Yashenko signs off as Cascade County IT director

Cascade County information technology director Tom Yashenko retired Friday after more than 29 years with the county.

“When I started with the county in 1986, employees were still using hand calculators, typing with IBM Selectrics, using tons of paper and filling dozens of filing cabinets,” he recalled.

When Yashenko joined the county as a programer trainee, he planned on leaving after getting a little experience. But he remained and was promoted to IT director in 1992.

By 1988, Cascade County purchased its first personal computer, he said. Now county officials use about 450 PCs and 30 servers spread throughout the different buildings.

“Computers are much faster, with bigger memory capacity and all kinds of applications now,” he said. “They’re definitely a lot more advanced than when I started.”

Yashenko said he enjoyed working with county officials, including “some four different regimes of county commissioners.” He said he considered the late County Commissioner Jack Whitaker a role model for others.

“Jack really cared about Cascade County, its residents and its employees,” he said.

“It’s been an interesting and challenging career,” said Yashenko, 65, who plans to spend more time fishing out of the family’s Monarch-area cabin with his wife, Johnnie.

County employees and community friends honored Yashenko with a going-away party Friday afternoon.

County commissioners named Sean Higginbotham, the network engineer, as interim director of the computer department.