{"id":2272,"date":"2016-04-27T16:15:20","date_gmt":"2016-04-27T20:15:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/morgancountyusa.org\/?p=2272"},"modified":"2016-04-27T21:04:29","modified_gmt":"2016-04-28T01:04:29","slug":"kim-johnson-nickles-and-kate-stotler-running-for-morgan-county-clerk","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/morgancountyusa.org\/?p=2272","title":{"rendered":"Kim Johnson-Nickles and Kate Stotler Running for Morgan County Clerk"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Kim Johnson-Nickles and Kate Stotler are running for Morgan County Clerk as Republicans. There are no Democrats running for the office.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/G3DuB0UUzgE\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Johnson-Nickles has been working in the County Clerk\u2019s office since 2002. She primarily handles estates &#8212; about 100 a year.<\/p>\n<p>Johnson-Nickles was born and raised in Morgan County. Her father, Herb Johnson, owned Herb\u2019s Auto Mart.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI started at the bottom and worked my way up,\u201d Johnson-Nickles told This Week in Morgan County with Russell Mokhiber. \u201cI tried to learn as much about the job as I could thinking that one day I would have this opportunity to do this. My dad died a couple of years ago. His thought was that if the opportunity ever arose to please try and take it. He believed in what I knew and what I could do.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI know the ins and outs of the office. It is a hard job. We do marriage licenses, birth, death, estates. I am more qualified because I\u2019ve been there for 14 years.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>If elected to office, Johnson-Nickles said she would retain the employees currently in the office. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cI would keep everyone,\u201d she says. \u201cWhy would you change something that is working?\u201d <\/p>\n<p>Kate Stotler is a civics and government teacher at Berkeley Springs High School. <\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/Un89Vhqps5Q\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>\u201cI have worked in politics for many many years &#8212; I have helped a lot of candidates over the years at the national, state and local levels,\u201d Stotler said. \u201cI never thought I was going to run for office myself. I have been teaching government for a lot of years as well. About a year ago, I started to think about it. And I thought &#8212; maybe this is something I\u2019m supposed to go and do. I could bring a big picture view to county government.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe County Clerk\u2019s office is the hub of county government &#8212; they keep all the records, birth, death, real estate. They keep the history. As a history teacher, that part of the job appeals to me. They register voters. They conduct elections. They pay the county\u2019s bills. They monitor the county\u2019s budget. They probate estates.\u201d <\/p>\n<p>\u201cI don\u2019t think citizens have any idea what the County Clerk\u2019s office does. I\u2019ve been very involved in the community. I\u2019m an active volunteer. I was involved in the levy campaign. I\u2019m out there on a daily basis. I would like to be out there as a liaison and a speaker at the Rotary Club and the Lion\u2019s Club &#8212; anybody who will let me come and talk about the County Clerk\u2019s office. And to listen in return. What kind of experiences have you had there that were not terribly successful? What do we need to do better to make your life easier as a citizen of Morgan County?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Stotler says in her campaign materials that she say she \u201cwill not play favorites.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cDebbie Kesecker has served this county very well,\u201d Stotler said. \u201cWhen we get to the end of one person\u2019s leadership, it&#8217;s important to step back and look at the office as a whole, have a fresh perspective. It\u2019s very difficult for somebody who is already in the system, entrenched in office politics, has friendships and relationships and doesn\u2019t want to come in and trample on long held traditions. But if the goal of the office is to be as efficient and effective as we can be for Morgan County citizens, sometimes after a long period of time under one leader, it\u2019s important for somebody to come in and make the changes that will create that efficiency and effectiveness.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI\u2019m a pragmatic politician,\u201d Stotler says. \u201cI would say &#8212; if you can be professional, if you can be courteous, if you can play by the rules and do your job, then that is what we want in our employees. These petty personal dramas that go on in office politics, that doesn\u2019t have any place in what I want to do. If people can play by those rules, I want them to stay.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Kim Johnson-Nickles and Kate Stotler are running for Morgan County Clerk as Republicans. There are no Democrats running for the office. Johnson-Nickles has been working in the County Clerk\u2019s office since 2002. She primarily handles estates &#8212; about 100 a &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/morgancountyusa.org\/?p=2272\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2272","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/morgancountyusa.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2272","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/morgancountyusa.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/morgancountyusa.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/morgancountyusa.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/morgancountyusa.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2272"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/morgancountyusa.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2272\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2274,"href":"https:\/\/morgancountyusa.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2272\/revisions\/2274"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/morgancountyusa.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2272"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/morgancountyusa.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2272"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/morgancountyusa.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2272"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}