Panel named for Central Health picks

It looks like Travis County Judge-elect Sarah Eckhardt will be coming out of her brief retirement a few weeks early in order to help the current County Commission narrow the slate of candidates for the Central Health board of managers. Eckhardt quit her job as Pct. 2 Commissioner in the spring in order to run for county judge. Last week, after finding out they had 39 applicants and only two weeks to make a decision on replacing two vacancies on the Central Health board, Commissioners voted to put it off a week and ask Eckhardt to join in the process. The game plan is now for a committee consisting of Eckhardt, outgoing County Judge Sam Biscoe, Intergovernmental Relations Coordinator Deece Eckstein and Executive for Health and Human Services and Veterans Services Sherri Fleming meet and make an initial cut of the 39 applicants down to about 20. After that, they will meet again and make further cuts to get the number down to the 10 or 12 top applicants. In about two weeks, the current Commission will review those names and pass them along to the new Commission, which will be sworn in Jan. 6.