White County Commissioner Becky Golden said she will not be resigning from the county commission.
Golden walked out of last week’s commission meeting after the commission voted to replace Golden as one of the Budget Committee nominees. Golden said she meant she would be resigning her nomination to be on the budget committee, not the commission. Golden said she felt attacked when the commission wanted to replace her with Commissioner Lanny Selby.
“I have nothing against Commissioner Selby,” Golden said. “He is a good friend, and he has been for years. And I felt like I was kind of being intimidated to step down from the budget committee, and so that’s what my intention was when I walked out.”
Golden said she believes there are tensions between several commissioners. Golden said she has yet to be on the budget committee and believes that every commissioner should have a turn on the budget committee.
“Everybody should have a turn on certain committees because, you know, that’s the heart and soul, you get the insight,” Golden said. “You know, with everything that happened this last go around with the budget committee, I just felt a drawing at the end to find out more about the budget committee and the things that go on.”
Golden said she wanted to clarify the statement repeated at last week’s meeting that numbers were “not her thing.” Golden said she was not saying that she could not understand a budget. She said she had already talked to several commissioners to clarify her statement.
Golden said she has no hard feelings toward the other commissioners at this point.
“Those have gone away,” Golden said. “I was elected not by the commissioner Hutchings or commissioner Austin or anybody else on that county commission. I was elected by the people of my district, and I have had so many of them reach out to me with encouragement and thoughts of positivity, and prayers, and they all, none of them have asked me to quit. They have all asked me to stay, so that’s what I’m doing.”
Golden said she has received support not only from people in her district but from people outside of her district as well. Golden said she will fulfill her term as commissioner, but will have a big decision to make next year.
“I haven’t decided if I’m gonna run again yet,” Golden said. “That’s still up in the air, but I will finish my term. I just will not be on the budget committee because if they don’t want me on there, then that would be a very uncomfortable set of meetings for the next 10 months.”