Town Finance Director Michael Sullivan has been appointed as Pahrump's interim town manager.

The town found itself sans manager with the recent resignation of Dave Richards, who had been in charge here for five years.

At a special town board meeting Feb. 5, town department heads were given delegated authority over their respective projects.

At last Tuesday's meeting the board approved an employment agreement proposed by Sullivan under which he will serve as interim town manager for a period of 13 weeks and will receive incremental compensation for his added duties of $1,500 a week, retroactive to Feb. 4.

Chairman Laurayne Murray expressed concern the compensation would add up after a year and asked that some responsibility be delegated to department heads so various town projects could get under way without having to go through an added layer of bureaucracy.

"Mr. Sullivan has been doing a fabulous job of taking on a lot and doing a lot more, and I think he deserves to be compensated for that," Murray conceded. "But I think it's just the tip of the iceberg on the town manager job, and until we get someone in there, it's going to take more than one full-time person doing two full-time jobs," Murray said.

She was reminded by Board Member Don Rust that it was unlikely Sullivan would hold the position that long as it was a temporary arrangement.

"It's a compensation for a job for which he was not hired," Rust said. "So whether he delegates or doesn't delegate, and I know he's going to have to delegate because we can't expect him to do everything himself, but I don't think $1,500 a week is excessive."

Board Member Dan Sprouse pointed out that Sullivan had largely been acting in a management capacity since Richards announced his resignation.

"It seems like on the day-to-day operations, the department heads are pretty much funneling things through (Sullivan) anyway," Sprouse pointed out.