City Clerk Walter Osborne is the second local official in a week to express interest in next year’s race for chancery clerk.

“I have been mulling the idea for about a year now,” Osborne said Tuesday. “We always want to advance and grow. I think I’m at a point in my life where I’m willing to take on a little bit more challenge. It’s perfect timing.”

Incumbent Dot McGee, 73, said last week she didn’t plan to seek a fourth term once qualifying begins Jan. 1 for next year’s county and state election cycle, for which current terms end in January 2012. Deputy Clerk Ann Tompkins also plans to retire once the current term ends. Warren County District 1 Supervisor David McDonald, 61, has confirmed interest in the post, which is among the highest-paid in local governments in Mississippi and one of nine county offices that drew no challengers in 2007.

Osborne, 51, is the longest-serving of those in the city’s eight board-appointed posts, having been named to the spot in 1999 by then-mayor Robert Walker. He had worked in the chancery clerk’s office for 16 years as an accounting systems analyst for former Chancery Clerk Oren Bailess, counting his time assisting the county’s conversion to computerized records as a plus.

“I worked with Delta (Computer Systems) to help get everything installed and up and running,” Osborne said. “I learned all the facets of county government while I was there.”

Qualifying ends March 1 for county offices, statewide offices and seats in the Legislature up for election in 2011, though a second set of elections in 2012 is possible if the 2010 Census shows any change needed in the county’s district lines.

Chancery clerks maintain all records for boards of supervisors and chancery court. Within that, statutory duties include recording board minutes, preparing the claims docket and county payroll, and recording and storing deeds, land records and documents received from chancery court. Another function is to handle collection of property taxes after the tax collector sells property at a tax sale.

State law establishes a $90,000 base salary annually for the position, though salaries vary from county to county, as it is based on fees paid to the office for services provided to people, courts and county governments. A 2008 report by the State Auditor’s Office pegged the net income for Warren County’s chancery clerk at $118,245.