The search is on for a new executive to lead Alabama’s largest water utility.

Three members of Birmingham’s regional water board will lead the process of searching for and hiring the utility’s first CEO.

That CEO will not replace the general manager, a position that is already under contract through 2030 and pays $446,000 a year.

“That is a new position not to displace any current position,” Tommy Hudson, chairman of the Central Alabama Water board, told AL.com.

Hudson this week named himself along with board members Phillip Wiedmeyer and state Rep. David Standridge to the search committee.

At the board meeting on Monday evening Hudson said the state law that recently reorganized the board also mandates that the agency hire a CEO.

The former water board in February rehired its former longtime general manager Mac Underwood to handle day-to-operations.

Underwood has a contract that pays him $446,118 a year. Underwood’s contract is valid till Dec. 31, 2030.

No timeline has yet been set to hire a CEO.

The makeup of the search committee created additional controversy among the board, which includes two Birmingham members and five others from suburban areas.

Sheila Tyson, Jefferson County Commissioner and board member from Birmingham, panned the committee as inherently unfair because it does not include anyone who represents Birmingham.

While the water works services a five-county area, 92 percent of the customers live in Jefferson County and 44 percent of them live within the Birmingham city limits.

“Why didn’t you ask if we even wanted to sit on that committee,” Tyson asked Hudson at the meeting. “I see clearly what you are doing. We’re just going to get shut out. We might as well not come to the meetings.”

Hudson said appointing committee members was his purview as chairman and that no member was notified before being named Monday evening.

Tyson noted that since the new board took over in May, contentious items have often been passed on a 5-2 vote, with the support of Republican suburban members over the objections of the two Democrats from Birmingham.

Following that pattern, the plan to hire an executive director passed despite the objections of Tyson and Jarvis Patton, the other member representing Birmingham.

The city of Birmingham has also filed a federal lawsuit against the new law that created the current board and put Birmingham in the minority.

In other business, the board elected permanent officers, with Hudson as chairman and Phillip Wiedmeyer as vice chairman. Hudson had served as interim chairman while Patton served as vice chairman.

The new leadership was approved on a 4-2 vote with Patton and Tyson voting no. Shelby County member Jeffrey Brumlow, who initially nominated Hudson for leadership, was absent.