Lincoln County Clerk of Circuit Court Cindy Kimmons spent her last day at the courthouse Friday, retiring after 25 years with the county.
Kimmons has worked in the Clerk of Courts office almost 20 years. She was appointed as Clerk of Circuit Court in June 1996, taking over for the retiring Janet Beyer-Thums. She was first elected by Lincoln County voters in the fall 1996 election and has been re-elected in the past eight elections. She retires with three years remaining in her current term.
Along with her husband, Willie, Kimmons owns M&M Strawberry Farm and plans to spend more time working on that business. When strawberry season comes around in the summer, Kimmons is looking forward to not working around another full-time job.
“I might enjoy it more this year,” she said.
She also has goals of getting her house organized and taking some short vacations.
During her tenure as Clerk of Courts, Kimmons has seen Lincoln County transition from one judge to two.
“We had a high case load for one judge,” she said. “We were always juggling with other judges coming in to use the spare courtroom.”
She has also worked through the major remodeling of the courthouse. During the project, the county’s court system was housed in the Lincoln County Service Center building.
“The remodel was a big deal,” Kimmons said. “Our entire office was in a meeting room. We had to transport jurors to other counties for jury trials.”
As Kimmons retires, the state is moving toward a paperless court records system. The work is ongoing to convert all of Lincoln County’s paper records to eletronic form.
“The latest big transition is the scanning and electronic filing,” Kimmons said. “At some point, this office will be completely paperless.”
What Kimmons will miss most about her job is the people she works with every day. She will also miss the challenge of keeping on top of ever-changing requirements.
“I didn’t have a week here where I didn’t learn something new,” she said.
Along with Kimmons, the Clerk of Courts office also bid farewell Friday to court clerk Sue Seslar, who retired after more than 20 years in the office.
Marie Peterson, of Merrill, has been selected as Kimmons’ successor to fulfill the remainder of her term of office, ending Jan. 7, 2019.
Peterson will be sworn in, by Judge Jay Tlusty, as the appointed Lincoln County Clerk of Circuit Court at noon on Friday, Jan. 15.