Sen. Don Benton, R-Vancouver, will lose his county job as part of a reorganization of the Department of Environmental Services, Acting County Manager Mark McCauley said this afternoon. Benton heads that department.

As of July 1, the department will be dissolved and its functions absorbed into other departments, McCauley said. Benton and three other employees who were laid off as part of the reorganization will be on paid administrative leave through June 30.

“We have budget pressures,” McCauley said. “My goal is to make the county as efficient as it can be. I think this reorganization will.”

This is the third time the county has reorganized a department since the home rule charter was approved in 2014. The charter grants McCauley full authority to reorganize departments, which he’s done twice before, he said.

McCauley said the decision is “strictly to do with overhead.”