The County Szchism Over Szczypka

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When Mason County's first County Administrator, Fabian Knizacky, decided it was time to retire a couple of years ago after 31 years at the post, it was much like when George Washington declared he would not seek a third term as president.  Who can easily replace a legend with an untainted record of excellence.  That duty fell to our county commissioners and when the white smoke issued forth from the conclave, Kaitlyn Szczypka emerged as the replacement.  

Szczypka (pictured above with Commissioners Steven Hull and Lewis Squires) was perhaps more fortunate than John Adams in that Knizacky agreed to remain at his position for over a year in order to introduce and assist the new hire with the duties of the job, before he finally retired at the end of January 2025.  As typical of the prior three decades, the county appears to have been administered fairly and professionally during the transitional period when both were present.

County commissioners freely admit that Knizacky was doing the work of about three competent administrators, so it may have come to no surprise that Szczypka would have trouble keeping up with the workload after he left in his supporting/mentor role.  This realization would come before the county commission at their regular April meeting on the 15th, with a couple requests from Administrator Szczypka that appeared to be admissions that she was having trouble keeping up with her county duties.  

The first item was not too controversial among commissioners, and a nod once again to the importance of the former county administrator.  Knizacky would come out of full retirement and be contracted by the county to serve ten hours a week at $100 an hour in order to provide support with the financial aspects of the administrative job.  Commissioner Nick Krieger said this was a very good value (at $52,000/year) given Knizacky's track record, and the rest of the commission agreed.  Some of the public were not convinced, however, with new Hamlin Clerk Sheila Genter leading the charge in questioning the expense.

The other issue was more controversial and led to some passionately voiced concerns from commissioners, the public, and the county clerk, Cheryl Kelly.  That item was first explored by three commissioners at the county's Finance Committee meeting one week before on April 8th.  Kelly, who attended that meeting too, said she was blindsided by the quick insertion of a solution to a problem that would negatively affect her department.  

That solution, or rather the resolution, is found buried on p. 271 in the April 15 agenda packet, where it describes how two employees from the clerk's office will be claimed by the administration office, and the clerk will be able to seek out a new full-time hire to compensate for the loss.

At face value this is not even close to a fair trade.  It's like the Detroit Tigers front office giving up a starting pitcher and a seasoned catcher to a division rival for a minor league player to be named later-- then telling your manager that it's a move to make the team better.   

According to Clerk Kelly, this imposition was never discussed with her in any kind of detail at the committee level and the resolution came as a surprise to her and her deputy clerks.  County Chairman Janet Andersen (also leading the Finance Committee) emerged as the main proponent of the resolution, while Commissioners Les Johnson and Krieger suggested discussions over this move were conducted in secret from the rest of the commission and the full commission should revisit the issue at their next work session coming up.  

Szczypka would pedantically dismiss such a consideration:  "There is an increased work load [in my office] and I need help."  She would add that time was of the essence.  “I would ask the board to consider this today. As I have argued, I do need that support... now.”

With those pleas of the urgency in the matter, the commission had a tough choice to make.  If they voted to defer until they could discuss it at their work session, they risked alienating their new hire to perhaps the point where she may just throw up her hands and quit.  On the other hand, they could vote to do it now and irritate their duly elected clerk and make it much more difficult for her to operate her office effectively.  In the end, the motion to suspend the decision was taken off of the table and the commission voted to appease Szczypka and oppose Kelly; only Krieger would vote against it.  

Wayne Kelly, Summit Township Supervisor and husband of the clerk, would caution the new administrator in the final comment session:  “Kaitlyn, let me give you a point of advice, you can take it or leave it. This is not starting out very well as being a team player. You have dictated the situation and everyone in the audience can see that."  Commissioner Krieger would punctuate that comment by saying "Several people lied to me too, Wayne."

And while I had sat quietly for the better part of four hours listening to the general business and then the general tumult over the last agenda item, I made the decision to comment on the issue at hand, as it seemed that the major underlying issue among all of the statements were that there were too many secrets kept, not enough transparency, and ineffective communication-- and at the nucleus of it all was County Administrator Kaitlyn Szczypka.  

For in my hand, I had several dozens of pages from a late 2022 initiative that took place in the Village of Elk Rapids, namely a payroll overpayment investigation report (available online here).  Before she was hired as our county administrator, Szczypka served as the village clerk for Elk Rapids when a minor crisis emerged that led to all village employees getting paid twice in October 2021 during one payroll cycle.  Some of the personnel caught the error and brought it to the attention of the village clerk, treasurer, and superintendent so that they all knew of the double-payment by the end of the next month, several email communications show that.  

The problem was that they didn't try to immediately correct the problem.  State law allows a political entity to recoup losses of taxpayer money through such errors if they timely do it within 6 months; they failed to report this error to the village council or to the people until eight months had elapsed.  By the next October, the village would recover approximately 50% of the overpayments voluntarily relinquished, and to her credit, Szczpka would be among those who repaid her overage.  

Her problem was that due to lack of communications with the council and the public, her lack of transparency and her inability to recognize the misuse of tax money from the start, made it so that the investigation saw her as one who had the opportunity to resolve the issue.  The village president, Bryan Gruesbeck, whose wife was the first to notice the overpayment (due to a bank error), resigned shortly after this investigation was finished.  Szczypka was publicly reprimanded.

In my comment, I pointed out that a relatively small error by a relatively small bank in Elk Rapids led to a gigantic crisis in Antrim County when the officials involved could not be transparent and communicate amongst themselves.  I expressed hope that the only person involved with that investigation at this commissioner meeting in Mason County would have learned a lesson from it, but that all I saw and heard over the course of the night was concerning evidence that they didn't learn anything. 

EPILOG:  A special county commissioner meeting was held on Thursday, April 24, 2025.  The sole item on the agenda was to approve a resolution making the county administrator a signatory on County bank reports.   Chairman Andersen would say it was suggested by the county's attorney to have this passed ASAP due to the shakeup of the personnel that happened.  One of the clerk department transfers received a $5 raise for the move, and this wasn't related to the public, nor apparently to the commissioners outside of the finance committee.  Commissioner Squires would caution Szczypka to ever again demand that the commissioners need to vote immediately on a non-emergency issue and reminded her that she is employed by the commission and that other elected officials deserve more respect from her office.