Friday, March 29, 2024

David Erickson retires from Dodge County board

He’s had an ‘interesting’ career

When talking with Hayfield, Minn., resident and retiring Dodge County commissioner, David Erickson, there’s one word that will bounce through your head about every four minutes.

“Interesting.”

Everything has been “interesting” to Erickson, now 80 interesting years old. Twenty years as Dodge County commissioner? “That’s been interesting.” A lifetime of teaching? “Well, that was interesting.” Being named to the Minnesota chapter of the national wrestling hall of fame? “Yeah, that was interesting.” The bubonic plague that wiped out half of Europe? Interesting.

He didn’t actually say that about the bubonc plague. But, the Black Death WAS interesting.

For his part, Erickson himself is pretty interesting.

After becoming a Dodge County commissioner back in 1996, Erickson will officially leave the commissioner stage at year’s end, marking the finale of a tenure that has, indeed, seen some “interesting” developments over the last two decades.

“I don’t remember how, exactly, or who talked me into running for commissioner—it was a few people,” said Erickson. “There were three of us in that first election, so there was a primary, and then I won the election between the remaining two of us.”

Yes, he did. And, in the time between that election and now, he’s overseen wind and solar energy developments blossom across the county, the implementation of a revamped rural addressing system, and the transformation of the previous Mantorville high school into the new Dodge County administrative building.

All of which was, of course, interesting.

“We also saw a lot of county positions that went from elected to appointed positions,” said Erickson. “That upset some people. But, it was hard to get candidates who were local and quality candidates to run for an election. Appointments just give us a lot more flexibility, and we’ve been very fortunate in that we’ve hired and appointed great people.”

“Local” and “quality” are

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