ELKINS — The Randolph County Commission approved on Thursday the sale of a pair of handguns to outgoing Sheriff Mark Brady, who will complete his last day on the job on Dec. 31.

Brady requested to purchase a pair of service weapons that he has used over the years during his time as the sheriff and a deputy. His second term as sheriff ends with the closing of this year.

“Throughout my career in law enforcement, I’ve been fortunate to be able to obtain the service weapons I’ve always carried,” said Brady. “There’s a couple weapons here that I’ve carried before and I’d like to be able to purchase those from the county.

“The state’s statute gives the Commission the authority to do so as long as the amount is not over $1,000 for any one item.”

Commissioners agreed to sell both of the service weapons to the sheriff for the amount of $400 each.

Also at Thursday’s commission meeting:

The hiring of a new juvenile coordinator for the prosecuting attorney’s office was approved.

Commissioner Mark Scott and Commission President David Kesling voted to approve the hiring of Mindy Planakis to the open position at the request of Prosecuting Attorney Michael Parker. Commissioner Chris See was sick and unable to attend Thursday’s meeting, officials said.

“At this point we have identified a qualified candidate and have conducted background checks and everything came back fine,” said Parker. “I’m asking the commission to approve the hiring of Mindy Planakis. She has a long, extensive history of administrative assistant work that we feel will be helpful to her in this position. She interviewed very well and we think she is going to fit in very well at the office.”

Planakis will start her new job on Jan. 1 and will be working under the county’s mandatory 90-day probation period. It will be a fully benefited position with a starting salary of $27,000 per year.

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The commission also voted to begin a partnership with Granite Government Solutions for the county’s phone services.

Granite helps administer phone and internet systems, and is the lone point of contact for anything that goes wrong with any of the services.

“They buy from the telephone companies wholesale and they sell it back to the counties at a savings,” Scott said. “It allows us to have one point of contact for all the issues we have with our telephone systems.

“It’s going to save us about $580 a year, but at the same time we have better service because we have one point of contact. So, anything that we need for our phone services, we pick up the phone and call Granite and they take care of it.”