On a shelf at his office desk, Derek Roland had several mementos given to him after the Oct. 12, 2021, Macon County Board of Commissioners meeting. One of them is a football filled with signatures. Just like a football a winning coach keeps after a big victory, this one has a score on it as well.
5-0. That score was the county commissioners’ vote that night to institute the county’s first pay plan for its employees. The football was from then-Sheriff Robert Holland, signed by many of his deputies.
For a county still reeling from the COVID-19 pandemic, the passing of the pay study to curb the county’s personnel losses became a high mark in Roland’s career.
“At one point, we had a 46% vacancy rate among deputies. We were one EMS vacancy short of having to cut an ambulance shift,” Roland said. “Immediately after we enacted the pay plan and the premium pay all those went to zero, so it had proven itself.”
The football wasn’t Roland’s only gift after that meeting. Human Resources Director Tammy Keezer gave Roland a “PayDay” candy bar. A black T-shirt with “10/12/21” on top and “5-0” beneath it has also been saved. That T-shirt came from Warren Cabe, who will transition from county emergency management director to interim county manager when Roland steps aside on Nov. 1 after 11 years in charge.
Roland resigned as county manager at the Sept. 10 commissioners meeting, giving up to a 60-day notice. County employees held a reception for Roland on Oct. 8, before his last commissioners meeting that night, where he was publicly recognized.
Pre-manager career
In his early 20s, Roland started his public career as Macon County planner in March 2009 after a stint selling real estate at Unique Properties.
“It was in the recession, 08-09, so the county wasn’t hiring. And so months went by and I’d email [then-county manager] Jack [Horton] ‘Have y’all hired that position yet?’ And little did I know, Jack was on the inside lobbying for me,” Roland said.
Roland said one of his first tasks was drafting a comprehensive plan, working with Lewis Penland Jr., Lamar Sprinkle, Susan Irvin, Larry Stinger, Al Slagle, Mike Grubermann and more.
“Just a bunch of great people, Democrats and Republicans, all together working to develop this comprehensive plan,” Roland said. “We went out into the communities, and we went to each community center and presented it to them.”
Roland said there were “some knock-down drag outs” at some meetings, remembering one at Gillespie Chapel he and Penland weren’t sure if they would get out of there.
Eventually, the comprehensive plan “somewhat passed,” which helps Macon County projects to earn points for NCDOT transportation plan funding.
A year into working with the county, Roland’s brother was killed in a car wreck, and the county staff, especially in building inspections, helped him get through that time.
“And, you know, I loved those guys and they loved me and they took me in,” Roland said. “Now, they aggravated the crap out of me over there.”
In March 2012, Roland took a job as a planner with the Town of Franklin not just for more money, but to give him a different perspective and a more well-rounded look.
Manager at 28
A year and a half later, in late 2013, Jack Horton announced his retirement as county manager.
A 28-year-old with no previous managerial experience, Roland thought he had no shot at the job when it came open but presented the commissioners with what turned out to be the winning strategy.
Roland recalls telling then-board Chair Kevin Corbin, “You can get some other county manager that’s been doing it for 20 years that has his own way of doing things and going to come in here and you’re going to fight…he might agree with your way of doing things and he might not. And you’re going to have to struggle with that. Or, I said, ‘You can get a blank piece of paper that ain’t never been wrote on.’ And I said, ‘I can run it any way you want me to run it.’”
“And they took that to heart,” Roland said. “And that’s exactly what I’ve done. I’ve always ran this organization exactly how the Board of Commissioners wanted it ran.”
Roland started as Macon County manager in December 2013, a day after graduating with his master’s degree from Western Carolina in public administration.
“I mean, I’m still finishing up my house, living at home, single. I’m making $45,000 a year and going to $100,000 a year,” Roland said. “I didn’t know what to think. I was so excited that, I mean, it was just like, wow, I never thought this would happen. And it was one of the greatest times of my life.”
Roland said the first person he told about getting the Macon County manager position was his grandfather, Guy Duvall, his biggest influence.
“He was so happy because he knew how hard I tried and he knew how much it meant to me,” Roland said of his grandfather. “I never will forget the night I was appointed. One person came with me, my [half] brother. He’s now in public administration. He’s the planner for the Town of Highlands, Michael Mathis.”
Roland called becoming the Macon County manager a dream job, something for which he went to Asheville three nights a week to get his master’s degree at Western Carolina’s Biltmore Campus.
“Many times I felt like not doing another year, but kept going. And that was so I could be a county manager of Macon County,” Roland said.
Becoming Macon County manager in 2013 began a new chapter for Roland following a whirlwind four and a half years and a meteoric rise, but it wasn’t sunshine and rainbows awaiting him.
The toughest battles
Weeks after taking charge, Roland was informed of an embezzlement scandal at the Board of Elections office. That investigation brought in the SBI to investigate a missing $70,000, which eventually had to be written off.
Under Roland’s tenure, Macon County’s base budget rose from $45 million to $63 million, which has been the subject of criticism. Roland points to property values rising over 50% in his tenure, especially during the 2023 revaluation, as well as sales tax collections going from $7 million in 2014 to $16 million in 2023.
“Look at what the population’s done, look at animal control calls, look at calls to EMS, look at dispatch, the increases in that during that time,” Roland said. “We have grown with Macon County. And we have grown at a rate that is affordable for Macon County. We have never gone above and beyond that.”
Roland also noted that capital outlay appropriation to education has increased from $99,000 to $1.25 million. Despite constant appeals for money funding by school board members and school supporters, Roland believes Macon County government has always fully supported Macon County Schools.
“You go back to the replacement of the Highlands gym roof, the renovations at South Macon, the renovation of Macon Middle School, and these most recent projects, we’ve always taken steps to make sure that we had and continue to have a great education system here,” Roland said.
Roland credits the Macon County employees with being the backbone.
“And I’m telling you, not to downplay this office, but the county manager is part of the team,” Roland said. “We’re all working for the board, and we’re all working for the citizens of Macon County. And it was an honor, perhaps the greatest honor of my life to be on this team with this group of people. I can’t say enough about them.”
It’s why the 2021 pay study and premium pay ranks as Roland’s top accomplishment as county manager. Macon County worked with a company called Gallagher who brought back a pay classification structure that Roland said “looked like Mandarin Chinese” and said it would have been a nightmare to implement.
A pay study committee of current employees ended up developing the pay plan and after a year and a half of work, the Board of Commissioners unanimously passed it in October 2021. But two years later, the premium pay part of the plan would cause a stir.
Premium pay came back to the commissioners in late 2023 after the U.S. Treasury declared the COVID-19 pandemic over. That meant the premium pay that paid county employees an extra $2 an hour from April 2021 through October 2024 had to be halted, as the money came from the American Rescue Plan Act.
Roland repackaged the plan, using the federal money to offset health department expenses and using general fund money to finish the premium pay schedule and presented it to the Board of Commissioners in November. Roland called that meeting probably the lowest point of his tenure, as he was criticized for bringing the plan forward by then-board Chair Paul Higdon and asked to resign by Commissioner John Shearl.
“I knew that was going to be controversial,” Roland said. “I still do feel that it was what was best for this organization. I think that still is the best use of these funds. Those funds were intended to be put back into the economy and what better way to do that than put it into the pockets of Macon County employees whenever the labor market is the tightest it’s ever been.”
The repackaged premium pay plan passed 3-2, but Roland said that night he didn’t sleep.
“It was kind of bittersweet because I got asked to resign, but it got passed three to two,” Roland said. “But it passed.”
The day after Shearl demanded his resignation, Roland went to work in the Courthouse Annex. Each morning when he arrives, Roland takes a back staircase to walk all the way down the hall and say “good morning” to everyone before reaching his office at the end.
Roland recalls the morning after that contentious meeting: “I walk in and I turned that corner and both sides of these halls are lined with county employees clapping. I was on the phone with my wife, and I just put the phone down and it was all I could do to keep from tearing up.”
The people who help you
The people, Roland says, are what he’ll remember the most. Roland credits retired Macon County Board Attorney Chester Jones for never losing his cool and was concerned about both political parties and the perception.
Finance Director Lori Carpenter has been around for Roland’s entire tenure as county manager, telling the board she would make sure the budget would be fine when Roland was hired.
“Lori Carpenter is one of the most brilliant people I know and she’s one of the kindest people I know. There’s nothing with numbers that she cannot do,” Roland said, noting all 11 of his budgets as county manager sitting on a sofa perpendicular to his desk. “And so, my first budget…I go through and get the budget message done, got all the numbers in there. Man, I’ve run through them…I said [to Lori] ‘Will you edit this?’ She brings it back to me. She edits with a red pen, and it looks like the Book of Matthew from the New Testament. There’s way more red than there is black. I found out that not only she’s a numbers expert, she’s a grammatical expert. She is a sentence structure expert.”
Roland also praised Administrative Staff Assistant Pam Ledford, saying no one knows more about Macon County than her.
“I come in here, I’m a brand new manager, I don’t know anything. People would call about this contract and I would say, ‘Pam, do you know anything about this?’ She would go in there and get the file on it [and say] ‘What do you need to know about it? Oh, this is not filed in there. It’s filed down in the basement,’” Roland recalled. “What a tremendous resource to have somebody that has had that much experience.”
Roland also mentioned former maintenance director Steve Ledford and Mike Cote, the two sheriffs he’s served with (Robert Holland and Brent Holbrooks), former County Manager and former Town Manager Sam Greenwood, Mike Grubermann at the Town of Franklin, plus Jack Morgan, Lynn Wright, Reggie Perry, Rob Partin, Steve Pitts and many others.
Moving on
As far as his time as Macon County manager coming to an end, Roland said that idea started to come together in August. Roland is leaving for a private business opportunity he said he’s been running the numbers on for a couple of years. After talking and praying about it, Roland said he decided it would be a good move and “potentially lead to a better life.”
Looking forward, Roland said Cabe has been the best emergency management director in the state and will be a better county manager than him.
“Change is good for everyone. And this organization will be fine. This organization has great leadership right now,” Roland said, praising Cabe for being involved in every big issue he’s dealt with as a manager. “I can say with no hesitation that in my leaving this county, this county ain’t going to miss a beat.”
Now in his late 30s, Roland says he once figured now would be the age he would become county manager, but God had other plans.
“It was my number one job as the county manager to make sure this organization had the tools that it needed to do its job,” Roland said. “I want people to remember me as the one that recognized the county employees as being the greatest tool this organization had and the tool that this organization needed to invest in the most.”