deserved and recommended they allow the next clerk to focus more on the core parts of the job.”

City leaders listened to Dean and brought in others for bookkeeping and to help manage the utility office. While Warren missed that work to some degree, she found there has always been plenty to do.

One of her philosophies is to try to learn something new every day. That might be why she has two certifications: Kentucky Municipal Clerk Certification and International Certified Municipal Clerk, and is working on earning a Master Municipal Clerk Certification, which is a 5 year process. She networks with other clerks around the state to learn from their personal experience and share hers.

 

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Warren collaborates on a project with Administrative Assistant Renee Rynheimer and Human Resources Director Rita Randall.

As the city has grown from about 10,800 residents when she became clerk to well more than 20,000 today, so has her job. In addition to record keeping and support of the Commission’s responsibilities, she is plan administrator for employee health insurance and property and casualty insurance. She is treasurer for the Nicholasville Tourism Committee, secretary for the Regional City Clerk’s group, and secretary for the Regional Cable Commission, a collaboration of 13 cities seeking standardization of cable service.

And, recently, she has taken on the significant responsibility of Applicant Agent for FEMA, which involves filing the official forms required for disaster funds being sought as a result of this year’s devastating ice storm. It includes seven projects totaling $422,000, not including costs for debris collection. Though it was much milder for the city, the 2003 ice storm gave her experience in collecting data and sharing applicable information with FEMA.

Warren says public service was a natural path for a young woman whose father worked for the city and whose mother retired from the health department. She attended Blue Grass Technical School in Lexington, focusing on accounting and administrative management. The youngest of five children she was instilled with a strong sense of right and wrong, which she expects others to live up to.

“I used to call her “The Hammer” for her ability to hold her own in the utility office,” Utilities Manager Tom Calkins said. “It can be hard sometimes when people are upset about their water or power being turned off or if they don’t have the money to pay their bills. But Roberta handled them well.”

Calkins and Warren laugh about some of the changes that have occurred over the many years they have worked together, such as how Calkins introduced Warren to working with computers, which were nonexistent when she started with the city 25 years ago.

Also vivid in her memory is the time a customer paid a $53 utility bill in pennies, just to be difficult.

It was, according to Dean, the right kind of training for a city clerk, as one of the most important characteristics is to be “strong minded” enough to provide stability for government because elected officials’ terms are two or four years, resulting in frequent change.

It’s a job that most of us don’t come into contact with on even an occasional basis. But be assured that day after day, Warren is busy seeing that records are kept, that ordinances are codified, and special projects are planned and carried out so Nicholasville’s city government can operate more efficiently and legally today and into the future.

 

 

517 North Main Street
Nicholasville, KY 40356

Phone: 859.885.1121
Fax: 859.881.0750
Email: info@nicholasville.org