New County Admin. Deputy comes home

When Adina Cunningham, San Juan County’s new Deputy Director of County Administration, moved from Hawaii to Eastsound and set up a legal practice in 2007, it was a homecoming. She attended school on Orcas from 1975 until 1983.

“Now I’ve come back with my own family,” she said. Cunningham has three young children; the oldest is now in kindergarten. Her husband Jon Kobayashi is the general manager at the Outlook Inn on Orcas where her sister Sara is the manager.

She will be taking over a position County Administrator Pete Rose describes as “an eclectic mix of centralized services to all county departments.”

Her predecessor, Dave Zeretske, assumed responsibilities in the position serving as the county’s Risk Manager – handling insurance issues, negotiating settlements, and working with departments in areas where unexpected financial losses can occur. The Deputy Director of Administration also conducts real estate negotiations, administers the County’s Public Defender program and supervises administrative staff, including Information Services, Human Resources and Contract Management.

Cunningham comes to the job with a Bachelor’s in History from Lewis and Clark College and a Law Degree from the Northwestern School of Law, also at Lewis and Clark. She spent a year as a law clerk for the city of Portland and a year as a Judicial Law Clerk for the State of Hawaii Intermediate Court of Appeals, and then nearly 10 years as a Deputy Attorney General for the state of Hawaii. For three of her years in the Attorney General’s office she represented the state pension systems. She also advised the system’s Board of Trustees.

“I have been lucky. In my relatively short career as a government attorney, I have been exposed to a wide array of important issues affecting government,” she said.

County Administrator Pete Rose said, “I am impressed by her intelligence, analytical ability and strong service ethic.”

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