Council unanimously appoints Hammond to replace Vogel

 

Note: This story was last updated at 8:20 p.m.

The Oak Ridge City Council on Monday unanimously agreed to appoint Derrick Hammond to fill the seat left vacant when former City Council member Hans Vogel resigned at the end of June to move for a job at Idaho National Laboratory.

The vote to appoint Hammond was 6-0. Hammond was one of seven candidates to apply for the open seat, and he was elected unanimously on the first ballot.

Hammond will serve through a special election on November 6. The person elected in November will then serve the rest of Vogel’s two-year term. Vogel was elected to a four-year term in November 2016.

Hammond has worked with city officials before, including in a series of community forums several years ago, on the new preschool at Scarboro Park, and on the federal plan to install high-voltage power lines on Pine Ridge, between Scarboro and the Y-12 National Security Complex.

The seven who applied for the City Council seat by the deadline this past Thursday were Susan Frederick, Hammond, Lynda Marcoux, Delores Moyer, Zach Panter, Timothy Stallings, and Darris Upton.

Hammond has been pastor of Oak Valley Baptist Church in Oak Ridge since 2014. He is a former church administrator at First Mount Zion Baptist Church in Dumfries, Virginia (2010-2014), and church business administrator at First Calvary Baptist Church in Durham, North Carolina (2007-2010). He has a dual master of divinity and master of business administration degree from Samford University in Birmingham, Alabama, in 2006 and a bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering from Auburn University in Auburn, Alabama, in 1999.

In Oak Ridge, Hammond is an Oak Ridge Chamber of Commerce board member, Emory Valley Center board member, United Way of Anderson County board member, and Oak Ridge Public Schools Education Foundation board member, among other activities.

Hammond took the oath of office Monday and started serving on the seven-member Council immediately.

More information will be added as it becomes available.