Around 7 p.m. Monday night, Geraldine Robinson was getting welcomes and congratulations on just being hired as Durham County's new social-serivces director.

By 9 p.m., she might well have been wondering why she took the job.

County commissioners had just d the internal auditor on her department-to-be, after social-services brass went through more than an hour of grilling and complaint over cutting the money out from under a family-service program.

"As you can see," commissioner Becky Heron told Robinson afterward, "Durham is never dull."

Geraldine Thompson Robinson of Nashville, Tenn, is the new director of Durham County Social Services. She was hired Monday night to succeed the retired Sammy Haithcock.

A native of Robeson County, Robinson has 27 years' experience in social services and is the former director for the Nashville metro area.

She resigned earlier this year after the Nashville social-services board offered her only a one-year contract renewal. She wanted a three-year contract, but some Nashville and social serivces officials criticized her handling of employee morale and an agency audit.

She had been Nashville's director since October 2004. 

Robinson is a graduate of UNC-Greensboro and has a masters degree in social work from the University of Maryland at Baltimore.

Robinson starts her job in Durham Sept. 14 at a salary of $129,000.