Interview Report with New York Country Clerk

This hub presents a report from an interview conducted by the author with the county clerk of New York identified as Mrs. Flora. The author asks him several questions ranging from personal, job experience, tasks and her general knowledge and skills regarding the actual job. Though the interviewee was a previous employee in various organizations, she had opted to quit in order to vie for the post of a county clerk at New York City. In this interview, the interviewee reveals that this position has given her the opportunity to utilize her massive skills and experience in serving the residents and the local government

Kindly tell me about yourself, your education level and job experience

The interviewee, currently working as a town clerk for New York is identified herself as Mrs Flora. Prior to appointment to this position, she had been a deputy county clerk since 1999 in the same county. As a county clerk, she handles a huge number of tasks which relate to storage and maintaining of records of different activities and operations that take place within the city. She had as well worked as a school teacher in North Rockland school district. Mrs. Flora has three daughters, Nicole, Jamie and Danielle who all grew up here and went through the public school system. Mrs. Flora, who was born in New York City, attended the North Rockland school district and SUNY Rockland College for one year. She worked at SUNY Delhi as a hotel manager for two years and obtained a baccalaureate degree of Science from Saint Thomas Aquinas. Prior to entrance in this position, Mrs. Flora had been working with computers since 2001. Alongside a degree in Science, she also has an advanced diploma in network support. She had also worked at different levels for a private corporate. Although she had loved all these jobs, she saw the opportunity of digging deeper as a town clerk and she is more than contented in this position.

How long have you worked in this position?

Mrs Flora articulates that over the years, she had also held a number of jobs in retail, a painting business, and finally ended up in government in 1988. She began as a budget examiner in 1988 in the County of Rockland and then after one year was appointed deputy county clerk. She had held that position for 16 years before she ran for County Clerk position in 2005 and went on to win the position. Mrs. Flora is currently serving a third term in this job. This implies that she has been in this position for fifteen good years.

What is essentially the work of a county clerk?

As postulated by the interviewee, the County Clerk is a state constitutional office established by the NYS constitution. Those holding the position run every four years and they also serve as clerk to the supreme and county courts. The main function of county clerk is to keep and maintain the records for Rockland County. The official is also expected to provide many different certifications for elected officials, maintain all notaries for Rockland, maintain filings for business certificates, pistol permits, passport processing, all land transactions and filings for supreme and county court actions. Any judgments, tax warrants, liens and foreclosures are filed in our office.

The interviewee continues to reveal that county clerks normally handle extensive tasks. Essentially, they care for historical significance of all the county records. County clerks fundamentally connect the local government with the public. The personnel is also an integral part of the county, owing to the historical significance of maintaining all the important records of the town. As already pointed, she or he acts as an important link between the local government and public masses.

What is your typical work day? How do you prioritize your work?

Mrs. Floras typical work day entails handling all aspects of the county processes, as well as the proceedings concerning an election. She is also required to document and record the result of the county’s official meeting, swearing in elected members and officials and issuing necessary permits and licenses to individuals and organizations. Other functions of county clerk include supervising, safe keeping of important certificates of the city’s important personnel such as birth and death certificates, marriage certificates, and photocopy of education certificates. Additionally, the country clerk is mandated to oversee collection of property taxes within the county alongside other payments such as water bill.

In regard to work prioritization, the interview explains that she starts by first evaluating on important things to do as per a particular day. In other words, she begins by doing tasks that need to be done immediately and those that have tighter deadlines. She does this by writing everything on paper in order to prevent good intentions and ideas to flow away. According to the respondent, the act of writing minimizes emotions while improving the emotional. In other words, writing on what to begin and end with forces one to ask himself or herself on what is really important. However, she only has to write on tasks that are needed to be done but could easily forget. This means that she does not need to write obvious things such as having lunch.

Mrs. Flora understands the essence of time management in personal, and work contexts. Time management in her case entails being focused, and utilizing the available time performing necessary, and prioritized tasks. In addition, she avoids doing unimportant things at the expense of the necessary ones. She is keen on meeting deadlines, even if this would mean working at odd hours. Another aspect that helps her to complete her work effectively includes being committed and taking things seriously. The projects and items are prioritized according to their urgency and degree of significance. She normally put the tasks in categories, and acts on them accordingly.

Mrs. Flora’s actual process in time management on her tasks goes like this; usually start by drawing four even columns in a sheet of paper. On the first column, she writes “Important, and Urgent”. She then lists the projects to be completed below the heading, and the deadline alongside the projects. She then immediately begin acting on important and urgent items in the order they appear to clear the column. The second column label it as “Important but not urgent”. These are the items, which have the same significance to the first items, but do not have to be rushed. The third column is labeled as “Urgent, Not Important” and they include such aspects as writing and contributing opinions to newspaper editions, returning a quick phone call. Items in column four are those, which are “Neither urgent nor important” such as responding to social media comments.

Ensuring that clients get timely services is Mrs. Flora’s priority. This she does by working on urgent matters and work as soon as possible and sacrificing such aspects as lunch time and extending some time at night to do urgent projects. This helps her to complete projects in a timely manner.