The District of Logan Lake has promoted an experienced staff member in hopes of finding stability in its top job.
In an update on Wednesday morning, the district said it has hired Wade Archambault as its chief administrative officer. Archambault had been the director of public works for the past year, having joined the community after working for the utilities department in the City of Kamloops. He’s also been a part-time trades teacher at Thompson Rivers University for 15 years, the school where he graduated from with a Bachelor Science Degree in Chemistry.
Archambault, who was hired for the CAO job out of more than 25 applicants, will start in the role on Nov. 1.
The district says Archambault’s goal is to “provide stability for staff and council, following a tumultuous year of staff changes and the (Tremont Creek) firestorm.”
“I know all the staff and I am very impressed by their dedication to the community and their level of professionalism,” Archambault says.
Last fall, Randy Lambright parted ways with the district after five years in the CAO role, for reasons unknown. He was replaced in the new year by Anne Yanciw, who departed within six months of starting; Yanciw had previously resigned from the CAO job in Ashcroft and, before that, had been fired from the CAO job in Smithers. She had worked in Smithers for more than four years after being let go as the CAO in Valemount.
After Yanciw’s departure, Randy Diehl took over on an interim basis, and helped see the community through a difficult summer of wildfires and most notably a week-long evacuation from the Tremont Creek wildfire, when the blaze entered municipal boundaries and reached within 30 feet of one home.
Diehl, a former Kamloops city manager who retired in 2012, has come out of retirement twice to fill interim CAO jobs in the past two years. He was the interim CAO for the Thompson-Nicola Regional District for six months in 2020 after long-time administrator Sukh Gill departed under a cloud of controversy in February of 2020. Diehl’s tenure ended when the TNRD hired Scott Hildebrand to take over permanently in August of 2020.
Along with hiring a new CAO, Logan Lake also announced today that it has hired Laurel Grimm as its new director of corporate affairs. The district says Grimm has been a corporate officer in Enderby until now and has more than a decade of experience in senior government positions.
Mayor Robin Smith says her council is thrilled with the new hires. “We look forward to a strong and positive relationship with Wade and Laurel as we all tackle the challenges facing the district, over the next several years.”
Meanwhile, Diehl said in a news release that he is sad to leave the district, after a “never-to-forget firestorm season,” but says he’s confident the new staff will serve the community well.
