Staff File Photo by John Rawlston/Chattanooga Times Free Press
Hamilton County Mayor Claude Ramsey participates in a county commission meeting at the courthouse.Hamilton County Mayor Claude Ramsey will leave office in January, but he will become more influential than ever, according to Gov.-elect Bill Haslam.
Haslam on Friday named 67-year-old Ramsey his deputy governor and chief of staff.
Haslam, now the mayor of Knoxville, said Ramsey was an obvious choice because of his experience and skills.
“At the end of the day in local government, you have to solve the problem,” Haslam said Friday during a news conference in the Hamilton County Commission room. “You have to make it work, and Claude has done that as a mayor very, very successfully.”
Ramsey has served 16 years as mayor and easily won a fifth term in the August elections.