The WhidbeyHealth commissioners chose candidates to interview for one of the vacant positions on the board for the public hospital district.

The board met Friday morning to narrow down the choices to four people who will be interviewed during a meeting set for Monday. The board received a total of six nominees for the seat.

They chose Henry Veldman, a Freeland resident and retired health care insurance administrator; Katherine Nelson, a Coupeville attorney; Roxanne Kroon Shepherd, a Coupeville resident with experience in nonprofit administration; and Kristina Hines, the director of the Economic Development Council of Island County.

On Monday, the board will hold another special meeting to interview the four candidates and choose a candidate to appoint to position 2.

The five-person board has two vacancies following the resignations of James Golder and James Canby. The two men resigned from the board last month following a dramatic meeting at which they, along with board member Dr. Mark Borden, voted to fire CEO Nathan Staggs with little explanation.

The majority of board members changed their decision after dozens of members of the medical staff came to the ongoing meeting in support of Staggs and harshly criticized the three board members.

Hospital Commissioner Marion Jouas was briefly stripped of her position and replaced by Golder before three board members backtracked from that too. She and Dr. Kirk Gasper, a newly elected member of the board, voted and argued against the effort to terminate Staggs during that meeting.

After the appointment is made on Monday, the process will start over again to fill the other position. The board will ask for nominations, with the newly appointed hospital commissioner participating in the vote.

Under state law, a person who is appointed shall serve until someone is elected in the next election, at which a member of the governing body normally would be elected. For the hospital commissioners, that would be the 2027 election.