Stephanie Cawley, a senior caseworker in the Carbon County Area Agency on Aging, will assume the position of acting director of the agency.

Her appointment by the Carbon County Commissioners came on the recommendation of Paraclete & Associates, Pottsville, a consulting firm hired to study the county's human resources staff after Republican majority commissioners Dean D.W. DeLong and Thomas C. Gerhard voted to fire Albert Petrole of Tresckow as the agency's director.Petrole claimed his firing was due to "political retaliation" because he contributed $400 to the campaign of Democrats John D. Mogilski and Albert U. Koch.