Jan 24, 2019 2 min read

The only woman ever to serve as Washington County commissioner is seeking her seventh, four-year term.

Diana Irey Vaughan, 56, of Nottingham Township, this week announced her candidacy in the Republican primary May 21.

Irey Vaughan was previously chairman of the board and she has been vice chairman since 2012.

“During my nearly 24 years of leadership, county residents have enjoyed one of the lowest county tax rates in the region,” she said. “Fiscal discipline in spending has helped Washington County not only to grow in population, but also to attain an AA bond rating.”

The retirement plan for county workers, in which commissioners, along with the controller and treasurer are managers, has a funding ratio of 90 percent.

She also pointed to Washington’s second-lowest daily cost of keeping an inmate in the county jail – $46.01 – compared with a state average of $123.36, and the Furlough into Service program that she helped create in 1997, taking nonviolent offenders out of the correctional facility as they provide more than 400,000 hours worth of labor to nonprofit organizations and local governments.

At the jail, she mentors incarcerated women, most of them mothers, through a re-entry program aimed at decreasing recidivism rates.

The mother of three, Irey Vaughan is married to Col. Robert Vaughan, a deputy sheriff who plans to soon retire from the U.S. Army Reserve.

Irey Vaughan has been the lone Republican on the board of commissioners since 2000. She attended the announcement of Republican Nick Sherman in December. Jason White is also seeking a Republican nomination.

Democratic incumbents Larry Maggi and Harlan Shober also announced their re-election bids earlier this month.

A commissioner’s base salary in Washington County this year is $93,944.