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Wayne Winebriner
BY CHARLES GARRATT • STAFF WRITER
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WARM SPRINGS Wayne Winebriner has a "real desire for the job" of clerk of the Bath County circuit court.
"I like the work, I fit in well and I want to keep the office going as it is now," said Winebriner. He has worked as a deputy clerk under Darlene Carpenter for almost eight years.
"I have a real desire for the job," Winebriner said of his reason for running and why he is the best candidate for the office. In addition to his time in the clerk's office as a deputy, Winebriner has supervisory and management experience from his years working at The Homestead. In over a decade at the resort, he said he was in charge of the front desk and later the phone operators. His last post was as reservations manager, he said.
Winebriner said he has "20 years in supervision" at various jobs and levels. He said his style as a supervisor is to try to "be a good listener."
"I always try to work with people," he said, and "not be a dictator." He likes to get people's opinions and then make a collective decision. Winebriner considers himself to be a consensus builder.
Winebriner said his management experience and strength makes him standout from other candidates. "I have a business sense and have managed people and offices," he said. In addition Winebriner said he "really enjoys people, especially helping them."
The clerk's office is governed by the Supreme Court, Winebriner noted, and the local office does not have the flexibility to make changes in how things are done. He noted the office is audited every year for compliance with rules and regulations regarding court records and other filings.
The clerk and deputies are "there to serve the public in general," said Winebriner, and not any particular group of people. "We have to be fair to everyone," he said.
But the clerk's office cannot do searches for people. "We are there to help them, get them started," he said, but not to do the work for them.
The records from 2004 to the present are online (computerized), said Winebriner. This includes deeds, marriages, wills and judgments, he said. The current clerk has applied for grants to computerize more of the records and also for a special program to remove Social Security numbers for computerized records.
Winebriner said he will have to "learn to be more out spoken in meetings, both local and state," if he becomes clerk. This is the only weakness he feels would impact his tenure as clerk if chosen by the voters.
Of the current deputy clerks, Winebriner says he plans to keep the staff "without a doubt." There was never any thought, he said, of replacing any deputy clerk. "We're too good a team," he said.
Winebriner knows the name of the four judges in the 25th Judicial Circuit and most of the counties and cities that make up the circuit.
"My desire for the future is to continue the excellent service this office has given," Winebriner pledged.
About the candidate M. Wayne Winebriner, 58 BCHS 1967, AS in business, Dabney S. Lancaster Community College Eight years deputy clerk Lives south of Hot Springs 26 years tenor "Edenaires"
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