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Richland County commissioners elect 2026 leadership, adopt routine annual resolutions
Summary
At its Jan. 6 reorganization meeting, the Richland County Board of Commissioners appointed Cliff Meer as chair and Daryl Banks as vice chair for 2026, approved routine annual resolutions on procurement thresholds and membership fees, and confirmed several board and liaison appointments.
The Richland County Board of Commissioners convened at 9:30 a.m. on Jan. 6, 2026, and moved quickly through its organizational agenda, electing Cliff Meer as chair and Daryl Banks as vice chair for the year.
Commissioner Tony Guerrero opened the meeting and nominated officers; the board affirmed the nominations in recorded roll-call responses. Guerrero also proposed that he take on the county’s mental-health liaison duties, shifting that assignment from Cliff Meer to even departmental workloads; commissioners approved the change.
The board adopted a set of routine annual resolutions governing procurement thresholds for federal funds. As County Administrator Andrew Keller later explained in the meeting, the board annually ratifies the federal micro-purchase threshold (set at $50,000) and the simplified acquisition threshold (set at $350,000) so county procurement for federal funds follows federal rules.
Commissioners also adopted a motion to keep the same meeting rules as the prior year, confirmed Cliff Meer as the county’s official voting representative to the County Commissioners Association of Ohio with Daryl Banks as alternate, and approved land-bank appointments with alternates Stacy Kroll and Daryl Banks.
Other routine approvals included the county engineer’s annual resolution authorizing use of county staff for certain road and bridge work, a standard stormwater-management resolution, the auditor’s certification of the Dec. 30 record of proceedings, and authorization for the county engineer to join professional associations at an identified cost of $7,034.60 to be paid from the auto license and gas fund.
The board also approved personnel- and finance-related routine items: payment of counsel fees for indigent criminal defendants associated with attorney Lydia Mansfield; authorization to post a wastewater plant operator position at $25.74 per hour under a memorandum of understanding with the wastewater union; and actions to address delinquent sewer accounts.
The meeting adjourned at 9:47 a.m.
The board’s actions were procedural and largely routine for an organizational meeting; no substantive policy changes beyond the assignment and routine procurement and administrative authorizations were adopted.
